I was recently in a coaches office and couldn’t help but notice some of the motivational posters on the wall. The poster was read desire in bright red letters and under the word desire it said “some people want it to happen…. some people wish it to happen… others make it happen”
This poster really resonates with me. I have some wants and desires so I meet the first two criteria now I want to meet the last. The last is truly the crux of it all. This is the most important point of desire getting it done or making it happen.
Desire is the act of wanting something and it is important to gaining fulfillment however unfulfilled desire is often life. We will always desire something more, this is the desire paradox. Understanding desires can help with mitigating the damage that desire does when we try to “make it happen”. Ranking our desires helps too.
I wish for a healthy happy family more than a thriving business so I will choose to attend the childrens little league games over spending late nights in my office.
I think desires matter and everyone should have healthy desires and I hope they achieve them. I just hope that we do not loose sight of what will truly make us happy and that is honestly our relationships with friends and family.
Saturday afternoon was spent with my wife the dog and my niece kayaking out to a light house and an island. We stopped on the island swam tried to get the dog into the water ( failed) and then got back into the kayaks. My wife took pictures and they were saved in her phone and marked as moments.
These are truly moments, last year we did the same thing with my daughter (we left the dog at home then). At the end of the day Saturday we were; wet, tired, a little sun burnt but I felt content. Just thinking back on the time spent Saturday and last year makes me smile.
Take time every day to have these moments with family and friends. You will experience all kinds of moments and how you live it out will make a huge difference on whether or not thinking about the moments make you smile or frown.
No matter what the moment is be kind (that is a tough one because in some moments friends and families are not always agreeable). No matter what the moment is realize it is that a moment so stay present.
It is the 8th day of Pride month in 2022. Pride month is, an month long celebration of the LGBTQ community, a celebration and remembrance of the Stonewall riots which occurred at the end of June 1969.
Right now as the nation celebrates Pride month there are representatives that have and are working to pass legislation that will make it impossible for students to discuss or learn about families from the LGBTQ community. The term for the laws is “Don’t Say Gay” laws.
These “Don’t say gay Laws” are discriminatory hateful laws made with with the intention of teaching children that LGBTQ families are not as important or legitimate as other families and that is shameful.
There was a graduate at the Pineview public school in Florida who was chosen to speak for his graduating class. The speaker was the class president and because of the hateful inhumane legislation passed in Florida the speaker was told that he could not mention his experience as being a gay student. When we prevent someone from expressing themselves in a polite non profane manner a message is sent and that is that that person is not welcome. Many people feel this way about the LGBTQ+ community.
People will say things like “I am fine with everyone but I don’t want to see two people of the same sex kissing”. They are lying to you and themselves. Instead of the lawmakers addressing their own bias and hate they are redirecting this hate to our children.
Kids that are not part of the LGBTQ+ community will not learn tolerance through and quite the opposite they will learn that it is not ok to be gay. I have to tell you this. IT IS OK TO BE GAY.
LGBTQ+ children need to learn this at home, and at school. Life is tough especially if you are part of a minority and the last things our children need is for the law to make their lives tougher.
Let’s make sure that we teach all children that it is ok to be Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersex or straight. Let’s focus on teaching our children that every family that is rooted in love matters.
I just finished reading an article on the Inc. website. The article gave some advice to managers on, how one should avoid being friends with any of their employees and exactly how to treat all their employees.
The article used the advice that a 5th grade teacher gave to her students on how to treat everyone.
I think this advice should apply for everyone and should be used throughout our entire lives.
Every person matters and if they do not matter to you then they should and they will if you learn about them. When everyone matters you will notice them, you may not find it easy to be friendly to all of them ( some real a@$$ hats out there), you may also have trouble making room for them, however if you are rooting for them and if you can empathize with them then you maybe able to be more friendly and make some
Of course we will all have special places in our lives and our heart for our family, friends and loved ones however, when we realize how special the act of living is I think then we can find ourselves in a position that will allow us to head the fifth grade teachers advice to her students.
The odds of you me and every person alive being born is 1 in 400 trillion. Some more information here on that math. Basically the odds of you being born are almost zero! Once you let that sink in you should be able to find it in your heart to root for everyone even the a@! hats out there.
