I was just out visiting some friend’s blogs and felt compelled to share a message of how sometimes less is more. It’s a standard truth that can be applied to many things. I wanted to leave a comment on one of my friend’s blogs about some technical woes she’s having but the page wouldn’t load the required anti-spam word for me to type. So I figured I’d touch on what I wanted to say this way in hopes it would help her and maybe some others.

Often we begin doing things simply because they are available. As more becomes available we find ourselves delving into more of those things. In the long run we may be clogging some vital things without knowing it. The fact remains that just because you CAN do something, doesn’t necessarily mean you SHOULD. Let me share an example of something super simple but that illustrates the point well.

When I began e-mailing I delighted in the ability to so easily correspond with others. As it caught on, a new wave of customizing e-mails surfaced and I thought it was pretty cool. I could add stationery backgrounds, images, etc. After a while it became a little cumbersome so I backed it down to just adding a cute picture in my signature line. I was happy with it and although I hate to admit it, it was one thing that had some impact on my decision to use a different e-mail service/program that didn’t support images. Up to that point I had been using Microsoft Outlook, now my husband was encouraging me to try Gmail. Now the major difference is Gmail was developed by an Internet search engine company, namely Google who specializes in the area of Internet services. They understand how plain text versus html message formats work. The bottom line is that as cute as all my images and things were they were sent with every message as an attachment. Spam filters know that virus e-mails contain attachments and are set up accordingly. As soon as I made the switch I found more reliability with my e-mails reaching their destinations unfettered, and I began to really appreciate the way Gmail filtered my incoming mail. I’d unknowingly sacrificed functionality for frills before.

Blogging is a classic example of more becoming more. Plug-ins, gadgets, widgets….all these things are enticing and offer enhancements to the basic web page, to say nothing about ads. But they can also really slow things down. When I redesigned my blog a few years ago I moved all the “blog stuff” onto it’s own page so every page view wouldn’t be trying to download every unrelated but “cool” thing on my side bars. I can’t tell you the difference it made. I took control over my blog navigation and cut out all unnecessary elements. It was a good lesson.

I can’t remember if I shared it here before or if I just talked about it with someone else, but in the recent Indiana Jones movie there was an early scene that stretched believability to a breaking point. Sadly, it wasn’t necessary to the story line and it has now coined the phrase “Don’t nuke the fridge.” In other words, less is more. In my experience 99% of blogs nuke the fridge.

No matter the realm or situation, the truth that often less is more resounds with truth and clarity. If there is clutter in your life or surroundings, you’ll feel cluttered and messy. Sometimes we don’t recognize building clutter in our lives and projects but if it builds you can rest assured that eventually it will catch up to you. So my advice when you’re having problems is to step back and see if you’re nuking the fridge. It’s likely that if you work on simplifying you’ll regain much of what you desire, control being at the top of the list. *smile*

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Sharing Organizing Perspectives Balance

I was browsing the $5 value DVDs yesterday with my daughter and came across a copy of Footloose. Just seeing the cover made me giggle. If I’m not mistaken, the soundtrack to this movie was the first tape of “our” music at my home growing up. It wasn’t mine, it was my older sisters but it was like a rite of passage which is probably why I remember it. My daughter saw my distraction and asked what was up so I told her this movie just brought back a lot of memories for me. She asked what it was about and I told her basically it was about a boy who finds himself in a tiny town kicking back against the rules. The message that stands out the most in my mind from the show is the argument he uses against the preacher that there is a time and a season for everything, even dancing.

This is a message I’d like to get across to my children and the teens I work with. I’d like to really get them to see that there is a time for everything. It’s part of why I’m so passionate about charm school which focuses on this through decorum. To really understand this concept is to master self control and self-discipline. This is so important in a world that is screaming instant gratification all the time.

