Stealing From Kids

At our house, we kind of have a bit of an obsession with self-reliance.  As a result, our kids are unschooled  and we are members of a local self-reliant community. We think it's important to know how to be able to take care of yourself. Most adults probably would not know how to take care of themselves if things they rely on -- grocery stores, gasoline, fresh water, electricity -- became unavailable. In our changing world, we think it's important to, at the very least, know the basics of self-reliance. Oddly enough, it involves actually talking to the people around you.

But getting to know your neighbors is another post for another day.  Today we are going to talk about kids.

In our increasingly disconnected society -- I mean disconnected with what sustains us (our food, water, etc) -- we are becoming more and more reliant upon big businesses to take care of us. There's nothing inherently wrong with that (but we should probably have a back-up plan, and be sure to keep the businesses that soak up our money in check), but we are, as a society, undoubtedly less self-reliant. So much less self-reliant, actually, that some of us are actually teaching our kids to be less self-reliant.

What are a few ways we teach our kids to be less self-reliant?

1. Making (and buying) things that are plastic and overly safe
2. Not allowing them to help make food
3. Showering with toys that severely limit creativity and imagination
4. Not allowing safe unsupervised play
5. We even make them physically less self-reliant, keeping them ridiculously clean (not letting them wash themselves, of course) and showering them in antibiotics and antibacterials which may weaken their immune systems while simultaneously encouraging the growth of "super bugs"

I'm a mom of two, and I understand how nice it can feel to be needed by your kids. It's so much easier and faster to just make dinner real quick while your kids watch TV, to wash their hands for them (they always miss spots!), to push your 12-month-old around in a stroller, how much better you feel when your little one goes on the little slide (NOT the big slide-he might fall!). It's also easy to convince yourself that you're teaching your kids how to do these things by showing them how to do it... but you never let them try. You just let them rely on you, and that's what they will pick up on more than anything. And in today's fast-paced world, who has the time to slow down and interact? Isn't that what you send your kids to school for, anyway?

The thing is, your kids will still need you, even if they are self-reliant. Self-reliance doesn't mean "never get help" or "don't have a loving family" or "don't talk to people." Self-reliance is ridiculously difficult if you don't have the help, encouragement, and love of others. And that's what parents are for, I think: Just to be there for their kids- to love them and encourage them and give them help when they need it. They don't need help all the time.

This, I suppose, is my response to a post on the Free Range Kids blog. Lenore Skenazy (the author of the Free Range Kids book) posted a short essay which had been anonymously written and published in an elementary school newsletter. The essay is simply about witnessing a parent "babying" her kid.. something that might be expected on the first day of school for a kindergartener; however, this was a much older kid in the middle of the year.

The essay goes on to say:

"When children have no need to do things for themselves, what do you think will happen over time? When children know their parents will do everything for them, what message did the parent send? And when their peers see this happening, do they see the child as independent and a “can do,” capable person? They may see incapable, they may see lazy, or they may think that the parent is being fooled."

I think that when a kid's peers see this, especially from multiple people in multiple places, they think it's okay. They may even think its expected. I mean, how many times have you seen kids bossing around their parents in public? My opinion is that this started from a well-meaning parent that did everything for their kid. The first image that comes to mind is Cartman from South Park.

The kid begins to expect to be catered to. The kid's peers notice this behavior... and many of them try it out. I'm sure you remember some particularly bratty things you did when you were a kid. With so many overworked, overtired, overstressed parents these days, however, I think a lot of people have less energy to stand up to their own children and make solid rules that are followed on a consistent basis. I'm really worried about the direction these kids (and their parents) are heading.

Do you think kids' self-reliance is being "stolen?" Are we doomed?  Is this all just normal? 

DISQUS

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First of all, I'd like to direct your attention to the most recent poll on the right side of your screen.  I was looking through random blogs and saw a pretty nice template from pYzam. I'm sure you all remember the days that MySpace was popular... that's when I first remember seeing pYzam MySpace layouts. I've never really liked having to resort to that type of thing (i.e. Vistaprint business cards, kissy face photos); however, it's a really easy alternative for something slightly different, at least until I can teach myself how to make my own really awesome layout. But I wouldn't want to get a pYzam layout if all of my readers detest that sort of thing. =)

Your vote on the poll would really be appreciated, even if it's just a "maybe."
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As per popular demand, I've taken the Disqus comment platform off of the blogs, even before the poll was up. =)

I still think Disqus is really awesome, it just wasn't working out for most of you guys, or for me. Those few extra clicks to go to the Disqus website to moderate the comments just weren't worth it.

I think Disqus really shines on more high-traffic blogs (like the blog of Jay Parkinson, MD). I love the nested comments - they are great for discussions, plus the Disqus website has all sorts of stats and there are all sorts of cool things you can do. Apparently it's also really good at filtering spam (I still haven't gotten any, yay!).

