Interstellar Space Travel - Humanity's Opportunity to Get Real

Space travel!

Astronauts, men on the moon, space stations, spacecraft that have visited all the planets - even asteroids and comets. One spacecraft has even left our solar system. It’s as if science fiction has become science fact. It almost seems that we can do anything in space if we put our minds to it. It seems so easy—I think too easy—to go from appreciating these achievements to dreams of sending explorers to the other planets and beyond.

Artist: WeeYak. More cool images at weeyak.deviantart.com. 

Interstellar space travel!

Not a new term. With hundreds of great sci-fi movies under our belt, we use this phrase as if it’s already a foregone conclusion, even just around the corner. Scientists, engineers and entrepreneurs are now loudly, even boastfully encouraging this perspective.

As for the first big step  - a manned mission to Mars - none of the problems that challenge this project have been solved.

Outer space is deadly. Beyond the protective shielding of Earth’s atmosphere and electromagnetic field, which protect us from solar radiation and cosmic radiation, astronauts will need a way to protect themselves during the flight. Current spacecraft shielding doesn't give enough protection to prevent permanent cell damage.

Human beings evolved to survive and thrive only in the kind gravity, atmospheric pressure, and temperature range found on Earth’s surface. Space suits can compensate for temperature and pressure extremes. But time spent in zero gravity during the months of the journey or working in the low gravity on Mars will have progressively detrimental effects on every part of the body—bones, muscles, lungs, heart and brain. Without a solution, astronauts will be crippled upon return to Earth, if indeed they could handle the trip back.

It’s one thing to spend a couple months aboard the ISS, with the huge sight of planet Earth outside the window. But a flight to Mars would be quite different, where views of Earth would shrink to a pinpoint. There are the unique, untested social and psychological issues related to spending years in space in the cramped cabins of the spacecraft and Mars living quarters.

And did I mention air, water, and food? Solutions for these problems of extended time away from Earth are easier to address, and scientists are working on them.

People in the space industry talk glibly about interstellar space travel being “the destiny of the human race,” as if going to Mars is only the first step. But there are problems that almost never get mentioned.

The Distance Problem – When you look up at the night sky you can see Mars, a pinpoint of light among the stars. It would be natural to think, "If we can go to Mars, we can go to the stars." But that's because you haven't done the math.

Alpha Proxima, the star closest to our solar system, is about 25 trillion miles away. This distance is so vast that the human mind can't understand it. Scientists created the concept of light-years (the distance light travels in a year) to make it easier to comprehend incomprehensible distances.

Speed of Light = 186,000 miles per second
= 670,000,000 miles per hour
= 5,900,000,000 miles per year
1 light-year = 5.9 trillion miles

Current propulsion systems achieve about 50,000 mph - pretty speedy by Earth standards. But at that velocity, it would take more than 50,000 years to arrive at the nearest star. So travel to stars will require much faster spacecraft. But even if a spacecraft could be built to travel 10 million mph, which is about 1.5% the speed of light, the travel times are still absurdly long.

At 10 million mph it would take 67 years, or about 3 generations of human beings to go just 1 light year. A journey to Alpha Proxima, is 4 light-years away – 268 years (12 generations of human beings) traveling at 10 million mph.

A news report about a newly-found exoplanet in a star's habitable zone described it as “only 100 light years away.” Yes, the farthest reaches of our Milky Way galaxy are 1,000 times that distant, so compared to the size of our galaxy, 100 light years is relatively close. But traveling at 10 million mph, it would take 6,700 years (300 generations) to travel "only 100 light-years."

The Impact Energy Problem – Space is far from empty. Asteroids, rocks, ice fragments, dust, gas—there’s lots of stuff in the so-called “void.” And no one knows where all this stuff is. Running into even the tiniest objects while traveling at enormous speeds can create awesome effects at impact.

The faster a spacecraft goes, the higher the probability that it will run into something. And the greater the speed, the greater the kinetic energy that will be produced at impact. Traveling at 10 million mph, even the impact of a single microscopic grain of space dust could destroy a space ship. Unimaginable shielding—something as dense and bulky as a sizeable asteroid—would be needed.

When scientists talk excitedly about exotic propulsion system concepts, they never mention the problem of impacts at very high speeds.

The Propulsion Energy Problem – How much energy would it take to propel a vehicle with that kind of shielding at 10 million mph? Answer: It would take a major portion of all the energy produced everywhere on Earth in one year.