When I was recently asked to start teaching some charm school classes again, I began to form my own outline of the materials and knowledge I’ve acquired over the years. I broke it down into three basic keys that will unlock potential and open doors to really acquiring and mastering the art of charm. My three include:

1) Self Concept: Know Thyself
2) Appearance: The Power of Image
3) Social Interaction: Conquer or Crumble

As I compiled the list and organized some of my materials I realized again how critical the truth of everything having a time and season is. Now that I’ve had some personal experience in life I’m better able to compile these courses and their materials, things that I wouldn’t have been able to do as well a couple of decades ago. And so the story goes with so many things in my life, there is indeed a right time and season to many of life’s experiences. Figuring out what those are for you and not messing up the time line will result in greater happiness.

A good exercise for me was taking these three keys and applying the principle of times and seasons. For example, my level of self confidence is a direct reflection of my life’s experiences to date. Learning how to put them into perspective really helps me get a handle on who I am, how I feel about myself and what I want to become. And take appearance lessons: When I was a teenybopper it was in style to wear lots of layers, pushed up collars, leg warmers and big airings. It was the right time to wear such styles because that was the current trend, but if I tried to resurrect that appearance today it would be quite catastrophic. Equally valuable is the lesson that some clothing simply looks better on the young bodies it was designed for. And finally, there’s the social interaction piece where all these things come together. Think of all those movies or times when the awkwardness between an adult and teen were palpable because the parent or teacher was trying to be hip using current teen jargon.

There’s simply a time and season for everything. Instead of wishing for the good things from yesteryear, we should be embracing our current time and season growing and developing those appropriate traits and skills for where we are now. I guarantee you that down the road we’ll be looking back on where we are now the same way we do on our teen years. I don’t know about you, but I’d like to be able to look back and smile.

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Sharing Inspiration Perspectives Success Beauty

I have a favorite saying that goes something like this: You teach people how to treat you.

When I first heard it I felt my muscles stiffen. It was so harsh and unfair, surely it couldn’t hold much truth. However, my efforts to prove it wrong ended up only proving how true it really is. It’s as if we hold a mirror up with our actions, words and decisions. Those around us will quickly learn from those things and will often throw them back at us, usually at the most inconvenient times.

I once heard a mother calling to her then nine or ten year old daughter to come into the house from play. The child didn’t want to come in and some arguing ensued. As I had recently been instructing teachers on improving their teaching skills, I was keenly aware of this concept of teaching as well as others. What I’ll never forget is the way the mother responded to the child’s exclaims of not wanting to. I heard in loud tones the words: “I don’t care what you want! This is what we’re doing right now!” I immediately pictured this same scene in future years, though reversed. A time when these words of ‘not caring what you want’ would come back to haunt this mother and she’d be stunned wondering where on earth they came from.

As with most things this concept is much easier said than done, but that doesn’t make it any less true or important. Perhaps if we stopped once and while to think about how we’re teaching others to treat us it would impact our actions, words and decisions. It seems like a reasonable start to improving ourselves and our character.

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Parenting Positive Impact Relationships Perspectives Intellectual

It’s a goal. Not just a wish or a hope, an actual goal. I don’t need to own one, just have ownership in one.

Air travel continues to go downhill. It increases my desire (and hubby’s) to avoid it if possible. You could probably trace the origins of our desire back to the days when Blake took his first contract job in 1999. It made you sick to your stomach to know that even though the flight time was short, the total travel time to get from our home in Southeastern Idaho to Fort Collins, Colorado took almost the exact same 9 hours as it did to drive it. If the same travel could have been done by private jet you would have cut that time down to under two hours easy. Because we value our time, it was always on the brain.

