2.03.2006
Taking Action
Because idle hands are the devil's playground, taking any morally good action is more important than ensuring those actions are productive. We have to stop wasting time planning out productive actions in moments of idleness. Instead, knowingly commit to a genuine and aligned direction that is congruent with our body's signals. Basically, don't fret about being productive, just take genuine actions and the harvest of prolificacy will ripen in season.
To Panacea or Not to Panacea, that is the Question
Dreams and Non-Dreamers
Of the two archetypal life trajectories -- abandoning dreams for fear of residing in fantasy or accepting the risk of visions and carving a reality for seemingly wild aspirations -- the former is reliable and stable, but ultimately mundane, while the latter has its own vibe and frequency, its own unique risks, and a distinct robustness.
The positive outcome of abandoning dreams as hogwash drivel is that one can quickly plan their life. Without a focus on dreams, one's life may be robotic or inhuman, but there lacks uncertainty of enigma. Lives void of dreams are very predictable. If you aren't dreaming of starting your own business, for example, you know that the next morn will begin another day of slaving away for the manager, but there will be exactness about your vocation. However, not dreaming deflates the intention of one's actions and committing to a dream ultimately must occur. But dreams can be planned. They are not always spontaneously generated occurrences. In fact, dreams are only accomplished through very detailed planning and a vehement focus and ardent commitment to that dream.
When one commits to a prudent and sincerely good dream, a regression is not only ridiculously unfeasible, but completely impossible. Oliver Wendel Holmes writes, "One's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions", meaning once a cultivated dream has taken roots, its delivery is in the pipeline, and it becomes an anchored dream. Retraction of commitment and choosing to consciously dispose of an anchored dream furthers the state of fantasy because the anchored dream has become the sole reality. Once one's spirit has already committed to a dream, the subconscious fulfillment is inevitable. This may sound like one is imminently drawn into the rabbit hole, but this path is of one's own devising, customized and personalized to the impassioned individual.
Non-dreamers frequently have a problem with dreamers, and vice versa. In addition to fallaciously believing they are lost, wandering souls, non-dreamers are intimidated by dreamers for fear of those dreams coming to fruition. If all the dreams suddenly sparked into reality, the non-dreamers would be missing a great harvest and would lose.
The dreamers are insulted and repulsed by a non-dreamer's waste. Through the eyes of the dreamer, the methods in which non-dreamers make refuse of their life by disposing of it -- by obsequiously handing it over to some unwarranted authority -- is repugnant. But dreamer's must implement there dreams through scheduling, planning, and tangible deadlines in order for them to come into fruition. The dreamers disgusted by laziness of people who fail to dream and, thus, avoid doing anything poignant with there life, and the non-dreamers scoff at the dogged pursuit of dreamers, claiming it to be a futile quest for a non-existant panacea?
The interesting part arises when dreamers ultimately reach success. This not only perturbs the non-dreamers, but it frightens them. The more oft birth of dreams into reality engenders in the non-dreamers, neurotic fright not of the fruition of a dream, but the sudden horror that their life lack connection to poignant intention.
The Tools of Non-Dreamers and Dreamers
Non-dreamers have conformity, society, and conventionality for structure with legal-rational authority to keep them afloat. Dreamers have tools at their disposal, too. The can catalyze motivation from nowhere, manufacture a creative and unique style, and utilize enthusiasm as an invigorating source.
Non-dreamers may appear to have an upper hand most of the time, but ultimately they only possess the hollow authority of detritus, things that are irrelvent; the dreamers must have continuation with transforming dreams to reality and recognize their obstacles not as opposition, but as a peculiar form of summoning motivation.
Successful dreamers are not in the clouds, but organized, scheduled and glued into a very demanding regimen.
If your sentient time is a blank canvas and your life is the painting, then your unique style is the paint to color your existence. Eventually, the weathered dreamer cultivates his or her original style. One’s style allows you to cultivate originality and it allows you to take an optimistic view on life because you act as a vibrant traveler heading through life with clarity of a destination and awareness of what you want to do during your travel. Style allows you to transform your ideas, thoughts, awareness, and dreams into reality.
Finally, the dreamer must tap into his enthusiasm, which is best accomplished, according to Aldous Huxley, by re-accessing the childhood voice. Huxley writers how childhood is an enthusiastic the path to genius: "The secret of genius is to carry the spirit of the child into old age, which means never losing your enthusiasm". It's vital to keep this connection to childhood voice a sincere beacon of our commitment to passions. However, those passions easily get derailed without planning and regimen. You have to program your own life and design. Dreaming is only half the process. Creating a strict, and discipling, but not enervating regimen that manufacture steps to success creates that inner knowing. Childhood zeal is a vital touch to all of this, however. Childhood zeal propels the mature adult into the experience of unbridled effulgence and invigoration.
Of the two archetypal life trajectories -- abandoning dreams for fear of residing in fantasy or accepting the risk of visions and carving a reality for seemingly wild aspirations -- the former is reliable and stable, but ultimately mundane, while the latter has its own vibe and frequency, its own unique risks, and a distinct robustness.
The positive outcome of abandoning dreams as hogwash drivel is that one can quickly plan their life. Without a focus on dreams, one's life may be robotic or inhuman, but there lacks uncertainty of enigma. Lives void of dreams are very predictable. If you aren't dreaming of starting your own business, for example, you know that the next morn will begin another day of slaving away for the manager, but there will be exactness about your vocation. However, not dreaming deflates the intention of one's actions and committing to a dream ultimately must occur. But dreams can be planned. They are not always spontaneously generated occurrences. In fact, dreams are only accomplished through very detailed planning and a vehement focus and ardent commitment to that dream.
When one commits to a prudent and sincerely good dream, a regression is not only ridiculously unfeasible, but completely impossible. Oliver Wendel Holmes writes, "One's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions", meaning once a cultivated dream has taken roots, its delivery is in the pipeline, and it becomes an anchored dream. Retraction of commitment and choosing to consciously dispose of an anchored dream furthers the state of fantasy because the anchored dream has become the sole reality. Once one's spirit has already committed to a dream, the subconscious fulfillment is inevitable. This may sound like one is imminently drawn into the rabbit hole, but this path is of one's own devising, customized and personalized to the impassioned individual.
Non-dreamers frequently have a problem with dreamers, and vice versa. In addition to fallaciously believing they are lost, wandering souls, non-dreamers are intimidated by dreamers for fear of those dreams coming to fruition. If all the dreams suddenly sparked into reality, the non-dreamers would be missing a great harvest and would lose.
The dreamers are insulted and repulsed by a non-dreamer's waste. Through the eyes of the dreamer, the methods in which non-dreamers make refuse of their life by disposing of it -- by obsequiously handing it over to some unwarranted authority -- is repugnant. But dreamer's must implement there dreams through scheduling, planning, and tangible deadlines in order for them to come into fruition. The dreamers disgusted by laziness of people who fail to dream and, thus, avoid doing anything poignant with there life, and the non-dreamers scoff at the dogged pursuit of dreamers, claiming it to be a futile quest for a non-existant panacea?