I have been having a little bit of difficulty getting the moderated comments from Technicolor Typecast back, though. I messaged Disqus about it and their customer service seems to be pretty cool.

I said something about Disqus not having a Google profile, and Tyler (the customer service rep) mentions, "for future reference, your readers can login with their Google profile URL by creating a Disqus account and then linking that Google profile URL to their account via our OpenID option." It's an extra, annoying step, but a one-time thing from the looks of it. So that's an option for you guys if you come across any other Disqus forums.

If you're ever frustrated with the way Blogger handles comments, I would definitely recommend looking into Disqus.


TL;DR:
Disqus, it's not you - it's my blog. Can we just be friends?

A Challenger Appears!

Nebberz here with my first contribution to Technicolor Typecast. Prepare for a more software oriented post!

I would like to take this time to recommend to our readers one of my favorite and most used websites.

ninite.com

Not just because this site is awesome and simple, but because they share top quality software many people use, and fully automate the installations of those programs including saying no to any toolbars or other junk the software would normally ask you to install. Just click the stuff you're interested in, download then run the installer, and you're done.

Really saves me a lot of time when I am setting up other people's computers. Here is what I usually grab and my short opinion on them. I don't consider my opinion perfect but it might help somebody out!

Web Browsers

Chrome or Firefox are fantastic. Chrome for speed and firefox for customization. If you haven't left internet explorer behind yet, better late than never! (:

Messaging

I grab Skype for cheap wifi phone calls using our iPod Touch. No more cell phone contracts.

Mifi is available if you need access on the go.

I use Trillian on my pc so I can't really comment on the individual chat programs they have available. Seriously though, who still uses aim?

Media

iTunes is a slow program but necessary for the iPod. Songbird has been a pretty cool music player, has an internal browser and is fairly customizable. Everyone knows Hulu by now. VLC Player is one of the better video players available along with media player classic (available with the K-Lite Codec pack). They will play just about anything and use low resources.

Spotify is amazing for music but is difficult to use in the states (regionally restricted.) Foobar2000 is another awesome music player, but is not pretty without learning how to skin it properly. Everyone knows Winamp I imagine.

Runtimes

I grab Flash and Java. (Make sure you uninstall old versions of java update, a lot of times they are left over.)

Imaging

I've used Irfanview for a nice low resources instantaneous image displayer. I've also started using Picasa which is still pretty fast and really quite pretty and user friendly.

Documents

Openoffice has been an amazing alternative to Microsoft Office. Instead of having to buy a whole new version every so often...just get openoffice for free and enjoy free updates. Avoid Adobe Reader like the plague and instead grab Foxit Reader (I would recommend PDF-Xchange Viewer if they would add it.) Libreoffice I believe is a good office suite to run off a thumb drive, though openoffice portable might be a better alternative.

Security

Avast for antivirus in my opinion. You have to register once a year, but I prefer that over the daily ads in AVG or Avira. All 3 are free and great though. Adaware, Malwarebytes, Spybot and Superantispyware are all excellent spyware removal tools.

File Sharing

uTorrent. Case closed. If you prefer p2p I would suggest looking into soulseek, it's not as pretty, but uses low resources and has good music communities.

Other

Dropbox is awesome for backing up your files online. It simply appears as a folder on your computer. Easy to access from other computers, just share the folder with whoever you want.

Everything is AWESOME!...leave windows search behind forever. Seriously. Once Everything scans your computer, you will have instantaneous live search results as you press each key.

Utilities

Imgburn is an excellent Image burner (for iso's and such.) CCleaner I have used for many years and has been a standby for cleaning off crap from many computers. Very quick and lightweight. It's registry cleaner has never harmed any computer I've used it on. Defraggler is from the same company (Piriform) and I use it for defragging just because Ccleaner has been so amazing. DiscburnerXP has been a good basic burning program. Revo Uninstaller is another amazing tool, wonderful at removing those pesky program that refuse to uninstall. Or simply use it any time your uninstalling programs as it's great at getting rid of anything those programs would normally leave behind. I would leave the advanced cleaning alone though, just let it delete the safe stuff.

Compressions

7-zip for opening up archives. It's amazing and highly efficient, you won't need anything else.

That's it! I know a lot of those other programs are awesome, but I don't feel I have the experience to comment on them. I know many people love steam, evernote, google earth, keepass, audacity and such. I can't use every awesome program ever made! (:

Another great thing is, once you've downloaded the installer, it goes to each website and grabs the most recent version available. So instead of updating each individual program when it's time...just run that installer again and it will find the most up to date versions available and install those. Hell yeah!

Feel free to correct my opinions in the comments! Any sites that we need to check out?

Really a Short Post

I have such difficulty doing short, lite posts.

So my account got hacked... every month or so my gmail and my yahoo accounts get hacked. Thank Reggie Watts nothing bad happens, but the passwords just get changed. -_-  Luckily its relatively easy to remedy, it's just a pretty big annoyance. I think I'm going to start using KeePass to generate passwords for me.

