As resolutions go, the loftier, more aspirational the more likely we are to proclaim them. So, here goes.

Image used via CC license from @atmosphera

After reading this book and watching this documentary in the past few weeks, it sends home the message that I’ve been thinking for a few months: we are a culture of excess. According to this NY Times article, Americans throw away 96 billion pounds of food per year; our hard drives are filled with terabytes of information; (remember, Bill Gates said that “640KB should be enough for anybody.”); and we sit in our congested homes and watch a show about hoarding. After spending time serving the needy in Mexico this year, I am astounded at how much I truly have.

While my house may not have 35 years of junk packed to the ceiling, I hoard. I have more than 100 GB of digital photographs; more than 50 GB of (legal) digital music files; and myriad digital fragments that tug at my mind. More than that, I have scattered bits and pieces of hobbies and aspirations crowding the RAM of my mind. Is it any wonder that medication for ADD is so highly prescribed.

So, here it is.

1. I want to carefully evaluate the things that are truly important to my life.

2. Evaluate the areas of my life that are in conflict with #1.

3. Take more time to tidy up (archive) my digital life.

4. Say “no” more.

I don’t expect this to be quick or easy, but I want to begin the movement towards simplicity. Cheers.

How about you?

Feature image used via CC license.

A few minutes ago, I popped open my twitter feed and read a numbing tweet from Jack Harvey.

A “Pennington” search confirmed my worst fears; Trey succumbed to the darkest of human conditions–hopelessness. Trey was a man of faith. He was a family man, and if you ever had a conversation with him, you likely had a sense that he was grounded. He was. Depression is not a respecter of education, class, faith, family, fame, or “happiness.” It strikes like a viper and speaks worthlessness and desperation directly to the core of those who taste its venom.

When I read Bridget Pilloud’s tribute to Trey and personal struggle with depression, I was struck by the simple gesture of her professor that assisted her off the ledge:

She asked me if I was thinking about suicide.

Yes, I said.

I was so depressed that I didn’t realize that she was going to try to talk me out of it. I thought she was going to say Go For It, or maybe Where are your poems? I want to publish a chapbook posthumously.

I was wrong.

You’re a mother right? She asked.

Yeah, I said, but you know, he’ll have his dad, and if I do it now, he won’t remember me.

She nodded. She was quiet for a moment and then she said, My mother killed herself when I was 9. She jumped off the balcony of our house. And every day since the day she died, I’ve wondered what I could have done differently.

I remember looking down at my doc marten mary janes.

Then she said, If you decide to kill yourself, understand that you are dooming your two-year-old to always wonder what was so wrong with him that you chose to kill yourself instead of being his mother.

I thought of my boy. I thought of my mother and how many times I thought I had failed her, and wondered what was so wrong with me.

And I never considered suicide again.  It stopped being an option.

We all hear a little voice from time to time; it’s usually no big deal. It might be that we feel like we failed a project, or because of a string of mess-ups, the voice says you are a “failure.” We may see that we’ve gained a few pounds in the mirror, but that voice tells says, “no one will ever love you.” These strikes are lies, that’s all they are. Eventually after listening to them time and again, the voice builds one on another and says “you have no reason to live.” Bridget heard the lies, and fortunately she was able to share her story with someone outside that gave her a different perspective and spoke truth into her life.

We have relationships all around us where the voice is striking. From the outside, it’s not always easy to see evidence of it. But our ability to listen and not always fix is the perspective that someone may need to walk off the ledge.

Recently, one of my closest friends moved out of town. For the last five years, our families ate dinner together once a week. He and I regularly had “back porch time” where we would talk about nothing in particular and everything in between. Something about that time kept my pressure release valve open. Without posturing, we would just sit outside and chat…or sometimes just sit outside and listen.

Since his move, the viper would strike a lie here and a lie there in my own mind, and after about a month the internal dialogue began to build one lie on another. Everyone has reasons why we don’t want to let anyone into our labyrinth of lies: I’m a man, I’m a father, I’m a mother, I’m a leader, I’m famous, etc., but I found myself subverting the viper’s strike until the other day. I had a telephone call with my friend and mentioned one of the lies. Almost immediately, he spoke truth into my situation and it changed my perspective.

We all need a little more truth in our lives:

• You are uniquely and wonderfully created.
• You are everything to your children despite your screw-ups.
• You are everything to your parents despite your screw-ups.
• You are important.
• You are not a whore.
• You are loved.
• You are rich.
• You can eat the elephant in front of you, one bite at a time.
• You are not a failure.
• You touch more lives than you’ll ever know.

Hope springs eternal in the human breast;
Man never Is, but always To be blest:
The soul, uneasy and confin’d from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.

-Alexander Pope

May God bless your soul and you find peace, brother Trey.