Imagination is a wonderful thing. So is our potential for achievement. But these challenges are more than daunting. When you do the math and consider the realities of the cosmos, interstellar space travel seems pointless and impractical. No, impossible. The problems are insurmountable. It's never going to happen. In the best-case scenario, our glorious species won't even try.

So the biggest challenge isn't shielding or speed. Considering how our minds have been conditioned by science fantasy, our biggest challenge is to get real. The ultimate drama isn't whether human beings will "reach the stars." It's whether we're intelligent and wise enough as a species to get down-to-earth and face facts and focus our ability to stop killing each other and figure out how to preserve Earth's limited resources.

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2014. Building Personal Strength .

Wake-Up Call - Time for Action

A test. One of the following two statements is correct. Choose A or B....

It's morning. You grab a cup of coffee, walk out the front door and gaze upon your familiar world, and...

A. Not much has changed.

B. Practically everything has changed.

Which did you choose? The correct answer is B. It isn't easy to create a life for yourself. You look upon your world and you need to believe that there's some constancy, some stability, some predictability to it. But all that is an illusion. Everything in the world is in a condition of flux. If you aren't surprised by what's going on around you, you aren't paying attention.

Every person is on a journey that is unknown to you. Countless changing variables propel these unknown journeys. Even random thoughts and small decisions have unpredictable consequences. The lives of all your friends and family are changing.

Millions of conversations are taking place. Millions of ideas are forming. Millions of people are taking action, often on the spur of the moment, often after careful planning. All these actions will have consequences.

Are you hoping to finish your project and have an impact? Is your work based on assumptions you made some time ago? Do you think the world out there is like a theater where a sizable audience sits quietly and waits patiently and politely for you to come on stage?

This day, as you stand on your doorstep, acknowledge the truth. Wake up! Almost nothing out there is the same as it was yesterday. Unimaginable changes and their consequences are cascading forward in time as you take another sip of your coffee.

You don't have any time to waste. Whatever is important to you, you need to be doing it. Most of what you do every day is of little consequence. Do what's important instead. Get into a flow, Bring the best of who you are to the work that defines you and gives you purpose. If you want to make a difference, then get on with it.

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2011. Building Personal Strength . (Permission to use image purchased from fotolia.com)

A Handful of Fossil Shells and Vast Reaches of Time

One of my favorite memories of the Fossil Rim Wildlife Center near Glen Rose, Texas, was the parking lot outside of the restricted area. While we were waiting for everyone to return to the shuttle vehicle, the guide reached down and grabbed a handful of what looked like gravel. He put it in my hand. "Fossils," he said.

2011 photo by Kathleen Scott

I looked at the material more closely, and sure enough, they weren't tiny pebbles. They were tiny shells. "Wow," I said. "How old are they?"

"Thirty million years old," he said. "All this land used to be under water. Millions of years ago, tectonic subduction pushed this land upward to where it is now."

Thirty million years is more time than the human mind can comprehend. Even though that much time is less than 1% of the age of the Earth.

How about 2 million years? Can you comprehend that? That's about how long humanoid species have existed.

Or 75,000 years? Which is 25 times as long ago as when Christ lived. That's how long modern human have been around.

Or 7,500 years? When written language was invented.

Or 1,000 years? That time-frame isn't so hard. That's how long we've had printed books.

Here's one for the kids - 60 years since the first digital computer and digital text files.

I love looking at these shells and contemplating the awesome reach of time since they were live creatures. That really happened. The Earth really is 4.5 billion years old, and it has an amazing history. We live on this planet. It's the only home we'll ever have. I think it's important to learn all we can about it, so we can appreciate it when we decide to pay attention to it.

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2011. Building Personal Strength .

Time Management - A Matter of Life And Death

The other day when I looked at my calendar I noticed I had a haircut appointment the next day. That gave me a cold chill. Seriously, it seemed to me that I had been sitting in the chair chatting with Blaine only a few days ago. But in fact it has been four weeks.

Time seems to fly by much too quickly these days. I've got to figure out a way to slow it down.

In 2004 I reconnected with a friend from high school - after 41 years! But it seems like only yesterday that I exchanged that email with my old friend. In fact, it has been seven years.

