I still have those periods of tremendous doubt. They almost always come when I am on the brink of doing something I think I am not very good at or when I am unsure of myself. The strange thing is that if you live an exceptional life, you will experience those periods of tremendous doubt quite often. You get better at recognizing it, but that sinking feeling you get stays the same. You also get a lot better at understanding that that sinking feeling means you are standing at the threshold of another accomplishment. It is the price of being successful.
You will recognize it when you join a new group of people, a new club, get a new job, enter into a new relationship or start down a new path in almost any area of your life.
For me it is simple. When I do something scary, I never tell myself not to be scared. It is a normal, healthy thing to be scared when doing something scary. It took me a long time to realize that scary stuff did not have to be a noble undertaking to be worthwhile. Most of my scary stuff would not scare another person but it is so very important to me. A lot of times it is just being in a new place where none of your normal points of reference or support are.
Doubt and fear are kind of a checklist, a way for you to quickly assess what you are doing, why you are doing it and really if you should be doing it at all. I accept that they are part of the decision making process.
Never let doubts keep you away from a desired goal. When they threaten to turn you away from a goal you just need to recall the last time you felt like running away and did not and succeeded despite all the odds. At your relatively young ages you already have a lot of these experiences.
A successful life and one that is well lived is never a completely comfortable one.
Love Dad
Wednesday, April 24, 2019
Monday, May 12, 2014
Folsom Field
I had a pang of melancholy while we were sitting in there in the cold trying to locate you in the crowd of graduates at Folsom Field. Sitting at any event, waiting to catch a glimpse of you was always a good day for me.
I always had a deep appreciation for what magnificent souls you both were. It does not surprise me that you turned out the way you did, you were wired that way from when you were very young. So waiting to see that unfold at all of those games, concerts, sporting and social events was like having front row seats to the best show around. The cold/heat, the bad smelling gyms, the long days, early mornings, late nights, did not diminish the experience one bit.
Of all the amazing things you get to do in life, nothing really compares to watching your kid cross another threshold or reach another milestone in life. Nothing makes me so happy to be in a stadium or gym full of other parents and grandparents doing the very same thing. So on Friday, I was soaking that all up.
It only gets better, your next milestones and thresholds may not be celebrated in stadiums or on national malls. They will will be celebrated with smaller audiences but have a depth to them that will pale in comparison to the stadium. All of the really amazing things in life are directly in front of you and waiting for you to recognize them.
You will never have a full appreciation on how full and happy you have made my life until...
You leave 2 hours before an elementary Christmas pageant to get 4 hard uncomfortable chairs close to the stage. All of this to take a bad movie of your own child who may not know the words to the song that his class is singing. The very same kid you have spent the day with, who has been pressing his luck all day. He/She will walk by and you will wave at him like you have not seen him for years and you will whisper his name and try to do it louder than the lady next to you. And when they walk by you will swell with pride that will make your heart hurt.
That is the day I want you to re-read the entire Dad blog. You will then begin to understand how deeply you are loved and how intensely proud I was of you all these years.
Make sure and call Grandma for no reason at all. She was telling me that you were those rare kids that were beautiful on the inside and outside and did not yet know it.
Love Dad
I always had a deep appreciation for what magnificent souls you both were. It does not surprise me that you turned out the way you did, you were wired that way from when you were very young. So waiting to see that unfold at all of those games, concerts, sporting and social events was like having front row seats to the best show around. The cold/heat, the bad smelling gyms, the long days, early mornings, late nights, did not diminish the experience one bit.
Of all the amazing things you get to do in life, nothing really compares to watching your kid cross another threshold or reach another milestone in life. Nothing makes me so happy to be in a stadium or gym full of other parents and grandparents doing the very same thing. So on Friday, I was soaking that all up.
It only gets better, your next milestones and thresholds may not be celebrated in stadiums or on national malls. They will will be celebrated with smaller audiences but have a depth to them that will pale in comparison to the stadium. All of the really amazing things in life are directly in front of you and waiting for you to recognize them.
You will never have a full appreciation on how full and happy you have made my life until...
You leave 2 hours before an elementary Christmas pageant to get 4 hard uncomfortable chairs close to the stage. All of this to take a bad movie of your own child who may not know the words to the song that his class is singing. The very same kid you have spent the day with, who has been pressing his luck all day. He/She will walk by and you will wave at him like you have not seen him for years and you will whisper his name and try to do it louder than the lady next to you. And when they walk by you will swell with pride that will make your heart hurt.
