These two graphics made me laugh out loud… literally! 🙂 I hope that they will bring a smile to your face as well…
Archives for July 2007
Before Forgiving Someone, Consider These 10 Points
Being violated, either physically or emotionally, by a friend or family member is one of the most agonizing occurrences in life. A series of questions ultimately arise in the aftermath. When a trusted third party consciously dishonors you, should you forgive them? How and when do you forgive them? Where exactly should you draw the line of no forgiveness?
The volatility of subjective circumstance varies greatly between different individual incidents. Based on the situational level of variance, there is no universally accurate answer to those questions. However, there are explicitly defined points in the form of 10 simple words that someone should mindfully evaluate when contemplating the rationale behind forgiveness. One must remember not to concentrate solely on the negative act, but also on the actions that followed the act.
Ask yourself: In what manner were these 10 points affected?
- Family – A direct link to your past and the people most likely stick by your side. Was your family wrongfully implicated, attacked, or used against you in any way?
- Money – Commonly regarded as one of the most essential elements of personal livelihood. Was money involved, either directly, or through the exploitation of a lawsuit? Were there any detrimental long term effects?
- Love – One of the strongest emotional feelings a person can possess. Were emotional feelings on par with love shattered in any way? Who was affected? Was it based on the direct actions of someone else? Are the effects permanent?
- Respect – The integrity of principal and quite possibly the foundation for which all relationships are built upon. Was there a failure to meet agreed upon expectations? Did certain actions depict a lack of moral values? In was way did respect, or lack thereof, play a roll?
- Trust – An assumed relationship of reliance usually based on past experience. Honesty, good character, and competence usually build the bond of trust over time. Was your assumed trust in someone else purposely used against you? Could you ever trust them again?
- Friendship – A bond created by feelings of regard and loyalty to others. Were attacks made that resulted in the disruption of friendship between you and a third party? Was loyalty dropped just to benefit the casual needs of the other person?
- History – The past times gone by that have taken you to the present moment. How deeply embedded in your past is this person? If they died tomorrow, what would you remember most about them?
- Betrayal – A form of direct deception going against presumed trust and confidence in an individual. How exactly were you betrayed? Was this a clear account of genuine betrayal or was it merely a perceived betrayal from your point of view? What is the general consensus of third party opinion? Is there another side to the story that should be heard?
- Intensions – Decided upon actions that lead to a specific purpose. What were the primary intentions of the other person when they betrayed you? Were you directly connected to the outcome their intentions? What are there intentions now?
- Instinct – An inherent perception of something; your gut feeling. What do your instincts tell you about the situation and about the person… both in the past, present, and future?
PS: I figured I’d give a little background info on what provoked me to write about the topic of forgiveness.
Angel and I were recently contacted by an old friend from college. We haven’t spoken to this person since July of 2004. She was a member of a tight knit group of friends that we met our freshman year. Everyone in this group knew each other from high school, so initially Angel and I were the outsiders. We met the group when I randomly moved into a freshman college dorm/apartment with a couple of them. We hit it off, and ended up living together for the entire duration of our college careers. Needless to say we spent a lot of time together and regarded them as good friends.
A fallout in our relationship occurred when feelings were hurt based on intimate involvement between Angel’s sister and one of the guys in the group. The situation was handled immaturely at both ends. We could have easily rectified our issues in a short period of time. However, the conclusion of college provoked them to relocate, which complicated our line of communication. They then quickly started a legal battle over the condition of the rental property in which we had lived for several years. They basically took no responsibility for wear and tear on the property. Due to the complexity of the situation, the bill got stuck on my lap. I felt as if I had been collectively stabbed in the back by an entire group of my friends. After 4 years of solid friendship, we never spoke to them again… until we received the recent email.
10 Things We All Celebrate Subconsciously
There are certain intricacies in life that we all repeatedly and unintentionally celebrate on a regular basis. These celebrated incidents are composed of the smaller things in life, those seemingly inconsequential events that instantly place us in a better mood. If you think about it hard enough, I’ll bet that you have taken part in each one of the following acts of subconscious celebration:
- Making the Yellow Light – It’s one of those simple pleasures, the act of beating the pack. As you blaze through the yellow light you glance in your rearview to see all the cars behind you stopping at the red light. You made it! Hoorah… You will now arrive at your destination 1 minute sooner! For some reason it just makes you glow inside. Life seems great in that moment of celebration.
