Free Thoughts

Tonight I'm writing. Period. I don't know what it will be about, I don't know where I'm going, but I'm writing. That's it.

As I'm sure you can tell, my mood hasn't been the best for a few days. I think it's the stress of work plus the stress of normalcy being anything but normal. I work in an environment that is unpredictable by nature and when administration proliferates that agenda instead of providing a solid foundation, well it causes even more stress.

We sell every day. We're full of it... we are. We say things in the heat of the moment that most normal people would never say in their lifetimes, much less regularly.

We have lines, like we're trying to pick up women, but in reality, we may be no different than a bum on a corner. We, like him, will say anything possible (mostly true, and the parts that aren't are normally for the customers sake as in "Your credit wasn't approved because our computers are down.") to make a sale. In reality, on average we make only a few dollars per sale. So, what really seperates us? We have overhead? We are selling a product AND ourselves, they're only seling themselves? They have more opportunities at customers? I don't know. I can't answer that yet.

Maybe my quote from Dante on the last post has me cornered now.

In a perfect world the manipulation wouldn't be necessary, but this world is far from being perfect and even I am not so idealistic to believe that it is possible to sell people based solely on merits of the product and its design alone. We sell romance, a watered down version of selling sex. We sell pre-sex. lol



0 out of 10 is a horrible ratio, but 1 out of 11 is really good. That's what keeps me going.



Mom: "You still have your cough!"
Daughter: "I know, Nanah. I got it from my brother."
Mom: "Why don't you give it back? lol"
Daughter: "I would, but everyone keeps telling me to cover my mouth!"

She's 4.



Now's the best time to start. Whether it's good or bad, I'll start emailing posting updates. So, if you're reading and I don't have your email on the list, then you only need to post to comments your address or email me personally billymo at verizon dot net. (I wrote it that way because spam bots will pick up your addy from a website if you post it there. Just remove all spaces and put it in the format the way it sounds.)



A divisive thought has entered into my life. A guy I know was looking into going to Iraq for a year to work on computers. I'm thinking about it too. It would be on base, so I assume that safety would be a minimal risk. It would pay very well. That year alone could easily pay all my debt, buy a car and pay for my kids' tuition through college (depending where they go). Realistically, the money would be invested after the car, and I'd use what was needed to start my own business when I get back. In all reality, I'd miss the kids for 26 weeks. That's all I'll see them next year anyways. As far as milestones, I'd miss my daughter's first day of school, but I had no guarantees of being there as it is. With the way my divorce works, I really have no guarantees of any time with them during holidays.

It's all merely thought and speculation at this point, but I am giving it very serious thought. Money talks, and that much money speaks very loudly. Not only that, it also has a way of lingering in your thoughts. Much like infatuation.




Everyone says to go for it when you have nothing to lose, because you have... nothing to lose. That's encouraging, but it's easy to say. I couldn't figure out why that logic doesn't work on people and the other day I had a thought: the real problem lies in the universal law that nothing is free. Those who have so little have no desire to sacrifice any of what little they have, taking a huge risk on that which they can't even imagine. Realistically we are then asking someone untrained to fly on the trapeze... with no net.

Now, before you start getting up in arms, I am an optimistic person. I'm realistic though, and discussions like these will help everyone with a workaround for the logic. I'm not exposing anything in my thoughts that won't help someone in the long run. I'm also sure that my mind will work on this thought, like it does so many others, until I have a new resolution.




Where are you right now? What are you doing? I mean obviously, you're at a computer, but are you at home? Are you at work? What did you do today? I'm always curious about that when I write this. lol. People rarely write comments but I do hear about it. So, I figured I'd ask.




I've come to the conclusion, I'm an information junkie. I can't get enough of it. That's why I don't watch too much tv. Because of that, I hate to hear the words "I don't know", especially if they're followed directly by a complete lack of interest of ever addressing the question again.




I think that's enough for one night. The lesson... Don't place all your eggs in one basket. I still have to learn that one.




Take care,

Mo

...springs eternal, and falls on a whim

"The darkest places in Hell are reserved for those, who, in times of great moral crisis, mantain their neutrality."

-Dante


"If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on';

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count on you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!"

-Unknown


It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.

-Theodore Roosevelt


I had dinner tonight with another dear friend. (Have I said yet that I have the best friends in the world? lol) He needs a name... ummm... INTEGRITYLANE. We discussed his life, and my life and almost everything under the Sun, and you know what I came away with?

One: People are actually reading and being changed, (in a small way albeit I'm sure, but changed nonetheless) by what I write. He stood there... quoting me. I was not only flattered, but speechless. You have to understand... this is a guy I trust and admire. For him to be standing there repeating what I wrote, well it was a realization that helped me quickly conceive a new found respect for what I write. I realized even more than before that I need to watch what I write... people are watching.

When I started this blog, it was for fun. I had something to say, and I said it. My very first blog was about me having a bigger voice than I felt I had in the actual situation. It could have been very poorly taken by the person it was about, but it was true, and that's what needed to be said at the time.