It’s Saturday morning. Lawn tractors all over the country are in high gear (except for the fact that every last blade is scorched in heat wave ’11). If you listen carefully, you can hear something over the hum of the over-horsepowered engines–it’s ideation in high gear.

How many times have you heard someone say, “I had a great idea in the shower this morning” or even “when I was on the mower, I had a thought?” On the other hand, when have you heard “I had an idea while I was answering email today?” While weed eating, we actually have nothing else to do than think.

Several of my friends have a “lawn service,” and I feel sorry for them. They are depriving themselves of the opportunity to have undistracted thought time under the guise of personal economics–”my billable is 3 times that of the lawn service.” Here is the problem with that, most of my knowledge working friends have the input on high gear and quiet time on mute. Who knows what million dollar idea will be hatched from the safe perch of a Cub Cadet this weekend.

So, what’s your idea haven? Have you ever had brilliant ideas on a mower? (leave a comment below)

As a bonus, here’s a great little piece about lawns in the us from CBS Sunday Morning:

Thumbnail and main image used under creative commons license.

You’ve heard the phrase: “I’m all in.” It’s a poker reference; it means I’m betting all my chips on this hand because either it is so good (there’s no losing) or they’re playing the ultimate bluff. In life, however, being all in means that an idea is so powerful that you will make any sacrifice to protect it. I hear people say, “I’m all in” or “I’ve drank the Kool-aid” or “I’m sold out.” I assume that they mean some principled statement, but fortunately we aren’t always tested on our commitment.

When I came across this video today, I saw the face of being all in, and it is probably one of the most beautiful images I’ve ever seen. Over the last month, the United States has experienced some of the worst tornadoes in modern history. Just this past weekend, Joplin Missouri was devastated by an EF-5 tornado that has taken an still increasing number of lives. From the devastation, we get a glimmer of a man that was without question all in.

Click here if the video doesn’t play.

Don loved Bethany more than he loved his own life, and he gave up his life so that she might live. In a culture where we sometimes lose trust in people’s words, we hear a story of someone who made a promise and acted out that promise paying the ultimate sacrifice. Wow.

You know the old proverb, “walk a mile in a man’s shoes before you judge them.” The longer I live, I believe my life is about really experiencing a handful proverbs–in excruciating detail. This season I’m learning something about humility.

Photo by Kables

I can’t recall faces in detail. The judgments aren’t vivid, but the hubris was real, palpable and now laughable. All I can remember is that a younger, pompous guy that looked a lot like me would say things like, “of course, would you expect anything less?” and smugly, “let me show you how it’s done.” That bristly tenderfoot brushed against worn soles. In my juvenile life, I encountered these people that were seasoned by life that had seemed to enter compact with life: they would temper their passion and desires for their lives in return for something I didn’t understand, something that looked like a plea for mercy.

When I went to law school as a non-traditional student, I remember thinking: I’m gonna show these losers how it’s done. I’m not going to give up until I ring the bell, until I win. In the infamous words of my dad, “no fat boy’s gonna tell me I can’t climb this mountain.” Law school was hard, and honestly there wasn’t a day that I enjoyed being in those walls. I learned that the meticulous, left-brained, detail-warring cog wasn’t me, and I learned this lesson over and over again. I spent three years and thousands of dollars discovering that I didn’t want to lawyer. Despite my hubris and missteps, my path was blessed. I was placed into personal and professional success.

Then 2010 happened. I watched my dad brush death’s doorstep–the single source of power and strength in my life was powerless. The health of everyone around me seemed to be unpredictable and fragile including my children, my wife, and my own. More doors in my life seemed closed than opened. Dear friends lost their children, wives, loves, lives. My beloved brother grappled with a world that seemingly signaled rejection at every turn. Unexpected events around the world that left broken people in the wake. I realized how little I knew of a world I thought I knew so much. I was shaken.

Ultimately, my value system of achievement was shattered. That 18 or 27 year old that had really only been stung in life, was fractured. And finally, it began to crystallize, that plea for mercy was humility, not weakness, born out of brokenness–experienced and never taught. The young-me believed that my will could overcome all circumstances and with a little bit more experience, I realized that my will is the sea and reality is a rocky shore–but for Grace, I don’t beat against that rocky shore all of my days. All of this brought me to one point, I don’t know what has brought each to the place where they stand, so whether in adversity or achievement, I cannot be their judge.

Last week I saw my old self in a young man. Full of ambition and confidence, he smugly uttered his impossible and brazen promises, and I realized despite my immediate reaction, I didn’t know the marks of his soles. More importantly, I couldn’t expect him to know mine. Journey on.

I wrote this post to a dear friend that has had a brutal 2010 and in the depths of his adversity had the calm to remind me of this proverb.

