The New (Old) Golden Rule

     There's been an idea floating around inside my head for a long time and today I experienced it for myself so I thought I must share this blessing.  I really feel that this moment right now we are on the verge of a great leap forward in civilization, a sort of new Renaissance.  You hear a lot of gloom and doom in the media and yes, that is the other possibility but we have only gotten to where we are as a species by choosing up, by choosing forward so it's only natural that we continue the same way.  I hope we continue the same way but if insanity is doing the same thing over and expecting a different result than as a society we are stark, raving mad!  Again and again we put material gain as our top priority and again and again we end up wanting.  Even so we keep going back to business as usual, thinking that everything will sort itself out this time.  How many of these depressions do we have to go through before we figure it out?  The answer is so simple.  Like fire, it's always been there we just needed to learn to harness the power of the flame to turn a force of destruction into a source of warmth and light.  So to is humanity's drive.  It is in our nature to conquer and build and seek but just as a raging wildfire desolates the earth our drive has the capacity to make barren what was fruitful and just as fire makes way for new life our drive can encourage new growth, greener and more plentiful then before.  The answer is in every religion and philosophy in some form or another but the Judeo-Christian tradition refers to it as the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.  Treat others the way you want to be treated.  The words are simple enough but how about the action?

     Hobbes wrote that it is in the nature of man to act in his own interest therefore we need laws to prevent the killing of another to make anther's possessions our own.  Nietzsche wrote that there is no such thing as a selfless act; it is impossible for man not to act in his interest and Locke wrote man, by nature, is inherently good.  The trouble with humanity is that all three exist within ourselves.  The miracle of humanity is that all three exist within ourselves.  What I mean is that if we act in the interest of our fellow man than we are acting in our own interest.  It's not only do unto others as you would have them do unto you, but do unto others as you would have them do unto you because what you do unto others will be done unto you.  If we act for the benefit of our fellow man we will reap the rewards.  That will be the major breakthrough of the 21st century but haven't we known this all along?

Write it DOWN!

Today while pilfering through the brilliance that is my twitter feed I noticed a video posted by Tom Price (@pricetom, PC Andy Torchwood).  The video was a commencement speech by my personal writing god Aaron Sorkin to the 2012 class of his Alma Mater (you can watch his magnificent brilliance here: https://ensemble.syr.edu/app/sites/index.aspx?destinationID=izHGVJ2he0iJAF4dHctW-Q&contentID=qp_sG09FV0-H77OwyXCDwQ ) Besides the usual feeling of personal hackiness that comes with observing any form of Aaron's writing it also (as per usual) inspired an idea of my own (that's writer's code for I stole this): If I were to address the graduating class of my own Alma Mater Oglethorpe University what advice would I bestow upon them? I thought back to my favorite sum-the-meaning-of-life-into-15-minutes-including-a-few-touching-and-witty-personal-anecdotes-speech moments, including another commencement address by JK Rowling, the "Wear Sunscreen" thing and The Last Lecture (go ahead and google, I'll wait for ya) my fantastically useful and magical words of wisdom are these-write it down.  Why is it that the so called secrets of the world's successful people are always so simple and common sense (i.e. anything from Poor Richards Almanac) yet so incredibly elusive? Oh, that's right we didn't WRITE IT DOWN! During my tenure among the hallowed halls of OU I learned many things about myself including the fact that writing things down committed them to memory.  At the time I used this "trick" to avoid studying, at which I was fairly dreadful.  The slight flaw with this brilliant plan is that it required one to actually go to class, to hear the things worthy of inspiration (read:stealing) spoken by my fantastic professors.  Here it is a little more than 9 years to the day from my own commencement and I finally figured this amazing idea that I already knew out.  Some learning curve, eh?

I had a job interview today and I didn't write some of the important information down.  Due to some mitigating circumstances I didn't sleep at all last night so my memory wasn't quite as clear as it usually is and the missing information caused an argument amongst my family members (that is a whole other blog post, trust me) which set in motion a group of events which might or might not have cost me the job, won't know until later in the week.  After the interview I was asked several questions by my family and the ones where I had written down the answers somewhere caused relief to my already stressed to the max clan whereas the ones which I couldn't produce physical proof of led to more arguing. 

So in closing write it down, take note, keep important information handy-whatever expression you prefer-do that and do it often and you will be guaranteed success or at least fewer stressful moments which can only lead to good things.  Never take for granted that someone else will have the information for you.  Tomorrow we'll tackle the whole issue of finding that information we have written down.