Do you ever have problems with losing access to your accounts?

Anyway, it's 6:47 pm, I just woke up an hour ago (it's a snow day so I have an excuse ^_~), and I'm going to go make some Fucking Pancakes. Maybe I'll post the recipe some day.

First I'll go take a picture of the snow. I LOVE Instagram. (No, I am not a macfag... but I may have been bitten by one...)




Man, I had to ruin the prefect snow for that picture. =/

6:59 and I got those pictures posted already with NO WIRES involved (and I did a couple of other things too =D)

Fucking Recipes - Chocolate Burrito

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Every Day I'm Hustlin'

Katt Williams Stand-Up - Every Day I'm Hustlin'

So, I think the decision to make blog(s) was a pretty fuckin good (PFG) idea. I'm constantly sprouting with ideas of blog posts... oh, if only I could just get them all out onto the screen. I'm not having a hard time writing, I'm having a hard time finding time to write.

Every day, man. Every day.

I slacked on this blog yesterday. But to my credit, I did make a post on the other:  How TV Ruined Your Life.

For some reason, I didn't really think blogging would be a part-time job, LOL. If I want to be successful at it, however, it IS. Especially with me being a bit of a perfectionist. It's a good opportunity to hone my skills though -- realize that getting something done with flaws is better than not getting anything done at all. The world moves too fast to be perfect. Ideas spread like wildfire. I love being on the cusp of things. And I love being part of it.

On having a successful blog/living your passion, I read a couple of articles and watched a couple of videos today. I'm excited to share them!!!

I've been reading a lot about finance and entrepreneurship (holy fuck, I spelled that right, first try), despite my marked disinterest in becoming rich and powerful. These people don't just share mindless drivel about dollar signs, surprisingly... although they do talk some. I think the insight that I find is worth sifting through the (shockingly few) superiority complexes.

Fred is a venture capitalist in NYC, and recently in his blog he shared a little personal story on how Risk and Reward are Not Obvious (a commenter or two suggested the title should have read: Follow Your Heart, Not the Money!) It's a pretty good post, but the real gold is in the comments. I'm just going to share some of the stuff I liked:

Alex shared a quote:

"Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life."
-Confucius

JLM says:

One of the most exciting things about life is the myriad of choices and interesting things one can invest their own time and capital in.I think we all have 5-7 "careers" in us if we are willing to follow our instincts and roll the dice.This is enhanced by the further opportunity to do if for others, or to do it with others or to do it on your own. It is further flavored by whether you are single, married or have a family. This is a huge impact on how we view the world. Each phase of our lives can be new, refreshing, energizing and rewarding.

Charlie Crystle says:

If you do what you love, risk becomes palatable. What hasn't been palatable to me is working on someone else's vision or passion, despite the offers and opportunities, even though that would make parts of life a lot smoother. I've become passionate about reducing noise in daily life, and the reward is the daily progress and knowledge that I'll help people in some way through the work.

Matthew A. Myers points out:

Money's just a concept. Money is just people's time. :)

LIAD exquisitely puts it:

No-one on their death bed ever wished they had chosen to earn more money at the expense of a more meaningful and fulfilling life.

FAKE GRIMLOCK (the giant robot dinosaur) is rather insightful:

DO WHAT YOU LOVE SMART. UNLESS YOU LOVE SIT ON COUCH. THEN JOB YOU HATE BETTER OPTION.

Fooducate quoted a Robert Frost poem:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

bwertz says:

I always thought that the best way to take decision was to follow your passion and do what you really wanted to do - the monetary aspect usually follows.

Another fantastic quote from Pascal Emmanuel-Gobry:

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." -- Douglas Adams (of Hitchhiker's Guide fame)

There are many other great comments, but I'm going to end with the video that pankaj013 shared: Steve Jobs' Stanford Commencement Speech. Whatever your feelings on Steve Jobs, he didn't even graduate college, and he's speaking to STANFORD graduates. Wow. It's pretty funny how he basically tells them they have wasted so much time already, lol. Great speech, though... especially the first 5 minutes.

How TV Ruined Your Life

Ironically, there is a show on BBC Two called How TV Ruined Your Life. How relevant!

No, really, it's relevant -- we are finally getting rid of cable this week!

I don't have much against TV shows; I enjoy watching gratuitous violence, jerks, nudity, and just plain stupidity just as much as any other person. I even like educational shows like So You Think You Can Dance. I'm just kidding, I like watching Pawn Stars for my education. No, seriously, I'm saying I watch Mythbusters for Kari Byron, I mean explosions, err, education. Honestly I do really like watching Nova on PBS.

Really, I do watch Nova.