The interesting part arises when dreamers ultimately reach success. This not only perturbs the non-dreamers, but it frightens them. The more oft birth of dreams into reality engenders in the non-dreamers, neurotic fright not of the fruition of a dream, but the sudden horror that their life lack connection to poignant intention.
The Tools of Non-Dreamers and Dreamers
Non-dreamers have conformity, society, and conventionality for structure with legal-rational authority to keep them afloat. Dreamers have tools at their disposal, too. The can catalyze motivation from nowhere, manufacture a creative and unique style, and utilize enthusiasm as an invigorating source.
Non-dreamers may appear to have an upper hand most of the time, but ultimately they only possess the hollow authority of detritus, things that are irrelvent; the dreamers must have continuation with transforming dreams to reality and recognize their obstacles not as opposition, but as a peculiar form of summoning motivation.
Successful dreamers are not in the clouds, but organized, scheduled and glued into a very demanding regimen.
If your sentient time is a blank canvas and your life is the painting, then your unique style is the paint to color your existence. Eventually, the weathered dreamer cultivates his or her original style. One’s style allows you to cultivate originality and it allows you to take an optimistic view on life because you act as a vibrant traveler heading through life with clarity of a destination and awareness of what you want to do during your travel. Style allows you to transform your ideas, thoughts, awareness, and dreams into reality.
Finally, the dreamer must tap into his enthusiasm, which is best accomplished, according to Aldous Huxley, by re-accessing the childhood voice. Huxley writers how childhood is an enthusiastic the path to genius: "The secret of genius is to carry the spirit of the child into old age, which means never losing your enthusiasm". It's vital to keep this connection to childhood voice a sincere beacon of our commitment to passions. However, those passions easily get derailed without planning and regimen. You have to program your own life and design. Dreaming is only half the process. Creating a strict, and discipling, but not enervating regimen that manufacture steps to success creates that inner knowing. Childhood zeal is a vital touch to all of this, however. Childhood zeal propels the mature adult into the experience of unbridled effulgence and invigoration.
Archive Success and Delete the Accomplishment
One hindrance in furthering success for people is that they believe they have accomplished enough already. Donald Trump, Julia Roberts, and Michael Phelps could easily say that. Those three could wake up and say I've made enough money, I've acted in enough movies, or I've won enough swimming medals, respectively. But they don't. Despite their tremendously gigantic accomplishments and achievemtns, there success continues to prosper. Trump, Roberts, and Phelps, like all successful people don't let their accomplishments sever there future aspirations.
Past accomplishments never legitimate retirement. Many people look at what they've done and say, "Well, that's enough for ten lifetiems. I'm done." No, success isn't made that way. So how could people continue to keep going despite all their achievements? They split the past and present achievements.
Believe in the present that you have not accomplished anything, and that -- in that specific, finite, present moment -- is true. Never forget your triumphs; never fail to herald your feats. But archive those successes in the past!
Forget your accomplishments in the present, but archive them in your history. That way you wake up and feel like there's so much you need to still do; you rejuvenate your youthful ambition, while maintaing your wisdom and experience.
Past accomplishments never legitimate retirement. Many people look at what they've done and say, "Well, that's enough for ten lifetiems. I'm done." No, success isn't made that way. So how could people continue to keep going despite all their achievements? They split the past and present achievements.
Believe in the present that you have not accomplished anything, and that -- in that specific, finite, present moment -- is true. Never forget your triumphs; never fail to herald your feats. But archive those successes in the past!
Forget your accomplishments in the present, but archive them in your history. That way you wake up and feel like there's so much you need to still do; you rejuvenate your youthful ambition, while maintaing your wisdom and experience.
The Deliberates (Warm) and the Festies (Cold)
At the apex of linguistic mastery, there emerges two distinct and corresponding methods of correspondence. One is not better than the other; neither is good nor bad, just dichotomous. The first conversational temperate is the deliberates. They are the Tony Robbins, the James K's. Their element is the earth -- the tree. They are calm, warm, slow, deliberate, Oak-like, in demeanor, and their words are the essence of the person's message. Note that, even though they depict the opposite of Cold feisties, they are not "hot" because hot connotes waspish and viciously quickness. They maintain stability by recieving a few blows, making their roots strong, and enduring despite some hardships and weather. How to interact with them (beating or dancing with) them: these guys are not marvelled by fancy footwork, but by the right usage of words. The right diction will achieve victory and comradeship with subtle footwork or all excessive footwork playing on the weakness, would be easiest
The other type are the feisties. They are the Basketball players, the Alex Ekmans, the Mike Maizels (maybe). Their element is water -- the ocean. They are feisty, agile, limber, cutting, icy, and quick. They are the instigators, the provocateurs, who insult and then compliment, throwing in slapshot comments to get people off balance, but then interjecting incredibly poignant praise. They are more deceivous than the deliberates, but equally as socially competent. They maintain their stability not with firmly planted roots, but with being able to dance around, avoid, evade, and dodge attacks, and move quickly with agility. How to beat them or befriend them: play on their strength, keeping up with the fast-paced dialouge, but then deliver a poignant deliberate mentality. Because they are very serious, the best method for interaction is realizing that excessive seriousness tends to cause myopia, so use gentle, mocking humor that is ontop of a narrow, but serious, focus.
I remember encountering a "feisty" in the suana once. I was sitting in there relaxing, having a calm conversation with a person, and talking about some pretty philosophical stuff -- creating ingenuity with passion to resolve a strength. In walks a "feisty", decked out in full long-sleeved clothing (warming up for a run), heard a few sentences, and then interjects, "You've got to stop smoking dope." I said that I wasn't interested in drugs and then shut up, kind of stunned that he had said that when I was so interested in health and non-drugs and the vitality of that certainty. What would have been a good strategy would have been to respond with a feisty comment to show that I could play that game, and then ease back into the deliberate mentality. Tactically, I could have responsed, "Nope, I'm clean as a whistle, monkey boy." Throwing around jargon and phraseology about not being on drugs and then commenting on how ridiculous he looked in the sauna, would have counteracted the comment.
Of course I, like George Costanza, can't think of these comebacks on the fly, but it is something I am working on.
The other type are the feisties. They are the Basketball players, the Alex Ekmans, the Mike Maizels (maybe). Their element is water -- the ocean. They are feisty, agile, limber, cutting, icy, and quick. They are the instigators, the provocateurs, who insult and then compliment, throwing in slapshot comments to get people off balance, but then interjecting incredibly poignant praise. They are more deceivous than the deliberates, but equally as socially competent. They maintain their stability not with firmly planted roots, but with being able to dance around, avoid, evade, and dodge attacks, and move quickly with agility. How to beat them or befriend them: play on their strength, keeping up with the fast-paced dialouge, but then deliver a poignant deliberate mentality. Because they are very serious, the best method for interaction is realizing that excessive seriousness tends to cause myopia, so use gentle, mocking humor that is ontop of a narrow, but serious, focus.
