All is Maintenance podcast on PJSC

When we think of important virtues in life, we think of things like goodness and honesty.  Very general concepts indeed- helpful as far as they go, but so general as to be largely meaning almost anything at all if you think of it.

I think what most of us struggle to understand is simply that life, overall, is about maintenance.

If you make a promise, or resolve to do something, that is one thing.  But it is the maintaining of that resolve, or promise, that really makes it happen, and solidifies it into reality.  The ongoing effort is all important, not just the spur of the moment feeling and idea that launched it.  Ongoing maintenance, whether in relationships, keeping up familial obligations, caring for youngsters for many years as they mature, of in caring for our elders- this is where the ‘rubber meets the road’, where we actually achieve what we set out originally to do.  

Build a house, or a road- well, even to do such things takes a certain amount of resolve, or maintenance, since it takes a long period of time to do either.  If one lives solely in the moment, with no real thought for tomorrow- why then, you have thrown maintenance out the window!  

But let’s say you have a house, a road; perhaps a vehicle and a tractor- maintenance is now what is key.  Not general ideas like ‘goodness’ or ‘the right thing’- simple maintenance- the daily, ongoing resolve to keep things running well, to lubricate, to protect and keep viable what is built- this is all important!  

The maintenance of the family, the town, and the government itself- all of these need endless maintenance, effort, and attention.  Our jobs, our relationships with neighbors and family- all are subjects of endless maintenance.  It is the bedrock of Western Civilization itself.

Back when our ancestors left warm the warm climes of Africa to go northwards into the harsh lands, they had to learn to plan, to accumulate foodstuffs to carry them through the hard days of winter.  This took the development of abstract thinking, or future-thinking.  The plenty of today’s summer day would not continue endlessly, as it did back in Africa, where one day was like the next, forever.  To live in the moment there was usually enough.  Planning, or maintenance of any sort of future provisioning was unnecessary, and so never happened.  

Europeans developed the skills of abstract, or future oriented thinking, and relied on those skills to survive in harsh winter lands.  Eventually, since these Europeans adapted to their hard environments very well, their endless planning and maintenance of what they built served them very well indeed!

What they built is now what is Western Civilization- actually- Civilization itself!  It is all about building, and then endlessly maintaining that civilization.

Interestingly, in African Zulu- there is no word for maintenance.  Or for ‘precision’, or for ‘the future’!  ‘Now’ is the same as any other time, or space.  This is a land of no maintenance, or really by definition, of any sort of technology at all.

And we can easily see the state of Africa today, what results from such a lack!

So, incorporate maintenance into your life!  It’s a very paleolithic, ancestral concept, once you understand it well.  Each and every day is not just new and different- no, it is a time to rediscover, to reawaken and renew what you have been working on for your whole life.

A new day- well, do your daily exercises!  Strengthen and reinvigorate your body and mind by going through your Perfectly Paleo Exercise routine.  Then, drink your paleo green smoothie, and a couple of eggs, while planning the rest of your day- (the maintenance of your paleo life)!  

Your job priorities are key, as are your relationships with your family, friends and neighbors.  What tasks (maintenance) are necessary for you to keep up your home (paint, trees trimmed, mowing etc.), the education of your youngsters (homeschooling or the examination and holding to account of your public school)?  How about your own health, and the health of your family?  Are you being a good father/mother, and leading your children down the path of health and good citizenship?  All of this a part of maintenance, the maintenance of the individual, and the overall health of the body politic.  

Are you being shortsighted?  Are you pretending to maintain your lawn by pouring glyphosate over your yard to kill weeds, and thereby killing weeks that don’t need to be killed by poisoning your groundwater and very land?  This is not maintenance, it is not future thinking, it is not planning- it is just stupid.

Are you working really long hours to make money, while ignoring your children and home life?  Again- no maintenance- just living in the moment really!  Get back to true maintenance.

You get the idea.  Maintenance is long-term, ,patient, ever-watchful and inglorious work.  You are basically a custodian of yourself- your body, your land, your house and neighborhood, your health and wellness.  You are a future-oriented planner.  A maintenance worker!  

To do such a thing is to be Atlas: YOU HOLD THE WHOLE WORLD UPON YOUR SHOULDERS!  You are no flash in the pan, hunter sprinting in the moment across the African savannah- no, you are so much more.

YOU MAINTAIN AND NURTURE CIVILIZATION ITSELF!