I guess I’m suffering from a vacation hangover. As I drove to work this morning, I shouted “punchbug” with no kids to echo the VW sighting. Sitting at my desk, images of the long days on the beach are flashing on my monitor. In honor of the R&R, I had a vacation observation that I thought I would post for you.

People do all types of things on the beach: they play corn hole, ladder ball, paddle ball, frisbee, swim, surf, sing, and sleep. Some curious folks spend hours combing the sand with metal detectors to turn up a few buried treasures. Still others walk the beach looking for shells and other treasures that the ocean yields to the shore.

On occasion a child exclaims, “I found a shark tooth.” That moment is special because of the scarcity of shark teeth rendered on the sandy beach, but really there are thousands of shark teeth. It is special to find one or a four leaf clover when you just happen upon them. The reality is that without choosing a strategy, finding these rarities is a long shot.

While at the beach, my niece found a shark tooth. She was looking for something fantastic sifting through the water cooled sand, and she found it. That was the only shark tooth that anyone in our group found. Then I saw a boy combing the shoreline and his hand was filled with a dozen of the little treasures. I inquired, “what do you have there?”

“Shark teeth” he responded. “I comb the beach all day looking for them and today I have found, ten, twelve, fifteen teeth.”

“So, you don’t boogie board or play frisbee with your family?” I asked.

“I wouldn’t find them if I was doing that stuff.”

Indeed. I guess this was the treasure that I was combing my vacation for. I needed that little nugget of wisdom. Right or wrong we get out of the experience the things that we are looking for. If you are looking to be a millionare, seek it, but know that to get those jewels, you have to sacrifice. Just as the boy had to give up the boogie board for the shark teeth, you sometimes have to sacrifice time with those people you love to earn the dollars.

In his commencement address to Princeton, I think Jeff Bezos illustrated this point nicely.

I will hazard a prediction. When you are 80 years old, and in a quiet moment of reflection narrating for only yourself the most personal version of your life story, the telling that will be most compact and meaningful will be the series of choices you have made. In the end, we are our choices. Build yourself a great story. Thank you and good luck.

What shark teeth are you looking for? Are they part of that compact and meaningful story?

In his speech, I think Bezos hit a nerve with me when he asked: “Will inertia be your guide, or will you follow your passions?” Sometimes, it is so much easier to take the path of least resistance.

Working without vision can leave you with a jacked up crapper and a pissed off wife. Trust me on this one.

About a year ago, I set out with a crowbar, a sledgehammer, and an idea. What a nasty recipe. I knocked out some sheet rock, removed a few studs, and created a fine mess. The next weekend I walked into the bathroom and fiddled with a few things, but I knew and the bathroom knew that I didn’t have the vision to complete the project.

Worked piled up and the thought of the bathroom slipped out of my mind. I had torn the walls out of the bathroom and erected walls around the project in my mind. Over the course of the next year, we had several contractors estimate the work, but we never arrived at the “vision” of the project.

Vision is more than just a design. Vision is peering into the abyss of possibility and plucking out something that can be. Vision is imagining the impossible and being able to articulate what it looks like to others.

Vision is creative and spiritual. The act of creating is divine. Humans ultimately wither and our handiwork ultimately crumbles, but staring into that which is broken and commanding something beautiful is other worldly.

Victories are rich. Seeing that thing appear in real life that was only imagined is satisfying and empowering.

Not having vision can be problematic.

Setbacks are catastrophic. When you come across a snag and you have no vision, the obstacles become insurmountable roadblocks.

Endurance. What is the difference in running 5 miles and a marathon? Endurance. You run 5 miles for exercise. You run marathons to make a point. You have to have vision to run a marathon, or you will bail at the half way point. Vision is the fuel to see it through to the end.

Where there is no vision, the people perish… -Proverbs 29: 18

For the bathroom, it took about 8 weeks of hard work every weekend, but once I had vision I was able to see the project through to the end. Ultimately, we ended up with a nice bathroom, and my wife forgave me.

I am paranoid. I can say it with clarity and without guilt or shame, but turning through the pages of You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto by Jaron Lanier forces me to be down right skeptical. I hope a bit more mature as a technologist. So, with this preface, I approach what is being dubbed as The Next Twitter, Foursquare.

photo by @zerok

The basic premise to the game/network is to opt-in by registering your mobile device and adding friends by mining your networks Twitter, Facebook, Address Books, etc. Then, when you’re on the go, you broadcast your location for points, and social capital (mayorship, eventually king of the world) by “checking in:”

People use foursquare to “check-in”, which is a way of telling us your whereabouts. When you check-in
someplace, we’ll tell your friends where they can find you and recommend places to go & things to do
nearby. People check-in at all kind of places – cafes, bars, restaurants, parks, homes, offices.

