I was a fan, but now I'm seriously a fan... check this out from SNL:

Update: NBC Universal hates YouTube (why get your content out where people could see it?) so here's a different live performance from London:

    There had been word that I might be sent to Bangkok for two weeks to do some work for one of our projects (the nature of the work is irrelevant to the discussion, but it's well within my scope of responsibility).  That had actually died down, and I though I would be able to get out of going.

    I really have no interest in going to Bangkok, ever.  I mean, you're asking me to go to a city where the first thing anyone thinks of when it gets mentioned is underage hookers and STD's.  So far, when my coworkers have been talking to me about it, the only things they've said are to make sure I "wrap it up" or I'll come back with a "laundry list" of diseases.  I don't even do one-night stands... as if I'd ever hire a hooker in Asia (or anywhere else).  Seriously, why the fuck would I want to go there?  I don't even like Thai food.

    Anyway, I awoke Monday morning to check my email and immediately became nauseous to find out that indeed I did have to go there for two weeks, and by the way I have a call with the customer Tuesday night PST to go over the details.

    During that call, the customer asked that I stay for three weeks, not two, because the last similar effort of two weeks didn't feel like it was long enough.  By Thursday, my manager suggested that I take more of a leadership role around this task and a related one, and turn the trip into four weeks so I can supervise the whole thing.

    So, in the course of four days, I've gone from "dodged it, don't have to go" to "have to spend a month in Bangkok."  And what can I do?  In this economy, how can I say no?  And the revenue I bring in for my team is important right now, and for all I know landing this work could make or break the year for us.  And how would I look at the annual reviews if I didn't?  The work itself is fine -- I appreciate that my manager wants to put me in a position to demonstrate more leadership -- and the customer really is great to work with.  I know that there will be a little bit of language difficulties, but the technical skill of the customer's team is quite high.  I just really wish I could do it from Seattle.

    Right now, as long as I don't think about it, I'm fine.  When I do think about spending all of March away from home, in a country I never wanted to be in, it just makes me sick, really.  I'm just thinking I'll try to get a lot of reading done while I'm there, I guess.

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Update: February 15th, 2009

    You know what?  I'm really embarrassed by this blog post.  I'm really embarrassed that I still react this way to being put into uncomfortable situations.  Foreign travel is difficult for me, it always has been, and although I've come a long way in terms of it, it's still a big challenge for me.

    I'm also not so chickenshit that I'm going to delete this, though.  Whatever.  It is what it is, I'll leave it there.  It says far more about me and my limitations than it does about Bangkok, and if I've offended anyone I truly apologize for it.

    The final story... I'll be there for the first three weeks of March.  The customer has been awesome to work with, and I'm really looking forward to digging in to the work with them.  Two good friends of mine who know what I'm about have told me that they love Bangkok, so I'll be following their advice in terms of non-work time.  I can't avoid it, so I may as well start to get excited about it. :-)

    Writers love to dive into etymology as if word origins hold the sacred wisdom of the ages.  While they're usually interesting things to point to, frequently they're just a cheap device to hammer home a point that could be made with more nuance and delicacy if more work was put into it.

    Let it not be said that I have any objections to the use of a cheap device from time to time....

    I was home last night working on some ideas I have about events that could be held in the Integral world, and a thought crossed my mind as I thought about what to say to introduce one of them: Have you ever noticed that integral comes from the same root as integrity?  (For those who already have noticed this really obvious thing, well, please read on anyway...)

    The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Ed., lists the origins of the words integral and integrity as:

Middle English, from Old French, from Medieval Latin integrālis, making up a whole, from Latin integer, complete; see integer.

Middle English integrite, from Old French, from Latin integritās, soundness, from integer, whole, complete; see tag- in Indo-European roots.

    Well, not that there should be much surprise about that, really.  But why am I pointing this out?  What's so important?  Why do I think I'm so clever that I'd better write this one down?

    The point is that once we see Integral philosophy, once we have the "aha!" moment about it, it changes us forever.  We realize that none of the previous worldviews can fully allow us to live in the way that we require, and that the world requires of us now.  Every previous worldview includes much in the way of valuable truth, but also leaves enormously important truths on the table, waiting to be discovered or rediscovered.

    And you know and I know that that's just not good enough anymore.  It's not good enough for us personally, it's not good enough for the culture we live in, and it's not good enough for the world.

    Like Ken Wilber said in this video, "...once you see it, you can't go back.  You just can't get that toothpaste back in that tube.  That's just not going to happen."

    For us, Integral is Integrity.  And Integrity comes from living an Integral life.  Nothing less will do, will it?  Our soundness comes from living so that we're making up a whole.

    Does this change how you view your personal relationship to Integral philosophy?  It changes my view, no doubt.  I've been fighting it, trying to cheat on the edges, hoping it were easier somehow.  We know that sometimes Integral is as simple as breathing in and breathing out... and sometimes it's as difficult as consciously keeping track of all quadrants, all levels, all lines, all states, all types -- in gross, subtle, and causal bodies -- personally, culturally, and globally.  And for each of us personally, it involves endless surfing of the waves of agency and communion, of choice and surrender, of involvement and awareness, every day, every moment.

    This stuff is really difficult sometimes.  But we have to do it.  You can't get that toothpaste back in that tube, can you?

    The next several years are going to show how the movement spreads and deepens among a larger population with a broader demographic.  Are you ready?  What are you going to bring to the table?  What are you going to demand of those who build this movement with you, and what are you going to demand of yourself?

    It's getting high time to decide....

    Over at Thomas P.M Barnett's website is this announcement for a reading group around Great Powers: America and the World After Bush.  If you haven't picked this up, the book is finally out in stores this week, and you need to get it and read it.  It contains the best and most Integral view of global strategy and America's role in it for the next 50 years.  You will thank me later, I promise.

    If you want to follow along in the form of an online reading group... join us and have some fun with it.