Postcards from the Funny Farm

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This post will introduce a series of posts I’m writing on looking at life a little bit differently, namely the practice of having an open mind.

I’ve been writing about psychology and inspiration here since December of 2006 and in the process I’ve done a lot of homework I love to share. Mark Twain once said: “When I turned 20, I was amazed at all my father had learned in ten years.” Our perception of the world is filtered through our point of view. If we have an open mind as we travel through life, we transcend much of the trouble around us. One invaluable tool in keeping an open mind is to have a mantra.

Remember when you were younger, about junior high age? You could run around all day: boys at the football field, girls at the mall or maybe the softball field. (Of course I don’t mean to sound like all women wanted to be at the mall but many I knew did). At any rate, physical activity back then had very few consequences. I would run 5-10 miles on the x-country team and have no soreness whatsoever the next day. Well, now fast forward to today. I can barely run to the end of my street without needing to stop and gather myself. Part of that is my fault for not exercising enough. Another part of it is just plain aging. Even as a youngster; however, practice had its place. Running those hill workouts paid off when I won the races. Our minds need practice too. A mantra can be part of that life-changing practice.

The big picture of this series is the way we feel about the world. Our mind processes things differently as it is accustomed to do. The good news is that as long as we practice the right mental things, we never need to suffer the way we do in our physical aging. In fact, if we stay mentally “worked out,” we can be more enlightened the older we get. Kind of cool eh? So, just to clarify the big picture here:

Physical Practice = Winning races/competitions

Mental Practice = Seeing the world the way it is.

One mental exercise we should engage in is the practice of having an open mind. Just like running one mile and skipping the rest of the week will not make a young runner any stronger, so we are made “mentally flabby” when we neglect this practice. The time this verb “practice” is most vivid to me is when I get angry or when I get disappointed or otherwise discouraged. It’s in those moments I can hear that inner psychologist on the couch in my mind say: “Calm down, this is what practice is all about.”

When and how to use a mantra to keep your mind open:

1. When we are out of sorts it comes from 1 of 2 sources: a) Internal - we have a chemical imbalance happening and need food or medicine to balance it out -or- b) External stimulus has disagreed with us in some way. The first step therefore is to determine which source is bringing you down. For example: Would a glass of water help? Some peanuts? You make the call there. This step is kind of like a stop and regroup.
2. The second step is to ACT to accept the cause of the problem. It could be your blood sugar or a person in your face. Either way: ACCEPT the cause for what it is.
3. The third step is a mantra. A mantra isn’t a middle eastern mystery, it’s just a phrase that has good energy for you. Remember the little engine that could? His mantra was: “I think I can, I think I can.” You can use many mantras that already exist or make up your own. I really like the mantra: “Is that so?” Eckhart uses it and recommends it in his book. I recommend it as well.

Other things you could say are (for example): “That’s one way to look at it,” “This too shall pass,” etc. I know you are creative because you’ve read this far. I encourage you to pick a mantra, write it on a card and when you lose your peace in the day, read the card, say the card, BE the card. I think you will as I have that the mental and spiritual rewards are mammoth.

When you exit a room of dissent and feel like you’ve made a contribution of peace, it’s one of the most powerful victories you can imagine.

This one is for my readers who blog and all those who take the time to comment. Comments are the vehicle of the future for blog communication, networking, and yes: making money. This is true because as more and more spam ensues, we will only be able to tell what is real from what is not by the manner of comments we read. You know those watches they try and sell you in front of the grocery store. You can probably tell they are fakes, but what about the guy who has the real Guess watches for dirt cheap? You want to recognize him as well. So is the way of comments. The comments we leave should show that we are indeed real readers/customers. I am very thankful for the amount of comments I receive here and I want to show respect by making sure they all make it to publishing and that they not get stuck in a spam quarantine. Akismet, the native WordPress comment spam protection plugin, spams a lot of good comments on my blog. I don’t always have the time to check it for false-negatives. As a result, I have probably missed at least several comments from many great writers, friends, and visitors. I’ve suffered with it long enough. Today I added a second tool to my arsenal. Now I’m using Recaptcha.

A couple synchronous things happened today that got me thinking about comments in the future of the blogosphere: 1) Wordpress came out with its latest update, 2.6 and 2) Entrecard sent me an email explaining they have teamed up with Sez Who to give their readers more credits when they have a Sez Who enabled blog. Lucky for me, I have been using Sez Who already for a while. It’s not too complicated, you just activate a Wordpress plugin (if you are like me and using Wordpress). It gives the author of a post a small icon that when rolled over shows her/his comment history on that blog. There are also rating features. It’s neat. Try it out.