Add to this the airline tragedy and aftermath of 9/11 and you have a melting pot for unpleasant air travel. Things weren’t fantastic before, but there was at least a focus on doing something - anything - to make the experience less painful for the traveler. Maybe even a little healthy competition for it and the revenue stream that followed. The added (and necessary) security measures put into place after that fateful day seem to have become a springboard for airline excuses for unpleasant traveling. Apparently, the vast majority involved haven’t yet figured out that what you do isn’t near as important as how you do it. You ask anyone who flies public transportation these days and you’ll find the vast majority only do it for lack of options. That’s a great premise for any business relationship. *eye roll*

So things are in a pickle. Naturally we add more to make it worse. Now we add economic strain, high gas prices and struggle for financial survival. Corners are cut which often result in more damage than salvaging. One of the biggest being outsourcing customer service calls. If you’ve seen the photo e-mails in circulation about the phone lines in India you can appreciate the irony of this. It’s the one where the telephone pole looks like Clark Griswald’s Christmas light plug nightmare of 100 plugs and cords sharing one outlet with a caption that reads “And this is where our calls for technical support go.”

Recently my husband had another experience that put the private jet ownership back on the forefront of our discussions. As it’s blog worthy and he’s not currently blogging I’ll be telling the story.

We decided earlier this year to let our daughter go to Idaho five days early to spend some one on one time with her grandma and family there. This meant buying her an airplane ticket to fly solo from Phoenix to Salt Lake City. Blake bought the ticket in April with US Airways. It was explained there was a $50 unaccompanied minor fee which was also printed on the ticket information. The only inconvenience he had with this policy was that they wouldn’t let him pay for the service with the ticket, he was told it had to be paid when he arrived at the airport.

As this is our first time doing this, he called last week to make sure we knew everything we could in preparation. He listened to the foreign accent on the other end of the line rattle off the guidelines and perked up when he heard him say something about paying the $100 unaccompanied minor fee. He corrected the man, reading from his printed ticket information the fee was $50. The man replied that the fee went up the first of May. The remainder of the call was spent trying to learn why this information wasn’t shared with the customer and why that is a problem.

I won’t bore you with the details of language barrier and lack of customer service. Suffice it to say it went the way most customer service calls go these days with an employee who can barely speak English, doesn’t like their job and doesn’t care about it or the customer they’re servicing. But the end of the conversation is worth sharing, I’m told it went something like this:

“Sorry sir, you simply don’t have any other option.” (Add in a great deal of foreign accent for the right affect.)

“Actually I do. I have the option to cancel my ticket and never fly with your airlines again.”

Now what’s really crazy about all this is that in this strained time for airlines you’d think they’d being doing all they can to keep customers not push them out the door. US Airways lost more than $50 extra dollars for a service, they lost the entire refundable ticket price as well as all our future business. It wasn’t about $50 more, it was a simple customer service principle that was violated - making changes in a contract without informing and gaining consent with the other party.

The crappy customer service continued through the process of cancellation and refunding as well. Another phone service employee with language barrier problems had to be taught how to do her job by my husband because she wasn’t sure if she was just canceling or canceling and refunding. A classic end to the experience.

The good news is that we got a better ticket rate, no additional fees and two bubbly English speaking employees at Southwest airlines to help us. There’s a lot to be said for the attitude, speaking skills and positive personality when it comes to customer service interfacing. Today Southwest wins, but I’m still looking to the best solution which is ownership in a private jet.

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Sharing Perspectives Travel

If I were at home with my mom today I’d be on day two of putting together flower arrangements and visiting cemeteries for deceased family. She’s done it my entire life and taught me how important it was to remember and honor my ancestors and all their sacrifices.

I’m a thousand miles away and so can’t help with the grave decorating, but I can pay tribute in my own way here on my blog.

I come from a noble heritage on all sides and I’ve always tended to take that for granted. Just this past month I’ve been reading through family history documents that I have copies of. I love history and when I read these personal accounts and stories it’s like I get a little taste of what it was like in their time. I am so grateful my husband’s grandmother gave me a copy of the family civil war letters because I dearly love reading them. I’m also supremely grateful for extended family who have compiled entire books of family history and genealogy. Without these I would not have any way to know my ancestors. I never knew my mother’s father as he died before she was married and without these histories I would have no way to connect with him or learn who he was.

