Marshology

There are millions of people who blog and/or create some sort of alternate way of communicating with people from around the world via the internet.

Since there are so many I have wondered for the past few months why I should really even bother trying to find an audience when an audience would find it very hard to find me.

That is even considering that I have been doing one form or another of this sort of stuff since 1995.

How crowded is this arena now? For example, when I started podcasting nearly 3 years ago I had my show hosted on a site that, at the time, had roughly 200,000 other podcasts hosted. 

That site…just that one…now has over 800,000. Those are just audio podcasts.

I’m not one to think that anything that I have to say is profound, funny, amazing or anything of the sort. I really just like doing all of this sort of stuff. I don’t make any money doing it these days so to put a great deal of effort into it is nonproductive. I just have fun and sometimes I do it to kill time.

But at the same time I have a lot to get off of my chest even if it’s just a form of therapy for me and I don’t bottle up all of my emotions inside to the point where they manifest into some new odd affliction down the road for me. 

This morning, though, I was thinking that I almost have a duty to talk about certain things because I have life experience that can be passed on to others that they may find useful. 

What ran through my mind was a list of top 5 regrets that nurses hear from dying patients.

·  I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

·  I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.
 

·  I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.
 

·  I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
 

·  I wish that I had let myself be happier. 

I’m going to talk about the first one on that list right now. 

I remember growing up in the hot days of the Cold War that children from Communist countries were funneled into certain career paths in their lives. If a kid seemed to be a good athlete she was turned into a gymnast or a shot putter; if a kid was bright he was going to be made a scientist; take any sort of example of a kid who demonstrated an aptitude for anything in particular and a path was chosen for them and they were forced down it.

I also remember taking aptitude tests when I was a kid. I remember being told that I was fit for two certain types of occupations – music and law, which are two completely opposite sides of the spectrum. 

Fortunately our country was still free despite those subtle attempts to sway our population into thinking differently about how we should raise our children so as to benefit the common good and the collective like the communists did. There is no worse way to crush a human spirit than to force it into something it doesn’t want to do.

Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremony
Dance or starve?

Not that either of the fields for which I had an alleged aptitude are horrible; I just had other plans for myself. 

One thing for which I basically had zero aptitude was sports. I loved playing sports but simply didn’t have the genetics to succeed as many others even in my own small hometown did. But I worked very, very hard at it because I loved sports and had my own successes throughout those days that I counted as successes because they were based, partially, on how they compared to what others thought I could do.

Never, however, did I attempt any sort of athletic activity because of what anyone else thought. I did so only because that was what I wanted to do. 

Baseball was my favorite, and best, sport but early injuries to my arm made it difficult for me to throw correctly and then a knee injury at 16 before arthroscopic surgery was available ended any real chance for that path. Even so I still knew that I could outhit most other people and since hitting a baseball is one of the most difficult things to do in sports, I always considered that a success that I achieved because I worked hard at doing something that I loved to do and became good at something no one thought I should ever do.

The next 12-15 years were filled with regular jobs and lots of booze. Horrible years for me and for those around me.

My family’s financial situation made it such that it was not in the cards for me to go to college so I had to work. I graduated high school early at 16 and walked from my last day of class to my first full-time job.

Right away it was obvious that working for the man was pretty much not for me.

I worked at a Burger King when I was 16 for a while. I was hard-working and motivated. I wanted to become a manager and even at that tender age the store management began a process with me to make me a manager. 

That meant an interview with a regional supervisor. The interview was very short, though, because he brought to my attention something that I had written on my job application in response to a question that asked something about my goals in life. I wrote, “To be my own boss and control my own destiny.” 

I remember writing it like it was yesterday. I also remember that jerkoff telling me that it was an “immature” statement and that meant that I wasn’t ready yet to move forward with the company because “everyone has a boss.” 

Even before I was working full time I knew that I wanted to work for myself and control my own destiny. 

I DID know, even then, that even though I was a non-conformist that I had to conform enough to survive until such time as I could write my own history. Today that remains true and since I have clients, they are my “boss” so while in one sense it’s true that I will always have a boss, I do, to a great extent, decide who they will be for me. 