It seems that time moved more slowly 40 years ago. Back in 1963, after all of us graduated and went our separate ways, a lot happened in the next seven years. I spent four years at West Point (I could write a novel about that experience, maybe more than one). After that, the Officer's Basic Course at Fort Bliss, then Army Ranger School. From there I went to Germany, where I was given command of a HAWK missile battery (I could write a novel about that, too). Then I served a year as an infantry adviser in Vietnam (I suppose there's a novel there, too). I returned for my Officer's Advanced Course and moved on to Duke University to start working on my Ph.D. in English. All this happened in seven years. It was like living four lifetimes.

Today, seven years seems to have passed in the blink of an eye. I am still staying in touch and "catching up" with my old friend. After the 2004 hurricanes, my wife and I moved to the Texas Hill Country. At work, it has taken seven years, but my company has successfully completed bringing to market our new online professional development service, ProStar Coach.

In fact, time doesn't speed up or move more slowly. It just seems that way.

But I don't have many more seven-year periods left in me. I want the next seven years and the rest of my time to be packed with memorable experiences. Do my work with more focus and intensity. Do the things that matter most. Attack writing projects I've been putting off. Play as hard as I work. Fill each day with satisfying experiences, followed by moments of appreciation.

Time is precious. We only get so much, and we never know how much that's going to be.

No more of this "blink of an eye" stuff.

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2011. Building Personal Strength .

Pay Attention! - A Long Life Isn't Measured In Years

I’ve seen some wonderful sunsets in my life, but my wife Kathleen taught me how to experience them.

Fifteen years ago we lived in Miami Beach. Our condo had a backdoor patio. Beyond the patio was a narrow strip of grass, and beyond that was a dock where we had a west-looking view of the Biscayne Bay that extended about a mile. The play of light on this expanse of water created some dramatic sunsets. Most evenings we would pour a glass of wine, sit next to each other on the patio and wait for the show.

1996 photo by Kathleen Scott, used with permission.

Sunsets affected her emotionally. Once the colors began to illuminate, Kathleen didn’t want to talk. This time was sacred. Her face angled slightly to receive the light, and she took slow, deep breaths, as if she were breathing in the light. After a while, tears would form so suddenly that they seemed to squirt from her eyes. She would sigh audibly.

Later, she might point to a part of the sunset she found particularly beautiful. “See the gold outline of the edge of that cloud? See how it brightens the purple underside? Isn’t that wonderful?”

Yes, it was. But I hadn’t noticed it until she pointed it out to me.

I had a lot to learn.

We would watch every stage of the sunset until the sun was gone and the high clouds overhead turned black. The event usually lasted about thirty or forty minutes, but it seemed like hours.

Not long ago a friend of mine returned from a cruise to Alaska. She talked ecstatically about seeing massive glaciers and a flock of three dozen eagles. One of the eagles flew within twenty feet of her. “The first day seemed like three days,” she said.

I think minutes that seem like hours and hours that seem like days are fairly universal human experiences. Kathleen likes to say that “time is elastic.” An hour isn’t an hour, after all.

Whether a span of time seems like a brief moment or an extended experienced depends on how you pay attention to what happens. During the past 20 years I've read extensively about the human brain, and along the way I learned some interesting facts. One is that our brain lets us focus attention on only one thing at a time. We may focus on what’s happening around us, such as a visual image or a sound. Or we can turn our attention to a memory, a logical thought process, or something imagined. So if I choose to analyze the pros and cons of something that happened earlier, my mind will focus on these thoughts instead of what’s happening around me. My consciousness may shift in and out of the present moment, but while I’m lost in thought, I’ll have remembered only a few brief fragments of what was happening. As a result, that period will seem a lot briefer than it actually was.

On the other hand, if you can block out all thoughts except sensing what’s happening in front of you, you can integrate each and every second of the experience into long-term memory. The result will be a very dense collection of second-by-second memories. Packed with so much rich detail, a few minutes of remembered experience will seem to have lasted a much longer time.

What I’ve learned from Kathleen’s sunsets is that an event can feel like a spiritual experience, so that a lifetime of such events might seem like a thousand years. Or the same event can be perceived as a brief, petty annoyance. It all depends on how I pay attention to it.