I remember encountering a "feisty" in the suana once. I was sitting in there relaxing, having a calm conversation with a person, and talking about some pretty philosophical stuff -- creating ingenuity with passion to resolve a strength. In walks a "feisty", decked out in full long-sleeved clothing (warming up for a run), heard a few sentences, and then interjects, "You've got to stop smoking dope." I said that I wasn't interested in drugs and then shut up, kind of stunned that he had said that when I was so interested in health and non-drugs and the vitality of that certainty. What would have been a good strategy would have been to respond with a feisty comment to show that I could play that game, and then ease back into the deliberate mentality. Tactically, I could have responsed, "Nope, I'm clean as a whistle, monkey boy." Throwing around jargon and phraseology about not being on drugs and then commenting on how ridiculous he looked in the sauna, would have counteracted the comment.
Of course I, like George Costanza, can't think of these comebacks on the fly, but it is something I am working on.
Trouncing Violent Opposition
Einstein said that "great souls have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds". When you start encountering opposition one of two things is happening, you're being a moron, doing somethign really stupid, or your engaging your great spirit from an incredible level of certainty, and that intimidates people. Don't let yourself be intimidated by their fear. For the longest time I would really start living it up at a party, singing, speaking my mind, and having fun, and people would get pissed. That's fine and dandy but my error was to use the pissed state of other people as indication that I was doing something wrong, when it could just as easily be something extremely aligned and right. Could it be so outrageous of a belief that someone could be getting pissed at you because what you are doing is something they can't? Could it be that I am doing something that might reveal an inadequacy or fallacy of their own? Doesn't seem to far-fetched. Life can be battle to prove that you're right and are going to party if reference frames are external, meaning people define themselves with outside anchors. I am not saying I am a great soul. Great soul's are Gandhi, Dalai Lama, Mick Jagger, Emerson, and others that have legacy. Just as everyone has a great soul to access, I am definitely committed to connecting with and showing others my great soul. Even though I have not encountered as violent confrontation and am nowhere as near as incredible as the Mahatmas (Indian for "great soul", literally) of the past, I definitely have encountered opposition.
At the bar I went to on Friday night, I was called a whore, oxnoxious, and a tool for dancing, singing with everyone else, and having a great time. Let's dissect these disparagements in a positive light to actually make them laudatory comments. After all, they are indications that I am doing stuff right in some light. How would it feel if you could never be insulted; if you were invulnerable to criticism? That deflection can occur with the process I call "Dissecting the Intention". The slang for tool means a dull, slow-witted, socially inept person. Sounds quite disparaging at first. Dull can mean "slow to understand" and slow also means enduring for a long time, so dull can mean that you're understood for a long period of time, or what you say sticks and holds true. Now for tackling "slow-witted". Your wit, being "slow and enduring" perpetuates, and inept can mean stupid, which means not using commmon sense. Well, if you aren't using common sense, then you must be using non-common, or different sense -- a creative sense. So just to recap, by being called a tool, what the person really meant was that my words stuck, endured the test of time, my wit perpetuated and persisted, and that I used a unique, non-common, creative sense. Thank you! The other "disparagements" can be dissected in a similar fashion. Whore, a promiscuous woman, is a little more challenging but it could be interpretted as though I have access to my femine side and have many stimulating, not necessarily sexual, relationships with people. Obnoxious could be interpretted as ob-noxious, the opposite of noxious, or the antithesis of harmful and poisonous, being very pleasant and curative, even.
I was derisively called a tool, a whore, and obnoxious. The villifying intent of the people who said those comments was to poison me. Would you ever try to inspire someone with snide ridicule or motivate some group with opprobrium? Nope, sorry. Their intent was certainly not to encourage me by throwing jeering aspersions; they were interested in delivering the low blow of humiliation. That's not dancing! Obloquy and insults do not normally bring you up; the intention is to put you down. Their malicious aim was to make me feel degraded and whithered. But, as we just learned, you can dissect intent from delivery and spin your own interpretation. What they really did was say that I was a creative person, possessing enduring, long-lasting wit, who had access to his male and female personality characteristics, all while being innocuous -- not noxious -- pleasant and curative! Why follow through with someone elses derogatory agenda? Bring people up, not down. And what better way to deal with violent opposition than to do more than neutralize it, but to become motivated by it!
At the bar I went to on Friday night, I was called a whore, oxnoxious, and a tool for dancing, singing with everyone else, and having a great time. Let's dissect these disparagements in a positive light to actually make them laudatory comments. After all, they are indications that I am doing stuff right in some light. How would it feel if you could never be insulted; if you were invulnerable to criticism? That deflection can occur with the process I call "Dissecting the Intention". The slang for tool means a dull, slow-witted, socially inept person. Sounds quite disparaging at first. Dull can mean "slow to understand" and slow also means enduring for a long time, so dull can mean that you're understood for a long period of time, or what you say sticks and holds true. Now for tackling "slow-witted". Your wit, being "slow and enduring" perpetuates, and inept can mean stupid, which means not using commmon sense. Well, if you aren't using common sense, then you must be using non-common, or different sense -- a creative sense. So just to recap, by being called a tool, what the person really meant was that my words stuck, endured the test of time, my wit perpetuated and persisted, and that I used a unique, non-common, creative sense. Thank you! The other "disparagements" can be dissected in a similar fashion. Whore, a promiscuous woman, is a little more challenging but it could be interpretted as though I have access to my femine side and have many stimulating, not necessarily sexual, relationships with people. Obnoxious could be interpretted as ob-noxious, the opposite of noxious, or the antithesis of harmful and poisonous, being very pleasant and curative, even.
I was derisively called a tool, a whore, and obnoxious. The villifying intent of the people who said those comments was to poison me. Would you ever try to inspire someone with snide ridicule or motivate some group with opprobrium? Nope, sorry. Their intent was certainly not to encourage me by throwing jeering aspersions; they were interested in delivering the low blow of humiliation. That's not dancing! Obloquy and insults do not normally bring you up; the intention is to put you down. Their malicious aim was to make me feel degraded and whithered. But, as we just learned, you can dissect intent from delivery and spin your own interpretation. What they really did was say that I was a creative person, possessing enduring, long-lasting wit, who had access to his male and female personality characteristics, all while being innocuous -- not noxious -- pleasant and curative! Why follow through with someone elses derogatory agenda? Bring people up, not down. And what better way to deal with violent opposition than to do more than neutralize it, but to become motivated by it!
One Craziness, Hold the Insanity, To Go, Please
Crazies can be sinkers or drowners, or they can be geniuses, affluent eccentrics. Crazy people sink to a watery grave or they can swim, generating tremendous erudition, applied intelligence, and wealth. Michael Gelb explain the avenues in which craziness can be channeled to create tremendously enriching outcomes. "Crazy people who are productive are geniuses. Crazy people who are rich are eccentric. Crazy people who are neither. productive nor rich are just plain crazy." Clearly, the goal is to not minimize the insanity, but to channel the "non compos mentis" (Latin, literally meaning, not having control of one's mind) into creativity by dancing with your own craziness to create productive eccentricity and genius. In other words, you can be crazy one of two ways: Successful crazy or Insane crazy. Both successful crazy and Insane crazy people have somewhat of a psychopathology at their core, but insane crazy people destroy and create malign, while the successful crazy people auspiciously channel that core into creative, nourishing, inventive acts. The trick is to not remonstrate craziness, but to herald it.