The odds were against them even showing up on the third rock from the sun and so after overcoming those odds one has to believe that these folks can and will change right? With some empathy kindness and friends maybe…
The other thing about empathy and friendship is that it beats the alternative. Which is apathy and meanness. when we loose hope in humanity and meanness is a slippery slope. Almost every religious text warns us about being mean. In the King James bible we are warned in provides that a mean person will be paid back with meanness (it really is a vicious circle). With all that in mind there is also nothing wrong with being a friend to yourself first and then others (remember we cannot put the oxygen mask on the kid if we are not wearing our own). It is easy to overlook self care and we should not do that. T
Today lets take care of ourselves, loved ones and everyone.
Today is January 4 2022 C.E. That is a fact. I started my work day with my daily list and on the opposite page of that list I wrote down 6 new year resolutions. I have a friend (yes only one (ha ha )), he does not seem to like resolutions. My friends reasons for the disdain of resolutions is the same as the others. Let’s see… no one keeps them, it is just an arbitrary thing, they are stupid, they set you up for failure and so on and so on. I have always liked resolutions and starting over. Ever since I was a child.
I was the kid who would build a city out of legos destroy it and rebuild it. I love the act of rebuilding doing something over and over again with just small changes and for me that is what a new years resolutions is like. I know, I know that we don’t get to reset our lives I realize that we do things that build over the years and time and the things can bring us good or bad results and that is why I try my best to make good new years resolutions and not bad ones. I choose resolutions like read 10 books instead of read 0 books (reading is so good for us!(it really is )).
My wife was speaking with my step daughter about doing something she was scared of and my wife told her that she has regretted things she did not try more than anything she has tried. I know that many of my new years resolutions may not get accomplished however I am a Cleveland Browns fan so I am totally ok with failure as long as I gave it my best shot.
I refuse to let the idea that I will not keep a resolution stop me from making and trying to keep one.
Time is an odd thing. When you think about time is about as abstract a concept as you can come up with and it is almost impossible to measure. Ask any scientist worth their weight and they will tell you the same. Many scientist will tell you that time doesn’t really exist at all. Every scientist will tell you that time is relative at best. I think that there have been some pretty famous papers written on the relativity of time and yet, you should never make it a practice to arrive late for appointments. Arriving late is a good way to upset friends family and get fired. Despite the wibbily wobbily nature of time (wink to all the Dr. Who fans), we all agree on time and try our best to arrive on time and mark time in our own ways. I refuse to let the nature of time to stop me from making a resolution.
Take some time today to create a list of things you want to get done this year and write this list down. 2022 is going to feel long and tiresome when it does look at your list and see where you are at. You may get to scratch something off the list. Oh man I get such an endorphin rush when I do this. I make a list every day of things I want to get done just so I can scratch them off. The year will feel long but it will be over before you know it when it ends and you are staring in the face of 2023 pull out the list and see all that you have done this will also feel amazing
“Gentlemen, we will chase perfection, and we will chase it relentlessly, knowing all the while we can never attain it. But along the way, we shall catch excellence.”
― Vince Lombardi
Happiness is? Subjective right? I mean a memory from Sunday school growing up was the youth pastor explaining heaven. “My dad imagines heaven as a farm in the country and I imagine that heaven will be a beautiful city with sidewalks.” – youth pastor Block (courtesy of Johns childhood memories)
Heaven is like happiness. My happiness and your happiness probably do not line up. I don’t know many people but there are some that do not enjoy petting a happy dog (I know crazy right?)! Our idea of happiness changes as we live our lives too.
When I was younger I was happy at my friends house watching his snake in the aquarium, now the snakes kind of make my skin crawl a little. I saw one on a walk with my dog two days ago and nearly jumped out of my skin.
Some say that being happy is a choice. I am not sure about that. I can choice to pursue things that I believe will make me happy however if I do not receive these things will I still be happy? Also, what things will make me happy? Lots of questions no answers.
I find joy in the unknown and the search for the truth. I really do. I think that this is good because I spend a lot of life with unknowns and looking for truth. If we are completely honest with ourselves well all do.