I realize now that I’ve lived a lot of my life in a state of distraction. At times this may have been necessary, but I know I missed a lot. I’m not sure how much life I have left, but if I don’t fully experience the important things that are going on around me, in the end my memories won’t add up to much. It could be the worst kind of mistake — the equivalent of wasting the rest of my life. The “life story” I’d be left with at the end would seem all too brief.

And there would be no way to undo the mistake.

A Fortune Cookie...

Slow down, and you’ll notice what you’ve been missing.

More Fortune Cookies...

The story behind the Fortune Cookies...

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2011. Building Personal Strength .

My Weird Notions about Time

A lot of people follow my blog; but beyond my bio, most people know little about me. On the one hand, I'm just a regular guy who has served his country, works hard trying to make a contribution, loves his family and friends, and is an avid sports fan.

On the other hand, in some ways I'm eccentric. For example, my relation to time...

First off, I'm a little weird about clocks and watches. I don't wear one. For two reasons. First, I think of mechanical time as a petty, confining concept. An hour can seem like a minute, or an hour can seem like a month. So I don't need some device strapped to my arm telling me about the hours and minutes. And I don't want my train of thought interrupted every hour and half-hour by some big, noisy antique clock.

Also, the whole world is geared to mechanical time, so time is displayed all around me everywhere I go. It shows perpetually on my computer screen, where I spend most of my day. When I watch TV I can see the time with a click of the remote. It's on the alarm clock in the bedroom and it's on the oven in the kitchen. When I leave the house, it's LED-displayed in my car, on signs in front of banks and on the walls inside of every building. I can even see time displayed while swimming laps in the YMCA pool. With reminders of time everywhere I go, wearing time on my wrist seems extreme to me. I know, I know - my attitude is a little outside the box.

The one exception, I wear a cheap sports watch whenever I travel. I want to make sure I'm always at the gate when my flight is boarding.

The second bit of time-weirdness: I'm fascinated with spans of time the human mind has a hard time comprehending. One is what my sister-in-law calls "geological time." She likes to say things like, "This river valley took a million years to form." A million years? Who can imagine a million years? People have a hard time imagining a century. A million years is 10,000 centuries. A million years ago, our ancestors were learning to climb down from trees and stand upright.

My weirdness is that I try. Besides, a million years isn't that long in geological time. At the bottom of the Grand Canyon are layers of rock that are 500 million years old. And that gets me into cosmic scales of time. Our star was formed a little over 4.5 billion years ago, and our moon was formed when a small planet collided with a hot, molten Earth a little over 4 billion years ago. And all this fits in context with the approximate age of our universe: 13.7 billion years. I want to appreciate these time scales because it's the real, true perspective of the planet where I live. My Earth home has a fascinating history. If I close my mind to it, I don't appreciate things as they are. So I'm interested. I think and rethink this time perspective until I grasp it. If you say that's weird, fine. You won't get an argument from me.

Third, I see my own life-time as the tiniest blink in time. My brief time as a person is running out so fast I can feel it rushing by me like the wind. I'll be old, dying and then dead before I know it. This gives me a sense of urgency to learn what I want to learn and do what I want to do as quickly as I can. I think this valuing of time is appropriate. Wasting time doesn't make sense to me anymore.

I wasn't always this way. When I was younger, I used to suffer fools a lot more easily and horse around with meaningless B.S., just like everyone else. But now, things like small talk make me nervous. Introduce yourself to me, and in five minutes I'll be asking you what disturbed you in your early teenage years. A lot of people find that weird, but it's my way.

Well, that's enough about me, at least for now. If you're still reading, that qualifies you as a kind, tolerant person, so chances are you don't have a problem with my weirdness. If so, I appreciate it.

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2010. Building Personal Strength . (Permission to use graphic purchased from istockphoto.com)

Structure Will Set You Free - Some Resources to Help You Focus

Most people think a disciplined approach to life is the opposite of a creative approach to life.

Actually, that's not true. Nearly all highly productive creative people have ingrained patterns of focus and discipline. Without work structure, where they focus on priority projects in a disciplined way - instead of doing something else that's easier and more fun - they wouldn't get their creative projects done. The most successful creative talents have well-established patterns of structure that get them focused during specific times of the day.

I used to kid some of my spontaneous, fun-loving creative friends by saying, "Structure will set you free." They would laugh as if I didn't know what I was talking about. There goes Denny being Denny. But I wasn't kidding.