As I was upgrading Wordpress I realized I had 77 comments in Akismet. I got that sinking feeling that maybe some of them were not spam (the term is “False Negatives”). Sure enough I found out that comments from some of my best friends, and most valuable networks, were NOT POSTED! As much as I love WordPress and see it as very good spam protection with Akismet, I had to activate Recaptcha as another layer of protection. Basically, it is better now because the reCaptcha keeps most spam out requiring a human typing code. Then, the Akismet is still necessary for the spam that can beat ReCaptcha. I still have to check my Akismet daily, but it is likely to be much less to pore through. This is a plugin/service I have always loved I just thought it was too cumbersome for you my readers. The commenter has to type the letters from a random image to make the comment go through. Akismet guesses whether a comment is spam which does not guarantee 100% true negatives (ie; only spam will be caught). It can and does often catch good comments. If I miss them, it has the potential of offending my commenters.

So … in a nutshell, I think the commenting revolution is about to begin and for me in my rocket ship, we’ll be flying with recaptcha. Does typing the ReCaptcha to comment bother you? I hope not … I want to make participating in discussions here as easy and trustworthy as possible. Nonetheless, I have tried both and I’m not disciplined enough to check the Akismet every day. Here’s to a great future of communication where the blog owners do everything they can to “keep it real” and so do the commenters. My apologies to those whose legit comments never showed up here. It wasn’t my doing and it won’t happen again.

I just read that 460 million vacation days went unused last year by American workers … no wonder we have so many mental problems in our country! To all those people so worried about missing work I say this: “Be responsible, go on vacation!” This post was inspired by a discussion at Loose Suits.

Of course people with jobs that don’t offer sick days, like freelance writers and the like, might not click on this article. Theirs is a different dilemma that I could discuss at length as well. Having said that, we are all faces with the importance of taking vacations. So if we know how important they are, why aren’t we taking them? In my opinion, folks with vacation days would be “sick” not to use them!

Any problems we have at work and at home will get worse if we don’t use our vacation days.

I look at vacation days as a time to regroup. It’s a time to get romantic with your spouse. Vacations are a time to find inspiration in even those “nothing” moments. How many times have I taken a simple walk in a new place and had tomes of inspiration flood into my mind. It can heal what you thought was impossible stress. I have written my best songs while taking vacation time.

I’ve been highly stressed out at work before. (hasn’t everybody?) It can feel like radioactive heat burning you up … it deserves you a day off. After a “mental health day” the heat goes away. I get fresh new ideas that ironically make me more valuable to my employer. What? More valuable by taking time off? Yes. It’s a time to sharpen my axe.

I think the paranoia many have of getting in trouble at work for taking sick days is unwise. People need to get over it and just take those vacation days like clockwork. It just might be the difference between a promotion or being written up for lack of productivity. The article I read on this was truly staggering. The best argument for this is simple: Look at pictures of your loved ones over the past few years. When you do so you will see just how fast this thing called a lifespan is passing by. Is work that important to Americans? Do people think a real man doesn’t call off work ever? Do that many Americans really think they are heroes for not taking a vacation? Getting any getaway locations in mind yet? I am. Here’s a place to buy your travel supplies. Enjoy.

1. Other fears pale in comparison: For example, if you are having trouble with your boss, he’s nothing compared to facing the loop-de-loop!
2. You escape life (if temporarily) and bring back stories.
3. You feel accomplished and can blog better.
4. You relax beside something much bigger than yourself: Remember Leeann Womack’s song, I Hope You Dance: “I hope you still feel small when you stand beside the ocean(Riddler’s revenge?).”

5. You see views that take your breath away (Then you drop 20 stories on Superman).

6. Your heart gets pumpin.’

7. You become less important and more creative.

8. Prove you’re no baby you can put away the crib bedding. Father and son thing.

9. You become a spaceman breaking speed records.

10. High altitudes, increased endorphines (alertness, well-being, happiness …)

I met a really visionary blogger this past year named David Masters and he writes a blog called “Be Playful.” I’ve guest blogged there in the past and he just published one of mine there today on “Playing Through Difficult Times.” I know some people going through tough times and others in their bliss out looking for birthday invitations. It just depends what cards you’ve been dealt. David has shared there in the intro that he himself has been going through the not-so-fun task of moving. Maybe you are going through a difficult time right now. Maybe you know someone who’s lost their job or is just plain down. It may seem like the end of the world but remember that all experience is life experience. When you stop feeling pain you’re dead. I love the quote Woody Guthrie said: “Take life easy or take it hard but TAKE IT.” You can read all my favorite quotes here. My guest post at Be Playful is here.

Walking home from school or playing on the playground as a kid, were you bullied? Flip that around now: were YOU the bully?

