I was watching this the other day and it’s interesting… is there a reasonable choice here or is it ‘frame’ job?

A short note today about climbing back on the horse.   I was dumping recently about the loss of IS from our Business School.  So now I need to move on to the third part of my three part rant.  How do you climb back on the horse when you fall off?

Don’t climb on for a while: The power of reflection

I think the key thing for most people who have a setback is to take time to think through the failure and ask, “what do I need to learn here?”.  I have learned that by picking a small discipline, that’s ‘fringe’ I was always at risk.   There are many others about that are the same.  The changing flux of social systems means you sometimes have to create new ways of seeing just to survive.  One only has to look at the history of recent trends with e-commerce to know what I mean.

Yet, in failure we can find reflection and that can help us learn.  When we have a setback the best thing to do is find something else to take our mind off things.  This can be helping someone with their problems, taking a course, reading a book, crying (ok that’s a little bit nasty), or simply put: doing anything that stops us from feeling like losers.  The next thing we can do once the pain has subsided enough, is begin to collect the lessons.  Think: what did I learn from that and what could I learn about better in the future?  Why did I do so poorly? Write it down and think about it.  It may help you find clarity and help you fail your way to success.

Don’t judge where you are now based on your present circumstances

The other thing we need to do to climb back on the horse, is not to judge where we are now by the way we are in our present circumstance.  Without revisting all of the cliches, I can say that stuff changes.  In my own life I have had many failures.  However, in each one of these failures, I have learned that you fail most of the time.  I like to think of it this way:   fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, win, fail, fail, win.  If life was continued success, it would be great but just about 3/10 things I try work.  Those that do, often surprise me.  You can’t ‘know’ the market or job or whatever as well as you may think.  People don’t often think the same way… there’s context to consider.

How to get back on the horse

The best way to get back on the horse, is to do this.  Start again.  When you have failed, you have one of two choices… stay down or get up.  What will you do?  Stay there lying on the floor, weeping, moaning, crying… no you have to get up.  Sure as hell it ain’t easy.  I have done it so many times that I am growing sick of it… but if you don’t keep growing you become stagnant and/or worse begin to wither.  Is that what you want?

Now you may be reading this and thinking, ‘great general advice’.  My response is, a seed of a dream is still a start.  It may take years to get back on the horse… but if it’s what you know you should be doing, then you should do it.  You just have to.  It doesn’t matter if it doesn’t sell… being true to your instincts is what matters.  What if you lose it all?  I did.  So what?  I had not much to lose anyway, sure it pissed my wife off!  I can go to my grave knowing I tried, I died and I lived another day.  All you have to do is get up and start thinking, you can do it.  I am not guaranteeing you will win next time either, you probably won’t.   Yet the taste of victory, in all it’s rarity, it’s a great thing.  It feels good to have a win.  I am still waiting for the ‘big one’.  But, I have had so many little wins by going again when I didn’t feel like it, that I felt I could honestly not handle it anymore.   What did I do?  I pissed around for awhile, procrastinated… then I got up and tried and failed again!

One of my life goals was to get into a particular journal.  Twice before I had been told NO (once after three revisions… that sucked ass.  Eventually a time came when I got in and alas I made it!  Now, will I get a payrise from this?  No.  Will I get a new house?  No.  What did I get?  I got what I wanted?  How long did it take? 5 years!  Actually, I told my current employer that I would publish in this journal when I started.  Which was stupid, yet it set the agenda and I did get it.  Sure, it means nothing but something important to me and my co-author.  Yet I did it!  It felt good getting the acceptance letter.  It seems trivial but that letter showed me that if I am willing to try and believe, I can acheive anything I want to.  Even if people and institutions stop supporting me.  You can do it.

Let me encourage you today by saying this: if you died and your greatest desire wasn’t fulfilled would you be sad?  Yes you would!  What if you died trying?  Went down in flames as it were?  Then you died trying, that’s 90% better than what most of us do.  Be the die trying person… I dare you!

If you are out there and you are a father… Happy Fathers Day!

Hope you have or are having a great day!

Recently I watched this video with landscape photographer Alain Briot.  He takes an interesting view on goal setting by saying that we should set low-expectations more frequently that set big goals less frequently.   I think during times when personal growth is required, perhaps the best way to tackle it is to make serious choices about what actions to take.  This tricks your mind into focusing on the small picture, while you gradually build the bigger picture.  Nothing new… just interesting I thought. For example, we could give into pressure and quit or we could make the way slowly by changing our expectations.

