I AM – The Movie You MUST See

Usually, I try to write about one or more thoughts that I think of as crystals of human wisdom, that in many cases are not new, but simply my distillation of spirits that have been around for a long time, with a particular emphasis on self-motivation, empowerment, self-actualization, and the general notion that we all have strengths and weaknesses and the weaknesses can be overcome… in some cases by simply focusing on the strengths. In other words, what we need to do to grow into our full and true individual power to change our world profoundly for the good of our community, ourselves, and the planet.

In this blog I’m going to depart from that format and tell you something more immediate (and potentially powerful) for those of you who are feeling the fresh air blowing in your lives from the changes that are afoot in our world. Those of you who feel like you want to make a difference, you can make a difference... but HOW?? … here’s an opportunity for you to light a REAL fire on a broader basis. First, you need to go see the movie “I AM” by Tom Shadyac. Then you need to spread the word!!

Tom is a reasonably well known movie director (Bruce Almighty, The Nutty Professor, etc.) who had an accident that lead to an epiphany, and subsequently to a journey of discovery. The result is a profound and substantive conversation, the start of which is the movie and the continuation of which is YOU…here, and in any other place you can think of – by motivating other to go see the movie, as well as by having the conversation in your own right.

What makes this particularly meaningful right NOW is that the film has been on limited distribution but recently (Last Wednesday) they taped the Oprah Winfrey show! Oprah saw I AM, was deeply moved, and dedicated her last open show to this film. Oprah and Tom talked in depth on air about the film, which she urged her audience to see, telling everyone plainly that this is the conversation we need to be having. The show will air on April 20th, if you’d like to check it out. Now here’s where the news gets exciting – Thanks to all of the positive responses, and with the above-mentioned national attention, the distribution team is officially opening the movie in 50+ more cities!

So, for what this website is all about, for the SHIFT that we all stand for in our own lives in the most positive manifestation possible, a singularly powerful action that you can take is to see this movie and the get others to se it as well. The movie website is http://iamthedoc.com/ and the NEW listing of showings and times (which by the way, Tom usually attends the opening of) is at http://iamthedoc.com/showtimes-date/ If you do NOTHING else this week you will have made a tangible and positive movement toward the SHIFT by seeing this movie. This conversation needs to be UNSTOPPABLE!!

Blessings to you all as we work to empower a better and more uniformly prosperous world.

John Strohl (aka Smokemaster)

It's YOUR Life - Use it Wisely!!

Have you noticed? - you always seem to have something intruding in your life that was unexpected and requires extra energy and effort. This is the way life is. There will never be "enough" time, money, energy, enough... life.... or will there? This is the attitude of INSUFFICIENCY or SCARCITY. I propose to you that your time is LIKE your money, in that you can budget it and manage it or you can just spend it on whatever comes along, run short a lot, and think "There will never be enough!" So... what is the first "wealth building" lesson of ANY money management course? Pay Yourself First!! In other words, take the first ten percent (preferably 10%, less if you absolutely must) of whatever you earn and put it aside. Before you know it you will see it start accumulating into something that you respect...and that increases your respect for yourself at the same time.

That's the way it works with time, too. If you COMMIT a certain amount of your time, meaning you establish in your WRITTEN schedule of your day when and what that time will be spent on (budgeting) and you make sure that "YOUR" time is set aside first (which means both written down AND your resolute, even absolute, mental commitment to THAT time) - pretty soon the fruits of your activities during YOUR time will begin to accumulate into something that you respect... and that increases your sense of self-respect at the same time.

Make no mistake, this will require that you have a specific plan laid out for what you will do with YOUR time, and you must stick to it. Maybe your best time is early in the morning, or maybe, like me, it's late at night. It doesn't seem like much at first, but even after one week you are 7 days further toward your goals than you were before, and you can see it. More importantly, you can feel it.

Remember the "great divide" exists not between those who take perfect action and those who take imperfect action. It exists between those who take action of any kind, and those who take no action at all. It is exactly like the old response about "How do you eat an elephant?" - One bite at a time! The Journey of 1000 Miles? - starts with the first step.