I often wonder if our ancestors weep over us in our day. They gave their all for us to enjoy all the things we do today. Many of them struggled and sacrificed deeply that we might never know those same struggles and sacrifices. Thanks to them we live in a time of abundance when all we could ever want or need is readily available. We’ve become fat and lazy, feeling entitled to the instant gratification that is so plentiful today. Sometimes I think of this as a love mistake scenario. As a parent you never want your children to suffer any of the same things you did - you want them to have it all, every opportunity and every happiness. Consequently we as parents may overdo it sometimes in giving to our children and in removing painful lessons or experiences. Unfortunately, with no personal experience in painful learning and growth too many grow with ingratitude and cause their parents more pain than they thought imaginable. I hope I’m finding a balance for my children and I think often on what my self-sacrificing ancestors would have to say to me today. I hope I’m showing my gratitude and love and passing it on to my posterity. Maybe we’d do well to have a few more days a year to reflect on a picture bigger than us. There are thousands of years of history above us, ancestors that paved the way for us to be here today. Too often I find myself getting stuck in the rut of my personal here and now - thinking only on my own family that I’ve known in my life time. So just for today (and hopefully many more to come) I’ll spend some time and effort getting to know my ancestors and the heritage they’ve given me.

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Family Sharing Emotions Perspectives Holidays

Get it right. Don’t leave yourself standing on a rug that begs to be pulled out from under you. This goes for more than writing, it goes for everything in life. Do your homework, make sure you know what you need to know before you stand on a soap box or any other form to state your case and opinions. It’s just good sense and it doesn’t matter how big or how small your audience or your reach is.

I’ve always been perhaps a little overzealous in my personal life to make darn sure I’ve covered all my bases before I start running. My boss once even told me to remind him never to get on his bad side or cross my path after observing my work for a year. He also told me that he had no problem seeing why I rose so quickly from secretary to regional administrator. It was a nice compliment, especially given that I was not yet 25 years old when I got it.

So where does it all start? Well, I can tell you I wasn’t born with it and I wasn’t handed these traits on a platter. I had to work hard, maybe even harder to gain respect in my job because I was so young. I know some of what I write about on this because I live it every day, I’m not perfect at it but I continue to nurture it every day. My husband has dealt with a lot of the aftermath of me being overly analytical sometimes and worrying about those things. I told you I haven’t perfected it, but I can tell you it’s very strong in me. I can tell you that it involves a great deal of thinking things through from every side, angle and perspective possible. It involves keeping a level head, taking time to set aside initial emotions and reactive thoughts. And it’s what makes me crazy when I see others spout off in various forms without a care or thought about whether what they’re writing or sharing has any foundation or if it’s just reactive vomit that negatively affects others. The recent garbage floating around with political mud slinging, polygamist sects and religious slandering makes me cringe. There’s no point to spreading the muddy water around and you can’t get into the mud without getting some on you. Yet time and again people everywhere jump in never realizing most of it is unfounded, false, taken out of context or exaggerated to gain attention. But it was ever thus.

In two of my favorite classics, “The Count of Monte Cristo” and “Les Miserables” you are introduced to two powerful characters who pride themselves in being servants of the hands of justice, upright and just men. In The Count you meet the unfortunate Villefort, and in Les Mis you meet the also unfortunate Javert. Their ultimate undoing is the unveiling of hypocrisy. For Villefort he realizes in his most desperate moment what a hypocrite he has been most of his life and he goes crazy with the realization and aftermath of his actions. For Javert, the battle is free from personal hypocrisy but he commits suicide when he realizes that to uphold his beloved law would be immoral. Both were extremists, not unlike many people today. It’s the very reason I bring them up. Today’s Villeforts and Javerts run around under the same cloak of blind following. And at the end of the day a blind follower is left with little more than anger and vindictive venom when they realize their pursuits have been vain. They strike at anything and everything, most especially at anything resembling the origins for their initial beliefs or thoughts. In short, they leave themselves standing on a rug which begs to be yanked out from under them.

