Life is about choices. Whether you fail or succeed it’s up to you. Nick is a great example of the fact that we all have issues. Compared to him my chair means nothing. The choice of how to deal with my chair and everything that comes with it, is up to me. I can give up or keep going. You have the same choice. No matter what you’re dealing with the choice is yours. Will you give up or keep going? It’s your choice
Thanks Nick

I think everybody needs a routine. It keeps life organized and gives structure. I have certain days that I run errands, certain days I work out and days that I work from home.

It makes it easy for me to remember what needs to be done on a given day and helps to streamline.  The problem with routines is that we seem to get stuck in them and that’s not good. Today is Friday, Friday is normally a workout day. I wasn’t feeling well when I woke up and so I gave myself permission to break my routine. I don’t do it a lot. In fact you can be certain I won’t do it again next Friday. My point is, our routines keep us on track, but we’re not robots so occasionally we need to change things up a bit.

It doesn’t have to be anything crazy. You don’t have to take a vacation in the middle the week,(although if you can do that you’re awesome, and I’m jealous). It could be something as simple as changing where you go out to eat for lunch, I’ve noticed I tend to go out to the same places all the time. A lot of the time I get the same food at those places. I don’t even think about it, I just order it, and then I realize “Hey I got this last time” I understand someone who dislikes change, but something as small as ordering a different meal might shake up your life enough to keep things interesting.

I don’t understand why people put  where they’re going for lunch on Facebook. I mean it gives you directions to their exact location. One day, to spice up my life a little bit, I may just show up where you are and let you buy me lunch.  I think I did video about that.

Isn’t it cool how I can just drop a video in like that? I didn’t even plan that.

So let’s recap, routines are good. They give structure and direction. It’s best however, to break them up a little bit, on occasion, to keep  from getting bored. If your life is boring, you might be doing it wrong.

For more help on keeping life exciting check this out

Happy Friday everybody

A lot of people get really “down” on themselves and they look at their situation and how things aren’t going their way and it affects every other part of their life. It affects their job, their relationships, their health, how they handle their kids (if they have any), and every other person they encounter. As we’re sitting here typing this, I’m going to be honest and say that it hasn’t been a really great 3 months. I’ve had a major change in my life in the last year which has drastically affected my attitude, but I have a rule. If I’m out in public or around other people, THEY aren’t going to know it. The only people that know what’s going on with the personal aspects of my life are my close friends. You won’t see any negative posts on Facebook. You won’t see any bitter Tweets from me. And it’s not because I don’t feel it, but I have to get up every day and do the things that need to be done, and whether I’m feeling particularly positive or not, the rest of the world doesn’t need to know. And if I put forth the effort to “fake it”, by the end of the day, things get done.

Like I said before, we all have bad days. We all have stuff to do every day. And some of that stuff isn’t fun. Actually, most of that stuff isn’t fun.

Lots of people complain about jobs, which I don’t understand, especially in this economy. The purpose of going to a job every day is to make money so that you can live your life. Yes, every major guru out there will say that you need to find a job that you love, and I completely agree…HOWEVER…sometimes that takes time, and sometimes you have to be willing to do the job that you don’t like in order to pay the bills until you find the job that you love. The funny thing about the job that you love is…90% of the time, whatever it is you can do it on the weekends or evenings. You may not get paid for it, but it will help manage your stress so that you can get up and do the job that you don’t love to do.

 I’m in a situation where it’s tough for me to get a job. I have transportation issues. I’m like an employer’s worst nightmare. Here I sit in my mid-30’s with no job because I can’t get there every day. What did I do to make up the difference? I got an internet job in a virtual environment. It doesn’t pay me a LOT of money, but I had to find something. I don’t love it everyday and then I’d much rather be speaking 260 days a year. At this time however, it’s what’s available to me.

This principle applies to anything you may not necessarily enjoy. To kids out there. Yes you have to go to school. I know it’s always fun, but nights and weekends are for fun. (I’d kill to be a kid again, I had so much time to play. I had no clue how good my situation really was)

Let’s recap,

if you’re in a job you hate, thinking of it like going to school until you find something better.  Every fabulously rich person you see, started out just like you. Most of of all of them will tell you, they worked Jobs they hated, before they got to do what they wanted.