Structure means focus, which means limits and boundaries. Because creativity has unlimited possibilities, it's capable of expanding in every direction, like a gas. But once a gas expands, it looses its identity, power and usefulness. Contain it, and the gas can be directed to accomplish something specific.

Beth Westmark, a long-time blog buddy who has enormous literary talent, posted recently about seeing the light about focus. It's an inspiring revelation.

To achieve what you want, time is the most precious resource you have. And it's running out, baby. Here are a couple other resources that may help... 

1. A secret I learned from Eben Pagan about getting focused...

2. The best book I've ever read on staying focused...

Make 2011 the year you kicked major butt.

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2010. Building Personal Strength . (Permission to use photo purchased from istockphoto.com)

Effective Meetings - A Summary of the Best Guidelines

A good deal of the time, you don't need to communicate with people in person. You don't need to bring them together to share information effectively. You have phone, fax, email, instant messaging, teleconferences, forums, and more. Take your pick.

But there are times when to achieve the desired result, you need real-time interaction. Sometimes you want people to ask questions and have everyone present benefit from or react to the answers. Several topics can be handled during one session. Nonverbal communication can be taken into account. Problems can be solved. Decisions can be made. A lot of time can be saved. A leader can verify that everyone clearly understands and that “everyone is on the same page.”

But meetings have high opportunity costs. When people are in meetings, they aren't doing something else. They aren't doing what they're paid to do. Meetings are almost universally disliked because all too often they're considered an amazing waste of time. And they often are. This is because most meetings are held for the wrong reasons and not conducted in a rational, time-efficient way.

What should meeting leaders and participants do to make meetings worthwhile? I've read about a dozen books on this topic, and I've consolidated the best guidelines here:

1. Hold meetings only when necessary. The mistake is to consider a face-to-face meeting as the default way of distributing information. People often forget that because meetings consume so much time, they are extremely costly to the individual participants and to the organization. For this reason, a smart leader considers a meeting to be the “last resort” method, to be used when no other way of communicating will get the job done as well.

2. Schedule meetings in advance to avoid disrupting people’s schedules. Too many meetings are called at the last minute. People aren’t given a chance to prepare, and whatever they had planned for that time period will have to be rescheduled. A boss has the authority to call a meeting, but an unscheduled meeting can be counterproductive and demoralizing.

3. Prepare thoroughly for meetings. A meeting should have a precise agenda. All the resources needed to communicate effectively should be made available: room, hand-outs, presentation media, attendance by outside experts, refreshments, etc.

4. Before a meeting, circulate an agenda. Invite only the people who need to be there. Participants should be given the agenda in advance, with enough time to schedule the meeting; and they should be told how to prepare themselves to participate effectively.

5. Make an effort to attend meetings when you're asked to do so. Assume that your attendance has been requested for a reason. This means that your absence could jeopardize the success of the meeting, which would waste the time of those who did attend.

6. Arrive at team meetings on time. A late arrival is always disruptive. You will miss some of what was communicated. And your tardiness will send the wrong message.

7. Arrive at team meetings prepared to contribute. Study the agenda. What role or contribution will be expected of you? If you’re not sure, find out. Do you need to do anything special in advance to be ready to make the contribution? What should you bring to the meeting?

8. If you’re leading a meeting, start on time whether everyone is there or not. This is a courtesy to those who showed up on time. Unexpected discussions can happen, and meetings can take longer than expected. A meeting that runs late will disrupt the plans of the attendees. It’s very difficult to end on time if you don’t start on time.

9. Help others understand the issues being discussed. Not everyone has the same background and not everyone communicates the same way. If you have knowledge or information that can help others understand what is being said, sharing that will help the meeting move forward successfully.

10. Stay focused on agenda topics. When people talk, it’s easy for them to digress. Pursuing off-topic or off-point discussions is normal and natural, but time wasn’t budgeted them. To achieve the goal of the meeting and to end on time, participants may have to remind each other to return to the topic on the agenda.

11. Encourage people to contribute their opinions, feelings and ideas. Not everyone is outgoing. Some people prefer to do a lot of thinking before they say anything. They may even feel that their input isn’t necessary or valued. For best results, these people should be invited to contribute. Often, this is all it takes to get them involved, and their perspectives can make a difference.

12. Use tact to deal with disruptive behavior. When certain participants are late, interrupt, dominate discussion, take care of other business or otherwise make group interaction difficult, you can point out the problem behavior and state what is needed. Even though disruptions are irritating, it’s best to take the high road—with respect and courtesy. Corrections will always be more effective if done without aggression or emotion.