That is the day I want you to re-read the entire Dad blog. You will then begin to understand how deeply you are loved and how intensely proud I was of you all these years.
Make sure and call Grandma for no reason at all. She was telling me that you were those rare kids that were beautiful on the inside and outside and did not yet know it.
Love Dad
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Puzzle Piece
I was down with Chris at the Cancer Center at University Hospital last week. He is getting the second of three cyber knife treatments.
The Cancer Center is an amazing place. You will be sitting there and a Dad and his 8 year old kid will walk out of treatment area both bald and looking like hell and you are not sure who is the patient. But you know that one of them is bald and does not have to be and they are hanging on to each other hands like there is no tomorrow. People have life changing discussions about upcoming treatments and prognosis in the most matter of fact way that you can. It is a humbling place because what ever you thought was a problem in your life becomes pretty insignificant.
So when Chris goes in, I sit at a table with a puzzle on it that I was working on from last time. After a short couple of minutes, I get a tap on the shoulder and a lady asks me if she can help me. I tell her of course and pull up a chair for her. She is engaging and a talker. I do more listening than talking but I genuinely enjoy her company. We are both nervous and it gives us a brief opportunity to not be in a waiting room in a Cancer Center.
As we are talking an older guy who is patient comes over and reaches between us (there are only about 15 puzzle pieces left) and he picks one up and goes back to his seat. For me, anyone sitting in that waiting area has an automatic pass. If he had elected to tip the table over, I would have quietly picked up the pieces and put them back in the box. The lady I was with paused for a minute and then went right back to our conversation. After a couple of minutes he old guys says "Aren't you going to ask me why I did that?" He is grinning away and you cannot help but smile back at him. I ask him why he did it and he said he always wanted to put the last piece of a puzzle in place. He walks back over, looks at the board and puts the piece in the area that it looks like it belongs in, laughs again and sits down.
We get down to the last three pieces and the lady stops talking, winks at me and picks up a piece and walks over and hands it to the old guy. He looks up at her and then the puzzle and says "really?". And she says, yea, put the last piece in.
So the guy is beaming and he gets up puts in the last puzzle piece, puts his hands on his hips and he is beaming and he looks at us both and says 'thank you very much"
And for a brief minute all three of us are not in the waiting room at the Cancer Center at University Hospital.
It did not cure anyone, but it was a small moment of grace in a sea of crap that made a huge difference. A life well lived is a collection of a lot of small moments of grace that are given and received. It is equally important that you are able to receive them as well as give them.
Love Dad
The Cancer Center is an amazing place. You will be sitting there and a Dad and his 8 year old kid will walk out of treatment area both bald and looking like hell and you are not sure who is the patient. But you know that one of them is bald and does not have to be and they are hanging on to each other hands like there is no tomorrow. People have life changing discussions about upcoming treatments and prognosis in the most matter of fact way that you can. It is a humbling place because what ever you thought was a problem in your life becomes pretty insignificant.
So when Chris goes in, I sit at a table with a puzzle on it that I was working on from last time. After a short couple of minutes, I get a tap on the shoulder and a lady asks me if she can help me. I tell her of course and pull up a chair for her. She is engaging and a talker. I do more listening than talking but I genuinely enjoy her company. We are both nervous and it gives us a brief opportunity to not be in a waiting room in a Cancer Center.
As we are talking an older guy who is patient comes over and reaches between us (there are only about 15 puzzle pieces left) and he picks one up and goes back to his seat. For me, anyone sitting in that waiting area has an automatic pass. If he had elected to tip the table over, I would have quietly picked up the pieces and put them back in the box. The lady I was with paused for a minute and then went right back to our conversation. After a couple of minutes he old guys says "Aren't you going to ask me why I did that?" He is grinning away and you cannot help but smile back at him. I ask him why he did it and he said he always wanted to put the last piece of a puzzle in place. He walks back over, looks at the board and puts the piece in the area that it looks like it belongs in, laughs again and sits down.
We get down to the last three pieces and the lady stops talking, winks at me and picks up a piece and walks over and hands it to the old guy. He looks up at her and then the puzzle and says "really?". And she says, yea, put the last piece in.
So the guy is beaming and he gets up puts in the last puzzle piece, puts his hands on his hips and he is beaming and he looks at us both and says 'thank you very much"
And for a brief minute all three of us are not in the waiting room at the Cancer Center at University Hospital.