So...yeah

My life always seems to be the same story over and over again: stagnation and restlessness.  Up until yesterday the stagnation was quite literal since I was recovering from a type of ankle fracture that requires staying off the injured leg for weeks and even months so just getting out of my tiny hobbit hole was nigh impossible.  Per my surgeon I am now officially mobile and can even take my boot off sometimes, both of which come with an incredible sense of freedom.  I'm still unable to do my job at Cracker Barrel (which, quite frankly I considered to be my former job the moment my ankle snapped).  Of course if I still am without a proper job in a few weeks I will have to try and go back but I am doing everything I can to keep that from happening.  I have a very promising lead on a job as I submitted my resume to HR without any advertised opening and a few weeks later they contacted me for an interview that went very well.  The very fact that they sought me out is a very good sign.  The job is at a plasma donation center and since they pay people for donations and you can donate as often as twice a week they are very busy these days.  The salary is lower than say being a phlebotomist in a hospital because the ease of the job (i.e. no kids, only willing healthy patients) but I will either get a raise eventually or have garnered enough experience to pay for a higher paying position.  I'm at that cautiously optimistic stage where I have faith but no expectation based on my experience of the past, I don't know two YEARS.  Keeping everything crossed until I find out one way or another.

I'm just so tired of waiting, and being frustrated about waiting, and complaining about being tired of waiting.  I have so many things I need to do but I need money to do all of them.  I should probably start donating plasma. I would literally make more money donating plasma twice a week than I did at Cracker Barrel.  I don't have the best veins so I'm not sure if I would even be a good donor but it's gotta be worth a try.  I just need to feel as if I'm doing something, making progress.  I literally feel as if my brain is incapable of creating endorphins.  Do you know what it's like to not feel anything like happiness or joy for months?  I hope you never do because it makes everything, even breathing sometimes feel so difficult you wouldn't mind if you just died.  Not suicidal just tired of feeling like that.

One of the things I should be doing is writing.  I mean, I am a writer and that's what writers do to deal with tough situations-you write.  Unfortunately, this kind of depression makes pleasurable activities painful and difficult.  That's the thing about writing-it's impossible to do it without examining your own life and emotions.  Some days, you just don't want to know that much about yourself.  The other thing about writing, however is that you can lose yourself in it.  You can control it when everything else in your life seems out of control.  I am better today than I was two days ago and next week? Next month? Who knows what wonderful things are around the corner? 

