Year in Review

It's just sort of natural to begin, or end, a year and reflect on one's life and situation so this is what I am doing for anyone who might care.

Personally, it was a great year. I have the new found love and support of a beautiful woman and that alone would have made it great.

I have my great health and I am so grateful for it that it might be hard to explain if people don't see so many others with poor health problems or even death.

Professionally, I can't complain too much even though with this still-struggling and changing economy it can be difficult to navigate through challenges quite often. However, I try to work very hard and 2016 is already bearing the fruit of those labors.

Those who don't know me so well often believe I am crazy. I hear it, see it, and even sense it. Those who know me well know that everything they see and read that I am doing are simply going to be some things I set out to do and succeed at doing.

I'll start another project early in 2016 also and it will be another podcast. This one will be completely different from the nonsensical one that I have been doing for nearly 5 years now (which some people thought would last a month or two.) It will be one finally inspired by one particular live image that burned into my memory recently.

The image was that of an older I saw staring out of a window into an open field as I was turning around, sort of lost, across from his house. Why this made me decide to leap into action is probably just a result of a growing stack of such images, I suppose. But, nonetheless, it lit the fuse.

I often wonder about purpose in life and for what purpose I am here. Those who are religious would have all sorts of different religious-related answers for that, I am sure. But I'm not really one of those people so I think differently.

What I don't want to do is be without some purpose or use in life and in a much grander way than just in my particular small realm.

I have the opportunity to help a lot of people with hypnotherapy. During my time doing that work I have come to realize just how many more people need help and not just help with issues people already know they have.

As someone who has been clean and sober for over 22 years I can offer some guidance for those who are struggling 

As an entertainer who made a career change into this difficult field who makes a living in it now despite many, many setbacks and lots of hard work, I see so many others failing for very basic reasons. I can help those people too.

Simply as someone who has been alive for 54 years now and has accumulated many life experiences I have things to offer those with less.

So I hope that 2016 will have great things in store for those close to me and those whom I hope to reach this year.

Happy New Year!

Surviving AND Thriving

In an age when technology evolves on a daily basis there are disadvantages as well as fantastic advantages.

The disadvantages include making certain vocations increasing obsolete. 

Are YOU in a field which could possibly suffer such obsolescence in the near, or relatively distant future? 

Think about some jobs right now that are in danger based on just one article I read yesterday…jobs in the retail sector. 

There are 19 nationwide chains that are closing over 100 stores this year alone. This doesn’t include that chains that are closing less than 100, obviously, and that includes Walmart also. Radio Shack alone is closing over 1000. 

http://retailindustry.about.com/od/USRetailStoreClosingInfoFAQs/fl/All-2015-Store-Closings-Stores-Closed-by-US-Retail-Industry-Chains_2.htm

Stores come and go all of the time. But this is a large and scary list and when you see Sears on any list, it is cause for concern. They simply have the best research team when it comes to forecasting future sales based on real estate and consumer purchasing trends.

This means a few hundred thousand people will be unemployed this year in the retail sector. When you think about the holiday season and how we point to the retail sector so often to discuss the strength of the labor market, this is troubling.

We can point to online sales as a major cause of this coupled with the shitty economy. Currently, we do know the US Government is doing pretty well with continuing record levels of tax income. That tax is coming from businesses and you and I, my friends. The US Government took in a record 472 BILLION dollars last month which beat the old record set just the previous month. That is money that ONLY the government can spend. Businesses can’t invest and YOU can’t spend it either so it makes it tough for businesses and individuals to improve their own financial situation.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/may/7/feds-set-tax-haul-record-472-billion-one-month/

Anyway…so what will you do if YOUR industry gets flushed down the Crapper for economic or technical reasons? 

For about 20 years I have run a sports video production company. It was only 8 years ago when I took on an additional challenge and became a hypnotist. But thank God that I did. Because the video production business basically got flushed because of technological advances which made it much easier and cheaper for my potential clientele to produce their own work. Now, they will rarely produce anything better than I can, but in these shitty economic times people are saving wherever they can.

That’s completely fair and in a capitalist society (ok, quasi-socialist society in which we live now) I have to accept that.

I was simply fortunate that I like to do other things don’t place all of my eggs in one basket, so to speak.

Are you a teacher? Are you safe? Well, as long as the government educational system makes laws to force kids into their system you are ok, but more and more parents are bailing from the public school system to teach them at home. A growing online teaching community is available and, in many cases, is CHEAPER as well. 