Changing your expectations

The beautiful thing about that video is that you don’t need to think beyond what it says in order to do it.  All you really need is to set a very small goal and then once you achieve that set a slighter bigger one.  My main problem is that I have set stupid goals and not got there and then got discouraged.  Perhaps it’s easier to set a smaller goal, achieve it then do the next thing.  There is however a catch with this way of thinking.

The catch

As it says in the video you need to make sure that you can do what you can, if it’s a small thing.  For example, Alain speaks of how when he was working as a grad student that he could exchange doing that for making money in photography.  The older you get, the harder this seems to be.  Nevermind, people keep telling me that it’s never too late to start.  But start what you say?  Well you have find the music in you and build on it.  Watch for my up-coming post on craftmanship that will deal with this.

Rather than say a lot more I would encourage you to watch the video (at least the first 10 minutes anyway – to get the gist) and reflect on what you are doing now.  The usual excuses apply of course… children to feed, rent/mortgage to pay.  This is why I have to think about sidebusinesses and the like!  However, keep an open mind as you watch this, the sheer brilliance of simplicity is very interesting.

Even the most productive workers are vulnerable to time sucks when certain triggers interrupt their day. One of the most popular of these triggers is the Internet, and social media sites, e-mail and blogs become addicting fast. But the key to maximizing the time you spend at work is to learn how to defend yourself against those traps and use the Internet in a more constructive way. First you’ll need to identify the websites that tempt you the most every day. By becoming more disciplined, you’ll be able to balance out the distractions along with your list of things you need to finish up before heading home. Keep reading for some popular ways that the Internet sabotages your workday, and what you can do to defend yourself.
•    Social media sites: Now that social media sites are for business networking as well as connecting with friends, they’re not always blocked on work computers and may even be encouraged. But logging on can also result in hours of procrastination as you click through pictures and update your own profile. To strike a balance, limit yourself to visiting only one social media site while you’re at work, and make sure it’s an account that you use for professional networking only. Set a timer or only log on during lunch to keep your Internet use to a minimum.
•    E-mail: Set up a separate work account than your personal account for organization’s sake and to keep yourself focused on work. Don’t subscribe to any shopping alerts or RSS feeds on your work account, either. If you’re still addicted to checking for new messages every few minutes, close your e-mail and only check it every hour or half hour. Many e-mail servers allow you to set up alerts whenever you receive an e-mail from a specified person, so you can still stick to your schedule and not have to worry about missing something important.
•    Blogs and websites: We all have our list of daily must-reads, from celebrity gossip sites to techie blogs. If you can, check these sites from your BlackBerry or iPhone on your way to work or during lunch. Consider them extra reading material. You wouldn’t open up your copy of your favorite John Grisham instead of prepping for a meeting, would you? Just because it’s on the Internet doesn’t mean it’s not separating you from what you should be doing.

*This post was contributed by Megan Jones, who writes about the online college degree. She welcomes your feedback at Meg.Jones0310 at gmail.com

Every now and again something catches your eye in the news and you are left with something to think about.  Here is one such article:

Redcliffe’s tent city.

If you are unsure where Redcliffe is in Australia (no not in Victoria) then check this website out:

Redcliffe near the beach

In this article we see people who are homeless living in tents near the beach.  What caught my attention was the sheer irony of this.  Here we have beaches and a seaside community with a collection of homeless people living by the beach.  Incredible isn’t it?  Now for once I am not inclined to rant (or ramble) but I will say as much as this: Where do we go when hard times fall on us?  I remember when I was studying the generosity of my relatives who cared for and looked after me.  It certainly makes you think.

When I think of reality… I think about Dick.  That’s right.  Phillip K. Dick.  He was the master of frying our collective non-consciousness by attempting to unravel the fabric of reality.  So what exactly is the fabric of reality? Polyester?  I remember watching Dr Katz and seeing the visual cartoon representation of David Duchovny reflecting on how he couldn’t tell the difference between his dreams or reality and how he had often thought reality was a representation of his dreams rather than the other way round.  Or put in words that I can understand reality is a simulation of our dreams and our dreams are the reality.

