Last night, I devised a list of attributes that best represent what Brian on Purpose stands for. For lack of a better description, one of the circles in a Venn diagram. Each of you brings your own circles of values and attributes that best represent your views. My goal is to create a following of people whose circles almost overlap. Please don’t misunderstand, even if we only intersect on one or two points, you are always welcome here. And hopefully we will learn from each other.
This may seem a bit self-indulgent, but after all, the website is named “Brian on Purpose,” so what can you expect? In some ways, you are reading my journal entries, so it will remain, seemingly, self-indulgent.
It may seem like I am trying to scream into an echo chamber, in the desire to surround myself with people who think the same way as I do, but nothing could be further from the truth. I know for a fact that our views on certain areas are wildly different, and I see beauty in that difference. Our diversity of thought, in many ways, represents a large tapestry that depicts something beautiful. Each individual thread may be nothing special on its own, but the way they are woven together creates something richly magnificent.
However, my goal is to identify the attributes of the thread that I represent here and help identify what you can and can’t expect it to be. My thread has evolved over a lifetime of learning and has only recently been radically modified with the change in my health status. Creating a list of attributes is helpful to me, and I am posting them here so you can have a better insight into my thinking. I hope that makes sense.
So far, I have come up with fifteen attributes. If we have half of them in common, I believe there is enough value on this site for you to pop in from time to time. If you have ten or more in common, I believe that you will enjoy most of what I post, and I would hope that you would visit often and especially invite your friends to visit as well. If we don’t have anything in common, I wonder how you got here. What rabbit hole did you fall down to enter such a bizarre site?
Without further ado, here they are:
- We are powerful beyond our wildest imaginations.
- We can inspire one another.
- We can learn from one another.
- We are chronic learners.
- Reading is fundamental.
- Food is the best medicine or the slowest form of poison.
- In its ideal state, the body is designed to heal and repair itself.
- The body is one complex, integrated organism and not a collection of 42 independent systems.
- Pharmaceutical solutions are often easy, but they come at a cost.
- Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you are right.
- Science, by its definition, is never settled.
- Walking is the single best physical activity.
- Our bodies are predisposed to one of two conditions: Growth or Decline.
- Beauty is all around us.
- Each new day is a gift.
The discoveries that I have made over the course of my life have developed these truths. As I mentioned, they have evolved. If I had read this list twenty years ago, I would never have visited the site again. As a chronic learner, the thoughts and beliefs I held twenty years ago have evolved and grown the more I learn. I also suspect, in another fifteen to twenty years, they will advance further still. But as I sit here today, this list represents where I am right now.
My health issues, which I have written about frequently, stopped me in my tracks and forced me to make a radical change in my lifestyle and my personal goals. Ignoring the issues and plowing ahead with my “nose to the grindstone” would have had devastating consequences, of this I am certain. I made the changes necessary and began a journey of better of how we are designed and how we function best.
This latest evolution has brought us to this point. As I have said before, to the degree that you are interested in joining me on my journey, I am glad to have your company. These attributes will likely become themes for future posts. I plan to expound on each one and fully explore its meaning.