13. Help the team evaluate alternatives before making decisions. When a group is involved in a decision, they should consider their options. That means laying out advantages and disadvantages, risks and rewards, costs and benefits, etc. These considerations typically exist in the minds of many, not just one person.

14. Contribute to team consensus decisions. When a decision is proposed, the group needs to know where you stand. Do you agree? Are you opposed? Or do you disagree but are willing to support the decision?

15. At the end, summarize what has been accomplished. This taking appropriate notes during the meeting, as agenda items are resolved. Reporting this summary will help people remember what took place.

16. At the end, assign action responsibilities. Often, the follow-through from a meeting will require certain people taking action. This should not be left to chance. Explicitly review who should do what. This fixes responsibility and increases the chances that something will get done.

17. End meetings on time. If possible, do whatever you can to end a meeting at the scheduled end-time. People make plans. They probably have something scheduled immediately afterward. So there may be unwanted consequences if this doesn’t happen, including the possibility that people will be reluctant to attend your meetings in the future.

18. Afterward, follow through to ensure actions are accomplished. Check on the people who have been assigned action responsibilities. Find out if they need help carrying out these actions. Otherwise, important results may “fall through the crack.”

19. Afterward, accomplish a share of the follow-up actions. If you’re expected to do something, take this responsibility seriously. Doing your part will contribute to team results and team cohesion.

It's a lot of guidelines, I know. But use them as a checklist. And don't forget - the most important guideline is the first one!

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2010. Building Personal Strength . (Permission to use photo purchased from istockphoto.com)

The Mystery of Relationships - Old Friends, New Friends

My West Point class regularly publishes a magazine that keeps me up-to-date on the activities of my classmates with reports of family, cruises, fishing trips, reunions and ceremonies. We're now in our mid-sixties, and I haven't seen most of these guys in over 40 years. Changed by the years, their faces are almost unrecognizable.

As I read the latest issue, I remembered a funny story that made it's way around the planet and found it's way to my email inbox:

My name is Alice, and I was sitting in the waiting room for my first appointment with a new dentist. I noticed his DDS diploma, which bore his full name.

Suddenly, I remembered a tall, handsome, dark-haired boy with the same name who had been in my high school class some 40-odd years ago. Could this dentist be the same guy that I had a secret crush on way back then?

Upon seeing the dentist, I quickly discarded any such thought. This balding, gray-haired man with the deeply lined face was way too old to have been my classmate. But after he examined my teeth, I asked him if he had attended Morgan Park High School.

“Yes. Yes, I did. I'm a mustang,” he gleamed with pride.

“'When did you graduate?” I asked.

“In 1975. Why do you ask?”

“You were in my class!” I exclaimed.

He looked at me closely. Then that ugly, old, bald, wrinkled, fat-ass, gray-haired, decrepit son-of-a-bitch asked, “'What did you teach?”

Thanks to the Internet, I've been reunited with old friends I haven't seen in decades. I always initiate these contacts with excitement, eager to rekindle the old relationship and pick up again where we left off.

It never works out that way. Yes, familiar reminders of the old friend are there. But a lot can happen in all those years, and a lot has happened. People change. I know I've changed quite a bit in that time. I'm still me, I still have all the memories, but I'm not the same guy I once was.

I realize now that while we were once good friends, the truth is that with all the water under the bridge, we're now mostly unknown to each other. We're now acquaintances. "Rekindling the friendship" is harder than I once thought.

First, I'll have to get to know the person all over again. If I do this right, I'll get to know a more complex person in a more complex way.

Second, I'll have to maintain contact. Otherwise, who they are will be lost to me again. In other words, I need to make the same commitment and investment I do with all my friendships.

And that's what I'll have to do if I want my acquaintance relationship to grow into a friendship again. It's a choice I didn't expect to have to make. And in several cases, I've decided to maintain the relationship as an acquaintance. The person I chose for friendship all those years ago isn't someone I want to work on getting to know that well today.

Strangers, acquaintances, friends, best friends and partners. We decide how much intimacy we want, whether we're conscious of the choice or not. And then we act accordingly.

For the people we really care about, we make the effort to spend time together and stay in touch.