So I line up my ducks - to a fault sometimes, I admit - before I do anything else. And I really wish others would do the same. Today’s world offers so much to so many. Technology and the Internet make it possible fore every person to be “published” and to read more content on every subject imaginable than one could hope to have time to sift through. Yet, in general we are still married to the idea that if it is in print it must be true. Therefore, misinformation, scams, hoaxes and more continue to run a muck as the muddy streams trickle from source to source. Few if any make the arduous trip up the mountain to the source to learn for themselves what is truth. It is only those who do that find true conviction and peace in their beliefs and knowledge. It’s also why the world is so full of angry people I think.

So I end with where I began. If you’re going to share or write (especially commit it to text) get it right. Follow the first rule of authors everywhere: Only write what you know. Do you’re homework, go to the source, find out for yourself. Enough of all this muddy water.

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Emotions Perspectives Blogging Intellectual

It seems to be human nature to not truly appreciate what you have until you don’t have it. It doesn’t seem to matter so much whether you ever really had what you now want either, although if you’ve had and lost you know first hand what it was like which can certainly add to the longing. Sometimes it’s even the perception that you thought you had it, when in fact you never really did. Either way the result is the same, you simply appreciate things more if you associate a form of loss with it before.

This morning I stopped to visit with another mom at my son’s school. I have to admit that I don’t know her name or anything about her really. We’ve exchanged a few friendly smiles and hellos on the playground before school starts for our Kindergarten sons. Recently, she’s been coming in a wheelchair and with some assistance, again I don’t know what the circumstances are but I know my heart aches for her. So this morning when we met at the crosswalk on the way back to our cars I asked her how she was doing and she replied that she was hanging in there. I could hear the weight of it in her voice and I told her how seeing her reminded me of myself about 5 years ago when I too was in a wheelchair. And then the entire drive home I considered how blessed I truly am.

I pondered on three primary elements of my life where I got to experience what I’ll call the “Greater Appreciation Algorithm” or GAA for short. (How’s that for pithy?!) The first, thanks to my friend, was my health and ability to walk. This in turn leads to the greatest gift of how you view and thus live your life. Dealing with unknowns is terrifying and lonely, even when you’re surrounded by loved ones. During the three months I battled some bizarre and never defined illness, I experienced some deep soul searching and gratitude training. I learned to be grateful for pain because it meant I could still feel and was still alive. I learned to be grateful for the many years of unfettered freedom and health I’d enjoyed without notice. Consequently, I don’t view life the same way anymore, I recognize each day as the gift that it is determined to make the most of it. There are no certainties; you make the most of what you’ve got while you’ve got it or you die on a bed of regrets. Life is too short for petty offenses, too fragile for postmortems and too wonderful for despair. How grateful I am to have learned this all important lesson before I was 30.

The next thing I thought about was one of those perceived items; the ability to become a parent. Suffice it to say that control in all things parenting from becoming to being one is an illusion. The GAA part of this experience for me is the ability to be a better parent, to recognize more. One woman compared this to experiencing children more on the level of a grandparent because you have different eyes and understanding. There’s some truth in there. At any rate, I find myself being supremely grateful for these parenting eyes even though obtaining them wasn’t something I was so sure I was on board with during the trial and wait. And I am especially mindful of the blessing that the vision was granted before I had children so I could make the most of the short time I have them.

And finally I couldn’t help but consider the blessing of all things temporal. At the height of my personal health trial came the greatest financial storm of my marriage. My husband and I were so close to the edge of losing everything that to remember now still causes my heart to skip a beat. Up to this point, we felt a level of control and confidence in our temporal situation. We were putting money away in a few different retirement and savings programs, paying more than minimum on our consumer debt payments, making conservative big decisions on our home and cars, and enjoying the freedoms of being your own boss. Sounds great right? It was, right up to the point where the revenue stopped, and I do mean stopped - no trickling, no bleeding, just plain gone. Oh, and now we had a mountain of medical bills too. For six months we plugged holes, depleted resources and extended every ounce of credit waiting and hoping for a new job to be in the cards. Not surprising, the climb out of that hole was no small task. But you know what? You keep climbing. No bankruptcy was declared, bills were paid and life continued albeit a bit strained for a while. And what I learned from all of it was that there is a difference in managing your money and in really having money to manage. I learned that money is not just some means to an end, it is a blessing and a gift that enhances your life if you let it. I learned that perception is everything and I learned it before I was 40.

