3. To my Son: Practice is the key to life

 Practice is the key to life. 

Nobody is great at anything the very first time they try. Sometimes it might seem like that, because often people won't allow you to see a skill or talent until they have been at home practising that skill for many hours. 

Most professional athletes work for actual years, every day for multiple hours to get as good as they are at their profession. It all takes work and dedication to do something well. This is why school, and post secondary education, and grad school all exist. Because if you want a good life and to become skilled at something, it takes a long time to get there. 

So pick up hobbies, but follow through. This world is littered with people who try to do something and aren't good right away, and quit doing that thing. Then they move on to the next thing and repeat the process, never gaining any actual skills and floating through life as a person who isn't really good at anything and expecting the world to be good to them. The world is good to people with skills and those that can provide value to others with that skill. 

 So practice, don't give up and strive to be one of the best at whatever it is you like doing. All the hard work is worth it when you are. I promise. 

The saddest thing in the world is wasted talent. 

2. To my Son: Success is failure

Success and failure are not opposites. You will never achieve true success without failure so in this sense, failure is a part of success and the other way around. 

This may at times seem ironic coming from me (depending on when you read this) but this may be the most important piece of advice I have ever given you. I know you have probably heard me drone on about this in the past and hopefully you've given it a bit of thought, but you must fail in order to succeed, sometimes many times. 

And sometimes, these many failures will be discouraging. Enraging even. However just keep moving forward. If something is worth doing or is something you want to do, it is worth doing right. This takes practice and learning how to do it. 

So embrace the failures and just know, that the more you do something and learn from your mistakes as you go, you will get better and eventually you will succeed at it. 

So here comes all the old "Dad" stuff:

If you start something, finish it. 

Never give up on anything. 

Practice is truly the key to everything, reps and persistence will unlock the world. 

 

1. To: my Son

 Henry: 

I love you more than words can possibly describe. You are my reason for everything and your success is absolutely paramount in any list of priorities I'll ever have. 

I am doing everything I can to stay around and raise you the best I possibly can, as you are such an incredible person already and your whole family is excited for all the potential you have already displayed. 

This blog is going to be from here on dedicated to you and everything I've learned in my 40 years. I would like to pass on this knowledge to you. You may have heard me say some of this stuff already but we all need reminders. 

The first and most important information I could think of is this:

Never, ever, ever base your actions or internal mindset on what others think or say. 

Take pride in your own appearance, dress for success, practice good hygiene and use manners and respect towards others always, but do this for YOUR success and happiness not because of what others will think. 

Take stock of what you want out of life, whether that is a career, a family, a nice house or a nice life... and then figure out what you have to do to make that happen. Nobody will give these things to you, you have to work for every aspect of your life. When you do accomplish these things for yourself you will feel like a king I promise, there is no better feeling for a man than accomplishment and building his own life, and taking care of his family. 

WORK HARD! Right now (you are 9) that means school. Your priority has to be grades. It absolutely comes first over anything. Without doing well you at school, the rest of your life becomes so incredibly hard for no reason other than you decided it was more important to goof off with your friends for 6 hours a day then to get your work done. Trust me you will regret it. Nothing sadder in life than wasted potential.

I am speaking from experience there (as I will for most of these posts), and I took a very unconventional route. I did not do well in school in high school and although I knew how to do most of the work, I didn't. I went back to upgrade and complete my high school grades when I was about 22, I wandered around post secondary education for about 20 years after that, not knowing what would make me happy in life. I could have avoided all this pointless pain and wandering by just doing the work in school the first time.

What I want you to do, is decide in high school what you really like doing in life, and then figure out how to make money doing that. I'd advise you to look out for your own happiness in this sense as well. Do not get into social services or welfare services, although it may seem like a noble and giving profession you will burn out and start to change your philosophy on social welfare if you go into a career of this sort. If you end up making the wrong choice and want to try a different career out, that is totally fine. I'm just trying to avoid you waiting until you are 40 like me to finally get your life figured out. That is 20 years of my life wasted and I wouldn't wish that on anyone else.

Do some research, make some money... although money doesn't equal happiness, always hurting for money always equals unhappiness. Life is tough without money. 

 Remember as well, keep being you and the awesome kid that you are. Remember you don't have to goof off at school to get people to like you, the best people are drawn to successful people in life, not the idiot that started smoking weed in high school and flunked out because he'd rather sit in some kids basement playing video games than getting anywhere in life. 

This might seem like an old man trying to explain everything to you, but know that this comes from a place of complete love and support for you (my son, my everything). I only want you to have a happy life where you can have the things you want. 

One last thing: the moment someone shows you who they are with disrespect, believe them... run away from people willing to disrespect you in any way. Especially if its a cute girl, those people will never change and are trying to manipulate you. Real good relationships are ones of mutual respect. And love, love always.