When you write down and manage the resources of your life - time, money, material supplies, etc. - you take the first major steps to eliminate the concept of SCARCITY as the driving factor in your life. You start to be aware of the sufficiency, even abundance, within which you live, and get away from talking about the "lack" of things. It has been an observed fact for quite a while that if you talk to people about budgeting and setting aside "savings", they will repeatedly talk about how they don't have enough of whatever to be able to "afford" to do that. However when it is done, and the resource is simply not available to be expended, all the other functions adjust and everything settles in on the new "norm" of 10% less. With rare exception you CAN get along on ten percent less of whatever needs to be "saved". The argument that "I'll set more aside when I have more." is also fundamentally bogus. Most people, when provided with more resources DO NOT preserve or save more for emergency or dedicated use nor do they start budgeting if they weren't before - the expenditures increase to match the available resources!!

So... the ONLY thing that makes any sense is to sit down and 1) write down what you need to do to achieve your goal 2) break those tasks down into time increments that that are "do-able" 3) write down your weekly schedule with a daily allocation of YOUR time. Pick a time that works for you and then.. MAKE IT WORK FOR YOU!! Just do it!! Start working your way through your list of things to be done... and before you know it you'll be there.

This I Believe: Part Two

So... There is hope! The only requirement is that we, each and every one of us reach out and enable it. It resides in us. It will not happen with Complacency or Inaction. It will only happen if we, to a man, woman, and child, step up to our most fundamental responsibility - the responsibility for our own success and prosperity. It's easy to think that somebody else should provide for some of this given the amounts that we pay in taxes but truthfully, that's just to provide sustaining infrastructure. It's not up to someone else. It's up to us.

As long as we tolerate the likes of Jeff Immelt, the CEO of General Electric, at the top of our power structure advising the president on what our economy should look like and how we should create jobs, and the vast army of lobbyists and insiders that are far more effectively represented in US policy and tax law than the population of the country is, we are doomed. I quote here from a MoveOn.Org campaign letter (with reference links) I received today -

"According to The New York Times, last year General Electric (GE) made over $14.2 billion in profit, but paid NO federal tax.¹ None. In fact, thanks to the millions GE spent lobbying Congress, we American taxpayers actually owed GE $3.2 billion in tax credits.²

Now GE is slashing health benefits and retirement benefits for new employees among non-union workers and is expected to push unions to accept similar cutbacks³, while its CEO, Jeff Immelt, gets a 100% pay raise.⁴

What's worse? Immelt now sits as chair of the President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness (Jobs Council), representing corporate America to the President on matters like job creation and corporate taxation."

and

"One of the chief ways GE avoids paying taxes is by shifting a large portion of its profits overseas, and jobs follow.⁵ Now GE's CEO is the person charged with helping the President create jobs here in America. That's just perverse.

And if the American people got back just the $3.2 billion GE took in tax credits, it would pay for the programs that House Republicans want to gut, like community health centers providing care to over three million low-income people⁶ and food and health care assistance to pregnant women, new moms, and children.⁷ We'd even have enough left to save the jobs of over 21,000 teachers across the country.⁸

The American deficit is being weighed down by hundreds of billions spent on bailing out major corporations. The tea party's plan is to make working families pay through devastating cuts, instead of making corporations with billions in profits pay their fair share.

But if we can hold Immelt accountable for GE's corporate irresponsibility, the nation will turn its attention to the injustice of corporate tax evasion in the face of the Republicans' budget-slashing attack on working families.

Make it all happen by signing the petition calling for Immelt to go. Just click below—and share this email with your friends, family, and social networks today.

http://pol.moveon.org/immelt_must_go/?id=26713-18776274-8YPpxxx&t=2

Thanks for all that you do.