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2010. Building Personal Strength . (Permission to use photo purchased from istockphoto.com)

Sobering Thoughts about Time Travel and Life Decisions

I have a Ph.D. in English from Duke University. Studying there some 35 years ago was a peak experience. The learning was intense, and it changed my life. Today, I use the research, reasoning, writing and editing skills I refined there to great advantage in my work. Also, thanks to that education, I have an acutely sensitive appreciation for the arts and literature, which greatly adds to my enjoyment of life.

Still, I sometimes wonder what my life would have been like had I chosen to study psychology instead of English. In my late 20s, I was equally fascinated with both areas. I sometimes wonder if a psychology degree would have served my current work at least as well, if not better.

I have no regrets, however. I don't indulge in time-machine fantasies such as, "If only I could go back in time and change what I did in graduate school..."

I've been watching the History Channel "The Universe" series on DVD, and of course they have a segment on time travel. I trust they decided to deal with this topic because of the public's fascination for it. The segment addresses the question, "Is time travel possible?" The producers did an excellent job of maintaining the suspense of this question while laying out the theoretical possibilities along with the technical impracticalities. The unstated conclusion: Time travel as we know it will never happen. No human being will ever travel back in time to change something about the past.

For those of you who indulge in regret or "if only" fantasies, let me tell you something. Say you could go back in time and correct an event that you considered a horrible mistake. The consequences in the future would not be as subtle and benevolent as you imagine. The changes would be radical and shocking. Everything that happens has consequences. And those consequences have consequences, involving countless other people as the consequences expand into the future.

If I could go back in time and get a Ph.D. in psychology instead of English, I wouldn't be sitting here in my office in the Texas Hill Country with my wife and cats. No, everything about my life would be different. I can't even imagine where I would be or what I would be doing or even if my different life would be a happy one. I might even be dead right now. And much about the world around me would be different, too. The number of new consequences that would cascade from that one small change in the past is staggering. It's a scary thought.

Well, not really scary, because it's impossible.

So consider this:

1. Be aware that your present moment is the result of untold influences that are the product of uncountable chains of consequences triggered by actions in the distant past. There never was any such thing as "destiny." You've always lived in a world of where you and other people do things that affect your life.

2. Be mindful and appreciate your present moment. It's what you have. Don't wish that it were different. Relish it.

3. Rather than indulge in regret, learn from what happens to you.

4. Give thought to your decisions going forward. Respect the fact that your actions will have consequences in the real world. More than you'll ever know.

I hope you can use these thoughts to make your journey a little more productive and satisfying, though I suppose they're a little "heavy." I guess I never would have written a blog post like this if I hadn't gotten that Ph.D. in English so many years ago....

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2010. Building Personal Strength . (Permission to use this photo purchased from istockphoto.com)

A 4th of July Perspective

I'm writing this post on July 4th, 2010 - Independence Day. If you're an American, I hope you had a really good one.

Today, one of my July 4th memories is that of the bicentennial, the 200th anniversary of the birth of the United States, which was celebrated back in 1976. At the time, I was in the Army, stationed in Germany. My wife and I took some vacation time and flew to London. It was summer, and the weather was lovely. 

One of the things we saw was the London Philharmonic and Choir presenting Beethoven's 9th Symphony outdoors in front of St. Paul's Cathedral. When we got off the subway we asked a kiosk vendor for directions. He was an old stout man with a gray beard. He looked at us, smiled, and said, "Happy birthday."

It was a thrilling concert. I remember thinking about the founding fathers and how long ago 200 years seemed to me. I was 31. I had been alive for only 15% of those 200 years.

Now I'm 65, and even though 1776 is now 234 years ago, that time seems much closer to me. The reason is that I've been alive 28% of the time since then, more than a quarter of the history of America. Kathleen says that's because I'm really old. She says that with a smile. 

Both my grandfathers lived to be over 90, and I'm in better health than either one of them were at 65. There's a chance I'll live to be 93, too. If so, I will have been alive for over 35% of the history of the U.S.

Why all the math? Because it confirms the feeling I have that America is a really young country. When I was 31 and serving in Germany, I visited a small town about 30 miles east of Kaiserslautern, on the day the town was marking its 700th anniversary. The parade had six floats. One of them had to do with the new wine that had been produced that year. We drank their wine and toasted the townspeople who drank with us. 