I digress. We live with "Grandpa" who has a bit of a TV addiction. Hey, if I was laid off and single, I'd probably had a bit of a TV addiction, too. I certainly did as a teenager. All day: TV. It was depressing, but it was easy to ignore the horrible sinking feeling as long as the shows and commercials did a good enough job of keeping my attention on them rather than my own thoughts.

Now that I'm a "grown up," I have experienced time without watching TV. Wow, the world is so different when you don't have a little life-sucker in every room of your house.  And I have kids. Have you ever looked at a kid's face while they watch TV? Staring, mouth gaping. They don't even know the difference between the shows and the commercials until they are at least 7.

Even though I'm being a little hard on TV, I think TV shows can be nice, helpful, and worth it to watch.  That's what the internet is for, now. Or DVDs. Or friends' houses.

I think the key to keeping what you watch helpful to you -- whether to relax for a bit, or to learn something, or for whatever other reasons people watch -- rather than detrimental is this:  MODERATION.  Everything in moderation, guys. The average American spends HALF of their leisure time in front of the tube. They would essentially have twice as much time to do stuff if they got rid of TV. I guess some people could call that moderation...

When you turn the TV on, do you turn it off after an hour? Or do you leave it on when you're done and find it sucking you back in?  How often do you intend to just watch something short, but before you know it, it's midnight and you've watched 6 different shows across 4 different channels?

I'm still being a bit harsh. I guess I've got a chip on my shoulder. And I'm not factoring in TiVo or anything.

But I think it's important to -- when you're going to watch something -- first of all, have the intent to watch it.  Second of all, when it's over, it's over. You're done; open the door and go outside.  Why not go for a run? That's what we were born to do, not sit in front of an idiot box.

Without further ado, here is an excerpt from How TV Ruined Your Life that was brought to my attention by The Moneyless Man, who I first heard of by randomly finding a site he started (I believe, don't quote me on this) JustForTheLoveOfIt.org. I think it's a 15 minutes well-spent. =)



Here's links to the books mentioned in the post:

Feels Bad, Man

My son is the worst player on his basketball team.

He played his first game today, and he just doesn't get it. He's only 7 years old, so it's not that big of a deal. Our car broke down a couple weeks ago (Of course it was FINE until it was time to take him to his second practice and then it wouldn't start), and we didn't get it fixed until after his third basketball practice, which he also missed.

Then it was time for game 1, and we had just gotten our car back from the shop. Obviously he didn't play, but I did take him to at least see his team members again and watch how a game works. I don't think he's really ever watched a basketball game before(!). The coaches had already forgotten who he was, and then when I took him to practice last Wednesday, the coaches still didn't remember him. *sigh*

Practice on Wednesday was horrible. Well, the drills went okay. But when they played a practice game, he didn't seem to even really know they were playing a game. When they had to run to the other side of the court, he would slide on his knees, every time. *facepalm*

Part of his difficulty, aside from missing 2 practices and a game, is that he's homeschooled.  Technically unschooled. Meaning he learns what he wants, when he wants. It's not structured, AT ALL. (I mean, unless he asks us for it to be.) Usually I think of a basketball team full of 7-year-olds to not be very structured at all -- and his team isn't, especially compared to the other 2 teams they have played -- but it's still WAY more structured than anything he's done since he went to Montessori School when he was 3.

We were totally not anticipating that.

Since we are strange parents, I mean, we are unschooling, we believe there is a lot to be learned from video games. So we ran out and got NBA 2K11. We saw it had great reviews, so perfect! He's only got to play it once before his game today... and when you don't know sports very well, the sports games these days are a little overwhelming. *sigh* He plays Starcraft though, so I know he can figure it out. We just don't have a lot of time, and I certainly don't want to push him too hard and make him hate basketball. Because basketball is awesome.

I'll grab some basketball videos for him to watch and have him play NBA 2K11 some more (playing video games is something usually reserved as huge prizes, so he should be a little excited, I hope) and hopefully we have time to play with him without getting too frustrated.

This is on top of all sorts of other random stressful things that have been occurring in the past couple of weeks, and I'm starting to question whether or not I'm doing things "right." Maybe unschooling isn't the best idea, maybe I should keep my job, maybe I can't do any of it....

Everyone has those types of thoughts, I know I'm not alone.
What do you do to get yourself out of a rut?

Today, I'm going to watch one of my favorite Alan Watts videos. I freaking love Alan Watts- listening to recordings of him or reading his books usually instantly makes me feel better. This short little cartoon is produced by Matt Stone and Trey Parker. =D



I feel better already. =)

New DAILY Blog!!

I LOVE Technicolor Typecast, I'm only a few posts in and I'm really feeling good about the blog; however, there are less deep things that I'd like to share more frequently, and I'm sure my readers will love more frequent posts...

So, I decided to make a daily version!  =D

Get ready for shorter, sweeter posts that fit in your pocket! They'll be better than an iPad!

I plan to post things that inspire me, polls, recipes... all sorts of stuff.