Robots are doing more and more jobs. Automated tellers and kiosks are taking more jobs.

One thing Obama did say one time, with which I agreed, when he spoke about jobs early in his administration he brought up how technology is taking jobs from people so that does have an effect on job numbers. 

There are currently over 93 million Americans NOT in the work force right now. That is a record and despite what our leadership will want to tout as good news that we have a 5.4% unemployment rate that is not good news for those 93 million, unless they are getting free money out of the 472 billion that the government has taken from those who are working last month.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-05-08/americans-not-labor-force-rise-record-93194000

So what are YOU doing to ward off a potential disaster in your own working life? The percentage of Americans who will never have to worry about such things is much, much smaller than those who do and I am not really talking to them. I am talking to YOU who has to strategize and plan more effectively for an unforeseen, or maybe even inevitable, dilemma in your life.

Remember the old In Living Color show starring the Wayans Brothers, Jim Carrey and even Fly Girl, Jennifer Lopez? They used to do this skit with a couple of the Wayans acting as Jamaicans and the running gag was that they are very hard working and always working at least 7 jobs. Anyone with less than that were just lazy people even if they had only 4 or 5.

I believe that EVERYONE in a potentially precarious situation should endeavor to be such a Jamaican, as portrayed in those skits. 

This has now set me up perfectly to promote all of the things that I do but it might give you some ideas as to how to earn extra money for yourself, pursue a dream of some sort, and not only survive in these times but thrive and be prepared for what we all hope never happens for you…a catastrophe. 

-      -     As mentioned I still do sports video production and a wide variety of it.

-        -   I have a website for that service which also does a smattering of local sports coverage to a much lesser degree than it did in the past. That coverage, which I am increasing again, helps bring potential clients to the site who may take advantage of the video services.

-         - On the site I can run ads to make extra money.

-        -  On the site I can sell videos that I shoot.

-       -   I am working to build that site into a national sports video presentation site. All of those videos will get plugged into the revenue generation program.

-       -   I am an entertainer, which is my main career right now. I even do TWO different types of acts, to diversify there.

-       -   I do hypnotherapy both group and individual.

-        -  On my hypnosis site I sell hypnosis recordings and can also run ads.

-        -   I also train others to become hypnotists live and now online.

-          - When I videotape my hypnosis shows I put some highlights on YouTube and they are in the revenue generation program so I earn per view there.

-          - I am associated with two other firms, one of which is a counseling service where I do hypnotherapy and the other is a Sober Companion service.

-         -  I recently started a booking agency because I make all sorts of contacts and can always match up a former client with an act that I have met on the road or online. I have a website for that.

-          - I recently started a social network, which is similar in operation (but with more features) to Facebook. There I can sell ads and, at some point, sell subscriptions.

-         -  I do a weekly “comedy” podcast called the Dungeon of Manlove. Our website is marshcast.com. There, we have just opened up an online store where we will sell our stuff but also invite others to sell their podcasts, music and merchandise too. We will then market the site, and therefore our shows, using an affiliate marketing system. 

-          - For quite some time I operated a sports festival called The Diamond State Games here in Delaware. I am looking to re-launch it in 2016.

-   Referee a couple of sports - volleyball and basketball

-          - And I have an affiliation with a credit card processing company and if you are a business which takes credit cards I can save you money on processing fees.

I never ever cared what I did to make a living as long as I could do so. I was very close to being able to sell out everything and retire before the economy tanked. I have to rebuild once again. But I won’t rely on just one thing to get me there, even though I never really did.

I have been called crazy before in my life…many times. I have been told over and over again that my refusal to comply and stop thinking “outside of the box” is plain stupid. I make social network posts all of the time announcing things that I am doing and am promoting. It has to look a bit crazy. But I don’t care and now you know why. I would hope that if you are in a position such as I mentioned but don’t have a backup plan…or 7…this will inspire you to get one.

Oh…yeah…I almost forgot. Even THIS BLOG earns extra money for me since its placed in the Google Ad Sense program. 

Done.

1000 Years to Live

If I actually believed in a diagnosis of ADD (attention deficit disorder) I would then believe that I have an adult version of it.

I would then blame that on why I only post sporadically on here because there are so many things that run through my head that I have a hard time focusing on one long enough to expand my thoughts on anything.

Therefore I’ll post this way.

Things on my mind right now:

I have been reading more about the possibility of living to be 1000 years old. In fact a story crossed my path the other day that said that someone is alive now who will reach that threshold. 

