A new chapter has started, in a way it's like revisiting a book series you loved and finding a new entry. I'm on my second week at the new job.
I had a shot at something different (working in the casino gaming sector)... But, I knew that it would involve being awake at all hours, and having to devote an inordinate amount of my time to the company.
The law firm I interviewed with offered me what I was looking for: straight forward expectations and a realistic workload. Law offices can be notorious for having to work overtime, deadlines are critical, and you have to juggle hearing dates and things like that. But every so often you find an attorney who has put in enough time (often several years) and has struck a nice balance. I've never worked with this particular attorney directly before, but we know a lot of the same people from as far back as decade (or longer) ago. So I felt comfortable taking the job.
A friend of mine and I meet up every week just to shoot the shit and compare notes. We keep each other motivated to continue moving forward and improving our lives. This week he shared with me a “Life Audit” document (specifically, it was a PDF). I was thinking about doing a blog post with basically all the steps from the PDF and talking about my approach to them. But I don't see the PDF publicly posted anywhere, or it's not easily accessible. I would say that the author is a pretty notable internet personality and “self-help guru.” It is branded content, but doesn't appear to be copyrighted... In any case, I'm not looking to be sued (should more than 10 people read this), so I'll spare you the specific steps that he walks through with his system. Instead I'll summarize the process without also promoting any one specific personality—there are a myriad of them online, you're free to pick the personality you like the best, they all essentially say the same things and they're happy to take your money. Sometimes these people are controversial figures, and I have no real context for this guy other than the title of a book he wrote, and this one PDF that my friend sent me.
There are probably a dozen different draft posts that I've written where I talk much more in-depth about cannabis. As of the last incarnation of berkough.com though, it has never seemed to be the right topic to bring up or talk about, ever. I have a lot of things to say about the plant, I just feel that a lot of people tend to think of marijuana as being a juvenile and lazy drug that people indulge in. But the plant is sort of from two different worlds, and it always has been. With legalization happening across the country, I feel that we're finally getting to a place of reconciling the two plants; the herbaceous flowering annual, and the psychotropic drug—a near perfect propaganda dichotomy. The truth is obviously much more nuanced than evil weed or a miracle plant. Nothing is ever just black and white, it's Joseph's amazing technicolor dreamcoat with different tones. When viewed as a medicinal herb—in the same way as St. John's Wort or Echinacea—the effects are moderate. You would never swallow or consume an entire bottle of Echinacea, right? The same is true for cannabis, the dosage is different for every person. So you have to learn how to control your intake. But the beauty is that it's impossible to overdose on cannabis, the worst that will happen is that you get a little too paranoid, or you fall asleep.
Going back to at least Bill Clinton, it has been in the mainstream zeitgeist that even though the plant was illegal (or still is for some), it still plays a non-threatening role in a lot in our early lives, the late teens and early twenties, at least.
(The first snow of the year finally touched down in the Humbodlt-Toiyabe National Forest.)