As a public school teacher in an inner-city demographic, I deal with the issue of kids fighting M-F (not Sa-Su thank goodness). I can attest that it is a real issue for parents and teachers. I am a big proponent of teaching things outside academics that are so necessary as life skills like teaching music and conflict resolution for example. Unfortunately, even the democrats have become polarized on language and math only so it may be a few years.

So if that is true, why is it I hear nearly all parents of kids involved in fights say they give their child permission to fight? (especially us dads) Of course, we invoke the “self-defense” clause of all that’s common sense about humanity … I would never argue with that. But, there is something they don’t know … something they don’t see. You might refer to it as “the fallen nature” if you are a Christian. Or, you might call it the law of the jungle if you’re an atheist. However you label the data, it’s there and it is kids beating the crud out of each other daily and blaming it on dear old mom and dad.

Last week there was a kid in my summer school class who pummeled another kid right in front of me. (incidentally, if you want to read a hilarious story about a similar student I had my first year, click here) This kid doing the pummeling was about 80 pounds give or take and the kid he was hitting was maybe 40, 45 tops I’d say. After going through all the steps and paperwork that we teachers must to in order to avoid being sued, I met with his dad and his dad said these exact words:

“I tell my son to defend himself because the school don’t do nothing.”

Poetry to this teachers’ ears (not). This isn’t an isolated case. I have even seen kids aggravate smaller kids until the small ones take a swing … then they move in fast for the, well in keeping with the idiom … the kill.

So what’s my point? I’d like parents to clear their minds of needless fears in much the same way you would get a Orovo detox or something physical like that. My school strives to be safe. It’s in the worst part of the High Desert. If any of you out there know Adelanto, it’s in “Old Adelanto.” I doubt many will see a picture in their head. It’s way off any tourist path. Still we keep it safe, and I know many other schools where they strive to do the same. Counsel your kids to NOT punch or hit, even in self-defense. Most the time, to avoid one parent suing the school, if any blows are thrown for any reason, both kids get suspended. There is a fine line between defending oneself and opening a can of whoop-ass. I wish more parents would have that discussion at the dinner table every night until their kids’ are 18. Let’s go beyond our animal urges and look at the psychology of what we tell our kids. In doing so, we won’t be cursing the darkness but rather lighting candles. Comments are open.

This post is another (I hope the last) rant about Google so feel free to jump ship before you go one. I don’t usually like to whine about stuff, I like to change things or shut up generally. After this post I plan to pretty much shut up about Google PageRank but I will respond to comments of course ;)

I’ve been setting goals for my blog and recording them here since December of 2007. It has been gratifying in almost every respect but I still am not where I’d like to be in other ranking systems such as Google and Technorati. Instead of getting frustrated or trying to game the system, I’ve decided to make my own ranking system based on the things that I value in my blog. I’m calling it the CAN. system My hope is that you, the regular reader, and anyone else who wants to will follow my progress and learn that serious writers can make legitimate money on their blogs without PageRank. My goal since December of 2006 has been to create, innovate, and intergrate quality content. I haven’t lost this goal, I’ve simply defined it more clearly and added “money” as a goal element. This blog does NOT deserve to have a zero PageRank.

Google seems to be highly puritanical when it comes to paid-links on a blog. It’s actually worse than “highly puritanical ” it’s near obscenely puritanical … it makes no rational sense. Who are they serving really? Do you care if a helpful blog post was paid or not? I know I don’t.

I have examined Google’s criteria for PageRank and frankly, I don’t think they even know what they are doing with it. Nonetheless, we have to suck it up as bloggers. It’s the industry guideline that advertisers and publishers use when hiring and taking blogs seriously. Thank goodness many influential bloggers are starting to come out against Google. IZEA is leading an effort against PageRank “.... As for me, watch for my first CAN. update in August. You can see my goals for July here. Maybe it will give you something you’ll find engaging to read by your espresso machines.

One thing, I will give away right now as I close: To make my logo and button for the CAN, Rank System was to use a tutorial for Photoshop. If you’d like to try something similar, it’s a lot of fun. The Google logo itself contains a font that costs $99. But this tutorial shows you how to make it with Ti.... It is cool. There are also tutorials there for companies like Hooters and O’Reilly … a lot more fun stuff. Enjoy and remember in whatever it is you blog about you CAN.

I just had my opinion piece on M. Night Shyamalan published at BlogCritics. I like posting over there because I get some traffic and a different sort of commenter once in a while (emphasize different). Anyway, to summarize, I travel through his work since the Sixth Sense and discuss the changes in his last two movies (specifically his latest The Happening that deviate from what I call his “special sauce.” Now whether that recipe will be his career’s term life insurance time will tell.