Enjoy every moment as much as you can because we never know when we will not be here anymore.
The heroes used math to predict when society would collapse and their reward for this insight was exile from the society they served. No good deed goes unpunished, am I right?
I have always been intrigued by the capabilities of predicative algorithms and probability. Right now algorithms are used in our lives everyday, often unknown working behind the scenes algorithms influence our career home choice where we are seated on public travel. There is a pretty good book Weapons of Math Destruction. The book outlines how and when algorithms are used in our lives.
The stock market is a pretty volatile business world. Fortunes can be made and destroyed in short spans of time. There are some pretty interesting predictive algorithms that are used by powerful players in the stock market that work well to make many fortunes.
There are some very accurate algorithms out there and some of the predicative algorithms are becoming more and more accurate. I for one love the idea of knowing what the future can hold. I think I like it because I understand that the future is not written it doesn’t even exist time doesn’t exist really. The future is simply the effect of the cause and the cause is the present. Pulling levers now makes a difference immediately and in the future.
I have some children and my major desire for my children was, initially for them to be healthy and happy however I quickly realized I had very little influence over those aspects of their lives and happy is pretty subjective. Now that the children are older I just want them to do the right thing. I want them to be Good with the capital G. I myself also want to do as much good as I can.
I really think that this is the most we can do. With all the predictive algorithms and formulas and tools we have doing good is still the best thing we can do. Thwe formulas and tools can help us choose the most good thing to do but at the end of the day it is doing the good or right things that will save humans and the world.
For as long as I can remember I have been a comic book fan. I love the stories, the art, the heroes and the villain’s. In a good comic book it all comes together for an enjoyable read. A real treat.
Most comic books feature a main protagonist, their name is usually plastered on the front of the magazine. The worlds our heroes protect and villain’s terrorize are mythical landscapes some are dystopian style and others are more balanced but in almost every comic book the villain is awful in their deeds. Some comic books have taken strides in humanizing their villains’ through back stories but still the actions of the villain’s are big. What the villains do gives the protagonist a mountain to climb and provides drama that propels the story forward. In the new comic book from DC Superman:Son of Kal-El. Jon Kent son of superman and Louis Lane does take on some real life villains like climate change, as well as a pretty bogus villain that was just introduced this month, and in the Marvel property The Black Panther, our heroes take on racism’s as well as the heinous villains. In the comic book Superman Lex Luthor the CEO of Lexcorp ran for and became president of the United States. Lex Luthor Divested from his company and made Talia Al Ghul the president of Lexcorp. Donald Trump never divested from his company while he was president, so the writers could not even imagine a world where someone would be as awful a president as Donald Trump was.
In the comic books good always wins, this is also true for the real world however in most comic books our protagonists defeat good on their own or with a partner, this is not how it works in the real world. To defeat evil or bad things we all have to work together. We can’t strap on a cap and eradicate diseases, poverty, climate change or crime.
Right now the world is experiencing a health pandemic with Covid 19. The last case of Polio in the United states was recorded in 1979. The scientists worked together with the doctors to craft a vaccination against Polio. The hospitals worked with communities to administer the vaccine and the citizens took the vaccine. Right now scientists and hospitals have done their part now it is time to step up and do ours. We have to get vaccinated. Herd immunity is essentially a myth. The mythical nature of herd immunity is being proven with the Delta variant of Covid 19. We have proof in nations that have not embraced the Polio vaccine like the United States that without a majority of citizens doing the right thing through vaccination we will never beat this villain. Afghanistan and Pakistan have been vaccine hesitant with the Polio vaccine and Polio still exists there unfortunately it seems that the children suffer the most.
There was just another story this morning on the news about a healthy college student Freshman that would not get vaccinated who died from Covid 19. If you love your children, grandchildren, family and neighbors it seems like you would jump at the chance to be a hero.
If you have already been vaccinated I salute you and thank you for doing your part you are a hero. If you haven’t been vaccinated I implore you to be brave. Joshua 1:9 Tells us to be brave and of good courage. Roll up your selves and get the jab.
This link will give you more information on where and how to get vaccinated.
The Corrigan Encore 