It did not cure anyone, but it was a small moment of grace in a sea of crap that made a huge difference. A life well lived is a collection of a lot of small moments of grace that are given and received. It is equally important that you are able to receive them as well as give them.
Love Dad
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
A good job
You are at a time in your life when a lot of well meaning people will tell you what constitutes success in the area's of:
-Jobs
-Career
-Relationships
-Continuing Education
-Where you live
-Who you live with
Is is really as simple as doing what you love and doing the things that matter the most to you.
The best possible outcome is that what you love and what matters to the most to you will grow and evolve as you learn more about everyone and everything around you. That is a well lived life.
Love Dad
-Jobs
-Career
-Relationships
-Continuing Education
-Where you live
-Who you live with
Is is really as simple as doing what you love and doing the things that matter the most to you.
The best possible outcome is that what you love and what matters to the most to you will grow and evolve as you learn more about everyone and everything around you. That is a well lived life.
Love Dad
Tuesday, September 17, 2013
Big Feet
This is one that I have been meaning to write for some time.
In the FD, you never could determine ahead of time what kind of things would stick with you and which ones would not. I have seen a wide variety of things and people in disrepair and I have yet to determine why some have faded from my memory and why some have not.
It is not what you would think. I have seen graphic traumatic injuries, impossible to describe here that did not linger in my memory. Some have, but it is a very small percentage. It is the everyday things in circumstances that are so far removed from everyday and normal that tend to stick. When it rains and the pavement has been hot, I always seem to remember the young kid with big feet that died in an accident on Fathers Day. You were little and I got home that morning before you woke up and just managed to get in bed before you woke up. When you were running in with badly wrapped presents and busting out with smiles, I was having one of the best mornings of my life. In another world, the Dad of the kid with the big feet was having the worst morning of his life.
On days like that you have to make a conscious effort to not carry a weight that you are not supposed to carry. And like a lot of things, those things that are of great impact to you, the whole thing may not really translate well to people that are outside your particular line of work. This also extends to the people to the people who love you the most. Somethings that impact you simply will not translate because other people cannot (despite their best efforts ) walk a mile in your shoes.
This is a life lesson that applies to both of you. There are events in your lives that will impact you to a large degree, things that will move and hurt your heart. And despite our best efforts we will remain unaware of the impact to you. And you certainly know how much you are loved. Some things will escape even your significant other and it is not for a lack of love or trying. They are weights that you have to make conscious efforts not to carry. They will get lighter because you will talk to people who understand what it is to be in your shoes and it might not be the people who love you the most. Talking about them deflates those big things to manageable bites of color that give you depth of character. Never ignore them or suck it up and try to ride it out. Embrace and deal with them, they will give you strength and character.
Never did tell mom the whole story of the kid with the big feet on Fathers Day. Even now it does not translate well. I don't carry the weight of the kid with big feet but I have not forgotten him. He is part of my strength and character. If you need to carry weight, they should be round black disks connected to a silver bar in a gym.
Don't forget to call mom for no reason whatsoever.
Love Dad
In the FD, you never could determine ahead of time what kind of things would stick with you and which ones would not. I have seen a wide variety of things and people in disrepair and I have yet to determine why some have faded from my memory and why some have not.
It is not what you would think. I have seen graphic traumatic injuries, impossible to describe here that did not linger in my memory. Some have, but it is a very small percentage. It is the everyday things in circumstances that are so far removed from everyday and normal that tend to stick. When it rains and the pavement has been hot, I always seem to remember the young kid with big feet that died in an accident on Fathers Day. You were little and I got home that morning before you woke up and just managed to get in bed before you woke up. When you were running in with badly wrapped presents and busting out with smiles, I was having one of the best mornings of my life. In another world, the Dad of the kid with the big feet was having the worst morning of his life.
On days like that you have to make a conscious effort to not carry a weight that you are not supposed to carry. And like a lot of things, those things that are of great impact to you, the whole thing may not really translate well to people that are outside your particular line of work. This also extends to the people to the people who love you the most. Somethings that impact you simply will not translate because other people cannot (despite their best efforts ) walk a mile in your shoes.
This is a life lesson that applies to both of you. There are events in your lives that will impact you to a large degree, things that will move and hurt your heart. And despite our best efforts we will remain unaware of the impact to you. And you certainly know how much you are loved. Some things will escape even your significant other and it is not for a lack of love or trying. They are weights that you have to make conscious efforts not to carry. They will get lighter because you will talk to people who understand what it is to be in your shoes and it might not be the people who love you the most. Talking about them deflates those big things to manageable bites of color that give you depth of character. Never ignore them or suck it up and try to ride it out. Embrace and deal with them, they will give you strength and character.