C.S. Lewis writes that Jesus -- given his outrageous claims of being able to enact miracles, revive the dead, exorcise the demons, and more -- was a "Lunatic, a Lord, or a Liar". Saying he was the son of God could only mean that he was a complete nutso, a total liar, or an actual lord. This is not implying that we all are either a lord, lunatic, or a liar, but that we must take up honesty to avoid lies, and embrace productivity and wealth to negate the insanity and the wretched suffering from lunacy. There are some brilliant comedians, for example, who would not be funny if they weren't crazy. Instead of suffering and combating their craziness in an ornery denial, they allowed it to flourish. Gelb reminds us that crazy people who are neither productive nor rich and active, simply wallow in their lunacy. However, committing to that unknown can generate a wild, but galvanizing roller-coaster.
Truly though, most of the successful people are lunatics. The unparralled, superlative intelligence or strength or artistic ability -- whatever the attribute -- can only be reached by an unparalled, superlative method, a unique unconverntional method. If the superlative could be acquired by simply following the status quo with a simple, ho-hum, convenvtional method, it would mean that everyone could be much more or much less intelligent, but that procedure could never be the path of a genius because genius posesses "exceptiona" creative power, intellectual ability or some other ability. Key emphasis on the exceptional. If everyone else has that same intellectual ability and creative power, it ceases to be an exception. In his book GENIUS, author James Gleick describes mathematician Richard Feynman as a "'Renaissance Man' were that term not so diluted from its application to everyone from television sitcom stars who scribble a few lines of poetic doggerel to major league athletes who speak in complete sentences. Instead, let's just say that, in this Jewish-American son of a New York uniform salesman, we find a remarkable marriage of transcendental intellect, hubris, and frat house debauchery. A "character" to be sure. But also a genius." A renaissance man possessing transcendental brainpower, pride, and an affinity for parties? With all of those zany characteristics stewing together in the same melting pot, how on earth could Feynman be anything but a little crazy? He was very much crazy, but this made him VERY much a genius.
Similarly, Picasso was psychotic, John Nash, inventor of Game Theory, was a diagnosed schizophrenic, Einstein, incredibly eccentric, the list goes on. This certainly does not exclude people who lack psychological disorders or eccentricities from becoming wealthy, exceptionally intelligent, or immensely successful, but it does mean that you have to get in the water. Gelb writes, "Geniuses and crazy people are both out in the middle of a deep ocean; geniuses swim, crazy people drown. Most of us are sitting safely on shore. Take a chacne and get your feet wet". Picasso, Nash, Einstein, and all the other successful crazies swam and, in doing so, they churned up all kinds of enlightening inventions of art, math, and physics.
The rich and famous, the eccentrically intelligent, the superbly successful people are not normal! Normal is staying on the shore. Normal is safe, innocuous, harmless, average, and typical. It is a constant, but does not imply, necessarily, goodness; it certainly does not imply craziness, productive or unproductive. Think about it, normalcy certainly never impllies genius, wealth, or supreme success. If someone is exceptional in anything you never refer to them as "normal". Normal is safe and without risk, but drab, discolored and debilitating towards expansive, but, channeled craziness. Don't avoid being normal, it's important to have a stability zone in life. You can have a comfort, normal, constant zone with the types of books you read, people you interact with, rituals you have, exercise you perform, and other invariates. Constancy can be the eye in the tornado of successful craziness.
Clearly, the correct measuring of craziness, is the ingredient to success. Important to note that while "normal" may not insinuate genius, the "state of normalcy" should never be relegated as an inferior state of being. Normal is simple, commonplace, prevalent, but it is never lesser or inferior. Obviously, most of the time, to be different, one must get off the conventional, well-beaten path and listen to his own drum beat. Or one could make their own impression within a well-beaten path, but some form of divergence from the norm must occur. The trick is avoid having that divergence from being a meandering, dismal distraction, and, instead, make it productive by maintaining resilience, generating a high-faculty of concentration,a and having immense faith in the process.
Faith is needed for success. Success is defined as the accomplishment of an aim or purpose, and many times the scintillating endeavor for creating success, demands faith to take the necessary risks. The risks necessary to success can be undertaken with or without faith. Risks endeavored without faith become frightening and disturbing changes of tumult. Risks endeavored with faith transform fearful moments of doubt into inspiring and dynamic moments of exciting "Satori" because you have the confidence from perseverence and the awareness that that risk is pursuing a goal.
Satori is a Zen word meaning, ""sudden awakening". Satori is "insight into our fundamental nature...not the result of abstract mental concepts or ideas but rather a momentary, experiential fusing of body, mind, and emotions" (Millman 92). When your emotional and physical energies flow freely you are experiencing the inner peace and power of the moving inner experience of satori. A great method for acquiring satori is creating craziness channeling in structure by using sound judgment for our decisions.".
Additionally, Famous story-teller, Roald Dahl, writes. "Most of the really exciting things that we do in our lives scare us to death" (52). Crazy endeavors possess the dichotomous quality of being frightening and exciting because you know that task is a stepping-stone to achieving a goal, but in the back of your mind, you know you are "acting crazy', abondoning the norm, and are entering the unknown. Don't purposefully pursue things that make you afraid, but that closeness to fear, is often an ingredient in things that are certainly exciting.Risk, craziness, and fear with the linchpin of faith, self-confidence, and personal belief, become invigorating and stimulating excitement. We must never abandon tact because prudence ensures success, but we must avoid "paralysis by analysis", while still analyzing our past, connecting it with the present, and moving forward with certainty.
We must abandon the reliance on restricting compartments for structure. Compartments provide obligation and structure. While the benefits of structure and support are undenialby vital to growth, obligation can get messy. The best positon remains outside of the cubicle by creating your own self-defined responsibilities. Define your own vocational department. Get your life aligned by identifying your interests and passions, access the freedom to discover those investments, experience the happiness from being prudent about your future, but passionate about your present, and the elaborate the happiness by expressing it.
The trick for happiness is to not avoid lunacy, but to embrace craziness, while engaging prudence. Tactfully create the resources you need to channel the non-normal, wild, sincere talent into productive outlets. Bach, Beethoven and Tchaikovsky, Mozart and Haydn -- masters in setting different, totally new Baroque, Romantic, and Renaissance-Baroque movements -- had the attributes for would-be "crazies" if failed to discover a piano, and music. Instead, their talent was channeled into sound and logical craziness, a productive zone, making incredible "crazy" -- different, setting totally new periods and movements -- and successful symphonic classical composition.
George Orwell asks, "What can you do against the lunatic who is more intelligent than yourself, who gives your arguments a fair hearing and then simply persists in his lunacy?" Nothing. Nothing at person, operating at high faculty of intelligence, yeilds to no obstacle. Abraham Lincoln failed 13 times trying to get elected into Congress, trying any more seemed like lunacy, but he persisted in his "crazy pursuit" and became the sixteenth President of the United States. Dogged, but calculated, persistence in any noble endeavor propitiously transforms the insane process into prodigious success because it is within that inner tenacity that we discover our subtle genius.