I saw my father get fired from jobs when I was a kid and watched how my mother was treated in the work force when she decided to go to join it after my sister and I were able to take care of ourselves. I never wanted to have that happen to me when I got older and knew that the only way was to be on my own when I could. 

Then there came a day when everything changed and once and for all.

One day I had a vision.

It wasn’t a hallucination but rather a daydream that was much more vivid than what I had ever experienced.

I saw myself on TV hosting a sports show.

Keep in mind that I had never been on TV, was 33, didn’t have any training for it in ANY area of the field whatsoever and on that day I decided that I was going to do just that - produce and host a local TV show.

Usually when we decide to do things in our lives we start to tell people that, right? This was no exception; I started to tell a lot of people what I was going to do. I was very excited about my new opportunity that in no shape or form was an actual opportunity.

The response from people to what I was stating I, rather emphatically, about what I was going to do was stunning. There was almost universal criticism, scoffing, and ridicule. 

Frankly it was all very confusing. Why would anyone tell me that I couldn’t or shouldn’t do something like this? It’s one thing to say suddenly that I am going to build a set of wings and jump off of a building today. It’s quite another to say what I was going to do but apparently many felt the two projects were equal.

I was actually counseled by someone who told me that at my stage in life I should be happy with what I had because of the old adage, “A bird in hand is worth two in the bush,” amongst other such “wisdoms.”

What really then hit me hard was a realization that I NEVER had to live the way anyone told me and do what anyone told me other than to obey laws and to not hurt people along the way. Who was anyone to tell me how to live? 

I realized that stepping out of one’s comfort zone, trying to take the lead and advance oneself in life serves to make other people very uncomfortable in sitting in their mediocrity. Many of the people in my circle of life at the time were stifled by mediocrity.  I believe that because they thought I may actually go out and do something and succeed at it that it would make them look bad or feel bad.

Thirty days later I turned on my local TV channel and there I was on it. This time it wasn’t a vision, it was a reality. I had done what pretty much everyone thought I could do.

Most importantly I decided not to conform. I escaped and lived outside the box into which others had packaged me and was never more proud of myself. 

The small company that I created is still in operation today. There were a few other examples between that period that were related to that business and I went through much of the same criticism although there certainly were less naysayers after that.

That is until 12 years later when I had yet another vision while driving down I95 through Philadelphia one day and I read a billboard that was advertising a hypnosis school. 

Hypnosis was introduced to me when I was a kid and I always had a back-burner interest in it but this advertisement painted a new picture in my head. 

The picture was of me performing a show in Las Vegas. 

Imagine now what people were telling me when I decided that I was going to become a stage hypnotist and work in Las Vegas. I was now 44 and the business that I had built from my first vision was doing well for me. I had absolutely zero need to do anything else with my life, even based on my own standards since I was working for myself in a creative environment that was perfectly suited for my desires. 

My girlfriend at the time thought I was crazy. Thankfully she didn’t do or say anything to discourage me because I would have ended that relationship (which she might find shocking to know if she read this.)

Think about that vision while you are thinking about how many people you know who are in bands, or tell jokes, or do some sort of stage act the type of which one might be able to see in Las Vegas. Well over 99% of people who venture into the entertainment field work their entire lives and never get the chance to take such a stage. There were many people to whom I mentioned what I was going to do and where I was going to do it who gave me that familiar look from 12 years prior that I vividly recalled.

Perhaps many part-time, or even full-time, entertainers don’t have such a goal. Maybe their goal is to simply create, have some fun on the side or make a little extra money on the side. I don’t criticize what other people’s goals are particularly since I can’t stand it when someone does that to me. 

But when you start to think that three years later I took a stage at the Bellagio in Las Vegas to perform my show in front of a crowd of over 1000 people, does it make you then wonder what would happen in one’s life if they simply adjusted their own bar?

If we stopped living as other people told us we had to live what would we truly be capable of doing? If we were able, and encouraged, to develop and articulate our personal visions how would our lives improve? How would our society improve in that case? 