If you are positive about your situation, whatever that may be, it gives you a better chance to get where you want to go, then a negative attitude ever will.

Check this out for more info on how to get a positive attitude

The picture is from there also

I don’t care if you live to be 100.  Life is short. I have a few regrets in my life but none of them happened because I didn’t put myself out there. Any Woman that has  ever been pursued by me will tell you that I don’t give up. Once I find something I want, I do not stop. It doesn’t matter if it’s a person, a new job, or a personal project. If I get put down or discouraged, I just keep coming.

This is different than perseverance. I don’t want to get to the end of my life and say I wish. This doesn’t mean I always get what I want. In fact, I  rarely do.

The key is, at least I tried. I’ve been trying to get my own TV show for eight years now. I look at what’s on TV, and I think “I can do better than that” I’m trying as hard as I can and it’s not happening. At least when I get to the end of my life I’ll be able to say that I took the chance and did all I could, whether it happens or not.

I’m also the guy that will take a chance and go skydiving if ever given the option because I want to say I did. I’m fairly certain that everybody out there has something in their life that they’d like to take a chance on. They may not  because they’re afraid of failure. Failure is part of life. If we never fail, we don’t learn. So whether it’s a business, a love interest, or a new flavor ice cream you’re thinking about taking a chance on, do it. I promise it will be worth it in the long run.

The Image can be found here

Seems pretty simple I know, but I think a ton of people in today’s world simply don’t believe in themselves. I always have. I think it annoys my mother. I can see why. There’s a fine line in life between believing in yourself, and staying humble while doing so, and believing in yourself so much that you become arrogant.

I’ll admit here and now to struggling with that line more often than I should. I often meet people who are meek and humble but have no self-confidence. Obviously, that approach doesn’t work either. Believe in who you are and what you can do, while also being willing to learn from others and you will go far. I’m not who I want to be at this moment, but I’ll get there, count on it

Disclaimer

This post was written a couple of years ago and I decided to use it for this post. Most of these observations come from growing up the way that I did. We didn’t have a lot, but we had what we needed and didn’t always get what we wanted. Looking back I’m a better man for it. I don’t know if he did it on purpose, but my dad taught me the value of hard work and that you get out of life what you put in it and nothing more.

I understand that people are concerned about the self-esteem of children these days. Nobody ever “loses” at anything. Even the losing team at the sporting event gets some kind of prize or they still get a pizza party, etc. When we were kids, it wasn’t like that. Somebody won and somebody lost. There was a reward for people that were talented or willing to work hard to achieve. People who lost were expected to show good sportsmanship. It didn’t mean you had to like or enjoy it, but you had to recognize in that moment that the person you were dealing with was better than you. Maybe the losing team could use this as motivation to work harder.

 “equality” is a hot topic word. Another buzz word among society is “self entitlement”. We are all concerned with making sure everyone gets equal treatment and rewards for all efforts, but many people are also aware of this behavior of self entitlement that is emerging.

My niece played soccer 3 years ago. It was a lot of fun watching 8 year olds running around trying to figure out the rules of the game. The parents are all standing up screaming which way to go, to kick the ball into the net, etc. There was a little girl whose dad was especially loud and boisterous throughout the game and was shouting orders to his daughter loudly. At one point during the game, his daughter looked up to the stands where her dad had been screaming and shouting from, and in a moment of honesty she said, “Dad! Don’t talk to me while I’m playing!” I was happy that she finally said that. For a long time, I was thinking the same thing. My neice was on the same team, but with this guy shouting at his daughter the whole time, it was like the game became about only her. Or maybe the game became all about the dad. The dad that could yell the loudest in the stand gets the most eyes. We sign up kids to be in sports with other kids so that they can get the experience of working as a team and forming a community, while the adults don’t know how to behave as a community. We go to sporting events and pretend it is all about us and nobody else is there.