So you see why I consider myself thrice blessed. Each of these primary areas are major aspects of life and I can’t imagine living my life without the gifts of knowledge that are now mine. This morning I thank the sweet lady that comes to school in a wheelchair each day to see her son off. She is an important reminder of just how blessed I am and sometimes you need the reminder. Maybe there really is something to the “gaa gaa” thing. *wink*

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Family Parenting Sharing Emotions Positive Impact Potential Inspiration Perspectives Motherhood Success Deep Thoughts

Okay, that title is an oxymoron I know. It should probably read when men do stuff. *giggle* But I can’t help myself, especially after the fantastic shares and stories my husband had on his return camping trip with the boy.

The visuals in my head are swimming with material for a post. First you have to picture the right framework: it wasn’t just my husband taking my son for an overnight camp out, it was a group of dads taking out their sons for an overnight camp out. My husband doesn’t camp. His idea of camping has the word Marriott in the mere definition. We own minimal camp gear and what we do own has seen little to no action and it’s likely that (as with the few power tools we own) I am the only one who has a frame of reference for how to use said gear.

You know you’re off to a good start when the location for the event is determined hours before, thus allowing ample time for people to plan accordingly. While men complain about women’s obsessions with needing to know details and planning I never hear them complain when they’re enjoying the spoils.

I have to diverge here to share a few fundamentals of differences between men and women. What better way to do that than by pictures. So for kicks and giggles I’ll post a few.

I have to point out that this is more than the obvious visual differences. The woman will have an entirely separate list of items, assignments and planning needs. It is not the all in one shot man’s approach.

Here we have the element of food and serving a group. The left is the result of a woman’s planning the right the side of the man’s.

My husband reports the dinner part of the camp as being a success. Of course it’s hard to go wrong with a Subway sandwich as opposed to the typical raw/burnt tinfoil dinner. The breakfast sounded pretty comical to me. A few dozen dough nuts and breakfast burritos. My husband took a mountain of tortillas and I’m sure other food assignments made their way around. He spoke of one who talked about the fantastic deal on 400 pieces of bacon (hence the picture of bacon above). Unfortunately, cooking preparations didn’t begin until everyone was ready to eat. Surprisingly the boys grew restless while the cooks tried to speed fry 400 slices of bacon on the highest camp stove setting possible. We’re back to the raw/burnt style. My husband stuck with a half a dough nut. You can imagine how well the waiting was going with a bunch of boys running the spectrum of ages from 4-15 years old. One father, on taking note of the dilemma, came up with a short term solution which my husband described as a stroke of brilliance. He suddenly asked who wanted to go see a dead skunk he’d discovered on a morning hike. This resulted in a much needed 15 minute window of time for the frantic cooks.

The entertainment sounds interesting. Apparently there was an outdoor movie set up which is quite ironic to me given the stress of the “roughing it” memos prior to the event. And of course the water balloon and egg launch from a sling shot sending the ammunition into the general wilderness area. The point of course being to see how far you can launch stuff, which we all know is critical. The young boys entertained themselves seeing what would burn in the fire through experimentation of course. I think a shoe or two may have been lost but at least the tents and bedding were spared. I won’t even go to the area of the ceremonial fire extinguishing because I’m a woman and not supposed to know about those things. And I’ll spare the other moms I know the details of hearing how many father’s came around asking if anyone had seen their son. All in all a good man outing.

Of course the only thing that really matters is that our son had a fantastic time and he and dad both made it home safe and sound. When I went to the car to carry his sleeping body into the house he roused just long enough to start excitedly telling me about the rocket they made that shot into the air before closing his eyes again. Mission accomplished. Thanks dad.