- Lunch Time – “Yes… its Lunch time!” It happens every weekday at the same time with the same crowd. You know exactly what to expect and yet you celebrate its arrival with eager enthusiasm. That turkey sandwich tastes better at noon on an idle Tuesday than it would in any other setting, under any other circumstances.
- Friday Afternoon – Okay, so you probably consider this to be a bit more of a full blown conscious celebration, but it actually does creep up slowly in the subconscious. It starts on Friday afternoon around lunch time. Productivity gradually slows down over the course of a couple hours, and then by 3PM it hits a brick wall. Pretty soon you’re happily chatting away with colleagues that you deliberately avoided all week long. But that’s okay, because you can almost taste the 48 hours of freedom that lay ahead.
- The First Sip – …of a beer or mixed drink that is! As long as you are not an addict, there is nothing wrong with having a couple alcoholic beverages in your off-time. And when the events leading up to this breath of freedom are hectic, that first sip is sheer bliss!
- Music – There is no better feeling than hearing the right song at the right time. It doesn’t matter what the setting is, hearing the right song in that moment is one of those simple pleasures in life that instantly lifts your spirits. You could be driving home from work, hanging out at a bar with friends, or jogging. When the right song for that moment rattles your ear drums the entire meaning of life momentarily makes complete sense.
- Post-Workout – Regardless of your fitness level or fitness goals, I have no doubt that you subconsciously celebrate the completion of a solid workout. It’s a giddy feeling of self accomplishment; the one true activity (without taking hallucinogens) that actually makes you feel better and look better simultaneously. When you walk out the front door of the gym you are on top of the world.
- Getting Things Done – Getting a task completed, no matter how big or small, is a conscious endeavor that usually brings you closer to some outstanding objective. However, this endeavor comes with a huge bonus! The bonus comes in the form of a warm subconscious feeling of accomplishment. Getting something done is like hitting 2 birds with one stone… the most important usually being the feeling of self accomplishment.
- Sleeping In – Whether you can admit it or not, sleeping in is a celebration of vast proportions. People usually feel guilty for sleeping in because they think they should be out conquering some vital chore. But, you know what? Sometimes it just makes sense to stop and relax. And there is no better feeling of relaxation than sleeping until your eyes just pop open on their own.
- Friendship – Friendship is something we persistently celebrate, yet somehow fail to consciously appreciate. How does this make sense? Quite simply, we are always in a rush to socialize, and we celebrate the act of doing so, yet we are not necessarily conscious of its fundamental importance. Friendship is always celebrated; consciously when we are aware of its importance, and subconsciously when we are not.
- Telling a Story – One of the most exciting gifts in life is that of a new experience. One of the most enticing roles we all lead in life is that of the storyteller. What good is a new experience if we cannot share the story with others? We are consciously aware of our new experiences, but that’s only half of the thrill. Subconsciously, we can’t wait to tell everyone we know.
The Only 7 Things Yahoo Does Better than Google
Let me start this off by stating that I am a long time Google power user. Google handles all of my daily web searching, email, chat, RSS feeds, blog monetization, etc. In my opinion, it blows Yahoo (and most other Internet companies) clear out of the water. However, there are a select few services that I regularly turn to Yahoo for. Why? It’s either because Yahoo does it better, or because Google doesn’t offer it.
Here are the only 7 things Yahoo does better than Google:
- Personal Finance – Yahoo Finance contains a great wealth of original content that easily rivals some of the biggest financial sites in the game (CNN Money, TheStreet.com, etc.). The interface is equally intuitive and accessible to both new investors and longtime financial gurus. Google Finance is coming along, but it isn’t quite up to par just yet.
- Answers to Questions – Yahoo Answers allows users to ask questions or answer other user’s questions; A simple concept that works well for Yahoo. Google has no such active service. The closest competition on the web right now is Ask MetaFilter… also a great question/answer service.
