Repeal Day 2018

Posted on December 6, 2018 by admin

Yesterday was the 85th anniversary of the repeal of Alcohol Prohibition in the United States. As expected, there were many parties and other celebrations. Here’s how I celebrated that night.

The Volstead, a speakeasy-style bar in downtown Jacksonville, opened its doors to anyone looking for a good time. I met up with a group of friends there and enjoyed celebrating with them. Most of us dressed in formal or vintage clothes for extra fun. Our evening started off at 7:30 with a swing dance lesson by Bold City Swing. Afterward, we danced to recorded music until the band finished setting up. The Raisin Cake Orchestra is a jazz band that plays a variety of music and they provided the soundtrack for most of the event. It helps to know a few different styles of dance when listening to them; most of my friends do, so we had fun dancing the night away to whatever the band played. Also, two of my friends won the best dressed contest and each received a goody bag as their prize. Although the event was scheduled until midnight, most of us left several hours earlier, but not before taking a few group photos and saying goodbye.

Although I don’t drink alcohol, I had fun celebrating Repeal Day. Last year, I went down to a restaurant in St. Augustine called Prohibition Kitchen in and danced with friends to a band called Swing Theory, so there were many similarities between the two celebrations. This one felt smaller and simpler, but I enjoyed both. It’s always nice to dance and have fun with friends, and I look forward to seeing what next year’s Repeal Day celebration will look like. 

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Knowing When to Move On

Posted on December 5, 2018 by admin

It’s in my nature to fix things. That’s why I spend so much time trying to help people with their problems and working on self-improvement. I do the same with the places I frequent as well. Wherever I go, if I spend enough time there, I’ll notice things that can be improved and do my best to do it. As long as it’s either within my knowledge base or simple enough that I can figure it out, I’ll try to leave it better than I found it.

Whenever I’ve run into a system at one of my jobs or somewhere else I regularly go, I’ve first taken some time to learn it and use it to accomplish whatever tasks are at hand. Once I get a feel for it, however, I start thinking about how to make it better. For example, maybe changing the order of a few steps will make it flow better, make it easier, and allow us to complete a task faster while still getting everything right. This has generally served me well, although it has gotten me into trouble on occasion. Sometimes those above me are more interested in doing things a certain way than finding the best way (or even a better way) to do them and they shut down my efforts to improve the situation. I can deal with that for a while but it eventually starts getting to me. The longer I stay in that situation and learn about how things work, the more opportunities for improvement I find. When I can’t act on them, it breaks my spirit and I eventually end up leaving.

I believe that nearly anything can be fixed or at the very least improved if given enough time, effort, and intelligence. However, sometimes I realize that fixing a particular situation would require so much from me that my attention would be better spent somewhere else. Somewhere that’s more receptive to my ideas, needs less improvement, and leaves me feeling tired at the end of the night because I was so inspired to pour everything I had into what I did that day instead of having the life sucked the life out of me by rigid bureaucracy. 

As much as I try to finish what I start and leave something better than I found it, I’ve learned that sometimes the best thing to do is walk away. It usually takes me a long time to do this once I’ve invested a great deal of my energy and thinking into a particular place, but sooner or later I say goodbye. I’m always thrilled when I move on and find people who appreciate me, my ideas, and my efforts to improve whatever situation I’m in. That’s what keeps me going and I’d much rather invest in those people than ones that make it clear that they could do without me. And I’m fortunate to know many people who appreciate me and everything I do. They’re the best friends I could ask for and I’m so glad I get to go through life with them. 

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A Big City with a Small Town Feel

Posted on December 4, 2018 by admin

I’ve lived all my life in Jacksonville, Florida. As I’ve explored different sections of the city and gone to more events, I’ve realized some interesting things about it. For starters, Jacksonville is the biggest city by area in the contiguous United States. There are some cities in Alaska that are bigger, but Jacksonville is the biggest city in the lower forty eight states.

Despite its size, however, Jacksonville doesn’t feel like a big city. One reason for this could be that the city is spread out enough to give everyone plenty of elbow room. This could contrast some other US cities with much larger populations in far smaller areas that might feel more cramped as a result. Another plausible reason may be that each section of Jacksonville has its own distinct feel. The area by the beach feels completely different than the more rural areas, and those are nothing like the downtown area, and so on. This makes Jacksonville feel like four or five small cities that have been combined to create one big city.