All success and true genius is acquired with the risk of admitting your own craziness. Athletes who train copious hours, insane number of miles, do so with a twinge of looniness; musicians who have psychotic fits on stage producing the greatest performances imaginable embrace being bonkers and engage their crazyiness; and the greatest breakthroughs in science, medicinee, mathematics, and chemistry occur with a zany and warped hunch that proves to be a new vaccine, cure, or discvory. Embrace the craziness, hold off the lunacy by being productive, but never deny that you're nuts. Denying your insanity limits yourself. Give testimony that you will recognize, honor, and nurture your wild crazy side is not an ominous crutch, but as an exhilarating springboard for catalyzing ingenuity.
Success is not categorical; it is never somewhat successful or not, it is black and white, make or break. Some people could argue that unhealthy crazies like John Wayne Gacey, Jeffrey Dommer, Ted Kazinski were all "successful", possibly notorieties, because they were certainly crazy (you'd have to be to murder that way), turned heads and became well known names. However, they were unsound, unlogical, destructive crazy people that were unsuccessful in every way possible. They drew attention, but did not experience an iota of success. Craziness is only successful if it is channelled into creativity. Notice the etymological backbone of "creative" is create, not destroy. Success is expansive and ultimately good. A twinge of craziness mixed with dogged persistence combined in a concoction of harmonious connection with humanity, creates a powerful elixer of genius and success.
C.S. Lewis writes that Jesus -- given his outrageous claims of being able to enact miracles, revive the dead, exorcise the demons, and more -- was a "Lunatic, a Lord, or a Liar". Saying he was the son of God could only mean that he was a complete nutso, a total liar, or an actual lord. This is not implying that we all are either a lord, lunatic, or a liar, but that we must take up honesty to avoid lies, and embrace productivity and wealth to negate the insanity and the wretched suffering from lunacy. There are some brilliant comedians, for example, who would not be funny if they weren't crazy. Instead of suffering and combating their craziness in an ornery denial, they allowed it to flourish. Gelb reminds us that crazy people who are neither productive nor rich and active, simply wallow in their lunacy. However, committing to that unknown can generate a wild, but galvanizing roller-coaster.
Truly though, most of the successful people are lunatics. The unparralled, superlative intelligence or strength or artistic ability -- whatever the attribute -- can only be reached by an unparalled, superlative method, a unique unconverntional method. If the superlative could be acquired by simply following the status quo with a simple, ho-hum, convenvtional method, it would mean that everyone could be much more or much less intelligent, but that procedure could never be the path of a genius because genius posesses "exceptiona" creative power, intellectual ability or some other ability. Key emphasis on the exceptional. If everyone else has that same intellectual ability and creative power, it ceases to be an exception. In his book GENIUS, author James Gleick describes mathematician Richard Feynman as a "'Renaissance Man' were that term not so diluted from its application to everyone from television sitcom stars who scribble a few lines of poetic doggerel to major league athletes who speak in complete sentences. Instead, let's just say that, in this Jewish-American son of a New York uniform salesman, we find a remarkable marriage of transcendental intellect, hubris, and frat house debauchery. A "character" to be sure. But also a genius." A renaissance man possessing transcendental brainpower, pride, and an affinity for parties? With all of those zany characteristics stewing together in the same melting pot, how on earth could Feynman be anything but a little crazy? He was very much crazy, but this made him VERY much a genius.
Similarly, Picasso was psychotic, John Nash, inventor of Game Theory, was a diagnosed schizophrenic, Einstein, incredibly eccentric, the list goes on. This certainly does not exclude people who lack psychological disorders or eccentricities from becoming wealthy, exceptionally intelligent, or immensely successful, but it does mean that you have to get in the water. Gelb writes, "Geniuses and crazy people are both out in the middle of a deep ocean; geniuses swim, crazy people drown. Most of us are sitting safely on shore. Take a chacne and get your feet wet". Picasso, Nash, Einstein, and all the other successful crazies swam and, in doing so, they churned up all kinds of enlightening inventions of art, math, and physics.
The rich and famous, the eccentrically intelligent, the superbly successful people are not normal! Normal is staying on the shore. Normal is safe, innocuous, harmless, average, and typical. It is a constant, but does not imply, necessarily, goodness; it certainly does not imply craziness, productive or unproductive. Think about it, normalcy certainly never impllies genius, wealth, or supreme success. If someone is exceptional in anything you never refer to them as "normal". Normal is safe and without risk, but drab, discolored and debilitating towards expansive, but, channeled craziness. Don't avoid being normal, it's important to have a stability zone in life. You can have a comfort, normal, constant zone with the types of books you read, people you interact with, rituals you have, exercise you perform, and other invariates. Constancy can be the eye in the tornado of successful craziness.
Clearly, the correct measuring of craziness, is the ingredient to success. Important to note that while "normal" may not insinuate genius, the "state of normalcy" should never be relegated as an inferior state of being. Normal is simple, commonplace, prevalent, but it is never lesser or inferior. Obviously, most of the time, to be different, one must get off the conventional, well-beaten path and listen to his own drum beat. Or one could make their own impression within a well-beaten path, but some form of divergence from the norm must occur. The trick is avoid having that divergence from being a meandering, dismal distraction, and, instead, make it productive by maintaining resilience, generating a high-faculty of concentration,a and having immense faith in the process.
Faith is needed for success. Success is defined as the accomplishment of an aim or purpose, and many times the scintillating endeavor for creating success, demands faith to take the necessary risks. The risks necessary to success can be undertaken with or without faith. Risks endeavored without faith become frightening and disturbing changes of tumult. Risks endeavored with faith transform fearful moments of doubt into inspiring and dynamic moments of exciting "Satori" because you have the confidence from perseverence and the awareness that that risk is pursuing a goal.
Satori is a Zen word meaning, ""sudden awakening". Satori is "insight into our fundamental nature...not the result of abstract mental concepts or ideas but rather a momentary, experiential fusing of body, mind, and emotions" (Millman 92). When your emotional and physical energies flow freely you are experiencing the inner peace and power of the moving inner experience of satori. A great method for acquiring satori is creating craziness channeling in structure by using sound judgment for our decisions.".
Additionally, Famous story-teller, Roald Dahl, writes. "Most of the really exciting things that we do in our lives scare us to death" (52). Crazy endeavors possess the dichotomous quality of being frightening and exciting because you know that task is a stepping-stone to achieving a goal, but in the back of your mind, you know you are "acting crazy', abondoning the norm, and are entering the unknown. Don't purposefully pursue things that make you afraid, but that closeness to fear, is often an ingredient in things that are certainly exciting.Risk, craziness, and fear with the linchpin of faith, self-confidence, and personal belief, become invigorating and stimulating excitement. We must never abandon tact because prudence ensures success, but we must avoid "paralysis by analysis", while still analyzing our past, connecting it with the present, and moving forward with certainty.
We must abandon the reliance on restricting compartments for structure. Compartments provide obligation and structure. While the benefits of structure and support are undenialby vital to growth, obligation can get messy. The best positon remains outside of the cubicle by creating your own self-defined responsibilities. Define your own vocational department. Get your life aligned by identifying your interests and passions, access the freedom to discover those investments, experience the happiness from being prudent about your future, but passionate about your present, and the elaborate the happiness by expressing it.