One of the greatest things my parents did for me was to allow me to explore the many options that life had to offer me. Yes, I even explored playing instruments and indeed was pretty good at the violin when I was a kid. Yes, they were disappointed when I decided to stop playing it. But there was one thing that my mother always wanted for me and that was for me to simply be happy.

When it comes to this subject about what I do for a living I certainly am happy. I am, in no way, rewarded with riches at the moment. But I certainly do not have any regrets about the paths that I have chosen because I DID, and still do, have the courage to live my life true to myself and not the way others have tried to tell me to live it.

That is a short version of just that first mentioned life regret. This is a blog, after all, and people these days probably don’t even read this far down the page. 

If you have, though, let me mention something else. 

Every single day I wake up and I wipe my slate clean about a lot of things. I had been in a bad relationship a while back with someone who crushed my spirit on a daily basis. I don’t think she realized it at the time or came to a complete understanding of what she was doing even though I told her that, but that’s something else. 

We fought pretty hard from time to time as well. But every day I would wake up and it was a new day; it was time to start the rest of our lives with a fresh, new beginning. I forgave and forgive easily and I move on with my life. One thing I know from my personal experience is that when we hold on to resentment it crushes us. Resentment eats away our insides…our hearts and our minds. It’s an evil virus that corrupts happiness and health. We have to let that go and we have to flush it from our system.

There is an actual way to do this that I was told when I found myself in recovery from addiction. That method is to simply pray for the person who has caused you resentment. 

When I was first told about this I scoffed because I was never someone who prayed or was religious in any way. I was then told that I had to pray that the same person who had wronged you was to get the same wishes that I would want for anyone that I loved or who had never hurt me. I was told that it might take some time but that I should do it until the resentment was gone. 

Now just having read an entire piece about how I should live my life the way that I wanted, to find out that I would even momentarily entertain the thought of doing something like that might seem hypocritical to you. But the truth is that rarely anyone does this anyway so I was really taking advice from someone who lives outside the box himself even though this is advice that is frequently given.

So I prayed…and I prayed…and then I prayed some more. I am not even exactly sure to whom I was praying but I did ask God for help in removing my resentment and praying that everyone on that very long list had every blessing imaginable. 

One day I realized that I no longer harbored those old and deep-seeded resentments. It didn’t happen the next day, but it only took a couple of weeks. It was, dare I say, a miracle for me. 

That physical and mental process allowed me and still allows me today to wake up every morning with a fresh look at what is in front of me every day. It keeps me positive when the negative has happened. It allows me to forgive and to be in a position where I can be forgiven. It allows me to be simply happy, which was my mother’s goal for me. 

The next thing that I had to learn to do was get some gratitude in my life. I needed to be grateful for what I had – my health, my standing in life, the people in my life and count everything that I had as a blessing.

Most importantly I had to do these things in tandem (pray to remove resentment and have gratitude for what I had) because if I didn’t, I would lose everything good in my life that I had. Make no mistake that when I am blessed with something positive I will do whatever it takes to keep it. I certainly make my mistakes along the way trying to do that, but if I remain grateful and I lose those resentments promptly I will be able to hold on to what I have.

Ok, so it takes work on other people’s part too. There is only so much that I can do. The girl in the past relationship to which I referred didn’t live that way so it was ultimately over but I did my part. SHE is the one who told me that she had regrets about what happened. I had no regrets about it since I did exactly what I knew I should to keep it alive. 

I’ll close this thought by saying this, and I write this down so it can be re-read and pondered until it sinks in deep and eventually turns on that light switch for someone reading this who simply has a light switch that is off in their head at the moment. I have found that, for at least me, praying and being grateful IS the magic cure. We search and scour the world over for mythical and magical elixirs that we can take to help us with this particular subject. We seek help from the most highly trained professionals for the answers to our problems in this area. But the answer is so simple and so profound that when that light switch gets turned back on you may slap yourself upside the head because it was there the entire time. 

Finally…never…never, never, never…push something out of your life that can only bring good into it and is only good for it. Never do it. Wake up, smell the coffee before you drink it and then climb out of the boiling cauldron of life misery soup in which you are sitting that is keeping that light switch turned off.

Done.