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I’ve Got Some Screws Loose.


June 6th, 2013

The last few days have been pretty stressful,  a state of mind usually labeled as ‘bad’. However, as with all interdependent pairs of opposites, expression of one necessarily casts a shadow of its opposite. Put another way: within every bad there is a good, and vice versa. 

Every adventure has stressful moments. To prevent or suppress the arising of stress is an exercise in futility. What matters is how one deals with stress once it has arisen. Life is fun, complex, and interesting. Stress of one kind or another is bound to arise. As was eloquently penned some time ago: Shit Happens. Such is the way of the Universe – a 13.7 billion year experiment with shit happening.

One thing that happens in the Universe is the intermingling of nucleic acids here on planet Earth. As these animate acids dance, prance, and get to know each other, they attract, quite magnetically, other amino-acids. Eventually this DNA dance causes, through myriad intermediaries, matter to be pushed, pulled, and jangled into an arrangement which can observe the Universe. It’s a pretty nifty trick. Thanks Universe!

Whether consciousness is what the brain does, or consciousness is that which observes what the brain does, is anybody’s guess. However, I suspect that it is the latter, and this has direct implications with how I try and handle stress once it has arisen.

Because I believe that stress is something the brain does, and I am that which observes my brain, the issue of stress less personal. I can take a step back and observe my brain on stress. This usually requires that I take a few breaths. In fact, it really helps if I park my attention solely on my breathing for a few whole minutes. The result can often be laughter. What was I so worked up about? Who or what is it that is stressed? Just my brain, just my body, just a dance of molecules. “Just This!” say the Zen masters.

“Stop searching for phrases and chasing after words. Take the backward step and turn the awareness inward. Your body-mind of itself will drop off and your original face will appear. If you want to attain just this, immediately practice just this.” – Dogen

However, the past few days I was put through some stress testing. I recently had the motorcycle crated for shipping to New Delhi, India. It’s a complicated process, but it was smooth sailing at first. My research indicated that shipping the bike would cost somewhere between $1000 and $1500. I selected a shipping company whose numbers indicated that my motorcycle would fall somewhere in that range. They diligently processed the required ‘Dangerous Goods’ permit within the necessary 5 business days. All was well and good.
   
Stress began to arise when the first firm estimate came in. Once the ‘Dangerous Goods’ permit was in order, I was instructed to dive the motorcycle to the warehouse, and have it officially measured and weighed. I drove through a Bangkok downpour, but arrived unstressed and optimistic. That is, until the initial measurements put my shipping cost closer to $2000. I was peeved. My body and brain were beginning to experience and generate stress.

I had a few options: find another shipper (and wait for the processing of another ‘Dangerous Goods’ permit), pay the $500 more than expected, or work the numbers. I didn’t want a long delay, and I thought I’d feel stupid paying far more than anyone else had paid for shipping similar bikes. I decided to take a look at the numbers, and find workable solutions.

Air-freighting services charge by whichever is greater: the gross weight or the volumetric weight (given by the formula (W x H x L)/6000 in cm/kg). The weight of the motorcycle, crate, and panniers came to around 300kg. However, using the initial measurements, I had a volumetric weight of 474kg. I had a volume problem. I had to shrink my motorcycle.

This would require removing some parts, especially those which stick out. Although I’m on a trans-Asia motorcycle ride, I’m no mechanic. Taking apart a motorcycle is something I’ve never done. Adding to the pressure was a ticking clock. I needed to shrink the bike and get precise new measurements for the crate builders in less than 24 hours. Of that time, the warehouse would only be open for 5 hours. If I didn’t get the crate builders the numbers by noon the following day, I’d lose my allotted space on the airplane. I had 2 business hours on day one, and 3 hours on day two, in which to do all the work. I’d have to do some research online, buy some tools, travel to and from warehouse several times, as well as put the bike back together in New Delhi. All in all, I estimated that I’d have to spend at least 20 hours running around, figuring things out, and turning such figuring into action.

One of the best things about life as a poker player is that you can accurately assign a value to your time. Back when I was a poker player, I may have simply played the extra cost, and put in more hours at the tables to make up for it. I would have saved myself the trouble of running all over Bangkok, disassembling, and reassembling the bike. However, the ability rationalize buying yourself out of time consuming trouble is one of the reasons I quit poker. You rationalize yourself right out of life. Life is full of problems that need solving. For me, poker didn’t encourage leaning about anything that was both time consuming and unrelated to poker or making money.

“Dude, you could have made like $10,000 in the time it took you to learn to play Stairway To Heaven!” – One poker player to the poker playing, guitar novice.