- Website Backlink Info – Most webmasters like to know exactly how many sites are linking to their various websites. Yahoo makes this especially easy with their “linkdomain:” search operator. It quickly provides a full list of incoming links to any given domain. For some reason Google does not publicly disclose this backlink information, but instead provides a small sample of quality incoming links to a given domain via it’s “link:” search operator. Google does provide Google Webmaster Tools that will give you backlink information for a specific domain once you sign up and prove to Google that you are the owner of the domain.
- Image Hosting and Sharing – With its recent purchase of Flickr, Yahoo now rules the Web 2.0 photo sharing market. Flickr is currently the king over all the other photo sharing sites out there. Although, lets not forget that Google rules the Web 2.0 video sharing market with YouTube.
- Local Search – If you are looking for businesses around your town or city, Yahoo Local is a step ahead of Google. While Google can perform local searches in a variety of different ways through their standard search interface and Google Maps application, Yahoo Local is a more polished service that puts all local search capabilities on one convenient page. Yahoo local is sort of like a digital Yellow/White Pages.
- Entertainment Portal – From music to online games to sports, Yahoo provides a solid entertainment web portal capable of satisfying various entertainment and leisure user demographics. For better or for worst, Google isn’t trying to be an entertainment portal, so it doesn’t even come close to competing with Yahoo in this regard.
- Privacy Policy – Yahoo is arguably better with the privacy concerns of its users. Certainly this point could be debated in favor of either company, but there seems to be more public controversy surrounding Google’s privacy policies. Like most, I suck it up and use Google’s services anyway. I do, however, have a Yahoo Mail account that I use to communicate with other bloggers concerning blog monetization strategies that may include Google’s Adwords service. I figure, why let Google have access to that info too?
So what does Google do better than Yahoo? Well, that’s easy… every conceivable task other than the 7 points listed above. Of course, that’s just my opinion… 😉
Taking a Vacation Leads to a More Productive Life
My buddy Donny is intent on taking a lengthy 6 month vacation to travel around the World… literally. He has all his destinations mapped out and is currently working on the details of costing. While his aspiration of conquering the circumference of the globe is a bit extreme, it got me to thinking about the considerable value a long, relaxing vacation adds to our lives. In a way, it allows us to step outside ourselves, invigorating our minds with fresh ideas and alternative passions. Sometime’s we lose perspective in the daily grind, completely forgetting who we are outside of the routine.
Here are the top 3 reasons why taking a vacation helps you lead a more productive life:
A Vacation Revitalizes Your Mind – The demanding events of our weekly routine can wear thin on the livelihood of our psyche. A worn down psyche means your mind isn’t processing information at its peak capacity. So, even though you feel busy, you aren’t being as productive as you could be. Completely removing yourself from the weekly routine by immersing your senses in unfamiliar activities and environments allows the overworked parts of your brain to relax, while simultaneously stimulating the unused corners of your mind.
A Vacation Sparks Creative Thought – The redundancy of a weekly routine prevents the mind from stretching its creative thought process beyond the barriers of your typical activities. Numerous physiologists have proven that taking a step away from your routine actually assists the mind in solving problems that exist within the routine. In other words, your mind can realize the solutions to various problems when you are not even concentrating on them. How does this occur? It has something to do with freeing your mind from the barriers that restrict creative thought, thus allowing you to think more clearly.
A Vacation Allows You to Be Yourself – It can be extremely difficult to completely let your guard down when you are caught up in the rapid pace of your weekly routine. Fear of getting behind schedule, or letting other people trample over you, usually takes precedence over all else. Thus, a constant tension exists that presses you to maintain a robust image. This usually prevents you from just being yourself. Vacations rid you of these external tensions and allow you to act independently of the iconic image you are constantly forced to uphold. Being yourself may not always be essential to the immediate tasks present in your routine, but it is absolutely vital to your long-term happiness. In the end, we must accept that our time on this planet is limited. Regardless of our accomplishments, if we are not content with our existence, we are not leading a productive life.