To start out, questions:
I want threaded comments.
Yea/nay? Do you know where to find any good widgets for this?

Of less importance at the moment:
I need to change the design of my blogs. Do you know of any simple, epic options?

Last question:
What do you think the font? Difficult to read? Awesome? Retarded?

So what is my passion?

I keep talking about how I've found my passion in life and, unbeknownst to me, I've been doing it all along! But I haven't told you what it is.

Why?

Well, it's difficult to explain. My passion hasn't turned out to be so cookie-cutter. I don't mean "cookie-cutter"  in a bad way, I mean it just wasn't so clear. Like knitting, or rebuilding muscle cars, or cultivating mushrooms to save the world (although those all sound like fun!).

I suppose the most simple way to put it - my passion is being myself.

Let's go back to that quote that I keep mentioning and break it down:
"I've been so busy doing what I really want to do that I don't have time for what I think I want to do."

The whole time that I was searching for my passion in life, I thought it was going to be another mask I'd have to wear. Like, The Knitter or The eBay Seller or The Organizer. It's the thing I thought I'd want to do, that I needed to prepare for. I figured I'd have to be 100% proficient in whatever it was that I picked before I could make a profit.

And sure, that's how the world works, right? You go to college to become proficient in what you want to do with your life, so you can make money! I knew I didn't want to go the college route, though. It's so rigid, and I've always known passion was fiery and unpredictable; often, forcing yourself to enjoy your passion will just squelch the fire.

That's the brick wall I kept running into. How am I supposed to force myself to stick to my passion long enough to make a profit if I know that the act of forcing it will likely just make it a chore, just like any other job?

The thing is, I think... if you really want to be successful in doing what you love, you gotta have faith.

And I'm not talking about religion. I'm talking about faith in yourself. Faith that you can make it. Faith that everything will be okay. That's something I think our society is lacking in these days. Everyone is so afraid that they will fail or they won't be good enough. The thing is - all of the people who have made themselves successful - they felt that fear, too. But they didn't let fear control the decisions they made, and they didn't let fear keep them in a cubicle.

And that's what I'm striving for. My passion is all the things I've mentioned. It's being an incredible mom. It's being a magnificent partner. It's unschooling. It's simplifying. It's learning new things. Tasting new tastes. Testing new ideas. Nourishment. Taking care of myself and taking care of others. There's an endless, ever-changing list! Not just one thing.

My passion is so many things all at once. They are all me. This whole time, all I needed to do was just be myself.

How merely being myself is going to help me quit my job is something I haven't quite figured out yet! I suppose that will be my leap of faith once I've put together an adequate safety net - enough money for my family to get by for 3 months. That's about $2,500 for our family of 4. Luckily, I'm not interested in getting rich, so we don't need too much money (and we're slowly working on going moneyless).

Here are a few relevant links about doing what you want with your life:

Ash from the Middle Finger Project recently wrote about tenacity and humility and risking failure in Argentina (and all over the world):
Argentina + An 11-Year-Old Boy + Greatest Business Asset of All

Another feature I LOVE on the Middle Finger Project - Fear Exposed. This week Elisa tells us how being herself got her a Forbes.com column:
Fear, Exposed -- Featuring Elisa Doucette

Last but definitely not least, Nina Yau from Castles in The Air has overcome some fears and the comfort of "playing it safe" and is in Taiwan living her dreams! Yay, Nina! =D


Live From Taipei, Taiwan: Living Your Dreams from Nina Yau on Vimeo.

Tathata

I was listening to Alan Watts last night as I was falling asleep (I like the thought that positive words affect our subconscious while sleeping :), and I heard something awesome. Unfortunately, I'm unable to find the audio on youtube; however, if it were on youtube, I'm sure it would be stuck in the middle of a long video anyway. Although I think everyone should hear every word Alan Watts has ever recorded, I'd like to get straight to the point. So here it is in text (I found it on Google Books):

Actually, some of the words that the Buddhists use for the basic energy of the word really do not mean anything at all.  The word tathata, which in Sanskrit for "suchness" or "vastness," really means something more like "da-da-da," based on the word tat, which in Sanskrit means "that."  In Sanskrit existence is described as tat tvam asi, "Thou art that," or in modern American, "You're it."  But da-da is the first sound a baby makes when it comes into the world because the baby looks around and says, "da, da, da, da, da."  "That, that, that, that, that!"  Fathers flatter themselves and think their baby is saying "da-da" for "daddy," but according to the Buddhist philosophy this entire universe is one da-da-da, which means then thousand functions, ten thousand things, or one suchness, and we are all one suchness.

This is especially relevant to me because we have a 10-month-old baby, and just the other day I was listening to him saying "Da-da-da, da, DA," and suspecting that maybe he was just trying to say "That!" Now I know why!