–Lenore, Tim, Marika, Kat, and the rest of the team

Sources:

1. "G.E.'s Strategies Let It Avoid Taxes All Together," The New York Times, March 24, 2011
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=207259&id=26713-18776274-8YPpxxx&t=3

2. Ibid.

3. "After Paying Zero Income Taxes, GE Plans To Ask Its Union Workers To Make Wage and Benefits Concessions", ThinkProgress, March 28, 2011
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=207260&id=26713-18776274-8YPpxxx&t=5

4. "UPDATE: GE Doubles CEO Immelt's Compensation, Shrinks Board", Smart Money, March 14, 2011
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=207261&id=26713-18776274-8YPpxxx&t=6

5. "G.E.'s Strategies Let It Avoid Taxes All Together," The New York Times, March 24, 2011
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=207259&id=26713-18776274-8YPpxxx&t=7

6. "NACHC Statement in Response to the Budget from the House Appropriations Committee," National Association of Community Health Centers website, February 9, 2011
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=206514&id=26713-18776274-8YPpxxx&t=8

7. "Bye Bye, Big Bird. Hello, E. Coli.," The New Republic, February 12, 2011
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=206104&id=26713-18776274-8YPpxxx&t=9

8. Based on an annual teacher's salary of $42,500, as noted in the Payscale website (updated March 19, 2011), accessed March 30, 2011
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=207263&id=26713-18776274-8YPpxxx&t=10 "

Now MoveOn.Org is right to raise this issue and make these points, BUT it's not enough. There is, within that appeal, the notion of dependence upon that ubiquitous "somebody else" that we have to appeal to to get it right. None the less, at it's heart, MoveOn.Org does serve to move US to action individually and that is a step in the right direction.

So... what else is at issue? I was communicating with a female friend last night and the ending of her message went "...Glad to hear there is some 'paying now' work going on. Wish I could say the same." Wish I could say the same... I detect a note of resignation, even despair in that - this in a message in which she's telling me that she has had a good job interview. I had to respond with a basic review of "Pep Talk 101"

"OK - it's time for the big reveal. Du du Dah!!!

Late last year I spent some significant time to review what was going on in my life, particularly in regard to what I "know" and what I "do". I came to the conclusion that I'm not farming half as good as I know how aka I was not doing what I know. Some of this is attributable to outside influences in my life that I let have more influence than they should have, but mostly it was me loosing track of the real vision in the comfort of a regular paycheck.

What I know is that you get what you focus on, and that focus has to be singular, unimpeachable, and continuous. No FUD - Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. I know that life can have any number of problems but that true faith is transcendent of problems and it is manifested in "feeling good now" as perfectly described in the Abraham Hicks audio link provided here - www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAoLDrERfko (forget any predispositions you may have about Abraham-Hicks - it's not relevant to this conversation. The point in this audio clip is valid and well made.)

So... when I left American Systems I made a hard core commitment to myself that I would NOT allow FUD and that I would, as some in my circle of opportunities choose to describe it, "operate from sufficiency" instead of from scarcity. That I would at all times and in all things manifest what I KNEW to be TRUE - that the powers of the universe REALLY are aligning with me every second that I am positive, and focused about my goals and feeling good about myself... On the dry marker board outside my cubbyhole office in our apartment I have written three things, labeled The Big Three:

1) You can't win if you don't play! Get on the field!!
2) Take care of yourself - they aren't making any more!
3) Clear the decks!! Get rid of or eliminate any and everything that in anyway distracts, breaks up, or fractures your focus on the goals. With EVERYTHING you do ask yourself "How is this contributing to me reaching my goal?" If it isn't - get rid of it!! "

It has been working rather well so far :-) ... for me! It COULD be working for everyone but "we, the people" persist in operating from, thinking in, and being overwhelmed by visions of scarcity and impossibility thinking. The majority population routinely forgets is that if the glass is half empty - IT'S ALSO HALF FULL!!

More about what we are facing if we do NOT get this in the next post -

Thanks for reading :-) Have a truly great day!!

This I Believe: Part One

The Republicans have put forward another wholly misguided and unacceptable concept of a budget and based on a misguided notion of "what the people want" - having failed to listen to a good 50% of the people out there - are drawing up battle lines instead of working for the best interests of the nation. As a result MoveOn.Org posted this notice to Facebook:

Save NPR and PBS

pol.moveon.org

The Republicans just released their budget proposal, and it zeroes out funding for both NPR and PBS--the worst proposal in more than a decade. Tell Republicans that cutting off funding was unacceptable last time they were in charge, and it's unacceptable now. Sign the petition to save NPR and PBS.