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Funnies Perspectives Blogging Recreation

I’ve been a bit reflective lately, surprising I know. *snort* I’m seeing with more and more clarity how we create our own realities, frame our own expectations and then our very lives based on those thoughts and feelings.

This sounds supremely simple, yet every day the energies and resources spent refuting the truth are insurmountable. For what I hear everyday around me are phrases like: “Well, they’re just a jerk”, “The economy is in the tank so things are bad right now”, “I have no control over that”, “I guess this is just the trial I’m suppose to be going through right now”, “It’s not my fault”, on and on and on. The words shift but the meaning is always there, responsibility is always to be found elsewhere and there’s an excuse for everything, especially when it involves work.

Can you imagine how different things would be if instead of sowing seeds of negativity, victimization and redirects we spent more energy sowing seeds of positivity, empowerment and responsibility?

Yesterday I spent a few minutes reading some of the book “All I Really Needed To Know I Learned in Kindergarten” by Robert Fulghum. I’ve always enjoyed his writings and find re-reading them gives my spirits a little boost. Specific to the thoughts I’m sharing today, the concept of “Clean up your own mess” as one of his lessons fits perfectly. The seeds that are being sown too often and the fruits they bear are those of irresponsibility. Not only do we not recognize that the pickle we’re in is most often direct result of our own making, we expend valuable energy and resources justifying why it’s not our mess to clean up instead of just digging in and getting the job done.

Another common thread I’ve observed is how easy it seems to be to find and see this truth in the lives of others while dismissing ourselves. It’s usually more subtle but it’s still there. I see it manifest in discussions where I hear someone describe a specific problem and then turn it into a spiritual matter saying that faith and prayer will solve it for them. Of course, it’s not said that directly but that’s what I hear. Sadly, people with this attitude will never understand the concept of an answered prayer. For they will not recognize any answer that doesn’t suit them just as my 5 year old fights against every “no” he receives. Hopefully he’ll learn the lesson and carry it with him, hopefully he won’t forget that just because the answer isn’t what you wanted or expected doesn’t mean the answer wasn’t given or isn’t there.

For the past 5 years my husband and I have been implementing, to the best of our ability, a life of personal responsibility, positive affirmations and hard work. We stopped finding fault with circumstances and praying for a rescue from the financial storm we steered our ship into. We stopped using the crutch of uncontrollable health issues and September 11th aftermath as the reasons for our being in the eye of the storm. It didn’t matter because we were in the storm and while these things may have hastened our arrival, our course was set before they hit. Besides that, focusing our energies there sure wouldn’t help us get out of the storm. Not surprising, the journey out of the storm was proportionate in time to our getting into it the first place. There was no single miracle that pulled us out and dropped us on a sunny beach. However, there were daily miracles and daily progress. In fact, things have been beyond good for us, especially within the past couple years and they are growing every day. It’s not free, it’s not easy, it’s not luck. We just started sowing different seeds and now we’re enjoying a very different garden full of variety and sweetness.

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Sharing Positive Impact Potential Inspiration Perspectives Balance Success Deep Thoughts

This morning I was reading a friend’s blog post about common sense and how it’s gone on a “permanent vacation” (I loved those words!) Then I went out and looked at some old articles I started to write several months ago. One was titled “Back The Train Up” and I’d begun by sharing how after reading some recent parenting articles I felt robbed at the end but couldn’t place why. Today I think I figured it out and it comes back to the concept Carmi shared this morning about the loss of common sense.

Everyone seems more than able and willing to ‘research’ and write articles, books, etc. on every subject imaginable. Yet most of them seem to be playing a game justifying why a lack of common sense is acceptable. It’s easy to jump on the newest fad or popular bandwagon of rationalization, but at the end of the drive you are left feeling cheated. And heaven knows we all want what is easy.

Take my experience last night. It shows not only a lack of common sense but also the way it is fueled (literally) by a desire for the easy way out.