The trick for happiness is to not avoid lunacy, but to embrace craziness, while engaging prudence. Tactfully create the resources you need to channel the non-normal, wild, sincere talent into productive outlets. Bach, Beethoven and Tchaikovsky, Mozart and Haydn -- masters in setting different, totally new Baroque, Romantic, and Renaissance-Baroque movements -- had the attributes for would-be "crazies" if failed to discover a piano, and music. Instead, their talent was channeled into sound and logical craziness, a productive zone, making incredible "crazy" -- different, setting totally new periods and movements -- and successful symphonic classical composition.
George Orwell asks, "What can you do against the lunatic who is more intelligent than yourself, who gives your arguments a fair hearing and then simply persists in his lunacy?" Nothing. Nothing at person, operating at high faculty of intelligence, yeilds to no obstacle. Abraham Lincoln failed 13 times trying to get elected into Congress, trying any more seemed like lunacy, but he persisted in his "crazy pursuit" and became the sixteenth President of the United States. Dogged, but calculated, persistence in any noble endeavor propitiously transforms the insane process into prodigious success because it is within that inner tenacity that we discover our subtle genius.
All success and true genius is acquired with the risk of admitting your own craziness. Athletes who train copious hours, insane number of miles, do so with a twinge of looniness; musicians who have psychotic fits on stage producing the greatest performances imaginable embrace being bonkers and engage their crazyiness; and the greatest breakthroughs in science, medicinee, mathematics, and chemistry occur with a zany and warped hunch that proves to be a new vaccine, cure, or discvory. Embrace the craziness, hold off the lunacy by being productive, but never deny that you're nuts. Denying your insanity limits yourself. Give testimony that you will recognize, honor, and nurture your wild crazy side is not an ominous crutch, but as an exhilarating springboard for catalyzing ingenuity.
Success is not categorical; it is never somewhat successful or not, it is black and white, make or break. Some people could argue that unhealthy crazies like John Wayne Gacey, Jeffrey Dommer, Ted Kazinski were all "successful", possibly notorieties, because they were certainly crazy (you'd have to be to murder that way), turned heads and became well known names. However, they were unsound, unlogical, destructive crazy people that were unsuccessful in every way possible. They drew attention, but did not experience an iota of success. Craziness is only successful if it is channelled into creativity. Notice the etymological backbone of "creative" is create, not destroy. Success is expansive and ultimately good. A twinge of craziness mixed with dogged persistence combined in a concoction of harmonious connection with humanity, creates a powerful elixer of genius and success.
1.29.2006
Childhood Voice: The Salient Indication of Adulthood
Machiavelli: Adults and Kids are the Same
Childhood and Adulthood are one and the same.
Craziness for love is the natural human state. Nicolo Machiavelli, of all people -- who write the "Prince", instructing rulers to create fear and rule with fear instead of love -- discusses the significance of the childhood voice, saying that "The distinction between children and adults, while probably useful for some purposes, is at bottom a specious one, I feel. There does exist a distinction between children and adults, but such distinctions are specious; they are superficial and nonexistent. On the fundamental level -- the significant level -- adults and kids are identical. Abandoning the childhood voice is a recipe for vacancy and void as an adult, but never understanding and being adult will create obstacles. Fuse childhood voice and adult demeanor to ensure incredible success and happiness. Machiavelli continues, "there are only individual egos, crazy for love". And that craziness for love -- creating, supporting, and giving love -- is healthy. The last thing I'd expect to hear from good ol' Nicolo is that kids and adults are fundamentally the same except for some minor superficial altercations. I would have expected him to say that adults have abondoned the inner child for a mature, powerful self, or something, but even this master of policits recognizes the power of the inner child voice and its parralells to adulthood.
Einstein
Childhood voice is success, time of freedom, and intuition.
"The purpose of education is to channel the childlike sense for lack of fear of failure and absence of fear of rejection into different areas of academia"
Rousseau
Childhood is time of freedom and intuition.
Rousseau contradicts himself saying that "childhood is the sleep of reason". Normally a dormant reason and conscious is not a good thing, but it could mean that the intuition is awake. Also, he also says that "man was born free and everywhere he is in chains". So that man, in childhood, when he was born, is free! So intuition and freedom are linked with childhood voice!
Aldous Huxley
Childhood is enthusiasm and path to genius.
"The secret of genius is to carry the spirit of the child into old age, which means never losing your enthusiasm."
Kahlil Gibran
Children cannot be possessed, owned; their souls never housed in a house or with a family.
"Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts. For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams."
You can give birth to, give love to, and give nurturing to a child, but you can never "own" or possess a child saying that it is your own. They generate their own thoughts and have tremendous incredible souls that can never be housed.
Childhood is GeniusPicasso. "What might be taken for a precocious genius is the genius of childhood."
Educate Children. JFK"A child miseducated is a child lost. "
Respect Children. Plato. "Let parents bequeath to their children not riches, but the spirit of reverence. "
Be not man fearing light. Plato. "We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light. "
Honesty is Childhood. Socrates. "An honest man is always a child."
Childhood and Adulthood are one and the same.
Craziness for love is the natural human state. Nicolo Machiavelli, of all people -- who write the "Prince", instructing rulers to create fear and rule with fear instead of love -- discusses the significance of the childhood voice, saying that "The distinction between children and adults, while probably useful for some purposes, is at bottom a specious one, I feel. There does exist a distinction between children and adults, but such distinctions are specious; they are superficial and nonexistent. On the fundamental level -- the significant level -- adults and kids are identical. Abandoning the childhood voice is a recipe for vacancy and void as an adult, but never understanding and being adult will create obstacles. Fuse childhood voice and adult demeanor to ensure incredible success and happiness. Machiavelli continues, "there are only individual egos, crazy for love". And that craziness for love -- creating, supporting, and giving love -- is healthy. The last thing I'd expect to hear from good ol' Nicolo is that kids and adults are fundamentally the same except for some minor superficial altercations. I would have expected him to say that adults have abondoned the inner child for a mature, powerful self, or something, but even this master of policits recognizes the power of the inner child voice and its parralells to adulthood.
Einstein
Childhood voice is success, time of freedom, and intuition.
"The purpose of education is to channel the childlike sense for lack of fear of failure and absence of fear of rejection into different areas of academia"
Rousseau
Childhood is time of freedom and intuition.
Rousseau contradicts himself saying that "childhood is the sleep of reason". Normally a dormant reason and conscious is not a good thing, but it could mean that the intuition is awake. Also, he also says that "man was born free and everywhere he is in chains". So that man, in childhood, when he was born, is free! So intuition and freedom are linked with childhood voice!
Aldous Huxley
Childhood is enthusiasm and path to genius.
"The secret of genius is to carry the spirit of the child into old age, which means never losing your enthusiasm."
Kahlil Gibran
Children cannot be possessed, owned; their souls never housed in a house or with a family.
"Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts. For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams."
You can give birth to, give love to, and give nurturing to a child, but you can never "own" or possess a child saying that it is your own. They generate their own thoughts and have tremendous incredible souls that can never be housed.
Childhood is GeniusPicasso. "What might be taken for a precocious genius is the genius of childhood."
Educate Children. JFK"A child miseducated is a child lost. "
Respect Children. Plato. "Let parents bequeath to their children not riches, but the spirit of reverence. "
Be not man fearing light. Plato. "We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light. "
Honesty is Childhood. Socrates. "An honest man is always a child."
