More than more

I’ve spent six months re-arranging my priorities.

The hope has been to get more out of life.

I don’t know exactly what prompted the change. But I became certain of the need to change things up after I biked and camped with my son for a week. That trip told me—again and again, mile after mile—that there is so much more out there for me to discover.

I’ve put a lot less on my plate this year to find out what more exactly there is. Somehow, I knew I had to clear up space. What would take its place? That has been the mystery.

Much of my more has involved my classroom work.

I am doing my best teaching right now, giving students and colleagues my undivided attention. It feels great. A true indicator that you love your work is wanting to be better at what you do. I don’t receive any bonuses. That’s not the reward. In fact, taking on less has reduced my salary. It is doing more for my students that leaves me more contented each day.

More of my more is also my father role.

My daughter landed a part in a professional ballet company. While proud, we are now scrambling every day to get to her to rehearsals on time, meanwhile juggling the myriad of other activities we’ve committed to.

Whenever I drop something from my long list of responsibilities, some new time-requirement takes its place. It always happens fast. I’m left with that feeling of how did I ever do all of that in the first place? I never have a good answer to that question. And it makes me wonder about the extent that time, as a construct, is a total illusion.

It’s the thing we think we never have but get more of each year.

For example, I was explaining to some of my students how mix tapes used to work. I still remember the purity of that blank cassette, the effort to find the exact track, pressing that magic combination of play and record together. Music alchemy! An entire tape of personalized songs to gift away to someone special or to play for yourself when you’re down. It must have been the effort that made it so special.

Playlists now come together in a few clicks of a handheld screen—a marginal increment of time compared to the more laborious process of dual deck cassette recording.

Examples of added time are everywhere. No more printing directions or calling a cab. Cooks in the kitchen have shortcuts to delicious meals. Supercomputers in our pockets answer research inquiries in seconds. So just where does all that time go?

I’ve been asking myself that exact question lately. I’ve decluttered my calendar as much as possible, thinking that brave new opportunities will present themselves, only to find the calendar fill up with all the brave new opportunities presented to my children.

They seem to need me more—any increase in my availability is matched by an increase in my responsibility. You might think after 10 years as a dad that I would know better. I’ve had an entire decade to adjust to the fact that it’s simply not about me anymore and as long a time to connect that selfless position in life to the mad joy I feel when I’m with my kids and watching them develop into the human beings they are destined to become.

More time isn’t useful unless my priorities are in the right the place.

I’ve often fantasized about possessing the power to freeze time. I read a weird and perverted novel about that by Nicholson Baker called The Fermata. When I dream of stopping time, I don’t do illicit things. I want to stop the world from spinning and do what I’m doing right now: write. I want to stop the world to catch up on all those great novels that I never have the time to read. I want to stop the world and watch every best-picture-winning film of the last decade. I want to stop the world to get more done.

What I imagine would happen if I did ever actually possess the power to stop time is probably more of the same. I would find myself bemoaning my responsibilities for not allowing me enough peace of mind in those frozen moments. If there is one thing recovery has taught me it is that the grass is never greener on the other side.

In fact, the greener the grass I expect, the more disappointed I become when I walk on it. Happiness starts with a mitigated sense of what comes next. There aren’t so many surprises left in the modern world, and I’ve found that not thinking I know what the day will hold is the best predictor of my daily joy.

It’s easy to imagine that each day will bleed into the next: lesson plans, activity scheduling, driving to hell and back twice over. But beneath the routine of the day is an amazing array of opportunity to be surprised.

When I am in this blissful continuum, I can hear my students’ brilliance. Just because I’ve read these books for the last 14 years doesn’t make their insights any less mesmerizing.  The more I allow my classroom to become a free exchange of thoughts, instead of a factory of preset inputs, the more joyful my day becomes. The more I listen to what my children are saying about the world, instead of thinking about all the other more worthy things I should be doing, the more they strike me to awe. The more I see my wife for the beautiful caregiver that she is, instead of my longtime business partner in the department of marital affairs, the deeper I fall in love with her. When I’m really in the groove, I swear I feel like I’m seeing how beautiful she is for the first time.

More is not always better.

Less is not always worse.

Tomorrow never comes.

And yesterday never leaves.

It’s only when I prioritize my experiences on a point outside of myself, that I can see just how amazing the live I lead truly is.