To which I added the thought "A consistant and reliable source of free information is the other half of the equation formed by the availability of public schooling, the overall reason for which is an informed electorate. If we loose this then Republicans, fascists, and other extremist groups will have easy pickings because reality will be whatever they say it is. Fight governance by the FUD Principle (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt). Please speak up in support of NPR and PBS." (the last part of which was cutoff for reasons not explained by modern technology - no matter).

As sure as the sun rises in the morning, I knew it was coming and sure 'nuff, next day I get a response from Dan, my one and only Republican friend - "

U really don't believe that do you, lumping republicans into that group, wow.

All my democrat friends think PBS should be supported by the private sector. This name calling from the left has to stop. The two party system works. Do you really feel we can spend our way out of debt? The two have a way of moderating each other.

By the way you probably figured out I'm a republican but I don't hate democrats. I don't like all republicans or democrats and that's why I put a lot of time into my vote and cross over vote sometimes.

As my daughter would say chill dude!"

To which I would have to respond as follow:

1) For the most part my life includes friends. Not Republican friends, or Democratic friends, just friends. Given that you prefer to identify yourself with a group as part of your identity I will honor that. You are my one and only openly Republican friend. :-)

2) There is no more "name calling from the left" than there is "name calling from the right". Based on my best effort to view "what is" in our world, I have developed a set of values and beliefs that I believe set a functional and effective basis for living and moving into the future. What I believe to be essential values have been decried as everything from libertarian to socialist... mostly by Republicans. If you pick them apart, various elements may be identifiable within those platforms, as a whole they make up a combination of things that I consider enlightened centrism, neither left or right. I try NOT to indulge in either the gutless intellectualism of the left or the boldly self-centered stupidity of the right.

3) I cannot answer for your "allegedly "democrat" friends. I CAN say that among my beliefs are the simple concept that I DO expect of government to provide certain basic necessities and guarantee certain rights such that I can work with my fellow citizens to identify and solve the problems of our time without having to be constantly challenged by the lower levels of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. In other words, I expect the government to provide some security, and some public infrastructure (aka a communication system, an information system, an education system, and a transportation system), and basic rights like the right to assemble, the right to keep and bear arms, the right to freedom of religion (completely and forever uneffected by ANY group's preconceived, and boldly erroneous, notions of what the nation's founding fathers believed), and freedom of speech. The public broadcasting system serves a significant and multi-faceted role in the communications system, the education system, AND the information infrastructure. I believe that it is ABSOLUTELY as necessary as the military in ensuring our freedom and liberty, for exactly the reason stated in my original Facebook note.

4) The two party system does NOT work. It does vastly more to disenfranchise the public that to enfranchise it. It has been a weak spot in the process since it's inception, which when combined with the electoral college process, is the fundamental reason why our government for the vast majority of time over last 50 years has not been of the people, by the people, or for the people. Since the beginning, a two party system has been unduly divisive, creating and sustaining the very thing that the colonists recognized as their fatal weakness before the British crown, the notion of divide and conquer. The colonists recognized that if they let the king deal with them independently they were lost - yet they turned around and instituted a process that allowed the very same "divide and conquer" mentality to prevail in their governance, with the almost immediate effect of the subversion of our government to special interests, reaching its peak as we see it today. IMHO this was when we lost true democracy and when we locked in the concept of "the republic dominant". By the way, the only truly "democratic" election I've observed in my lifetime is the one that occurred some years ago in California, when Arnold Schwarzenegger (a Republican) was elected governor.

I don't hate Republicans. I regret that, as a group they have moved away from constructive dialog and toward divisive rhetoric. "Read my lips!" Give me a break! Current Republican actions are on a par with picking a fight over where the deck chairs should be on the Titanic - as it's going down! In essence, the Republicans have chosen genuflective pandering to the "tea party" over genuine functional leadership and will undoubtedly squander what little they have gained. We need to work TOGETHER and the Republicans have decided to "claim" a mandate that they simply don't have and fight about everything instead. The Democrats have been horrible at delivering a functional message and the Republicans have been functional at delivering a horrible message. Great! As you may or may not have figured out I walk my talk. I'm neither a Democrat NOR a Republican. I'm an independent... and no, I'm not going to "chill, dude!" I'm going to keep right on calling it like I see it.