After that it was observations, and just general life stuff. But now it's more fun than ever... because I don't know who's reading. People have emailed the link to their friends (something more than I've even done) and I have people I don't know reading. This adds a new twist of responsibility to which I say...

WRONG! lol

I'm going to keep on writing just the way I have, and I'll be as responsible as I've been... right or wrong. There are blog rules here that no one knows about... they'll keep me in check.

I am, however, humbled and honored to be quoted by a dear friend. That has motivatd me to come home and write about what I had already planned... hope.

Two: There is a certain amount of comfort you can have when you have someone who is positive and sees life without obstacles. He is the type of guy that I will surround myself with when I have my own company. He sees solutions in every problem, instead of problems in every solution.

People like him remind me of the only thing that may be more important than Love... hope. Even if you have no one in life that Loves you, you'll survive based on the hope that someone, someday will. So, by that rationale alone, hope is more important.

People commit suicide every day, unfortunately. All of these people have lost hope. Had they not, they'd still be upright. With hope we can endure anything, anything at all. It is what keeps us disciplined and our minds in the right place.

Our psyches are fragile, and I have seen even myself slip. Going with the flow sometimes means that the flow takes you to the gutter. I, like many others, have had my desires wrapped up in one small package to be opened at a date some time later. When later came... I found the box to be empty. I looked back only to find that I had learned a tough lesson in life. Sometimes the lesson is more important than what was originally thought to be wrapped, but that doesn't temper the pain.

I speak all the time, on here and in life, about success. Every day that I live I have a more difficult time explaining just exactly what that is for me. I don't know what it entails any more. I don't even know for sure what makes me qualify, when I do finally get there. (It's hard to know if you're in the right place if you've never been there before, and you don't have any way of knowing you're already there.) I am constantly thinking about this day where things will finally be better. I even tell people around me how good they will be, and I emphasize the WILL. I'm beginning to think they must all believe I'm a quack, lol. But I'm not.

Mark Cuban said in his blog... "You will fail many, many times in life. As a matter of fact, you can fail every time in life... except once. You only need to succeed once.", and he's right.

I was recruited yesterday by a gentleman that I worked with before. It was a horrible realization that I wasn't so different a year ago as when he had met me five years prior. It gave me the stark realization that every year I said it would get better, and every year, well it hasn't.

"Oh, but Mo think about your kids, and think about... blah, blah, blah."

I am, but it still doesn't change history. I do have great kids, and I do have great friends. What I don't have is the things that I wanted even then. Call me greedy, or selfish, or what have you, but clean off your own front porch before you start talking about mine. I am no where near my wit's end, but I am...

restless.

Everyone wants more - everyone. For even the most humble of men seeks to be more humble.

I'm curious when I can finally take my boots off and relax. I'm curious when this elusive success, that I have a tougher and tougher time every day defining, will finally come to visit.

Success can take it's boots off too... and please, by all means... stay a while. lol

Don't worry, I know. I'm going to have to visit success... you don't have to tell me. lol.

I have kept a running total of number of times I've taken a chance, a big one. I'll continue to do that. One thing though, as it's running, know this; they've all been failures - every one. The lessons learned were great, but they were still failures at the end of the day. Hope has kept me going on them. Mood determines the number. Time will only tell.


9


Take care,

Mo

Halo 2

7

Time to geek out a bit. Tonight is the Halo 2 release and I'll be busy playing it for a couple days. I will say this; I'm excited to write my next blog. I'm not even sure what I'll write about, but I do have one new thing I plan on doing, and I'll unveil it next time. It's not a big deal really, but the timing seems to be right, and I think it'll change things, a little, on here.

So that no one thinks I'm cheating on this blog (I am), I've decided to link to two sites tonight. I have two friends that are both very talented in what they do. http://www.denverllewellyn.com is where one now resides.

Denver (there I go breaking my rule again, this time it was done to protect him when I do give his pseudonym) has started a new site highlighting his art, and his bike riding. Those two things are done with such a passion that it's not only infectious, but truly a wonder to watch. Denver is one of those guys that could succeed in anything he ever tried if he wanted to. Luckily, for the art world, he has decided to make it his home. He will someday completely enrich that world ever more than he already has. I am truly excited by the possibilites that Denver brings to the table when anything is asked of him, so I know that the future is extremely bright for any projects on his radar.

Cory. Cory is one of those guys with so much potential he oozes it. He's real laid back and doesn't excite too easily. That's what will make him great at whatever he finally decides to completely focus on. He is very patient and understands clearly that good things will come. That's why he seems to be in no particular rush to jump into anything that he's not completely prepared to succeed at. His latest endeavour is a blog. It's early, but trust me on this one, it will be something you come back to regularly. I guarantee that he will make this as entertaining and intellectual as anything you'll read on the net. So give it a try.

http://cdyer.blogspot.com/

For now, I'm going to head off to my copy oh Halo 2. If you don't get what that is, you wouldn't understand anyways. Take care everybody.

Lots to do, lots to keep us all happy.

Next time... hope. I promise.


-Mo