It may also explain why I sometimes run into people from my past. For example, two days ago at my job, I helped a customer who happened to be one of my elementary school music teachers. We hadn’t seen each other in at least fifteen years and we spent a good while catching up. This is just one of several times in which I’ve been reunited with a past teacher or schoolmate at one of my jobs. I’ve also had these sorts of occasions outside of work, although sometimes I’ve happened to run into friends I see on a regular basis rather than people I haven’t seen in years. In any one of those situations, it reminds me of how close and connected Jacksonville is and how it feels more like one or more small towns instead of one big city. That’s one of several things I enjoy about living here and why I plan to continue calling it home for the foreseeable future. 

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Don’t Take Anything Personally

Posted on December 3, 2018 by admin

The second agreement Don Miguel Ruiz covers in The Four Agreements is “Don’t Take Anything Personally”. Like the other agreements, this one is simple to explain, difficult to practice, and powerful in its effects. 

Ruiz says that whatever someone else does to us is because of how they are, not because of how we are. With this empathetic mindset, it’s easy to give other people the benefit of the doubt and avoid being hurt by what they say or do. I should say that it’s easy to do this after practicing it for a while and making it a habit. Some people may be able to switch their thinking in an instant, but I find that incredibly difficult. It’s easy for me to avoid taking anything personally if I’ve been in that mindset for a week or more, but it’s difficult if I’ve spent a long time taking things personally. 

When I’ve been in the wrong mindset for a while, I can misread what someone else does and think it’s about me when it really isn’t or think it’s negative even if it’s actually meant to be positive. Since I read The Four Agreements, I’ve gradually realized how often I take things personally, especially when I’m not paying attention. Breaking away from that habit and going through times of mental peace remind me how much better it is to live that way.

However, it’s so easy to slip back into old patterns of thinking without even realizing it. Once I’ve done that, I usually only notice it once it’s started causing problems for me. I’m going to try to break that habit by working on each of these agreements every day and perhaps focusing on a particular one if I feel drawn to it. I know from experience that the wisdom in The Four Agreements can provide a great deal of peace and personal freedom as long as I live by them, so that’s my plan. If you’re in a similar situation, I recommend getting the book and using its wisdom to improve your life. Thank you and I’ll see you next time. 

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The Benefits of Stretching

Posted on December 2, 2018 by admin

I’ve long been interested in physical fitness. I enjoy lifting weights, playing sports, running for short distances (mostly during sports), juggling, dancing, and so on. However, one area of fitness that I’ve mostly neglected is stretching. Although I’d heard people talk about it for years, it wasn’t until within the past year that I decided to look into it. And boy am I glad I did. 

Stretching is important for just about any athletic activity. If you are too inflexible to go through the full range of motion on a particular lift, stretching will increase your range of motion. Loosening up tight muscles can allow you to move around more comfortably, naturally, and, in some cases, safely. Stretching can even improve your posture and relieve pain if done regularly and correctly. The best time to stretch can vary from one activity to another, but stretching properly and at the right time makes a huge difference in athletic activities as well as in general life. 

Since I began stretching, I’ve mostly focused on stretching out my lower body. This article from The Art of Manliness has some great advice that I’ve used to loosen up my hips. In addition to using the advice in that article, I’ll spend at least a few minutes sitting down touching my toes (or trying to touch them) to stretch out the muscles in my legs. Although I also want to work on stretching out my upper body, I think sitting makes my lower body tighten up more easily and need extra attention, so I primarily focus on lower body stretches. 

Before I started stretching regularly, I thought flexibility was something you either had or you didn’t. I never believed that I could get more flexible by working consistently at it, but that’s exactly what’s happened. In addition to increased flexibility and the other benefits I mentioned above, stretching has given me quick fixes to relieve occasional joint pain (especially when my neck starts bothering me) and provided me with a way to relax and be present when I start feeling overwhelmed. Taking some time out of my day to stretch helps keep my thinking positive and prevent negative thoughts from arising. I have a long way to go and a lot of work ahead of me, but I’ve already seen several benefits from stretching and I’m excited to see what else it does for me. 

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Review of Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion

Posted on December 1, 2018 by admin

Have you ever wondered why some people are so skilled at selling, organizing, or otherwise getting those around them to agree with them? Robert Cialdini, a social psychologist, had those same questions and spent much of his career studying the things that get you to say “yes”. The answers to his questions came in the form of his most well-known book, Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion. 

Influence covers six of what Cialdini calls “weapons of influence” that skilled persuaders use to get you to say “yes”. They include reciprocation, commitment/consistency, social proof, liking, authority, and scarcity. He gives each “weapon” its own chapter and includes several examples of it in use. Some of his examples include how members of Hare Krishna use flowers to get donations for their organization, the way location played a fatal role in the Jonestown Massacre, and the reason one man paid four hundred dollars for a one-dollar bill.