Never did tell mom the whole story of the kid with the big feet on Fathers Day. Even now it does not translate well. I don't carry the weight of the kid with big feet but I have not forgotten him. He is part of my strength and character. If you need to carry weight, they should be round black disks connected to a silver bar in a gym.
Don't forget to call mom for no reason whatsoever.
Love Dad
Sunday, September 1, 2013
Abhorrent Behavior
I went to a class in the FD about workplace violence. In almost every case, the people who worked closely with or knew the person (who committed the crime - the bad guy) said they could not believe that person was capable of doing such horrible things.
When they interviewed these people in depth, a different picture emerged. The bad guy that everyone thought was harmless, had a series of escalating behaviors that people just disregarded. The bad guy would make what people thought were harmless threats and people laughed at him. They just said oh that is just him/her don't pay attention. The bad guy would be at work at weird times (very early and late) and he started to dress strangely (a winter coat in the middle of summer). He was the weird guy at work. There is one in almost every workplace.
This is real story. It turns out the guy started toying with the idea of hurting or killing his co workers. His escalating behavior was his way of testing the waters. The last thing he did before actually shooting people was some test runs of bringing guns to work and seeing if he would get caught (winter coat in middle of summer). He shot 4 people at his office.
The truth of things is that we all accept abhorrent behavior from people. How do you get used to or accept abhorrent behavior? The answer is so simple it is painful. Simple repetition works all of the time. People who abuse drugs or alcohol are adept at getting anyone to accept truly abhorrent behavior. It is incremental, the person who throws up, passes out, has blackouts, or does really crappy, offensive things while under the influence does it repeatedly. It gets incrementally worse and it gets harder to see that the more you are around it. The worst part is that anyone can come to accept that as part of who the person is. It stops being abhorrent and it just becomes a pain in the ass. It is part of who they are. It should NEVER stop being abhorrent. Trust the voice in your head that tells you how abhorrent it is.
There are people in my life that I have had to walk away from. You simply cannot threaten, cajole, or convince a hard core drug or alcohol user to stop. Hard core users need reasons to stop that come from inside of themselves and they need the help of a professional. You cannot stop or slow the decline for them. You simply become a witness to a tragedy. These people need a tragedy and they will always find someone to witness their self destruction. For reasons I will never understand, people who are self destructive need people to witness them doing it.
So what do you do? You walk away and you don't look back. And another hard truth is that while you are feeling crappy for doing that, they will be plugging someone else into your spot. They will not feel bad at all, they will find another person to fill that need for a tragedy witness.
Some bridges need to be burned, so that person does not have the ability to follow you and suck more life out of you. Give your life and love to the people who want to give the same to you. These bottom feeders need you for a reason that has nothing to do with life or love.
Love Dad
When they interviewed these people in depth, a different picture emerged. The bad guy that everyone thought was harmless, had a series of escalating behaviors that people just disregarded. The bad guy would make what people thought were harmless threats and people laughed at him. They just said oh that is just him/her don't pay attention. The bad guy would be at work at weird times (very early and late) and he started to dress strangely (a winter coat in the middle of summer). He was the weird guy at work. There is one in almost every workplace.
This is real story. It turns out the guy started toying with the idea of hurting or killing his co workers. His escalating behavior was his way of testing the waters. The last thing he did before actually shooting people was some test runs of bringing guns to work and seeing if he would get caught (winter coat in middle of summer). He shot 4 people at his office.
The truth of things is that we all accept abhorrent behavior from people. How do you get used to or accept abhorrent behavior? The answer is so simple it is painful. Simple repetition works all of the time. People who abuse drugs or alcohol are adept at getting anyone to accept truly abhorrent behavior. It is incremental, the person who throws up, passes out, has blackouts, or does really crappy, offensive things while under the influence does it repeatedly. It gets incrementally worse and it gets harder to see that the more you are around it. The worst part is that anyone can come to accept that as part of who the person is. It stops being abhorrent and it just becomes a pain in the ass. It is part of who they are. It should NEVER stop being abhorrent. Trust the voice in your head that tells you how abhorrent it is.
