My 2009 resolutions:
- blog
- run
- snap
- budget
- organize
What do you plan on accomplishing this year.
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Tags: blog, GTD, life, Photo, resolutions
Too many people are just passing through life. To them, it is a chore. There isn’t anything interesting or intriguing, you just wake up and move on. No purpose or goal and everything seems mediocre. The problem is passion. They lack a driving force in their life.
Passion
Passion is a corner stone for a prosperous life. Passion for anything and everything you do. Seek out projects and get involved with them. Feel a personal connection to them. Build value in your life by surrounding yourself with things you care about. The world will look bland if you never look up.
Take on things you care about. It means nothing to fill your life with stepping stones. Don’t seek out a job only because it will lead to a “better one.” That can be a factor but not the factor. That better job may never come and you will settle with what you have.
We have a limited amount of time and there is no need to waste it. Seek out what you are passionate for and don’t be ashamed of it. If you like taking pictures, then take pictures. Don’t spend time thinking about how goofy you look or how bad your photos might be. If your friends and family are important to you, then spend more time with them.
Boredom
Every so often someone will tell me they are constantly bored. They sit around and complain about it and refuse to take a step in a different direction. This is shocking. There are so many opportunities and they can’t even find one that interests them. The problem may be linked to respect.
Respect
Respect your passion and the passion of others. One reason people don’t follow their passion is because they are too worried about what others think. This shouldn’t be an issue. Your passion is for you and no one else. Respect it and pursue it. Passion is solely for the one pursuing it. Don’t judge another’s passion. Let them seek it out and enjoy it.
I have a passion for technology, photography, numbers, writing, movies, and books. What are yours?
It is starting to get cold outside and I am hoping to have a very white and snow filled winter. The cold air seems to bring back a memory from my childhood. When I was younger, around 3rd or 4th grade, I believed that gloves were cool and mittens were dorky. I wouldn’t be caught dead going out to play with mittens on. All the cool kids wore gloves. At home we had a pair of mittens that were never taken out of the hat and glove box.1
Then I advanced into middle school and high school. Magically, mittens were cool. It seemed like everyone had a pair of those knitted mittens. They would wear them all the time: indoors, outdoors, summer, and winter.
In hindsight all this was pretty silly. Hand garments aren’t a status symbol. It is crazy how young people put a coolness factor on everything. Mittens are more practical because they keep your fingers together to maintain warmth. Gloves are practical because they allow you to use your fingers. They both have their advantages but I wouldn’t consider either one dorky or cool. People can and have devoted lifetimes to understanding these social trends.
In case you are wondering, I had planned this whole post to be about gloves and mittens. That is dorky.
Photo by kathrynivy
- Notice that my family called it a hat and glove box, not a mitten box. ↩
Tags: cool kids, gloves, knitted mittens, memory, Photo, social trends
When I was a young lad, on New Year’s Eve I would watch cartoons on Cartoon Network. The whole family would be over. The kids were in the basement watching TV and the parents upstairs enjoying some tasty beverages. It was a blast, especially the cartoon part.
The one year that comes to mind, Cartoon Network was previewing a number of shows that were being considered for full time. Among them were (if my memory serves) Power Puff Girls, Johnny Bravo, and Dexter’s Lab. Throughout the night you could call in and vote for the one that you thought was the best. I never called, mostly because I thought it was silly and didn’t make a difference. In hindsight I was most likely right.
That year as I sat and watched these shows I started to get a little down. You see, I didn’t have the knowledge I do now and had some interesting thoughts about the TV studios. In my mind there was a single man in the studio who had to put in the tape (this was back when my family owned a VCR) to start the next show. He would manually load all the shows and commercials and take all the calls. I started to feel bad for this person and wonder why I was so lucky. I imagined that he was sitting there in this dark room all sad that he had to do this while his family was having a party at home. I wondered what he did to pass the time. He must have already seen these new shows since he worked for Cartoon Network. I could only guess that he sat there staring into space with a bottle of juice. I really wished we could invent a robot to switch the tapes so he can go home with his family.
I now know that it is mostly automated and there is no one manually changing tapes in a VCR. There probably is someone who is working there during New Year’s Eve, but I don’t think it is anything like the scenario I imagined. Looking back, I find it interesting that I never felt this way on Christmas.
Tags: Cartoon Network, cartoons, family, New Year's Eve, TV
I have been in a bit of a rut as of late. You may have noticed by the lack of posts going up. The good news is that I have pinpointed the problem. The blog has become less about me and more about what I believe others want. I stopped writing about things I cared about and started to try and figure out what my readers (all 4.68 of them) would like. After awhile I realized the problem.
If I write purely for my readers, you will get half assed and mediocre articles. There will be no emotion or personal interest driving the article. Unless I am interested in it, I will see no point in writing it. I may force one out just to get something up, but that doesn’t do anyone any good.
Writing for others also made it hard to find topics to cover. There aren’t many topics that will be right for everyone and the result is no post at all or they are all over the place to try and cover the entire audiance. There is no formula to follow that will guarantee good results.
From here on out I will get back to my roots. I started blogging for me. I wrote articles so that others can see my interests and opinions. I want to put my energy back into something that I care about and hopefully the result will be higher quality and more frequent articles. The posts will be about whatever I choose and can be anywhere from two lines to a 1000 word essay.
If you find yourself in the same situation as me then start writting for yourself. Write articles you would want to see and that you want others to know about. Put your opinion in there and take ownership for every word you place on your site, even if you end up being completely wrong. This is my site and I want to be proud of it.
Tags: A Bit Eclectic, ABE, audiance, blog, emotion, ownership, personal interest, writting
Design. Every day I surf the web reading articles and trying new services. As I proceed on my journey I see sites that have amazing design. Sites ranging from crazy, cluttered and creative to bare bones simple. Every time that I cross paths with great design it creates a burning desire. I want so badly to have the knowledge to mold my site how I see fit.
I love the theme I have. It does a great job and my eyes don’t bleed when I look at it, but it isn’t mine. I didn’t create it and it doesn’t satisfy my wants. The problem is that I lack the knowledge and creativity to build my own.
My personality drives me to learn new things and tackle new problems. Some day I hope to learn enough to create something that will satisfy my wants. As of right now I just have too much on my plate* and must settle with a simple blog post.
* If you don’t believe me, you can ask those who are: waiting for my photos, wanting to hang out, suggesting I work more, etc.
Tags: blog, creativity, Design, personality, problem, Website
Most of us have heard the phrase “when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” We sometime fail to realize that there are other things we can make with these lemons. We can make lemon pie, lemon flavored italian ice, lemon smoothies, lemon cookies, etc. The point is that even when you get hit with tons of problems they can be turned into many different good things.
There is a limit to the conversion. There are only so many problems, or lemons, that one person can handle. After a certain point it just gets ridiculous. You can keep making delicious treats but lets face it, nobody would like an entire lemon flavored meal. I don’t want to sit down and eat some lemon cookies with my lemon pie and have lemonade while I prepare my lemon basted turkey.
So remember, when life gives you lemons create delicious food but fix the problem before you create a meal.
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