Like a lot of folks, I’m finally recovering from attending the South by Southwest Interactive conference. It was great to finally meet a lot of the folks that I’ve gotten to know on-line over the last few years in person, and meet a few more folks that I seem to have a lot in common with. And, without trying, I managed to generate some work for my freelance WordPress design business. I had a blast.
But I noticed something else. In these conversations, the names of a few people kept popping up with less than flattering opinions and statements made about them. One person in particular (name not required) came up over and over in a very negative light. Yet, of all the people who made these statements and shared their own negative experiences, only 2 of them had actually SAID anything to this person. They simply ignored them, or worse still passively communicated with them. A few folks actually told how they had been ‘bullied’ by this person when they attempted to ‘break’ their social media bonds.
This is sad on so many levels.
What happened to all the self-respect we talk so much about? Passion, personal goals, and all that jazz. Yet, when faced with a clear load of bullshit, we back down? Allow someone to speak FOR you, ABOUT you, and INSTEAD of you? What happened to this ‘voice’ we all had now?
You were taught better than this
Face it. You know that back when you were wee little ones, you were taught right from wrong, and how to stand up for yourself. It’s a worthy trait to have, self-respect. And I’m also guessing that you don’t enjoy dealing with douchebags and could do something better with your time. So I’ll make you a deal: cut the ties. If you think you’re missing out after 30 days, I’m sure they’ll still be there. But, will they even miss you?
Coming in under the wire, this is my contribution to Holly’s Mentor Roundtables post
Have you failed in life? No? Then you have nothing to teach me. It’s just that simple. In my life and my career, the biggest gains in my life have come from the result of a huge, drastic failure. Failure to finish college. Failure to manage my vices. Failure at my first stab at a career. All of these things were monumental failures. And you know what? I learned more from those than anything else. And that’s what I have to offer. My failure. My experience.
So what do you have to offer? What have you failed at? Because if you haven’t failed, you haven’t been tested. It’s easy to give mentoring advice when you don’t know what happens when the shit hits the fan. How’d you deal with it? What was the fallout? How did you grow?
Because that’s what I would want. Pain is learning.
The other night, I had a plan. A good plan. A productive plan. After my AA meeting, I was going to go downtown, fire up the laptop, finish a blog post I’ve been working on, tweak a few things on my laptop, set up some FTP access for a friend, and maybe catch some football on TV. But I did none of that. Instead, I had a cigar and enjoyed the football game with the other patrons. And in doing so, I came to a realization that had been gnawing at me for a while.
You need to turn ‘off’ the multi-tasking and networking from time to time.
Smoking cigars is something I do to relax and unwind. It’s somewhat of a carryover from the 15 years I smoked cigarettes (yes, I started smoking at age 10, and even worse I began again a few months ago.), some of it is tied to my father’s own cigar smoking, but mostly it’s a reason to sit down and decompress. Given that it takes a good 45 minutes to an hour to smoke a cigar, it’s almost as though I am mandating relaxation to myself.
So why do I want to include other work in it? I don’t, and I shouldn’t. While it’s OK to do something else from time to time, there’s a reason I need to relax in the first place. If I begin to incorporate other tasks into it, the meaning and purpose is gone.
There is always the push to always be ‘productive’. Whether it’s the non-stop data feeds of RSS and email, the numerous GTD posts, blogs, gurus, or just the fact that there are more things to do than time to do them, we often lose sight of relaxation. Relaxation IS productive, probably more so than half the things I do to ‘stay on top of things’. When I am in a situation that is calming and relaxing, I have a better chance of seeing through the problems and issues I may be facing at that time. I can allow all the half-thoughts to either complete themselves or filter there way out.
And most importantly, I can watch football.
What happened to all the self-respect we talk so much about? Passion, personal goals, and all that jazz. Yet, when faced with a clear load of bullshit, we back down? Allow someone to speak FOR you, ABOUT you, and INSTEAD of you? What happened to this ‘voice’ we all had now?
I am a freelance web monkey in St. Petersburg, FL. I am heavily tattoo'd, I sleep too little, I drink too much coffee, smoke entirely too many cigarettes, but otherwise do my thing. I have a fantastic wife and a rock & roll son.