There are people in my life that I have had to walk away from. You simply cannot threaten, cajole, or convince a hard core drug or alcohol user to stop. Hard core users need reasons to stop that come from inside of themselves and they need the help of a professional. You cannot stop or slow the decline for them. You simply become a witness to a tragedy. These people need a tragedy and they will always find someone to witness their self destruction. For reasons I will never understand, people who are self destructive need people to witness them doing it.
So what do you do? You walk away and you don't look back. And another hard truth is that while you are feeling crappy for doing that, they will be plugging someone else into your spot. They will not feel bad at all, they will find another person to fill that need for a tragedy witness.
Some bridges need to be burned, so that person does not have the ability to follow you and suck more life out of you. Give your life and love to the people who want to give the same to you. These bottom feeders need you for a reason that has nothing to do with life or love.
Love Dad
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
Awkward
I remember when your mom first asked me to meet her father and extended family. I was at first flattered but that gave way very quickly to an overwhelming feeling of dread. People tend to either like me right away or think something is wrong with me.
When she started to introduce me to the important people in her life, she took a huge leap of faith. You don't want people close to you to think the person you are hanging out with is wrong for you. When you start those introductions, you expose yourself and that other person to scrutiny that you may not normally welcome. Family, friends, and extended family are coincidentally those people who can really hurt your feelings because they have known you so long. These are the people who really know how to hurt your feelings.
It is a part of having a new significant relationship that is a complete but necessary pain in the ass.
I first really met her Dad when I was putting in a flagstone walk at her house. I shook his hand and while I was working made small talk so we could break the ice with each other. About 10 minutes into small talk he asked what my intentions were regarding your mom. It was like trying to open a window slowly and having someone opening the same window with a large brick. After that uncomfortable pause (for me, not him) I told him that I liked her a lot and we were both figuring out where this was going to go. He told me that I must be serious about her because I was putting in flagstone for her. I repeated the same thing and your mom manged to come over and save me. She was adept then (and now) at keeping me from falling in large holes that are hell to get out of.
Meeting her older brothers and sisters for the first couple of times was a lot worse. Her brothers and sisters were welcoming but regarded me with a healthy suspicion. Nothing is more awkward than to be at a family or friend gathering and being the new guy. Trying to participate and be part of conversation is like jumping rope with razor blades. You can get chopped up to bits if you jump in at the wrong time. Your mom's brothers and sister had a sense of humor much like your mom and were OK with letting me sweat a little. In their eyes, she was worth it. Now that both of you are old enough to bring that person over, I understand (and appreciate) why they would have made me work for your mom.
Of course if I had stopped to realize that the one thing I had in common with them from the start was a deep and abiding love of your mom, all of those first awkward first meetings/holidays/occasions would have went much smoother for both of us. Damn Occum and his razor for coming into my life so late.
Love Dad
When she started to introduce me to the important people in her life, she took a huge leap of faith. You don't want people close to you to think the person you are hanging out with is wrong for you. When you start those introductions, you expose yourself and that other person to scrutiny that you may not normally welcome. Family, friends, and extended family are coincidentally those people who can really hurt your feelings because they have known you so long. These are the people who really know how to hurt your feelings.
It is a part of having a new significant relationship that is a complete but necessary pain in the ass.
I first really met her Dad when I was putting in a flagstone walk at her house. I shook his hand and while I was working made small talk so we could break the ice with each other. About 10 minutes into small talk he asked what my intentions were regarding your mom. It was like trying to open a window slowly and having someone opening the same window with a large brick. After that uncomfortable pause (for me, not him) I told him that I liked her a lot and we were both figuring out where this was going to go. He told me that I must be serious about her because I was putting in flagstone for her. I repeated the same thing and your mom manged to come over and save me. She was adept then (and now) at keeping me from falling in large holes that are hell to get out of.
Meeting her older brothers and sisters for the first couple of times was a lot worse. Her brothers and sisters were welcoming but regarded me with a healthy suspicion. Nothing is more awkward than to be at a family or friend gathering and being the new guy. Trying to participate and be part of conversation is like jumping rope with razor blades. You can get chopped up to bits if you jump in at the wrong time. Your mom's brothers and sister had a sense of humor much like your mom and were OK with letting me sweat a little. In their eyes, she was worth it. Now that both of you are old enough to bring that person over, I understand (and appreciate) why they would have made me work for your mom.
Of course if I had stopped to realize that the one thing I had in common with them from the start was a deep and abiding love of your mom, all of those first awkward first meetings/holidays/occasions would have went much smoother for both of us. Damn Occum and his razor for coming into my life so late.
Love Dad
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