1.28.2006
Identifying our Work
I've been shown the door a lot . However, quite often, I recognize the importance of understanding that I jump into situations that I don't want to be a part of and will get booted from, in order to say that I tried that option. Why not just cut to the chase and create more certainty with what I do want to do? An answer is that I don't know what I want to do, but I have some resourceful indicators. My brain never stops. It is constantly going when I am not in a situated situation. Check out your own signals and you'll create opportunities in the places that you want.
I have parents that are very interested in their work. They're great at it. However, I frequently get asked what is it that my parents do. I respond, saying my father is an innovation consultant and my mother is a writer and "professional mom". You can relegate any profession by emphasizing the minute modus operandi functionalities. Describing "what they do" as they make phone calls, give PowerPoint presentations to people, are passengers in airplanes, own a home, and drive around in cars. My mom certainly is a "professional mom". She devotes her time to, according to her book, "creating in [the] home as sanctuary of love, nurturing, and support" (Kuczmarski 8).
It's been great to grow up in a caring place, devoted to support and development, but it can make you a bit panicky at times, if I don't feel as if I am developing. The real transformation is maintaining connections with family, obviously, but becoming able to create one's own haven of fostering care, love, and nurturing healthy living. Additionally, Susan Kuczmarski "encourages teens to take time to appreciate their inner strengths as well as those of the people around them" (Kuczmarski 14).
Now it's fantastic having a mother who is not only incredibly wise and keen on the field of parenting, but devoted to always being available to listen, and interested in talking about problems and providing genuine help. However, a debilitating tendency that can arise in most teens -- *ahem* me, especially, about 5 years ago -- is to ricochet and reject this genuine help for fear of being a trophy child. If a teen believes he has really become a trophy child, things will change fast in that teen's life. I felt that being successful with friends, family, school, sports had all been for the sake of proving that my mother could raise a kid. Given the tumultuous melting pot of hormones, pubescent changes, and highschool peer pressure that a teen already copes with, now feeling like a trophy child hits the teen with a tidal wave of fear. The last thing that anyone wants is to be is some object that is paraded around to enhance the status of someone else. The definition of a trophy child or, more commonly, a trophy wife, engenders self-sabotage or an amputation of the relationship.
I felt as though I needed a clean slate, I needed to get wherever I was going without outside help. I switched schools, got into activities other than sports, pursued acting, pursued painting, read different books, dated different women, visited different places -- great things to do for becoming a cultural and eclectic person. However, I did them in a freakish attempt to make sure that I wasn't a gem of success for another person.
The important realization is that "you don't own success" no one does. Anyone who thinks that they are successful because of another person has got another thing coming.
Although not the most prudent response, the immediate reaction foranyone who feels their life has become an implement for Person B's success is to that sever ties with that person. If that can't be accomplished, the next -- with an even greater lack of prudence -- reaction is to sabotage the possibility that Person B could triumph from your success, even if that means throwing the monkey wrench into your own works. However, being a personally unsuccessful isn't a good solution because that has a negative effect on my one's. The best solution is to acknowledge that personal success can be admired and recognize by other people, but that ultimately, it is your own. You not only must acknowledge your success, but your must share it with yourself and others. In the process of emanating your own success with others, people who helped you along the may feel satisfied and content, even successful themselves, but you were always the one behind the wheel and accomplished it.
Ultimately, Susan Kuczmarski's writing, in regards to trying to listen, always be present to teens, and providing a nurturing, loving place for them to grow reveals quite an enormously sincere effort to parent. It is all quite interesting advice. However, some of her writings tend to be advice on being a parent, so that the teen feels parented, which is the last thing that a anyone would ever want. Susan Kuczmarski does an incredible job of being, simultaneously, a parent and friend. However, her writing should not be misinterpreted -- with guidelines for parents to lay ground rules, encouraging the teen to practice kindness, and controlling the balance of structure and flexibility in the household -- as advice on ways to be a parent, so that the teen feel parented. Feeling parented cogs up the human "machinery" in the anyone's mind. It specifically jeopardizes the teen because the teen is trying to create his own identity, individuate, cope with school, learn, cultivate a social sphere, and an enormous amount of other daunting tasks, and having to ward off the sensation of one person trying to be parented, creates a more bizarre sense of certainty. Leading the teen on his or her own path, versus having the teen not only discover and create his own path, but embark on it himself. A teen's job is to discover, create, and embark on his "flight" and the parent's job is to provide the fuel, cargo, and anything they'll need on that flight, and to supply a crash-landing runway for emergencies. Other than that, parents should be some of the best friends a teen can get, and, fortunately, I've had parents that make excellent friends.
The MAP System for Growth
Thomas Kuczmarski claims that the key to new product success involves three Ms -- measure, manage, motivate -- an A, for attitude, and three Ps -- plan, process, people. According to Managing New Products, you can't manage what you can't measure, and that the act of management can occur with creative and that "the cross-functional teams dedicated to executing the plan of course must be managed". However, teams or any entity that is dedicated to something does not need necessarily need management because they already would be motivated to do the task . It all depends on what the team is lacking, if they lack leadership, they need a leader, if they lack the capacity to administer jobs and responsibilities but collectively have the motivation, they need management. The final M, motivation, refers to motivation with "intangible, soft incentives, such as positive feedback and team structures that encourage employees to embrace risk, and "hard incentives" such as reward systems that enable employees to benefit from intelligent risk-taking" (Kuczmarski 11). While the notion that the "soft incentives" of positive feedback is a type of "hard incentive" reward system itself, this is remarkably similar to Joseph Nye's distinction between soft and hard power. Basically, Joseph Nye described two types of power in politics. There was soft power was power through attraction and co-option, the ability to shape the preferences of others, while hard power was the use of force, military might, carrots and sticks, coercing and threats, inductions and payments. It's difficult to classify military might and any hard-power coercion or induction as having anything but a crippling effect, let alone a motivating impact. The message of the article I wrote on soft-power and hard-power using Nye's references, was that power cannot be trounced by power. J.R.R. Tolkien writes, "Power is an ominous and sinister word in all" of his books (Tolkien. 152). Additionally, he writes that the ring in his tales can be allegorically considered as an example of the failure of trying to ward of power with power. While the distinguishing characteristic between an intangible "soft incentive" and a "hard" reward system is unclear, the necessity of motivation is genuine, for certain.
Attitude links the Ms and the Ps, making it a "linchpin" which makes a lot of sense because you sell yourself and a poor attitude cripples any exchange while a captivating attitude can only create more of it. Apparently, planning produces more breakthrough products. Furthermore, understanding that technology and businesses are in an ever-increasing process is vital to learning the art of building new products . It seems the new products shouldn't be managed, at all, but simply given a few subtle adjustments, having the product create a life of its own. The people-component of MAP basically only gives a reference to a reward system or "splash" that honors work outside of one's expertise. While such a dynamic concept as "people" engenders a smorgasbord of neglected considerations in the topic of "people" -- motivation, punctuality, esteem, proficiency, dynamism, commitment to the task, knowledge of their vocation, awareness of other employees, to name a few -- encouragement for growth outside of one's expertise certainly couldn't be a more significant emphasis.