I also went to a church that had a ballet recital this past year and watched parents standing up in the aisles filming their kids dancing with their ipads. I sat behind them in my wheelchair, my vision obstructed by where they were standing. People couldn’t get out of the aisles if they wanted to. For those parents, the ballet was all about them and their child. I understand that you’re obviously going to watch your own kid during a recital and be proud of what he/she is doing, but it’s not only about YOU. Otherwise, why sign the kid up to dance with other kids? Kids dance just fine in your living room to Barney songs. I don’t see you standing there blocking the door to your home while family members want to come in because you’re filming uber important dancing to “Mr. Golden Sun”.

I think the sense of entitlement that is emerging so strongly in our culture is due in part to parents who have over-rewarded their children in a “positive discipline” effort, and now those kids are growing up and having kids of their own to be raised in the same way. Everyone feels like they deserve the trophy, yet nobody feels they should have to work hard to get there. People say they are willing to work hard, but more often you hear complaints about how meager efforts are going unrewarded, and there must be a clearly defined “reward” for every bit of effort we put forth. I don’t know what the reward will be for my physical therapy sessions, but I know that if it doesn’t make me worse it is making me better, and that is enough reward in itself.

The image was borrowed from here

If you were paying close attention this week, you’ll notice that I missed posting one day . The simple truth is I ran out of time on that day. We’re all busy. Some days you just can’t get everything done. When I was just a few years younger, I would have never thought about being this busy. Every adult I knew told me it was coming, but I had no idea. As I get older Time management is becoming more and more important. Figuring out what’s important and what’s not on a given day is becoming absolutely essential.

Time management is a skill that you’ll learn by doing. As with the example of missing a post this week. I am far from knowing everything I need to about time management. That said here’s a few things I have learned

Know what’s important

This is going to sound really stupid, everybody should know that paying bills  on time is more important then playing video games right? I think logically we all know that but sometimes you just don’t want to pay that bill right then. So you tell yourself, I have a few days I’ll do it later. Then the day it’s due you scramble around trying to get it paid. I hear you saying I don’t have the money to pay that right now. That happens to the best of us. In that case you have to prioritize what’s most important.

For most of us it goes like this

1. Food
2. Rent
3. Utilities

You have to eat, you need a place to sleep and you need power and water.  sounds like a no-brainer right? Well I’ve actually met people who will pay their cell phone bill, Before they pay their utility’s

That’s kind of an extreme example but it applies to everything you do in life.

Make a priority list

To me, my cell phone is not a priority I’d much rather eat. I’m using the bills example, because it is something we all have to deal with, but I have a List of priorities that are important to me and they change depending on the days of the week.

On Monday I stand in my standing frame. It’s not something I want to do it every Monday but it’s something my body is telling me needs to happen because I’m getting older and my body is getting tight. That usually takes two hours from start finish. After the standing frame, I eat, get a massage(when that option is available) and get a shower. From that point on I try to focus on whatever work I have for that day.  Whether it’s working on this blog or working on projects for the New Media Arts nonprofit.  NMA is  paying gig, so if there is work to be done. I try to focus on that because I have bills just like you do.

When the work is done, I come here and start to write. Each post I write , takes a ton of time, even with speech to text. A post like this routinely takes an hour or more. That’s just one.

When I’m done with that, I usually try to pray and study. (Although that has fallen through the cracks lately) Long story short, by the time all of this is done, and I look up it’s seven or 8 PM Monday night.

I watch about an hour of TV a day, because most days that’s all I have time for. If you’re looking at my Monday saying to yourself “that doesn’t seem like much” just remember, it takes me 2 to 3 times as long to do everything you do. It gets done it’s just slow. For me that makes time management even more important. It also helps to know what can wait until tomorrow. I rarely get everything done in a day that I need to,  My Tuesday was completely different than Monday. As does Wednesday each day have a completely different list of things I need to do.

So let’s recap

Know what’s important, prioritize

Know what can wait

Be smart enough to do big stuff first, bills  beats video games

You can only do so much  in a day. Rest is important.  It is something that I struggle with as well you can read more about that right here

I decided to put this down because it’s something that I struggle with, and it causes stress in my life. Life is too short, to be stress the point that you’re overwhelmed. That’s not good for anybody. I’m not an authority on this and your results may vary. I’m just telling you what I’ve learned.

Who ever originally said one day at a time, was a really smart person.

Image from http://www.cliparthut.com/delegation-women-clipart.html