I believe that our greatest test as a people and a culture may in fact be whether or not we can almost completely reverse this state of affairs and adopt a public and social standard of respect, even reverence, for individual independence simultaneous with a fundamental respect for each other AND a capacity for fast, effective collective action in the greater good. We need to be engineering a social structure and process that is simultaneously sustaining and nurturing to independent ability, while fostering and sustaining a capacity for immediate collective action as and where it is needed. Much as the people of Flight 92 came together from completely disparate backgrounds to take rapid action in the greater good, we as a civilization and a country need to be able to act quickly and effectively in the greater good, without the constant pissing on each others shoes about how the deck chairs should be arranged on a foundering Titanic. Had the men of the Titanic worked together quickly, deck chairs and other such materials could have been lashed together to form additional flotation, with the likelihood of significant additional lives saved.

Today, we pay vast lip service to the value of the individual and (his or her) independence and violently argue about "state's rights" vs the federal system, yet NONE of our processes form an effective path from our schools to our social structures, to our business processes, and ultimately our governance. Our system manifestly fails to "recruit" the young of the next generation to sustain and support the processes and systems that have been put in place before them. As a result, we are burdened with high drop out rates, gang problems, higher rates of prison incarceration than college graduation, extraordinary difficulty starting and sustaining businesses, constant social expressions of insecurity and disenfranchisement, and most particularly, inadequate, divisive, and dysfunctional governance. Each stage of the process reaps the "benefits" of the previous stage's inadequacy. Our economic system is unworkable. Our supply system is unsustainable. Our security system is failing daily. Our educational system has failed two generations of Americans manifestly, as evidence by the fact that 50% of the country was manipulated by special interests into the thought it was a good idea to have a good 'ol boy from Texas, who couldn't run a baseball team successfully, run the country. We have engineered a society in which the simple function of taking responsibility for our own well being is almost an impossibility. For most people there is little or no prospect of EVER owning a real piece of land and working it, in whatever fashion, to their own self sustenance and improvement. There is HUGE prospect of them sinking a lifetimes wages into successive, unproductive pieces of real estate that they will never actually own but will spend their lives "paying for". Further the system is built to REQUIRE levels of dependence that are, at their core, anti-individual, ant-community, unhealthy, and unsustainable. They are reflections of what is so wrong with our process today - the ultimate failure of the capitalist process is when it fails to acknowledge any other value than a monetary value.

Is There Hope?? Why, yes, yes there is... See This I Believe: Part Two

4YEARS.GO. - A Call To Action

I am part of a consortium working to change the global mindset about critical issues facing us and the impact our response to those issues will have on human life for the next thousand years. That consortium is called 4YEARS. GO. From our current newsletter -

FOUR YEARS. GO. is an evolutionary conversation that asks us to change our way of relating to one another and our planet, to take responsibility for our actions and in so doing shift our civilization to a regenerative path that reverses the impact our modern industrial society is having upon the natural world and societies around the world. It asks us to use this window of opportunity of four years, ending in 2014, to redirect ourselves and begin turning toward a sustainable, just and fulfilling way of living on the planet. It is a transformative conversation, since it changes the context we live in and makes new distinctions for what is possible. It is a conversation that gives us hope because it asks us to come together and act collectively to create the world that we see as possible.

“We can change things! So let’s do it!

And, let’s do it in four years!!”

FOUR YEARS. GO. is a call to action, to do those things we know will make a difference, to use all of our collective resources to usher in this new world. It is a call to each of us to ask, “What can I do?” and then begin to take action. It is a call to businesses to work together in common interest, using the power of their organizations to channel ideas, people and capital to make a difference. It is a call to NGO’s to collaborate and expand their impact in bringing about social change. It is a call to educational institutions to develop and train us in ways that are pertinent to this massive global change. It is a call to all faith-based communities to be responsible for the care of all life. It is a call to political leaders to mobilize the resources and pass the laws that will create the climate that supports a sustainable global culture. It is a call to the financial institutions to fund and invest in this massive cultural and economic shift.

