Lesson of the Week - My Pipe.

I recently purchased a tobacco pipe. It's a classic brown and black pipe that smokes pretty good for the comparatively modest price of $30 that I paid. I've found since buying this pipe, that I really enjoy smoking the occasional pipe/cigar/hookah, however the keyword there is “occasional”.

American culture teaches us to not be satisfied with anything. Were told to eat more, to drink more, to buy more, basically were told that the goal of life is to live hoarding as many things as possible in order to die with as many things as possible. I don't buy into this factory sealed logic at all. I believe that there is an art to living, a balance, an order to be obtained. I think the key to living is living a lifestyle of moderation. Everything can be bad in excess, anything can be bad in limitation, but by seeking balance, we can find the art of living.

I believe this idea of limiting ourselves, to better ourselves, is a lost art. Modern advertisers and companies have succeeded at completely strip mining the American consumers of all their needs and are now given no choice but to continue to sell the idea of never being satisfied to keep us coming back to the mall, to the buffet, to the bar, and to the television. I reject this state of our culture. I am pretty young, but I still remember people growing their own fruit, canning it, and storing it in the basement. Those people who remember the simplicity of life and what things are truly necessities.

Basically, when we drink too much we become dependent slobs who throw up on furniture. When we eat too much, we get fat and develop serious health problems. When we watch too much TV, we grow disconnected with the rest of the world.

Back to my tobacco pipe. I bought the pipe and I was super excited to smoke it. I smoked it after leaving “Pipes and Pleasures”, I smoked it while driving, I smoked it before dinner, after dinner, and twice later at a party. Sure enough, the next day my mouth not only tasted like crap, but it felt like crap. I successfully burnt my tongue, the roof of my mouth, and my lower lip, which made eating an aggravating chore. Did I enjoy my pipe in moderation? No. Was it in excess? Yes. Were there consequences? Yes. Will I probably make the same mistake again? Probably. But you get my point.

Lesson Of The Last 4 Months / The Rivalry

Recently two of my peers, named Brian Carr and Adam Schuch, started their own blog called produmption. The concept behind their blog is that each time they drop a log, they drop a blog too. To me, the concept is brilliant. However, they chose not to include me so I'm afraid I'm going to have to get back in the blogging game in order to compete with the men of "Produmption"

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lesson of the last 4 months.

A lot has happened it 4 months. Plans made and plans broken, relationships grown and relationships destroyed. Time moves fast, but life moves faster.

As humans, I believe we are predisposed to failure. Let's be honest, how often do our plans actually come to fruition? How often are we exactly where we want to be? How often are we content? We shouldn't be surprised or disheartened when our plans fail, rather, we should be surprised when our plans don't fail.

In grade school I was programmed to believe that life goes in this exact order:

(A) --> Graduate High School-->(B) Go to, and graduate, college -->(C) Get a job right away to make that starting salary of $60,000-->(D) Married--->(E)--> Kids-->(F) Death.

We feel our lives are meant to be a linear ascendancy of progress. A goes to B and to C and so on. However, if you've passed step "A" or "B", you've probably realized that life does not work this way. The problem with this equation is that there is no room to factor in for the variable "X". Think of X as the real life variable, reality if you will.

Graduate High School--> Graduate College --> (C)Get A Job--->(X) Get laid off.
(B)Graduate College --> (X) Never get a job
(D)Get Married --> (X) Get Divorced
(E)Kids --> (X) Miscarriage

There are too many variables and outside circumstances to believe that its possible to live a linear life.

I prefer to think of life as walking through a dense forest. There are some trails that you can follow, but you can be mislead down a bad path, you can get lost, you can walk in circle, or you can get mauled by a bear. That's what life is like, were walking and we don't always know where were going, but were all trying to get out of the woods, its just a matter of what paths we choose take to get there.

Am I on the right trail in my life? Am I going to have to do some back tracking? Am I going to get mauled by a bear? I don't know, but I do know that when we find our own way through the forest, we will be stronger, smarter, wiser, and ready to guide others through the dense forest.

The Rivalry / Less of the Last 4 Months

Recently two of my peers, named Brian Carr and Adam Schuch, started their own blog called produmption. The concept behind their blog is that each time they drop a log, they drop a blog too. To me, the concept is brilliant. However, they chose not to include me so I'm afraid I'm going to have to get back in the blogging game in order to compete with the men of "Produmption"

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lesson of the last 4 months.

A lot has happened it 4 months. Plans made and plans broken, relationships grown and relationships destroyed. Time moves fast, but life moves faster.

As humans, I believe we are predisposed to failure. Let's be honest, how often do our plans actually come to fruition? How often are we exactly where we want to be? How often are we content? We shouldn't be surprised or disheartened when our plans fail, rather, we should be surprised when our plans don't fail.

In grade school I was programmed to believe that life goes in this exact order:

(A) --> Graduate High School-->(B) Go to, and graduate, college -->(C) Get a job right away to make that starting salary of $60,000-->(D) Married--->(E)--> Kids-->(F) Death.

We feel our lives are meant to be a linear ascendancy of progress. A goes to B and to C and so on. However, if you've passed step "A" or "B", you've probably realized that life does not work this way. The problem with this equation is that there is no room to factor in for the variable "X". Think of X as the real life variable, reality if you will.

Graduate High School--> Graduate College --> (C)Get A Job--->(X) Get laid off.
(B)Graduate College --> (X) Never get a job
(D)Get Married --> (X) Get Divorced
(E)Kids --> (X) Miscarriage

There are too many variables and outside circumstances to believe that its possible to live a linear life.

I prefer to think of life as walking through a dense forest. There are some trails that you can follow, but you can be mislead down a bad path, you can get lost, you can walk in circle, or you can get mauled by a bear. That's what life is like, were walking and we don't always know where were going, but were all trying to get out of the woods, its just a matter of what paths we choose take to get there.

Am I on the right trail in my life? Am I going to have to do some back tracking? Am I going to get mauled by a bear? I don't know, but I do know that when we find our own way through the forest, we will be stronger, smarter, wiser, and ready to guide others through the dense forest.