Sincerely comprehending some of the clean and efficient phraseology used by Tom Kuczmarski simply engenders a sure-fire result of swift success.
Kuczmarski, Thomas. Managing New Products. Chicago: Book Ends Press, 2000.
I have parents that are very interested in their work. They're great at it. However, I frequently get asked what is it that my parents do. I respond, saying my father is an innovation consultant and my mother is a writer and "professional mom". You can relegate any profession by emphasizing the minute modus operandi functionalities. Describing "what they do" as they make phone calls, give PowerPoint presentations to people, are passengers in airplanes, own a home, and drive around in cars. My mom certainly is a "professional mom". She devotes her time to, according to her book, "creating in [the] home as sanctuary of love, nurturing, and support" (Kuczmarski 8).
It's been great to grow up in a caring place, devoted to support and development, but it can make you a bit panicky at times, if I don't feel as if I am developing. The real transformation is maintaining connections with family, obviously, but becoming able to create one's own haven of fostering care, love, and nurturing healthy living. Additionally, Susan Kuczmarski "encourages teens to take time to appreciate their inner strengths as well as those of the people around them" (Kuczmarski 14).
Now it's fantastic having a mother who is not only incredibly wise and keen on the field of parenting, but devoted to always being available to listen, and interested in talking about problems and providing genuine help. However, a debilitating tendency that can arise in most teens -- *ahem* me, especially, about 5 years ago -- is to ricochet and reject this genuine help for fear of being a trophy child. If a teen believes he has really become a trophy child, things will change fast in that teen's life. I felt that being successful with friends, family, school, sports had all been for the sake of proving that my mother could raise a kid. Given the tumultuous melting pot of hormones, pubescent changes, and highschool peer pressure that a teen already copes with, now feeling like a trophy child hits the teen with a tidal wave of fear. The last thing that anyone wants is to be is some object that is paraded around to enhance the status of someone else. The definition of a trophy child or, more commonly, a trophy wife, engenders self-sabotage or an amputation of the relationship.
I felt as though I needed a clean slate, I needed to get wherever I was going without outside help. I switched schools, got into activities other than sports, pursued acting, pursued painting, read different books, dated different women, visited different places -- great things to do for becoming a cultural and eclectic person. However, I did them in a freakish attempt to make sure that I wasn't a gem of success for another person.
The important realization is that "you don't own success" no one does. Anyone who thinks that they are successful because of another person has got another thing coming.
Although not the most prudent response, the immediate reaction foranyone who feels their life has become an implement for Person B's success is to that sever ties with that person. If that can't be accomplished, the next -- with an even greater lack of prudence -- reaction is to sabotage the possibility that Person B could triumph from your success, even if that means throwing the monkey wrench into your own works. However, being a personally unsuccessful isn't a good solution because that has a negative effect on my one's. The best solution is to acknowledge that personal success can be admired and recognize by other people, but that ultimately, it is your own. You not only must acknowledge your success, but your must share it with yourself and others. In the process of emanating your own success with others, people who helped you along the may feel satisfied and content, even successful themselves, but you were always the one behind the wheel and accomplished it.
Ultimately, Susan Kuczmarski's writing, in regards to trying to listen, always be present to teens, and providing a nurturing, loving place for them to grow reveals quite an enormously sincere effort to parent. It is all quite interesting advice. However, some of her writings tend to be advice on being a parent, so that the teen feels parented, which is the last thing that a anyone would ever want. Susan Kuczmarski does an incredible job of being, simultaneously, a parent and friend. However, her writing should not be misinterpreted -- with guidelines for parents to lay ground rules, encouraging the teen to practice kindness, and controlling the balance of structure and flexibility in the household -- as advice on ways to be a parent, so that the teen feel parented. Feeling parented cogs up the human "machinery" in the anyone's mind. It specifically jeopardizes the teen because the teen is trying to create his own identity, individuate, cope with school, learn, cultivate a social sphere, and an enormous amount of other daunting tasks, and having to ward off the sensation of one person trying to be parented, creates a more bizarre sense of certainty. Leading the teen on his or her own path, versus having the teen not only discover and create his own path, but embark on it himself. A teen's job is to discover, create, and embark on his "flight" and the parent's job is to provide the fuel, cargo, and anything they'll need on that flight, and to supply a crash-landing runway for emergencies. Other than that, parents should be some of the best friends a teen can get, and, fortunately, I've had parents that make excellent friends.
The MAP System for Growth
Thomas Kuczmarski claims that the key to new product success involves three Ms -- measure, manage, motivate -- an A, for attitude, and three Ps -- plan, process, people. According to Managing New Products, you can't manage what you can't measure, and that the act of management can occur with creative and that "the cross-functional teams dedicated to executing the plan of course must be managed". However, teams or any entity that is dedicated to something does not need necessarily need management because they already would be motivated to do the task . It all depends on what the team is lacking, if they lack leadership, they need a leader, if they lack the capacity to administer jobs and responsibilities but collectively have the motivation, they need management. The final M, motivation, refers to motivation with "intangible, soft incentives, such as positive feedback and team structures that encourage employees to embrace risk, and "hard incentives" such as reward systems that enable employees to benefit from intelligent risk-taking" (Kuczmarski 11). While the notion that the "soft incentives" of positive feedback is a type of "hard incentive" reward system itself, this is remarkably similar to Joseph Nye's distinction between soft and hard power. Basically, Joseph Nye described two types of power in politics. There was soft power was power through attraction and co-option, the ability to shape the preferences of others, while hard power was the use of force, military might, carrots and sticks, coercing and threats, inductions and payments. It's difficult to classify military might and any hard-power coercion or induction as having anything but a crippling effect, let alone a motivating impact. The message of the article I wrote on soft-power and hard-power using Nye's references, was that power cannot be trounced by power. J.R.R. Tolkien writes, "Power is an ominous and sinister word in all" of his books (Tolkien. 152). Additionally, he writes that the ring in his tales can be allegorically considered as an example of the failure of trying to ward of power with power. While the distinguishing characteristic between an intangible "soft incentive" and a "hard" reward system is unclear, the necessity of motivation is genuine, for certain.
Attitude links the Ms and the Ps, making it a "linchpin" which makes a lot of sense because you sell yourself and a poor attitude cripples any exchange while a captivating attitude can only create more of it. Apparently, planning produces more breakthrough products. Furthermore, understanding that technology and businesses are in an ever-increasing process is vital to learning the art of building new products . It seems the new products shouldn't be managed, at all, but simply given a few subtle adjustments, having the product create a life of its own. The people-component of MAP basically only gives a reference to a reward system or "splash" that honors work outside of one's expertise. While such a dynamic concept as "people" engenders a smorgasbord of neglected considerations in the topic of "people" -- motivation, punctuality, esteem, proficiency, dynamism, commitment to the task, knowledge of their vocation, awareness of other employees, to name a few -- encouragement for growth outside of one's expertise certainly couldn't be a more significant emphasis.
Sincerely comprehending some of the clean and efficient phraseology used by Tom Kuczmarski simply engenders a sure-fire result of swift success.
Kuczmarski, Thomas. Managing New Products. Chicago: Book Ends Press, 2000.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Mailing List