Aside from the fact that we are "alerted" to the issues in question on an almost daily basis, albeit a disconnected and fractured alert, we get caught up in our daily lives and say "I can't do THAT!! That would take {Select - time, money, focus, activity, etc.} that I don't have!!"

The fact is that that kind of thinking is your OLD mental wiring talking. The "Why I can't" or "How it won't work" thinking. The impossibility thinking. What we need to make our world a better place is POSSIBILITY thinking - the thinking that says (Sorry, I know it's hugely cliche at this point) "Yes, We Can!!" President Obama didn't invent that phrase he just gave it new meaning. Now we have the chance to give it even more meaning because ultimately, our collective effectiveness and prosperity relies entirely and exclusively upon each and everyone of us believing, first about ourselves, and then about everything we touch, Yes, We Can!! Our collected attitudes and actions ARE the Light Side of the Force. Ultimately you know this - and it scares you! Don't let it - your creative subconscious will TRY to keep you in your comfort zone. Get outside of it. Almost nothing truly momentous in human history has been accomplished inside a comfort zone. As a wise man once said - "one cannot reach new lands without being willing to loose sight of the shore for a period of time."

Join Us!! All are welcome and all have ways to make a difference. To borrow another worn but useful phrase - Stop Me Now And Ask Me How!! I can be contacted at the email link here or you can go to http://www.fouryearsgo.org/ and take part in the conversation.

Thanks for reading and have a great day!!

THE NATURE OF CHANGE

God give me the courage to change the things I can change,

The serenity to accept those things I can’t change,

And the wisdom to know the difference

THE NATURE OF CHANGE
When we are faced with the realities of life we recognize that, ultimately –

1. we cannot change other people,
2. we cannot change the nature of our world,
3. we cannot change the passage of time

What we CAN change is primarily our own attitudes, behaviors, and approaches to things. In essence our responsibility starts and ends with ourselves. Responsibility is an old concept but gets a refreshing revisit from H. Stephen Glenn when he breaks it apart into response-ability – our fundamental ability to respond effectively to the external stimulus and conditions that we encounter in our lives. This works – when you are functioning responsibly in the more conventional sense of the word, we are also functioning response-ably in the H. Stephen Glenn sense of the word. The opposite is also true. This plays back directly into the old saying that we are not defined by what happens to us but by how we respond to what happens to us.

What is it that prompts change? Essentially we reach a tipping point. In any life circumstance there is an inevitable sequence of events, or life cycle, from beginning to end. If that sequence can be anticipated in terms of it’s nature and scope, as well as its impact, the opportunity exists to make a preemptive assessment of one’s best interest in relation to the anticipated outcome. It is reasonable to note here that people tend to run away from things that are bad for them much more, and faster, than they run toward things that are good for them. That having been said, most of the motivation for change can be described as inspiration, no matter whether the catalyst for that inspiration is good or bad.

There are two faces of change – individual change and group change. Inevitably, group change is accomplished through the concerted efforts of a number of individuals working to effect the change in in concert with each other. Based on what we noted previously, this would mean that one or more individuals were inspired to accomplish the change, and then were able to convey this sense of inspiration to the others, until there was a majority in favor or a consensus to pursue the change.

PRECONDITIONS FOR CHANGE

There are preconditions that must be met for any successful change.

1. Recognition that there is a problem – suboptimal conditions, reduction in benevolent outcomes, or simply unhappiness, negative stress, and anxiety as prevalent mental conditions.
2. Determination that there is a better and achievable alternative state of affairs.
3. Determination that the process of change will not exceed the functional parameters for stable continuation of life. This can be a trade-off – if the current condition will ultimately result in untimely or unreasonable death, then the risk associated with a path of change that includes the possibility of death may not be as significant.
4. Necessary resources to effect the change are available.
5. Personal conviction and sense of direction necessary to work through the inevitable difficulties and complete the change.