I hope you’ll check it out there and join the discussion about this man’s amazing breadth of cinematic work. Are you a fan?

There’s been a lot of buzz about Google PageRank on the internet lately. Many people have had their “currency” (I say that tongue in cheek but that IS what it is for those who seek advertisers favor for a living) taken from a 5 or 6 sometimes (or more) to a 0 overnight. I wrote about how my page rank was set from 4 to 0 and it was a real bummer let me tell you. I was angry.

Then some time passed. I was once the wild horse on this subject that Google has finally broken. I want my pagerank back if I can swing it.

I decided that it is possible Google is trying to do something right (I didn’t say probable). I can’t question their motives. So I started searching the web for examples of bloggers who had restored their Page Rank and the stuff I found wasn’t too promising. The first 3 that came up in a Google search with the search terms: “How I Got my PageRank back,” had some good advice, but when I by chance checked their pageranks, they were ALL STILL ZERO! My experience was that there were two waves in Google smackdown: 1) An initial and then a restoration of many and then a more resolute “spank” as IZEA calls it. (see button up top.)

Then I found a promising one. You can read it here. It’s where I got all the ideas I have engaged to try and get my page rank back. First, I went through and for every sponsored post link and/or commercial paid link, I added this inside: rel=”nofollow”

It took me a long time because I had two pages of PayPerPost links and quite a few PayU2Blog links I had to put rel=”nofollow” in. the rel=”nofollow” keeps the search engines from crawling links you add it to. This process took me 4 days to complete. I can’t imagine how hard this would be for someone who made their living at sponsored posts. You’d almost be better off just starting new. As for me, I’ve only done them for several months.

Next, as indicated in the article, I requested reconsideration from Google. (see below) Now I just wait. Google says it “may take a while.”

Hello. This is my second request for reconsideration to have my Page Rank restored. I believe the reason it was removed was because I did not identify paid links with a rel=”nofollow” tag. I took some out altogether and then requested reconsideration but I didn’t understand how to insert the rel=”nofollow” until recently.

I have spent the better part of 4 days going through all my posts and adding rel=”nofollow” to any commercial or paid links. I feel 100% confident that my site is worthy of page rank and that it will not follow paid or commercial links ever again in the future. I also know that now it does not have any paid links that are not kept from the search engine crawler by rel=”nofollow”

I average 80 visitors a day and I value the Google Pagr Rank system in letting readers know my content is trustworthy. Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions.

To close I just want it to go on record with my readers that I still think Google is purposely sabotaging people who use paid links. I find their way in this to be at best anal-retentive and at worst crooked but I can’t deny the power pagerank has over advertisers. I am hopeful it will change but for now, I’m takin’ what their givin’ … well, you know the rest. To Google I say this: “My hands are held up high.”

So I’ve started this series and I will keep you posted what I have done and what result there is good or bad. I hope it helps out those in my shoes: Content-filled bloggers that are being penalized by Google for making money with their work.

It’s the 4th of July and as always: guests are coming over. Before I unloaded/loaded the dishwasher and shocked the pool, I picked up my weapon against the cleaning blues: My Martin triple-o.

Whatever situation I find myself in … the guitar saves me in relaxing the room. Example: kids in my class are out of sorts and chatting constantly. Unable to focus and get the situation under control, I pick up the guitar, which silences many, and start to count: one … two … three … you can hear a pin drop on carpet. A scene not even the best digital cameras can capture … you have to be there.

I then strum out Woody Guthrie’s “This Land is Your Land” and every kid sings along. That song really tells a powerful story. I tell you I have been teaching for 10 years and working with kids for at least 20. The guitar never fails. It’s like a semi-automatic weapon against chaos in tha classroom. But this morning I used it a different way.

Sauntering over with sleep still in my eyes, I sat on the kids’ toybox and started flecking the strings with my pick. Paul McCartney’s almost now obscure “My Love” came into my head, a song I taught myself years ago. “My love does it goooooood.” My 3 year old started twirling in front of me as I continued strumming and faking the lyrics. Reminiscent of another time undefined, another place.

I went on to place a few other Beatles songs and ended with the “Gidget” reminiscent “Wipeout” instrmental. Rippin’ it up still at 39. When I came out of the guitar zone, I unloaded and loaded the dishwasher, fed the dog, and shocked the pool. I hear the pump outside filtering the water for our guests at 2pm. I smile to myself at an idea only I will probably “get.” Then I come here to blog it for the archive. Maybe somebody will get it out there, Chris or somebody. Happy 4th readers of mine. (afterthought: this post should serve to remind us players that only we can teach the youth of today to appreciate the guitar)