I find this interesting because in a way David, and probably a dozen or so solipsist philosophers, have a point. We can create realities from somewhere (the guts) that harm us… terribly. We can believe we are worthless or not of any value which is dangerous.

Why a false concept is dangerous

A false concept as Roy Bhaskar and someone else once said, is one that does not appear to reach a sense of what we call reality.  I shall it the Matix (I have filed the patent).  If our concept of our personal Matrix is false it too can be dangerous because it can put us at odds with our fellow colleagues, friends, neighbours, reverends, cheese, and the most important thing… life itself.  That aside, I think we fail to represent reality to ourselves with the wrong meaning, one that poisons our minds, we harm ourselves.

Low self esteem as a concept is dangerous par example…

We can believe in things that are harmful.  If I believe that I am worthless then to me I have that ‘reality’ as a false assessment of myself.  If I think of myself as useless then that false concept harms me  It will create in your mind a hotbed of lies about what people think about you, what they say, how they act and what they do.  More to the point this false concept is DANGEROUS.  It makes you think about things that may or may not actually be what other people think… it could be that people think you to be a toss.  If that is so, and it may be, is it any business of yours?  Probably, but I digress.

What I am saying here is that there are some “things” we believe which harm us dreadfully.  When you agree with people who create false concepts for you to believe in,  you are saying, “yes I am useless”.  You believe it then VOILA it is so.   If you believe it, it becomes reality to you.  You then take false reality to work, to bed, to the shower, to the toilet, to the kitchen, to the car, to the shops, to the doctor, to the lawyer and so on.  I am haunted by plenty of false realities… yet I am hoping through the use of my mind, spirit, body and will I overcome these ‘demons’ and begin enjoying life.  No false concepts here… keep moving.

In concluding this post I want to encourage you not to believe your own press… if it’s bad.  Bhaskar, for all his vagueness and Theosophy has a point… we shouldn’t believe false concepts.  Things we know that don’t help or cause us to lack effectiveness.  I implore you, don’t let the evil people in this world of asshattery convince you of false concepts.  You have value… and not just transcendent value either (I am looking at you Roy), I speak of actual value.     Some concepts are false, bad, evil, wrong, sick and nasty.  Don’t allow your reality to be invaded by them.

courtesy http://missdebbie.net/

A while back I started reading self-help books.  Now, I need as much help as the next guy HOWEVER… I am starting to wonder why this phenomena has become so successful.  Yeah I know (potential flamers) that thousands of people realised this long before I did.   Anyway, as a preclusion to the following let me say that I think that you can get a lot of value from reading self-help books.  But, one thing has bothered me… so much so that I am about to say it in CAPS:

I DON’T HAVE A VISION!!!

Phew.  That’s better. Nine out of every ten self-helpers will promote the idea of ‘manifesting’ or ‘having a vision’.  What if there’s nothing there?  I stopped (as in put the book back on the shelf and closed it NEVER to open again) reading a book that began with … all you need is a vision.   I suspect that I have dreams, passions and desires.  I sure as hell do (read this for more information).  Nevertheless I have been thinking about this for a while… I have no great desire to do anything much.  Sure, if I could land an agent and sell my book to a willing publisher that would be good.  Getting promoted recently was also pretty sweet and having children is lots of fun.  Yet, inside the great vast of my spirit is the essence of nothing.

I am not alone.  I know of heaps of people that are clueless about the reason they exist.  From the time I was sixteen until now I have had desires, only to find out after a period of time that I no longer wanted to do that.  Perhaps I am a transcient?  Anyway enough glamourous navel gazing let’s think outside the box.

Visions for sale

Perhaps the core part of the problem lies in the belief that our lives are said to have a grand ‘awesome’ plan to them.  What if we decided to anti-vision?  OR Anti-plan?  Let’s imagine that there is already a plan and the plan is to find out how NOT to plan?  I feel at peace the most when I am relaxing and not worrying too much about what tomorrow will bring.  Maybe anti-planning is the answer?  Planning to not have a plan… living by … emergence?  As things cross our paths we can deal with them and begin to build a better existence for ourselves.  Why do we need a vision?  Yes, I know, I have said having a vision is important… but hey MAYBE I AM WRONG!  I think what we find in the majority of self-help literatures is the manifestation of false hope syndrome. We believe in hope and hope lies to us.

