“Each man’s life represents a road toward himself, an attempt at such a road, the intimation of a path… But each of us — experiments of the depths — strives toward his own destiny. We can understand one another; but each of us is able to interpret himself to himself alone.” ― Herman Hesse
In the series Friday Night Lights first season, episode 12, Smash has fallen for a new girl. She likes him too, but is playing a little hard to get. This is difficult for him, as he is used to being pursued. She finally comes over, ready to pour attention on him at the state fair.
Finding a job and working for spending money came fairly early to this Midwestern raised boy. There was always something I wanted and my parents just kept repeating “get a job.”
#1 Keep the first date short. This one is nearly impossible for me, especially if things are going well. I want the night to go on forever and may try to make that come true. Usually sending the prospective partner practically running out of the car for her front door.
Recently while trying to monetize YouTube a lie told myself was uncovered that I believed for 11 years “Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won’t come in.” ― Isaac Asimov Blind Spots It easy for me to recall when I was first introduced to the idea of blind spots. Our blind spots cause a failure to recognize that emotions, such as fear and distrust, change how we and others interpret and talk about reality. We think you understand and remember what others say, when we really only remember our thoughts about about gets said. And that is not all… Today, I was working on my YouTube presence trying to attract enough followers and subscribers to monetize my channel. I uploaded the first video there 11 years ago! Wow. Over a decade and it only has 625 views. It’s kinda whimsical, one of my first attempts at making a video from sill pictures. Read the entire article on Medium at Real Window Creative
The acquisition creating a catalyst to inspire a thriving business flipping storage units “Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.” ― J.K. Rowling Running Out of Options Back in early 2005, I had a hole to crawl out of. Without getting too far into the details, struggle, a major injury and a geographical transition led me to a place with little resources. Still having rent to pay along with food to buy and other expenses. My bank account had a meager $150 left, I was unemployed, no benefits or help was available. It became clear I had to do something and do it fast. Literally living in what used to be a chicken coop, one day during a brainstorming session, an idea arrived. The website eBay, had been my friend, knowing how to list, sell and ship, my efforts were focused on finding something to sell. But how, with only $150 left and food needed in the pantry? My memory does not serve me well enough today for sharing exactly how I came up with the plan, but here it is. “If you have never reached rock bottom, you have never attended the school of greatness.” ― Matshona Dhliwayo Dialing for Dollars Sales were easy with my knowledge of selling online and an established eBay account with several thousand positive ratings from selling my art. Products can be turned into cash in just a few days. If you have the inventory, but I didn’t. AContinue Reading
“Thankfulness is the beginning of gratitude. Gratitude is the completion of thankfulness. Thankfulness may consist merely of words. Gratitude is shown in acts.” — Henri Frederic Amiel
Just my luck literary pursuits can bring about a whole series of dangerous maladies “Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness.” — George Orwell The Roller Coaster It’s been a full 10 months since I seriously took on this writing journey. The addition definitely filled in the last bit of available time. Just in the last few weeks, I doubled my efforts, while noticing some new health issues. As usual for me, living leads and informs the writing, a story idea appeared. Doing some research, some of the findings have been troubling, to say the least. Franz Kafka apparently put himself through both physical and emotional turmoil while trying to write. His work took 10 hours out of his day leaving little time for writing. All the activities he jammed in pushed him to the verge of collapse. In a weakened state he unfortunately contracted Tuberculosis which lead to his throat swelling until it closed. He died. Leo Tolstoy of War and Peace fame, suffered from depression. As he aged and his questions became more serious about inquiries into the human condition, the debilitating depressive episodes worsened. He died shortly after collapsing at a desolate train station. And then, there are all the suicides to consider. Hunter S Thompson, Virginia Woolf, Earnest Hemingway, and many more. What is it about seemingly innocuous writing that can create depression and suicide? My own issues have seemed to pop up since taking writing seriouslyContinue Reading
How to put your writing in front of a new market in the eBook format “Lovers of print are simply confusing the plate for the food.” ― Douglas Adams Leaving Money on the Table In years of creative and business experience I have found myself sometimes leaving money on the table. Usually by failing to see possibilities or take new action. This reality has me looking at the library of my authorship with new eyes. Up until now it has been exclusive to Medium, but changes do come, humans tweak things and income invariably slides south. However, we are not powerless and the first step in taking new actions may be to assign the proper value to our creative product. “The secret to success is no secret. Be honest in your words, be trustworthy and share value. Most people won’t tell the difference, but those that do are your readers.” ― Robin Sacredfire Being meticulous when creating our file system can make it fairly easy to multi-propose content to other media platforms. My practice is to name folders just like each article and also save copies on a separate hard drive. All the text is saved in a Word Document and the pictures are placed in the folder as well. This habit makes it very easy to copy and paste creative content already produced to a new platform, blog, website, eBook or audio-book. The folder names can also help me keep track of other details as well, like if narrationContinue Reading
Finding one good quality in all things and people transforms outcomes, how we feel & attract. “There is an innocence in admiration: it occurs in one who has not yet realized that they might one day be admired.” ― Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche It’s me who needs this, not you I’ll have to admit, I’m in a bit of a funk with now way to create attract ion from anything good. Maybe it’s more like a funky rut of no gratitude available, the law of no attraction.. Yesterday, I received a bill from Amex for a card with my name on it that I have never had. During the several hours of phone calls trying to uncover the reality of the situation, I was not grateful. As a matter of fact, I was downright rude. The event left me with a physical and mental hangover, my own actions creating complete de-motivation. No wonder I did not get the help needed in the end. I was asked to email a copy of the bill to the the fraud department and have not heard anything back. My mistaken choice was to name the whole encounter bad or unacceptable. That cemented my mindset and it hit every person I spoke with like a brick. Part of their listening had to be taken up by processing my stuff. I made them less effective in this encounter by taking that stance. A little voice whispers to me right now, “Let go of what you can notContinue Reading
People are the fruit of the Earth, so much like an Apple is to a Tree. “A tree Apples and the Earth Peoples: — Alan Watts People are the fruit of the Earth, so much like an apple is to a tree. The tree takes it’s time growing up and finally bears fruit. The apple grows and matures but has little say in the matter and only two possibilities for it’s future exist. Maybe, they are even the same in a way, It could be a crab apple, a bit sour, left on the branch until over ripened then falling to the ground. It is returned to the Earth nurturing her, providing nutrients to the soil. Or, maybe it’s a red delicious apple, sweet and juicy. Birds pick at it, insects live in it, or it is harvested and sent to the grocery store. It is being given to you, the apple, or to life to be enjoyed. It’s purpose is simply to help sustain other forms of life. It is life at the height of beauty and working perfection. In effect, either scenario is the same. It nurtures either way and even looks beautiful in the process, yet the apple has no choice. The best outcome is for life to benefit from it, other life. People are really the same, yet I believe unlike the apple, we have a choice. You can sit alone being sour like a crab apple, eventually getting returned to the earth in a box nurturing worms.Continue Reading