I was watching a pair of teens make attempts at starting a fire in a fire pit. The goal was to make smores. I walked over to see one holding a piece of paper and lighter in front of her. The other was holding a can she explained was hairspray and was trying to help her friend get a flame going by spraying it. Brilliant.

So I attempted to explain a few basics. I told them that first, there are too many things to list on the “stupidity” front for using a can of hairspray as lighter fluid but suffice it to begin with the fact that you don’t need any help getting paper to burn. Moreover, spraying it in the general direction of the one holding the paper and flame is also a bad idea. This could definitely be listed in the “stupidest stunts” top ten. Second, any fire held up in the breeze is likely going to blow out with the wind before you get it back down to the ground, not to mention the increase in risk for burning yourself, so when starting a fire you should keep the flame as close to the source as possible using the wood and surroundings to provide a protective barrier against any breeze for you. Which brought us to their prepared log formation. Great T-pee formation: of full sized logs! I asked where their kindling was and they both gave me a blank stare. I explained that you can’t start burning full size blocks of wood, you need to build to it and therefore need a pile of kindling - smaller twigs and branches of wood - to get the process going. The one holding hairspray explained that was why they had hairspray because the wood wasn’t catching on fire. *sigh* I was about to give them a full lesson in fire safety and basics of starting when another exuberant teen walked up with a can of gasoline sharing how the problem was solved. Clearly, I needed reinforcements.

At this point I walked over to the parent of the gasoline marauder and another leader informing them that the element of gasoline had just been introduced. The response from the parent was a short wave of the hand saying how glad she was she wasn’t a leader for the group. I guess parent doesn’t count? (A post for another day.)

I look back over to see a blazing fire burning…for about 30 seconds. One of the youth is sent to look for more gasoline. Thankfully, by this point another leader (who later shares how a family member received 3rd degree burns after a lighter fluid can burst in his hands while lighting a fire in a fireplace) steps in to help me bring a close to the gasoline fix. The parent now joined the scene with instructions on where a Duraflame log is and it is retrieved. As it is placed under the full size log T-pee and slowly begins to burn with a small flame on one end. Several minutes pass as the group sit around the tiny flame which moments later turns into a raring blaze after a surprise attack of…you guessed, a cup of gasoline.

I could add another entire chapter on how roasting marshmallows in new flame is missing the point of cooking and roasting in a campfire; how the point is to let the fire burn good and hot long enough to produce coals for that purpose, or even how flinging a marshmallow on fire back and forth isn’t the best way to put the flame out, but I’ll let your imagines finish that part of the story. Perhaps I’ll come back later and tie in the greater lessons we could learn from that but for now let’s move on to the real point of sharing this.

I shared this story because it’s so chuck full of possibilities to explore and fits in nicely with the permanent vacation of common sense. But at a more general level, it typifies life today in a nut shell. Everyone is in such a hurry to find the easy way that it matters not what is sacrificed along the way, common sense being one of the greater causalities, not to mention unhealthy and life threatening hazards. Our “Duraflame” logs may take on different forms, but they still represent a cheating element - the concept that you can replace beginning and foundational steps by cutting a few corners. That it’s as easy as running to the store for what you need, that someone will always be there to provide you an easy out. Even egotism is fed by this growing epidemic, nourishing the belief that nothing but your selfish desires matter and whatever you do to obtain them will be inconsequential. We’ve spent so much time trimming the fat that we never noticed we’ve been whittling away at the meat for so long there’s almost nothing left.

I for one say it’s time to back the train up. Everyone needs to call back common sense from its extended vacation. Everyone needs to step up to the plate and help repair and rebuild critical foundation elements in every aspect of our lives that have been replaced with laziness, instant gratification and debt. Our children need to know and understand how to do things for themselves the right way, what the dangers and hazards are of the easy way and how important this knowledge is. We need to be better teachers and examples. We’re the current engineers and conductors of the train, but we’ll be passing it on to a new generation and we’ll still be on that train for the ride. It’s time to think about that and make some positive changes now so the future journey won’t be disastrous.

Stepping off my soapbox. Thanks for letting me vent.

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