We're mostly water

A man can either change with the times, or roll over and let the times change him. I'll take the former. 

Funny thing when you change your life (and your lifestyle) the things that you desire in almost every aspect of your life change as well. 

I no longer desire relationships that hurt me, no longer seek company just to hate myself for allowing disrespect to happen every time I see them. 

No longer am I alright with friends that despise me when they around each other, and then reciprocate love when they aren't around each other. 

I love my friends, and that is something that I believe deep in my soul. I am loyal even when I shouldn't be and before the changes in my life this loyalty was often misplaced for people that were palpable silent killers. People who were kind to my face and then murderous when they slunk into the shadows. 

Drinking buddies aren't real. That is all I had, was a series of old friends I made while drinking, drank with, and did stupid shit with because of drinking. 

This rings true (and probably 1000x more intense) in a romantic or sexual relationship. It's been said a million times, but you have to love yourself before anyone else can love you. I chased a bunch of drunk and disorderly women that were only interested in status, what others thought of them, and optics of a relationship. This is in stark contrast to what anyone should be looking for in a relationship: mutual respect, communication, seeking and supporting each-others goals and their own while being unhindered by a relationship. The relationship should make you feel successful before you actually are, during the process of becoming successful, and should make your entire definition of success change anyways. 

Until now only one relationship I've had has made me feel this way, and I was a young and stupid boy who fucked it all up with ego, hubris and self-hate. We were both young, it wasn't all my fault: I'd say it was about 75% my fault in that relationship. But I look back and wish I did things differently. I've learned from it and now hopefully, if I find someone who makes me as happy as she did, I will be able to show that love, reciprocate that love and be in love above all else. 

Finally: if you aren't feeling valued in life remember the parable of the value of a water bottle: 

A bottle of water in a supermarket is roughly .50 cents. 

A bottle of water in a convenience store is $2.50

A bottle of water in a movie theatre is $4.00

A bottle of water on a plane is $6.00 

If you don't think you are being valued correctly, change your f'n location. 

Man on fire

 When you are on fire there are two types of people that will come running towards you: those with water and those with gasoline. The trick is figuring out what they have before they reach you. The ones with gas are far more common and unless they can gain something from putting the fire out, they will douse you with the more flammable liquid and take out the competition for whatever game they are playing internally. All too often, they'll be telling you its water until they are close enough to drench you with gas. 

We have to develop our own internal extinguisher. Then it doesn't matter what they have in their bucket, you'll never let them close enough to find out. 

Too often we start the fires ourselves and don't know the difference between the two, pouring gas all over every mistake in an effort to quickly put out fires while making them 100x worse. We make countless mistakes and look to firefighting guides without taking stock of what set the fire in the first place. 

 I suppose writing this to myself is an attempt to fix my internal extinguisher. It was as broken as it gets until about a year ago. I was broken and sought the company of gas holders. I suppose when you love the smell of gas you really don't care if water is better for you. I'm just now learning to love water more. 

Respect in the wrong circles

Respect to me is mutual in any relationship. In order to receive respect you must be respectful of others. 

Being respected is a funny thing sometimes. Often if you are nice and kind (respectful) to the wrong people, you can be disrespected in return. Everyone is trying to get ahead in life, and people have varying degrees of morality in their ways to achieve success. 

I think sometimes I might be blind to a person's moral integrity. That is something to work on, using the great "moral sieve" and weeding out the nefarious among us. After certain life-altering events, a person can gain a new perspective on life and I no longer feel the need to give people around me chances until they are close enough to dole out some real damage. 

Live and learn, c'est la vie and all that... at least now I know. It's just lonely sometimes when you have to leave the majority of your former close friends behind, as they have burned you irreparably. 

Chances and forgiveness do not come easy in this new and improved mindset and way of living, but self-actualization and personal progress have never been more abundant when you subtract the disrespect from others.

About a Girl

 I fell in love with

her Hope Sandoval impression

while she smoked cigarettes in the 

folding lawn chair 

in the corner of my garage. 

 

She could always make me smile, 

and she could always 

rip my heart away from my body in silence, 

with a Cheshire Cat grin 

and her fingers crossed behind her back. 

 

I want you inside me, 

she said. 

And I was too stupid to reply. 

I pushed the door open 

for her to slither onto my bed 

and take my soul away 

on any particular night of the week. 

 

This was a pattern 

and until yesterday, 

I was always more than happy 

to feed her sick delusions. 

I was a sucker for big brown eyes and plump lips, 

not too mention 

the rest of her, 

which didn’t show the miles put on by a reckless driver. 

 

She was lucky to dodge 

the wear and tear 

many women of her experience

tend to show. 

 

She couldn’t have children, 

if she could 

there would be 

a few regrets

biting the ankles 

of the ghosts who were

dumb enough to ignore the red flags 

and focus on the eyes, 

and lips, 

and the rest of her