In short, you are rewarded for broadcasting to the world your location, patterns, interests, routes, routines, employment, and most other mundanity that up until now has seemed too egocentric to broadcast.

The brick and mortar retail use of Foursquare captures all the elements that retailers hoped Twitter would possess: location based service, customer identification, gratis reward structure, and incentivizing physical presence. And, quite frankly, it is fun to keep up with your friends and compete on the learderboard for the most points earned in a week.

Here are my issues:

1. Abdication of Personal Autonomy. Any old-timer would say, “what the hell is wrong with you?” For centuries we have fought to protect our information from being collected and protected by governments and churches, but under the hipster sway of technology we gladly volunteer our personal information, freely.

2. Privacy Desensitization. Related to the previous point, we are choosing to blur the lines between private and public in the name of community. Privacy policies aim to protect the users, but with continual revision, one is essentially opting in to global, unfettered broadcast of personal information.

3. Building the Machine. In a culture that was once fascinated by algorithms, we are increasingly governed by them. Even the most well intentioned people trade humanity for quanitification. As people continue to plug more of their human patterns into the machine, the machine learns to act more like them, anticipate more like them, “think” more like them. The point of singularity seems like a farce to me (for reasons that are too lengthy to engage here), but conceptually the machine is built with data.

4. Where’s the Community. Twitter has been a magical community development tool. Without fanfare and proper billing, micro communities popped up built around common interests. Conversations that occur on Twitter, although truncated, foster idea expression, commentary, emotion, location, status, ergo community but simple location updates limit that communication to data points. It is fun, but it isn’t community.

5. Criminal Minds. I have posted a tweet or two about the possibilities of burglars “friending” you on foursquare. Social networked burglars are out there; aptitude is another issue entirely. I could see a situation where a burglar follows someone on Foursquare to confidently burglarize one’s home. Of course, such concerns are fundamental to all Web 2.0 participation.

I have been using Foursquare for six months and much more actively in the past months as its coverage became ubiquitous. I am an early adopter, or as I like to say a neophiliac, but pouring through Lanier’s work provides another lens to see our technological world. Web 2.0 holds many exciting opportunities, but coupled with that, the interfaces and user compromises should not be taken lightly. How does the old addage go? “you aren’t paranoid if everyone really is out to get you” or follow you at least.

Something happens to me when the 5 day forecast suggests the possibility of snow, a little boy springs up with excitement and a little hope. As the promise of the white draws closer, the childlike anticipation manifests into something that is seldom experienced as an adult–snow day.

Image used under creative commons license by skycaptaintwo

Of course, I live in the south, so the soft white snow doesn’t stick around long enough to turn into the road-muck, black of northern towns. The winter storm rolls through and softens the sharp angular edges of our world into soft, white contours. Virgin white that makes even the brightest white creation of man lack luster in comparison. Then, in a few days, the memory of the snow is dotted with only a few melting snowmen. Painless.

As the day draws closer, the “believers” gush with a little childlike hope of the 3, no 6, no 12 inches of the winter white. Safely tucked in their nostalgic gaze is fireplaces, families, snowballs,  snowmen, and of course play. Sometime between our twelfth birthday and midlife, we forget what it is like to play. School becomes increasingly important, grades, college admissions, jobs, wives, kids, houses, and play that once consumed our days, thoughts, and emotions is relegated to a basement of our responsible life. But the weatherman’s forecast rattles that basement door and awakes the freedom that we had as a child and have long lost the memory. The freedom that can audaciously sled down the giant hill because falling means that old man winter can gently catch you in his soft arms that blankets the harsh, dull earth. The freedom that has no agenda or appointment because time is frozen solid and you can run for 30 minutes or 3 hours making real the line, “since we have no place to go, let it snow.”

I was thinking about Pat Head Summit, the ladies basketball coach for University of Tennessee, this afternoon and how her goal of the team is perfect execution of the plays. And you’re welcome for stating the obvious, but this really sank in today in a very different way than ever before. I view coaches as motivators, recruiters, promoters, but I have never really thought of them as visionaries of perfect execution. In this sense, the coach may think “if only…player A runs down the left side of the court and player B dribbles to the defender and player C follows behind player D, etc. then we will score..”

However, often in business we toil away with so many of the tactics that the “if only” strategy is seldom considered. Especially in small business/entrepreneurial situations, we spend all of our energy acting and very little thinking, which reminds me of an anecdotal story that I was recently told:

An astronaut was asked if you only had 10 seconds of oxygen, what would he do do? After thinking for a few moments, the astronaut responded, “I would think for 8 seconds and act for 2.”

So, whether you are the coach of a team, a small business owner, or an employee seeking to make your mark, I ask you to pause and think about your “if only” statement. What series of events if perfectly executed would bring you great success?