(Random baby saying "da-da")

Here is the book quoted above on Amazon. One of my life goals is to read every Alan Watts book (progress of which has ground to a halt in part because of said baby!). So I definitely recommend it!

The Evolution of Blogging

I was planning on my next post to be about what I've found my passion to be, or perhaps about why I'm SO DONE with my job, but I came across something that thought I'd like to take a little break to share.

One of the most influential people in my life (now that I think about it, there is a HUGE list) in the past few months has been Everett Bogue. I've been reading his blog, Far Beyond the Stars, for a while now and I've been into it the whole time. He's gone from just quitting his job at New York Magazine to owning less than 50 things, all while blogging about it and writing e-books in a way to earn enough money to travel all around the U.S. When I found out he was unschooled, it all made sense how he had become so successful so fast! Now he's getting into the deeper part of life and what he does, and what he's saying is still making perfect sense (to me, at least).

Anyway, I've started following some people who are kind of new to blogging, and I thought I would share what Everett had to say in his most recent post: How Blogging Evolves(ed). (Since he has a Creative Commons license, I'm going to go ahead and copy the whole thing - but be sure to visit Everett's website and see what else he has to say!)

Blogging is in transition.

Many of us who have practicing blogging for awhile are becoming incredibly aware of the limits of the web as a medium for communication. 

We have so much inside ourselves that we want to communicate, but our ideas end up getting caught in a technology that hasn’t changed very much since I was a teenager. 

Yes, blogging has definitely gotten more widgets — but the most important decisions I usually make on my blog is turning all of the little functions off. Essentially many of us are blogging in the same way that we did ten years ago. The only difference is how we get the blog posts out, which these days is mostly by Twitter. 

I turned off the Facebook ‘Like’ button, because as much as I loved the large number on the top of my posts that resulted from people pressing it, the actual traffic to my site was negligible. This is because Facebook wants Facebookers to stay on Facebook where they can be shown ads and click ‘Like’ on photos of girls/boys they will never sleep with. 

Regardless, all of the smart people I know are leaving Facebook anyway. 

Blogging needs two things to make it more successful as a platform:

1. Bandwidth.  Bandwidth is a term that we cybernetic yogis use to convey the depth of an information transfer between two humans. F2F (face to face) is universally the highest definition, holograms are the next (but are kind of hard to find in the world right now — soon enough) next is 3d video, video, still photos, audio, and then finally text. 

Blogging tends to find itself in one of the lowest bandwidth ranges — text. The good thing about text is the low bandwidth means that it can travel much farther and faster than higher-bandwidth creations. A tweet can be read by 5000 people instantly, a blog post by 2000, but a video will probably only be played by 200, and F2F only conducted with one person at a time. 

This results in an ecosystem of how we interact on the web. As my blog grows in popularity, my threshold for F2F has grown with it. Whenever I say ‘Wheels down in X-city’ I commonly get dozens of requests to connect — hardly any I can answer because F2F takes an incredible amount of energetic power, especially if it’s a one-way conversation. 

2. Dimensionality.  Dimensionality is how smart the blog is in relation to its readers. For example, not everyone who comes to my work is in a place where they want to read about cybernetic yoga. They might want to time-travel back to when I was writing about how to reduce your possessions to less than 100 things. 

This is where the intelligence of the web itself needs to evolve, I’m not sure how much blogging or even my own ability to curate the content can correct for the huge variables involved in breadth of the knowledge that readers who stumble across this blog may have. 

To generalize, my blog used to have some pretty solid content for 20-somethings who were uncomfortable with their jobs — but over time my content has shifted to a place where I imagine my core audience is centered on Silicon Valley futurists. 

What if people who needed my ‘how to quit your soul-sucking job’ posts could get be shown that content instantly? What if the people who really needed to declutter a desk could be shown that content instantly? What if the people who want to learn mental cybernetics could be shown that content instantly? 

A lot of the tension surrounding my blog right now is the fact that decluttering-desks people are accidentally stumbling across posts on mental cybernetics. Not everyone is in the same place, it’s a big leap from clutter to maintaining your 3rd brain. 

I think blogging systems will need to learn to adapt to this level of dimensionality if blogging is going to evolve. 

– 

I’ve been blogging on Far Beyond The Stars since October of 2009, since then my strategy has changed a lot. I’ll take the rest of this post to point out some ways in which I’ve changed my blogging strategy. 

1. Business strategy entirely F2F (face to face).  I used to get my blogging knowledge from places like Problogger and Copyblogger, which I’m not linking to, because after a few months of experimentation I realized that almost everything those sites teach you is wrong. Everyone still thinks those sites are popular because 80% of bloggers have been trained (like little blogging puppies!) to suck up to established authorities in the off chance that they get linked to by an ‘A-List blogger’. The reality is that when I was linked to by Problogger last month it resulted in a grand total of 34 click-throughs. 