Little Miss Friggin' Sunshine

I know I'm lucky to have a roof over my head, some people don't.  I know I'm lucky to have (although I can't do it at the moment)  a job , many people do not. I know whenever I want to complain about something I should think of it from the standpoint of something I am grateful for, and I am so, so grateful. I know that to a certain point my current situation is a result of my own actions. The thing is, I need a release.  I need support and encouragement.  Why am I constantly being made to feel guilty for needing and wanting these things?  I think much like divorce (which I've also the pleasure of experiencing) or the death of a friend's loved one, when people have a friend in severe economic straits they don't know what to say.  I don't mean they can't think of anything to say I mean they are ignorant of the kind of words truly needed.  It's not that they don't care or mean well but when the struggle is not their own there can be a kind of tunnel vision that prevents them from seeing what's really going on.  I can only wholly speak from my personal experience but I'll try to include general advice on how to handle this situation and, let's face it, these days who doesn't know several people in severe financial trouble.  I'd also like to add that I am by no means innocent of doing exactly the same thing.  There was a time when I took several vacations a year and basically had everything I wanted (within reason, of course) and I, too would tell my less fortunate friends to "stay positive" and "things will turn around" and every other platitude one is "supposed' to say under such circumstances.  No wonder we think we're doing the right thing, because the friend smiles or writes "thanks for your support" on their facebook page and we privately congratulate ourselves on being a good friend.  Here's the thing: we're in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression and the hard times that "won't last forever" are still lasting a pretty long damn time and people tire of having to give positive reinforcement to their less fortunate friends, leading them to say the most painful thing possible, which is saying nothing at all   I think positively all on my own. I'm not looking for a cheerleader.  I truly believe I will get out of the hole I'm in someday, but I can't create a job for myself out of thin air or make a recruiter hire me over people with more experience (how do you get experience if they won't hire you but that's a whole different blog post).  In my case I am dependent on my parents for transport since I totaled my car last year so I can't job hunt as hard as I'd like.  Yes, I'm without a car because I had a wreck but do you know the reason I wrecked?  I hadn't slept in two days because of my constant state of almost panic attack level anxiety over my situation and my reflexes were just a little slower than normal.  One year on my situation is even worse, as is the anxiety and sleeplessness.  You're probably wondering why I don't ask my doctor for medication to relieve anxiety and help me sleep. Well the only psychiatrist I can see is one through a government program and he is not allowed to prescribe medicine for anxiety or sleeping.  Ya know, one of the poor patients might scam them for meds and sell them so lets screw the vast majority who would not.  Although for you life may be pretty much the same as it was a few years ago for many people like myself it is a very different world. It is easy to believe in the ability to pull oneself up by the bootstraps if you don't actually have to accomplish the feat. Take my field, phlebotomy--how many times have you had blood drawn or donated blood in your life?  They must constantly be hiring phlebotomists and the constant demand use to allow less experienced phlebotomists to be hired. However, healthcare is not immune to market fluctuations and the high unemployment and underemployment rates of two years ago prevented people from going to the doctor as often, which resulted in the laying off of medical professionals.  Now that the economy is improving companies are hiring more people and those experienced, unemployed workers are applying to the same jobs as people just starting out like myself.  Who would you pick?  It's only logical to go with someone with more experience, especially in a field so subject to litigation.  I guess my point at the end of this rambling mess is I want to be comforted and to not feel guilty about asking for comforting.  I don't want to be frozen out of everyone's life.  My mother says, the reason no one does anything with me is because I'm so negative.  I should talk about the weather and not how I missed out on a job because of a very expensive, temporary injury.  If I talk about things like that it's because that's my life and my life is in a negative mode right now.  It's the same as me talking about better things when my life is in a positive mode.  Funny, when I was in a better place no one scolded me for being too grateful but now I'm constantly being told how ungrateful I am.  It's like when your grandmother fusses at you for not cleaning your plate because of starving children-whether you eat it or not, the starving children will still starve.  Me constantly smiling and writing only positive things on facebook will not solve my problems.  Reaching out honestly and openly to that friend on the other hand helps so much more than you know. In my case it's even more important because I barely receive acknowledgement from my family let alone encouragement and I live with them!  Of course if I suggest doing something I'm needy and ungrateful for what they've done for me, but as you well know from your own life we creatures need more than just food and shelter to survive and thrive and yes, we less fortunate realize that you have problems too and we'd love to hear about them.  You should also feel no shame about coming to us.  If you think we'd be offended that you bring up your own troubles we won't.  If we wanted you to boost us up while muting your own problems then we wouldn't be a friend.  If you're afraid to ask us to do something because you think we expect to be paid for trust me that's not what we're after unless you truly want to treat us.  What we want is to know that just because times are hard we still have friends.  Actual, in the flesh, laughing friends.  Silence hurts more than anything because when you're in a hole for a long time you forget there's an above ground unless someone up above throws you a rope.

Last call at the pub

Some of you have visited my website www.rounthepub.com. I have decided to delete the site. There was an episode of How I Met Your Mother where Ted and Barney dream of opening a bar. One night they get the chance to run their local and they realize how much work running a bar is. I too did not realize how much time one must put in to constantly update the site. It is a lot of fun but there are other hobbies I would like to dedicate time to. Much like an actual pub, there are already plenty of good sites that are much better than mine. I will keep the twitter account to post UK related news. Thanks for your "business."

A very wee fish in a very large Pond

I have spent the last few days building a website for fellow anglophiles and seekers of information about the UK.  Here's the trouble, my skills are quite rude and there are so many flashy sites out there that attract advertisers and visitors by the thousands.  Just as a screenwriter creates films and TV shows they themselves would enjoy I am trying to create the type of website I would frequent.  Here's to www.damnyanks.net I am proud to be one!

Wibbly Wobbly Walky Walky?

It is high time I get into shape.  I do not want to suffer with the same health problems as my parents, especially as my family tends to live well into their 80s, if not 90s.  Like any insecure writer (a redundant statement I know) I obviously have not to this point believed that I am worth the effort, but to do it for others? That is a powerful motivator.  My plan is to raise 100 pounds (about $180) for FibroNetwork via www.justgiving.com.  How will I raise this money? I am asking for one penny per day I meet or exceed my goal of taking 10,000 steps per day.  Please visit my just giving page, www.justgiving.com/marinda-rule for more details, and tell your friends!