Something I greatly appreciate about Cialdini is that he discusses the importance of using persuasion ethically. His reason for writing “Influence” was to point out the various ways that you can be persuaded to do something you’d rather not and give you some tools to effectively resist that unwanted influence, which helped him overcome his tendency to say “yes” to anyone and everyone. There are plenty of people who see persuasion as a way to rip others off and push them around, so it’s refreshing to see someone advocate using it properly.

In the relatively short time since I read Influence, I’ve been able to more easily see weapons of influence in action all around me and, when I’m focused, succeeded in saying “no” and meaning it. Cialdini’s ideas have helped me find that sweet spot between being a pushover and being a jerk. Thanks to him, I have a number of life hacks that I can use to politely decline an unwanted offer instead of going over the top in shutting it down. Because there are so many people vying for your time, money, and support, I recommend reading “Influence” so you can have some things with which to counter unwanted influence. This goes double for those of you who, like me, have struggled with saying “no”. At the very least, it’ll be some interesting reading. At most, though, it could be a real game changer for you and the way you see the world. If you do check it out, please let me know. I’d love to hear your thoughts about it.

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Nervous Habits and How to Deal with Them

Posted on November 30, 2018 by admin

How are you breathing right now? Are you taking short, shallow breaths or are you breathing more slowly and deeply? Do your shoulders feel relaxed or are they tensed and pulled up toward your ears? If you’re not using your hands, are they clenched in tight fists or opened and at rest? These are some ways to hold tension and manifest anxiety through the body, as well as some remedies for countering and relieving those signs of stress.

I see a lot of people display signs of stress on a regular basis. They may perform one or more of the actions in the previous paragraph or do something else along the same lines: continuously moving one leg while seated, tapping a finger, playing with their hair, and so on. If I’m not careful, I can slip into one of several nervous habits. My most common ones are pacing, playing with a pen, chewing my lips, and messing with my hands or my beard. I mostly catch myself doing those when I’m struggling to explain something to another person or when I’m having a difficult conversation with them. I don’t know what other people experience while they perform a nervous habit, but I think I’m made worse off because of them and tend to interact more smoothly with others when I avoid doing them. 

As suggested by the phrase “nervous habit”, these behaviors are simply habits, which means that they can be changed if you so desire. Of course, before you can change a habit, you have to be aware of it, and that’s where self-awareness comes in. Self-awareness allows you to notice how you’re breathing, what you’re doing with your hands, how you’re holding yourself, and so on. Bringing conscious attention to your body makes it easier to control your actions and less likely that you’ll slip into a nervous habit. That’s why I’ve found relaxation and presence to be the most useful life hacks for dealing with nervous habits. I can do them both fairly easily while stretching (which I’ve also found aids in the release of tension and helps me relax), so I try to practice them during that time. Lastly, I try to work through whatever may be stressing me out. Once I’ve done that, the stress is either a fraction of what it was before or it’s completely gone. It’s difficult to have nervous habits without stress, so working through stress is a great way to secure long-term relief. 

I think my recent lack of sufficient sleep is a sign that I’m stressing out about something and need to deal with it. As I try to figure out what’s getting to me, I’ll make use of the above life hacks. They’ve consistently worked for me in the past and they’re available to me whenever I want to use them, so I’m sure they’ll help me through this ordeal. If you’re dealing with stress and you want to manage or eliminate it, I hope you find this post useful. Please let me know if you do, and I will see you next time. 

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Learning Like a Wise Man

Posted on November 29, 2018 by admin

There’s a saying that says, “A smart man learns from his mistakes; a wise man learns from the mistakes of others.” While the saying focuses specifically on mistakes, it could work just as well if it focused on life lessons instead. In either case, those are the two primary ways I’ve learned life lessons. 

I couldn’t even begin to estimate how many bad decisions and poor choices I’ve made in my past. Some of them were the result of inexperience, but I made plenty of them knowing full well that I was acting dumb. I say this not to condemn or denigrate myself, but to give some context for what I’m about to say. When I think about a particular bad decision, I’m often reminded of a lesson it taught me and how that’s made my life better since then. Also, even if I can’t find any valuable lesson, I try to go easy on myself and forgive myself for past mistakes instead of beating myself up over them.

Whenever possible, I try to be like the wise man and learn from other people. Sometimes that means avoiding their poor choices, but other times it means studying their successful strategies. That’s my primary reason for reading so much and trying to learn as much as I can about principles of success. Countless people have lived incredible lives and written about the stuff that works for them; by reading their books, I can glean some useful information that may (and often has) made a positive difference in my life.