If I do need intelligent advice on getting traffic to my blog, I commonly will buy Corbett Barr three beers or some good Scotch and ask him his honest opinion about my blogging strategy. The next best thing to buying Corbett drinks is reading his blog. 

The lesson here is that all of my learning these days is not being done from blogs, instead I’m reaching out to people who I respect in real life. The highest bandwidth is real life, so if you want to learn how to blog successfully, the #1 strategy that you can employ is to meet a successful blogger in real life. Obviously this is hard to do, I commonly get upward of dozens of requests for drinks when I land in any city. 

Start by reaching out to bloggers who are around your same level and in your city. For example, one of the first bloggers I met up with was Ash Ambirge in New York — now we’re both rockstar bloggers. Why? Because we supported each other until we found success.
Getting access to a rockstar blogger/entrepreneur F2F is difficult, but can upgrade your success at an incredibly fast rate — if you’re open to their suggestions. 

2. Stopped caring about stats.When I first launched my blog, I was obsessed with how many people read my blog posts. I’d click on google analytics three times a day (even though it only updates once a day!) I know, it seems silly now. Anyway, now I don’t care about stats so much. 

I’d rather have a small group of enthusiastic readers than a large group of confused readers.
When you write for the masses, you end up writing stupid posts that no one cares about. One of the most surprising elements of transitioning from writing about minimalism to writing about augmented humanity/the cybernetic yogi lifestyle is that my blog traffic has actually gone up (though, I’ve only checked it once this month). 

Why is that? Because blogging success comes from pushing your own personal edge. Too many young bloggers are trying to write what they think other people want to read, instead of writing work that actually challenges themselves. 

Culture exists on the fringes. The center is boring, and secretly everyone wants out of the mediocre middle. 

3. Pushing audience interactions to higher levels.Many blogs will encourage you to ‘join the conversation’ in a place called “The Comments”. 

“The comments” is where your good ideas and time (your most valuable commodity) goes to die. The reason for this is no one actually sees comments, because it’s generally assumed by the majority of smart Internet users that the commenting section is a place where the low-life of the Internet go to play. 

Many people go straight to the comment section of larger blogs and post a “me too!” comment, because Darren Rowse told them that posting comments on other blogs is the #1 way to build your blog audience on his aforementioned blog that should be re-titled Unproblogger.com
There are two more important ways to “join the conversation” (whatever that means.) These two ways are guaranteed you put your interaction in a space where others can actually see it. 

1. Respond on Twitter. “The most awesome cybernetic yogi I know is@evbogue! Here’s a link to his blog post –> TK TK url” or perhaps “Wow,@evbogue has really gone off the deepend and I don’t even understand what he’s talking about anymore.” Can really do wonders for how many people see what your opinion is. This way all of your followers can see it, and check out whether I’m really awesome/lost it themselves and weigh in on Twitter. When your followers see you responding to creators on Twitter, they will learn how to respond to your creations on Twitter, thus bringing more attention to your work! Yay! 

2. Respond on your blog. If you read something online that really blows your mind, one of the most powerful actions you can take is to respond on your own blog. This can be as simple as linking to a post “this post made me think.” or can be a 2,000 word exposé building on the awesomeness of the material that you’ve been reading. They call it The Web for a reason, there are hyperlinks connecting everything. If you avoid hyperlinking out from your blog, no one will ever know your blog exists. 

Both of these are what I consider ‘high-level’ interactions on the web. You know how in the middle ages all of the kings and royalty had great parties in the castles while all of the serfs got to sit outside the castles and live miserable lives? Twitter and blogging = building castles. Dwelling in comments or on Facebook = rolling in mud while we giggle at you from the castles. The good thing about modern day royalty is you don’t need to be born into the castle to stay there, all you need to do is launch a blog or sign up for Twitter. 

A good way to start using Twitter is to follow me, and then follow everyone I follow. It’s a small list. This will instantaneously flood your brain with useful information, and you can change your follow list from there as time goes on and you discover more awesome people on Twitter.

I think a huge part of the reason I have been so excited about this blog is because of Far Beyond the Stars and joining Twitter and seeing what all the other insanely intelligent people have to say. I actually feel hopeful and confident about the future, even though I'm planning on quitting my job soon. =D

Have You Found Your Passion?

In my last post (or perhaps more correctly, my first post), I mentioned passion. Most people would like their focus in life to be something that they are passionate about. But what are you passionate about?? It can be a tough question to answer, especially if you've never asked yourself before. And how can something you're passionate about sustain yourself and your family?

Like a lot of people, I had no clue what I was really passionate about. I feel pretty strongly about my family and the recent birth of my second son, and even a good bowl of ice cream. But could I really incorporate those into something to make a living?

The answer is yes, but would I want to make money with those? I'm not really interested in solely making ice cream for people for a living or getting my kids into modeling or anything.

