Hi,
It's Brooks,
And thanks for joining me today.
It's good to be here with you.
Today I'd like to talk with you about my favorite phrase,
One of my favorite phrases.
I have a lot of them,
But this is one of my favorites,
And it's see the job,
Do the job,
Stay out of the misery.
And it's so peaceful to think about that,
To even consider that phrase.
And what I like about it is it makes everything really simple.
There's seeing the job,
Okay,
What do I want to do?
Then there's doing the job,
The action required,
Like doing the action,
And then staying out of the misery,
Which for me means staying out of,
What if this doesn't turn out well,
What if people don't like it,
Should I do this,
Is this the right thing?
You know,
All these things I would just interfere with actually doing the task,
Doing the thing.
There's another phrase which I like,
Which is stay out of the fruits of the action,
And it's very similar.
It's,
You know,
Do what you're gonna do and stay out of the results.
What's gonna result from what I'm doing?
And a lot of it really is about worrying about how people will interpret what we do or how we'll interpret it.
And again,
That takes us out of the moment.
It takes us away from focusing on,
You know,
Giving our all to what we're doing.
And I like to use this phrase whenever I start to feel antsy about something or get worried.
You know,
When I'm about to do a project,
I'm like,
Oh god,
Well,
You know,
All those worried thoughts and all right,
See the job,
Do the job,
Stay out of the misery.
Like making this recording.
Let's make the recording,
You know,
Without thinking about,
Oh,
The listener,
Like,
So are they gonna like this?
Did I do it right?
You know,
Meanwhile my experience of being a writer and performer is everybody that reads or listens to what I do has their own experience from it,
Their own interpretation.
So there isn't just one reaction,
You know,
One effect.
There's multiple effects.
And the main thing is really to enjoy the creation or enjoy whatever I'm doing.
Like earlier I made lunch,
So I focus on that.
I made lunch and then I cleaned up afterwards.
I'm just very simple.
Make it,
Eat it,
Clean it up.
I would see the job,
Do the job,
Stay out of misery in a real basic way.
But I like to share this because someone shared this with me a ways back and ever since I heard it,
It made a very positive difference in my life.
And I really think it honors whatever it is that we're doing.
I really don't think that there's a higher task,
You know,
Or a better task or more sacred task.
I really think they're all tasks.
They're all something we're doing.
They're all action and we're built for action.
That's what our bodies and minds are built for.
We have a mind which has an intellect,
An intuition,
And those two things blend really beautifully with anything that we do.
And then there's our body,
Like our hands.
We have these ten digits,
Flexible digits,
Which can move and grasp and do all kinds of incredible things.
So we have that,
We have our legs,
We have our feet,
We have our eyes,
Our ears,
All our senses.
All these things come into play no matter what it is that we're doing.
Seeing the job,
Doing the job,
And then staying out of the misery.
It's a cleaner way to live.
And at first it might be a little odd trying to stay out of the misery.
You know,
It's easy to get addicted to misery,
Worrying,
You know,
Oh my god what's gonna happen?
Are people gonna see this?
What's gonna happen to me?
You know,
Is everything gonna crash as a result of this?
Or am I getting yelled at?
Or you know,
It's just there's so many multiple things of imaginings,
Imaginations,
Of what if or what could happen.
And it's all fantasy.
I've written some things or done some things like that,
Oh my god this is great,
People are really gonna like this.
And it gets very low reception.
And other things where I thought,
I don't know if that was all that great.
And a lot of people loved it.
So you really can't know.
You just see the job,
Do the job,
And stay out of the misery.
And I think it's a very spiritual approach because I think anything that's kind and gentle and helpful is spiritual.
You know,
It's not like it's better than any other approach.
It just makes life a lot easier.
And if life can be a lot easier,
Then that's a wonderful thing that we can have in our lives.
So I encourage you to consider this idea.
See the job,
Do the job,
Stay out of the misery.
I wish you the best.
Take care.
Bye.