THE PROCESS OF CHANGE

There is a sequential nature to change. Given that the preconditions have been met, that sequence starts with changing the way you think about the issue. Most conditions that are prevalent are because the people sustaining them have adopted a uniform and consistent pattern of thought in regard to those conditions. This may be a matter of benign tolerance or a matter of abject hopelessness, among other states, but whatever the state there is a sustaining nature to the mental condition of the people enduring the situation. The first requirement of change, then, is to change the way you think about the condition. Get outside the problem, breakdown the stereotypes, and create a new frame of reference. If you change the way you think, you change your beliefs.

Changing your beliefs is the next step in the process of change. If you change the way you think about something then almost as a matter of course you change the nature of what is possible and impossible. As you expand your possibility prospects, you inherently change what you believe.

Beliefs affect Expectations, Expectations affect Attitude, Attitude affects Behavior, and Behavior affects Performance. You get what you envision, what you focus on… or – What you “see” is what you get.

What You THINK You Need and What You REALLY Need - More Thoughts from Life

A friend, who's had a spotty time with jobs lately, contacted me with "good" news. "I've got a job offer on the table to go be a ramp supervisor at Dulles! That's a load off!" Upon closer examination, the job pays less than half, he's done it before and it's a go no where job, he's putting one more pin in a job map that's been all over the place, and he's mainly worried about improving cash flow at the house with a kid coming. So I sent him this -

"My Friend

The problem that always intrudes into these situations is - if you have a new job there's always the spin up time, and then the basic expectation that you will be focused on your work. This means not focused on a different job - aka the job of finding that better career opportunity.

I have said a number of times that finding a job is a full time job in and of itself. One of the ways that you can impress a potential employer is by demonstrating that you understand that, in the way you have been conducting your job search. After all they have little else in terms of real performance that they can look at.

This is where the notion of faith has to enter the picture... not it terms of Christianity or Buddhism or anything religious but the simple function of belief in yourself and what you are doing. It is easy to "settle", to take the easy path, to do something that is less than what you want to do, because it covers the bases. When it gets right down to it, that's not much better than the subsistence worker, like a Masai who come in from the bush, gets a menial job just long enough to pay for the pots and knife that he wants, and then heads back to the bush.

I am not trying to talk you out of this but there really is a point, for any of us doing this, where you have to be able to make that wager and say "I'm betting I can do better!" and then really WORK the plan to do better. Part of the process requires faith in yourself, and part of the process requires action based on that faith. Where are you on the path we set out before? How far are you with your tickler list of contacts? If you want to have the bases covered while your hunt that's fine but you better be real clear with yourself about what time and effort you will need to put in to work the issues, above and beyond the time required for that job. Depending upon when that job is, you may or may not have much time during normal working hours, when you can realistically contact people, to work the better job issues. The odds on shot is that the next time you'll have the time to no kidding, actually WORK the problem of improving your job situation will be the NEXT TIME your out of work.

Just make a pass through all this and let it mull for a couple hours, then, make your decision. Silence the clamor of worry and fear. Set aside the anxiety of the moment. To quote something useful from Dune - the Bene Gesserit "Litany Against Fear" :

"I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

This is that point in life where you have to make a decision that will effect the rest of your life. There are probably moments like this every day. What message do you want to send yourself? your wife? your life? It is a simple thing with vast potential. Are you really going to fall into the river with the crocodiles, or are you going to get your leg over that pipe, get across the river, and complete your mission? You have to decide what, and how much, you believe about you. It is Herculean to tell the panic to take a fuckin' hike the first time you do it, but it gets easier after that. How much of you is chutzpah, how much schmuck? How much is cajones, and how much is frijoles? In your soul of souls only you know. I have expectations and beliefs, my wife has expectations and beliefs, your wife has expectations and beliefs, but only YOU can make the decisions that determine the answer to those questions. Whatever you decide - understand this. Life is to be lived without regret. Whatever you decide, if you then spend your life regretting it, you made the wrong decision. Whatever you decide, decide something you can be happy with and then, be HAPPY!

Regards
John

He called me ten minutes later and wanted to know how I could read inside his soul like that. I said I didn't need to read inside his soul, I simply paid attention to those moments in my own. We all KNOW what is right, what we really want but how often do we have the fundamental courage to put it out on the table and lay claim to it? That's where the rubber meets the road!!