We believe in what they say so badly we think we need a grand narrative and meaning to our lives.  Go to a cemetary one day for fun.  Look at the tombstones.  These are ordinary people that died, perhaps they had a dream, perhaps they didn’t.  What’s important now is that they are food for worms.  They are no more.  However, this is not a depressing thing.  It means simply that life can be ordinary.

Life is ordinary… most of time

I can count the amount of times I have had ‘defining moments on one hand.  Marriage, when my kids were born, getting my first real job etc.  Yet, none of these things teaches me about me.  It teaches me, that life is like a punctuated equilibrium with long delays inbetween the spikes.  Why do we strive to work SO hard to have all this stuff that destroys us in the end.  Why?  Is being ordinary so damned terrible that we have to avoid it.  We can’t all be Richard Branson or GOD FORBID Bill Gates.  No, you can’t all be rich millionaries.  SORRY.  Through hard work, divine favour (perhaps), money and good connections you can be something you think you should be… although I am wondering about the hard work part.   Everything I have I worked for, yet in that, the best things I have at the moment were given to me.  Hmm… DOWN WITH WORK!

I guess the point of this post is to highlight the beauty of the ordinary.  There is real worth in being nobody in particular.   Ambition is a double edged sword that on one hand makes you want something but on the other takes you to extraordinary lengths to achieve it. Why do that?  Be normal, be beautiful!

Why should we sell our souls for a vision?

Hello everyone… I have a lot going on at the moment so I just wanted to let my readers know that I am taking some time off the blog. I have felt the last two months or so that I need to work out why I am doing this and if it adds value or interests me.

Given that at the moment it isn’t adding value or making me interested I need some time to sort out if I want to continue down this road. I will see after a short break if it’s worth my while continuing.

All the best.

Luke

On recent expedition to the internet I discovered that another site (nameless it will remain) that promised access to riches in a quick, easy and sure-fire manner.  This got me thinking about life (of course).  In life we often spend a very long time looking for shortcuts.  There is probably nothing wrong with looking for the “shortcut to glory” but there is something very wrong with making a promise based on the illusion of such.

We live in a shortcut society

There I said it.  We live in a society that demands we create short ways of doing things, whether it be ad-hoc applications of the so-called “power law” or the adaptation of techniques designed to save time.  I have heard this rhetoric for a while, that you develop new ideas as “leverage” and this leads to ultimate power and success.  So far in my short life anything that I have wanted (doctorate, children, marriage, friendships) has come at a price.  There is indeed nothing that comes at a price.  Given that we live in a shortcut society, we should therefore be wary of “quick” “easy” and “sure-fire” solutions to the problems we face.

So what is life really all about?

I am sure I have no idea.  My last post about emergent strategy reflects what I am going through at the moment with my life.  What comes next?  I am not certain as I am sure most of you are.  The lack of certainty and general malaise that comes with it reminds me that I still have the burning sense of achievement in my stomach, yet defining this shapeless void is particularly difficult.  I know that if I was rich perhaps I would be happier?  I doubt it.  Having money does not lead to happiness or success.  Success in the truest sense escapes definition for me at present perhaps because I don’t what it would look like if I saw it.  If I did see it, how would I know it?  I wouldn’t.

The question is then would a sure-fire way to make riches even exist.  If it did would it solve my problems?  Every time in society when we lean on the “quick” solution we only need another “quick” solution to fix the previous one.   Can I suggest that if something is too good to be true it usually is.  This isn’t a truism, especially when we consider the masterwork of chocolate known as the crunchie (yes it’s as good as it sounds) or when you see a magnificent view or notice how much you love your children.  There are things that are good enough to be true.  However, most things that are designed to make you rich quick usually make you poor(er) quicker.

So I will end this somber post with a warning.  Everything that has value, work, life, God, cheese, the things in between, all of the above etc, is based on something that took time to make.  In life the things you value the most are more than likely the things that took the most time to make.  A happy marriage for example takes listening to your wife and doing what she says I mean following orders, working hard to build the life your wife wants, takes time, thought and effort. You don’t arrive anywhere without building, patience and work.  Now I know work sucks, but what would you rather a quick, easy, sure-fire solution that leaves you worse off than when you said.  Let me leave you with something out of context:

Wise words often fall on barren ground, but a kind word is never thrown away – Arthur Helps.