1776 was only 234 years ago. Probably you don't think of it this way, but the truth is, that was practically the day before yesterday. And not on a cosmic time scale. On a human time scale.

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2010. Building Personal Strength . (Permission to use photo from Creative Commons 2.0 generic license.)

Seize the Day - Sobering Thoughts as Time Runs Out

I've expressed these thoughts before, nearly a year ago when few people were listening. But they're so important, I'm sharing them again...

Nearly half a century ago, when I was in high school, I fell in love with the smartest girl in my class. After graduation we went to separate universities, and we eventually lost touch with each other. Still, I always wondered what happened to her, and none of the classmates I reconnected with knew anything about her.

And then, a few years ago, I was lucky enough to find her on the Internet, and we've since exchanged several emails. She's been happily married for over 40 years, has two fully grown children, lives on a horse ranch, and is an award-winning high school chemistry teacher. It's almost exactly the best-case-scenario kind of life I sometimes imagined for her, and I'm delighted that things have turned out so well.

But I've had a sobering thought: she is now a grandmother, and her son is twice as old as we were the last time we saw each other.

This thought may seem strange to a young person - the idea that there aren't an unlimited number of grains of sand in your life's hourglass, and most of them have already emptied out.

With luck everyone achieves this perspective. And the sooner the better, because it grabs your attention. Once you acknowledge that your days really are numbered, you get a sense of urgency to seize the day, focus on what you care about most, and avoid wasting the time you have left.

Open your eyes to what's happening right in front of you, right now. While you're still alive, live each moment as completely as you can.

Post by Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., Copyright 2010. Building Personal Strength .

Elastic Time - A New Year's Wish

New Years always makes me think about the passage of time. I think about how quickly time seems to pass sometimes, and these days, I'm thinking more about how much time is left.

My favorite Steve Martin flick is “The Jerk” (1979), which has a cool scene that exemplifies the elasticity of time. Steve Martin tells his lover that days with her seem longer than normal. His girlfriend is asleep when he exclaims, “Our first day together seemed like a week. The second day seemed like five days. The third day seemed like a week again. And the fourth day seemed like eight days.”

Years ago, when I lived in Virginia, I was driving to a party with my wife. It was raining hard, and traffic on the Interstate was heavy. Then something totally unexpected happened. As we approached a curve in the road, the car didn’t turn with it. We were hydroplaning. The car slowly began to rotate in the wrong direction. It was a strange, helpless feeling. I saw two lanes of oncoming cars rushing from the other direction and I thought, “Well, this isn’t what I wanted.”

Fascinated, I watched everything as it passed by my field of vision. I saw the steady stream of cars rushing towards us. The car hit the median with a crunch and I felt each bump as we left the highway. At some point, all motion stopped. The car was still. We were still alive. We weren’t hurt. We were resting on the narrow median, facing the opposite direction. Traffic streamed by in both directions. We were lucky. Damage to the car was minimal, and we drove off the median to a repair shop. Later, we talked with amazement that we survived the accident and that the whole experience had taken place in less than two seconds.
Have you had that feeling when minutes seem like hours? Or when hours fly by like minutes? Naturally, I wish the good times would last longer, and I’d like to get past unpleasantness as quickly as possible. Why does time seem elastic? Isn’t an hour an hour, after all?

The answer lies in how you pay attention to what happens during an hour. The human brain manages new information by focusing attention on only one thing at a time. The more you concentrate your attention on what’s going on in the present moment, the more second-by-second memories you create. With your memory filled with rich details, a few minutes will seem to have lasted a much longer time.

Compare this to what it’s like to think about something. As you focus on your thoughts, your attention isn’t focused on what’s happening around you. New images aren’t taken in and stored in memory. You may shift your focus in and out of the present moment, but during that time you’ll have stored in memory only a few brief fragments of here-and-now experience, and in retrospect that period will seem brief.

When a friend of mine returned from a cruise to Alaska, she talked ecstatically about seeing massive glaciers and a flock of three dozen eagles. One of the eagles flew within twenty feet of her. “The first day seemed like three days,” she said.

American philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson said: “To fill the hour—that is happiness.”

At the end, your life may seem like a single, boring afternoon, or it may seem like a thousand years. My New Year's wish for you is that you experience hours and days seem to last forever. Everything depends on how frequently you concentrate your awareness on the present moment with passionate intensity.

More about time...