There may be some people who have figured out how to learn valuable life lessons purely through observing and studying other people and avoid making their own major mistakes. If there are, I’d like to meet them and find out their secret. I don’t know if I’ll ever get to that point or if that point is even possible, but I can say that I’ve benefited a lot by learning from mistakes, whether they’ve been my own or someone else’s. As I’ve worked more on taking charge of my life, I’ve made fewer major mistakes and terrible decisions. I’ll continue to make mistakes as long as I keep learning new things, but those mistakes are far better than mistakes arising from bad decisions. I hope this is helpful and I will see you in the next post.

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How I Handle Criticism

Posted on November 28, 2018 by admin

Unless you live alone and never interact with anyone else, you’re going to face criticism at some point in your life. Sometimes it’ll be intended to help and other times it’ll be intended to hurt. In either case, it’s important to know how to receive it and what to do with it. Here are some things that help me with both of those.

More than anything else, I’ve found the most beneficial thing for handling criticism to be getting in control of my ego. I do this by focusing on presence, relaxing, and refraining from taking anything personally. There are many life hacks that are great for getting me into a better state of mind for handling criticism. Something that also helps me is remembering times in which I’ve used criticism with good intentions in mind. This makes it easier to give others the benefit of the doubt and see their criticism as an effort to lift me up rather than drag me down. 

After I get my ego under control, I think about who is criticizing me and why they might be doing it. If it’s a close friend who has always been there for me, then I consider their criticism to be intended to help me and I listen to what they have to say. On the other hand, if the criticism is coming from someone who dislikes me or appears to be a result of bad intentions, then I do my best to ignore it. If I’m in doubt as to the motivation behind someone’s criticism, I may ask them about their intentions or, more likely, I’ll just say “Ok” at the time and then forget about it later. In any event, I try to avoid dwelling on criticism that’s intended to hurt and see what I can learn from criticism that’s intended to help. 

I’m no expert at handling criticism but I’ve gotten better at it over time. As I’ve regularly met and gotten to know many new people and continued learning new things, I’ve learned that criticism can be extremely beneficial when offered and received properly. For example, I’ve improved tremendously at swing dancing in the relatively short time I’ve been doing it because I’m always looking for feedback and tips on things I could be doing better. It helps that I’m actively seeking that criticism instead of having it foisted upon me, but even when that happens, I can still handle it better than I used to. I hope you find this information useful. And if you don’t, please feel free to let me know. I can handle the criticism. 

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Review of How to Have Confidence and Power in Dealing with People

Posted on November 27, 2018 by admin

Some of you may remember my review of How to Win Friends and Influence People. If so, then this review will feel like a walk down memory lane. That book is very similar to How to Have Confidence and Power in Dealing with People, which I just finished reading a few nights ago. Dale Carnegie and Les Giblin both poured their extensive knowledge of communication skills into their respective books. Despite their similarities, however, Giblin’s book is worth reading on its own and has some additional insights over Carnegie’s work. 

The title may be off-putting to some people, with the words “power” and “dealing with people” most likely to give someone the wrong impression. Though the book may sound a little devious, the techniques within are intended to be used for positive purposes. Much of the book is dedicated to correcting bad mindsets and habits that readers may have gotten into; this makes it a useful self-improvement book as well as a persuasion book. Speaking of self-improvement, the last chapter contains a self-improvement program that you can fill in and use to track your progress. I’ve seen that in only a handful of books I’ve read, which makes this a rarity on my bookshelf. 

When it comes to the persuasive portions, following Giblin’s advice results in bringing out the best in other people and helping them live up to their potential rather than pushing them around. This is similar to how Robert Cialdini encourages readers of his books to use persuasion in an ethical fashion. For example, I’ve already posted an excerpt from Giblin’s book about the “feeling of importance” that everyone craves and how much more enthusiastic someone becomes when they receive it. So if you’re looking for a book that will help you interact with other people more easily, you’re in luck. But if you want a book that will help you take over the world, better look elsewhere. Or better yet, don’t. Please don’t take over the world. 

How to Have Confidence and Power in Dealing with People is a great book. I probably would have benefited more from it if I’d read it a year or two ago as I’m familiar with most of what it talks about, but it’s always good to have a refresher for this stuff. Whether this is the first book you read on this subject or the latest one, I recommend checking it out. It has a lot of good stuff that will improve your interactions with others and help you out in every area of your life.

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