So I was stuck. I researched it online. I recorded ideas for 6 months and still really didn't have any idea how it would be possible for me to quit my job that I'm definitely NOT passionate about. I felt like I'd never see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Finally I had an epiphany, and I can see! There's light at the end of the tunnel!! I'm not stuck in drudgery forever!!!

The thing about passion... is it can be sneaky.  With me, it definitely was. I have been doing what I'm passionate about all along! I'm just SO passionate about it, that it's just everyday life for me. It was right under my nose the whole time.

Today I listened to an interview with Derek Sivers, a hugely inspirational guy that I've just discovered. To access it, you need to sign up for Ramit Sethi's free 30-Day Hustling Course (if you scroll down the page, you can read a bit about Derek and sign up for the free course). Honestly, I signed up just for the interview, I'm that into Derek Sivers right now. Ramit mentioned in the interview that he knows his website and his book, I Will Teach You to Be Rich, come off as a little questionable. I laughed was like, "You got me!" when he said that, but from the sounds of it, he really knows what he's talking about. Even though I'm not really interested in getting "rich," I would like to make a little bit of money (another story entirely), and so I'm definitely going to look through his course to see if there's anything that I can benefit from.

Back to the passion. Derek mentioned in the interview how elusive this "passion" thing can be for some people. It's something both he and Ramit get a lot of emails about -- people saying something like, "I really wish I had your passion, but I just haven't figured out what I'm into... (and so I'll just use that as an excuse to be stuck with this job I hate)."

It's because people, me included until recently, feel like their PASSION is supposed to be this big obvious thing for everyone. For example, Treavor (my un-husband :) is really passionate about chess and computers. He plays chess every time he gets the chance, and if he hears your computer is malfunctioning, he can't help but assist. It's obvious that he's passionate about those things. It's often obvious when people are passionate about music. There are a lot of passions that appear obvious to people. But ordinary, average people by definition aren't really passionate about anything, right?

Wrong.

(By the way, I don't believe anyone is really ordinary or average, they just convince themselves they are. You are extraordinary and you have a passion. Even if your passion is not having a passion.)

Everybody is passionate about something. If you're stuck trying to figure out your passion, I want you to first think about the thing that knocked me out of the unpassionate box. You are so busy doing what you really want to do that you don't have time for what you think you want to do. Is that true? Mull over that for a few days, maybe a few months. And while you're mulling, write some stuff down. I suggest Leo Babauta's Short But Powerful Guide to Finding Your Passion. And while you're at it, take a look at the post about doing what you love on Man vs. Debt.

Keep in mind that if you're still not sure what your passion is, while you're figuring it out, DO NOT focus on how to profit from it. Save that for later, when you're sure you can be happy doing this thing just for the fun of it, maybe for no money at all. Focusing on profit will more than likely cloud your vision -- you'll be more focused on the money than the love. That was part of the road block to finding my passion; even though I don't really want to be rich, I was still too focused on what generates income to consider what my passion ultimately turned out to be. So, remember, when finding your passion, follow your heart and not your wallet.

So, do you know what your passion is? Are you living it? Let me know!

First! -or- Why I Started This Blog

Welcome to the new blog!

I've been into this whole minimalism thing (link is for humor), getting rid of excess stuff, not wasting so much, etc. I was reading blogs like zenhabits and Far Beyond the Stars... and I got to thinking: I don't like my job! Imagine that, someone who doesn't like their job!

So, I started racking my brain: How could I quit my job, but still generate enough income to pay the bills? What am I passionate about? How can I sell that, whatever the hell it is? I was coming up with a bunch of things, but nothing I felt like I could really make any money on in the short-term.

I was stuck. I don't like my job, but I can't seem to make a living any other way. I don't want to just have a job. I just want to do stuff that resonates with my being. Not willingly slave most of my life away just so I can have a couple days off at the end of the week. I just don't think that's what humans are built for. What can I do???

And then it hit me.

I hate to talk about Facebook... but this is how it really happened. I came across a post during the holiday season by my Godmother's Mom (who is in her 80s by the way) that goes like this:

"Bill Vaughan was also Burton (Hilliard?) in the Better Homes and Gardens or one of those magazines. In one of those columns he said, 'My wife is so busy doing what she really wants to do that she never has time to do what she thinks she wants to do.' I've never forgotten it and you won't either now that you've heard it." (The link she posted by the way is Bill Vaughan's 'A Story of Christmas.')

To be historically accurate, here's what I said:

"You may be right about that quote! It feels like it's going to be rather unforgettable."

And it just sat and stewed for a while.

As I sat working at my desk a week or two later, I was going over it again in my head, relating it to my job and work and money. I had thought of that quote every couple of days. I don't know if it was only unforgettable because I had labeled it that way or what, but it kept popping up. Then came the moment of clarity.

I am already doing what I really want to do.

I really am already doing what I really want to do.

And that's all I need. So why not tell people about it?


What about you? 
Do you have time for the things you really want to do, or are you already doing them?