Negative Visualization

Yesterday on the plane from Mexico to Costa Rica (via Panama City) I dove into A Guide To The Good Life by William B Irvine. It’s essentially a complete guide to the philosophy of life known as Stoicism (which was briefly mentioned in Insights Vol. 2).

The Stoics thought we should spend time thinking about what would happen if we lost things we value such as material possessions, friends, and family. This, in turn, will result in more appreciation for those things.

From the book:

Negative visualization teaches us to embrace whatever life we happen to be living and to extract very bit of delight we can from it. But it simultaneously teaches us to prepare ourselves for changes that will deprive us of the things that delight us. It teaches us, in other words, to enjoy what we have without clinging to it.

I’m only 26% into the book, but I decided to give it a shot as soon as possible. It started last night with a taxi driver who didn’t know how to get me to my place of accommodation. But I want to skip ahead to this morning.

The hostel I’m staying at in San Jose was rated fairly highly, but it’s cold and dirty and I don’t get why the high ratings.

This morning it was 60F/15C, and since my room’s window is non-existent I woke up shivering. “I did have a room to sleep in and I slept well. It could’ve been worse.” That felt better.

I went to check out the breakfast, which was garbage white bread and jam. I didn’t eat it. Instead, “Well, maybe I won’t enjoy this, but the others here seem to be enjoying it.”

Then it was off to shower. The toilet was backed up and the shower water heater wasn’t working. I was already cold and this only exacerbated that feeling. “Well, at least I’m clean and fully awake now.”

Since I didn’t eat breakfast I went off to find the veg restaurant near my hostel (aka a main reason I booked this hostel). But it wasn’t where it was supposed to be. (It seems Google Maps doesn’t have their act together outside of the US. This was a regular occurrence in Panama as well.) “Well, at least Costa Rica has a national dish that’s supposedly vegan. Let’s see if I can find it.” I stopped in the first “soda” (small local restaurant) I saw and, sure enough, got gallo pinto and jugo de naranja for 1,300 Colones (~$2.50). It was fantastic.

Next it was off to get a SIM card. After 3-4 hours of walking and asking I wasn’t making any headway. I speak maybe 10 phrases of Spanish and nobody spoke English.

I decided to take a break. “Ehh, well, I want a working phone, but I guess I don’t need it. Could be worse.” And so I began a random walk to nowhere, looking to find some food. Almost immediately I looked to my left to see a restaurant that said “vegeteriano.” Far be it for me to pass up a vegetarian restaurant for lunch. And so I ate a phenomenal meal of gallo pinto, soy meat, greens, plantains, and orange juice.

I stepped out of the restaurant in search of a SIM card again. In my previous 3-4 hours of walking/asking I discovered that Kolbi (brand name) was the card I wanted if I also wanted prepaid cell internet.

I stopped in a little kiosk and asked for a Kolbi SIM. Lo and behold, they had one. But after paying 3,000 Colones ($6) the internet didn’t work. They were trying to explain that I had to walk somewhere and do something. I looked on with a blank expression when a young guy named Mario, who was in the store buying an iPhone case, said, “wait a minute my friend, I will help.” After he paid for his case he walked me to the Agencia and then waited in line with me for 30 minutes so he could explain to the receptionist what I needed done. He also took the opportunity to set up internet on his new iPhone. (You have to register the internet separately for some reason.)

I likened this SIM experience to talking to pretty girls. Rejection, rejection, rejection, rejection, rejection, score!

And so it goes with life. Things will suck sometimes. They can nearly always be worse. And negative visualization has shown me again that nothing is ever as bad as it seems.