The scary thing is, depending on certain variables, the above statement would be true.

Taking apart pieces of the motorcycle has been, so far, a fun and interesting process. I love learning new things. However, it was stressful, and there seemed to be problems at every turn. Tools broke or were missing. Some pieces came off easily; other were seemingly stuck. I was, and still am, worried that I was doing costly damage to the bike with my neophyte tinkering. I was also constantly worried about how I was going to put the damn thing back together. I didn’t have the time or the means to label.
   
I lost my cool a few times: pounding the ground, yelling at air, getting angry at ideas and concepts in my head. These uniquely human abilities gave rise to the uniquely human experience of mental stress. At times, I mistook the occurrence of stress in the mind as my stress. For fleeting moments, stress and upsettedness became my entire reality. I identified with the stress, not as the temporary process of the brain over which I am the observer, but as a process which I am. This is counter to my belief of how I think consciousness works, and completely disregards any larger perspective.

When I became aware that I was identified with stress, I practiced mindfulness/ Zazen/ meditation/ awareness of breath/ calming the f@*k down/, whatever you want to call it. I tried, with varying success, to bring myself back to a common ground of experiencing Just This! At the very least, I remembered to come back to a larger perspective; of the trip, of my life, of the fact that inside my skull is a hunk of organic matter arranged in such a way that it allows me to observe the Universe. I remember to feel grateful.  

Calmed, I brought my attention to the task at hand. I watched my mind and the thoughts which arose in response to the taking the bike apart. My mind produced thoughts about design; why certain joints and fasteners were put together in a particular way, and how they might be improved. I watched my mind solve problems, learn things, and think about things in new ways. It discovered that there is more than one way to undo nuts and bolts! The most amusing thoughts my mind generated were about the numerous metaphors it detected in the relative tightness of screws.

Screws that are too tight can be just as problematic as screws that are too loose. With screws that are too tight, change is not possible. With screws that are too loose, things fall apart. If all screws are tight, the object is rigid. If all screws are loose, the object is precarious. I was removing mostly nonessential parts of the bike, and ran into several problems with screws that were too tight. For things that aren’t essential to the functioning of the device, screws that are too tight are the most problematic. However, put some loose screws at the core of the engine, and there would be big consequences. It’s important to know which screws to make tight, and which ones to keep loose.

After all my fiddling and twiddling, I had removed the rear mud flap and rack, which made the frame flush with the rear tire. I removed the handlebars and turn signals, which made the bike narrower. I removed the front wheel, which reduced the front length quite a bit. The guys in the garage were very helpful and were rooting for me. By noon I had the measurements I needed down to the centimeter. The volumetric weight had come down to 267kg. I no longer had room for the panniers, but set about to solve that problem with a call to the airline customer support. I found out I was allotted 30kg of luggage for the international flight. The panniers, completely empty, weighed 20kg. My backpack weighs about 10kg.  

When the crate arrived, it was ½ an inch too short for the motorcycle. The base plate which covers the engine prevented us from ratcheting the suspension down as far as we had anticipated. However, we meddled with the crate and made it work. We then set about placing the parts I had removed, and the contents of the panniers – all of my tools, bulky riding gear, spare parts, a hammock, and some books – in any available empty space. With the smaller crate and lack of panniers, the gross weight came to 267kg. By accident, I had located the minimum, the point where Gross Weight = Volumetric Weight, and ended up paying $1300.

The guys at the warehouse boxed up my panniers for me. I'll have to check them on the plane, locate the bike in the receiving areas of New Delhi airport, fill out who knows how many forms, get the first stamp in my Carnet de Passage to temporarily import the bike, pay some (hopefully) minor fees, and find a place to put everything back together in the 100+ degree New Delhi heat. The stress is not over yet. My biggest fear is that the bike will be damaged from the transit, or that I will not be able to get it back together properly. No matter what, all of this is all going to take me very long time to figure out. And, as always when travelling, things won’t work as expected.

I may forget myself again. I may punch the ground and yell at air. I hope I don’t. I hope that my desire to get my motorcycle back won’t unhinge me in the face of obstacles. I hope I maintain a broad perspective at all times. I hope that all that is good in me is securely fastened with tight screws, and that the screws which bind me to my needs, wants, desires are loose, for who knows where this adventure is going to take me.

I leave for the airport in 5 hours. I arrive in the stinking heat of New Delhi, India in 14 hours. I should probably pack. I should probably get some sleep. Clearly, I’ve got plenty of experience with loose screws. I wouldn’t be where I am without them!   



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