I wonder what 1000-year old skin would look like. I would imagine that figuring out how to keep it looking from the horror that is conjured up in my mind would be really key to really wanting to live to be 1000. I can’t stand how I look at 53, let alone what might happen in a natural progression in 947 years from now.

I am someone who thinks there are too many people on the planet now. I don’t really care what the Bible says about “going forth and multiplying.” I think, “job well done there,” and now its time to move on to another goal of Biblical proportion.

How will it be possible to sustain 40 generations of families all at the same time? 

If we do end up with the ability to reach the age of 1000 I would have to think that there would need to be some trade off, unless with that ability and the ability to colonize and live on new planets, we could manage that immense population size.

So what would be that tradeoff? It would have to be sterilization, in my opinion. Yes, in order to live to be 1000 we would have to keep from adding to the increased numbers of the population. 

Then that calls into question what would happen if there was a huge disaster where a significant portion of the population were wiped out. Or, even if by attrition, it was determined that new members of society were needed. That would then mean we would have to start cloning people in order to increase numbers. Wouldn’t it? 

Makes you stop and think a little doesn’t it? It sure has for me. Ask my girlfriend who has heard me bring this up a few times in the past few weeks already.

This made me think about Social Security. When SSI was created, the age necessary to reach to begin collecting SSI benefits was 65. At the time, however, the average life span was 60. So, basically, SSI was designed to rarely even become collected. Now we are living to be 72-75 rather easily. What the hell would happen to our treasury if we lived to be 1000? 

I know that’s just a simplistic thought and question but at the very least I am rather certain that a REAL discussion of increasing the age for SSI benefit collection HAS to be raised to help keep it solvent because the math of SSI doesn’t work, and it was never intended to work.

Robots are doing more and more jobs that humans used to do and this is simultaneously awesome and frightening. 

When we think of robots, however, we need not necessarily think about Lost in Space robots or those similar to Terminator robots.

Much more simple machines have taken over for humans and have done so for a long time. I was at my local BJ’s Wholesale Club yesterday where there were 6 cash registers open but only two had live cashiers. That’s four people who didn’t have jobs right there. Ok, say three because I suppose one is necessary to fix the machines when they break down. 

In some other country I read last week that McDonalds had ordered 7000 order-taking kiosks. That is going to put 7000 people out of work.

Could the McDonalds kiosk project be a result of workers asking for increased wages of as much as $15.00 per hour to do such tasks as take orders? Hmmm....makes ya think, doesn't it?

This has been going on for a long time, as mentioned. There used to be a job called Telephone Operator, for example, and I’ll refrain from adding a bunch that you already know.

I’ll be truly worried when robots can start hypnotizing people since that is my main source of earning a living. I would think, though, that we, as a society, truly need to wake up before we are forced to wake up to the fact that we need to re-establish a hard-work ethic and not one of an entitlement mentality. The latter only forces businesses to come up with ways to get their work done, and their products produced, in an efficient and cost-effective manner.

This makes me think about my particular community and taxes. Our school districts keep trying to sneak past us these referendums to raise our taxes to give to our schools. I happen to live in the second worst district in my state and I DON’T HAVE ANY KIDS. Yet they continue to try to steal my money and pump it into this failure and joke of a district. 

Why is that related to robotics? Because too many kids come out of these schools incapable of succeeding. I keep getting told that my taxes help our community because these kids need the education and they will return to the community to make it a better place to live. Its not happening here.

I swear I just read a Facebook post in the middle of that paragraph from a writer acquaintance of mine promoting a tax increase in his district. Seems that he has some grandchildren there who will somehow benefit from the fact that the government is going to forcefully take tax money from the residents there. 

I have an idea. How about those who actually have kids in schools shoulder the tax burden for it? And if your family can’t do it then how about thinking that its time to stop having kids and placing that true burden on society?

Watch The Goldbergs on ABC. It’s a great sit-com. How did I get to that subject? Because when I start going down that path that ultimately leads me to get into basic political conversations I have to divert my attention somehow and that is one way to do it. 

But its very hard to steer clear from politics when people are now beginning to jump into the Presidential race for 2016. Make no mistake that I am very much invested in what happens in 2016 as WE ALL SHOULD BE. In these past 6 years I have suffered major setbacks that I can directly attribute to specific policies laid down in that period of time.

What you don’t know is that I just had to delete two full pages of material because I just went off into some detail and needed to replace that with this sentence.

See what I had to do there?

Back to work-related issues though. If I can impose ANY wisdom on anyone who actually reads this, or any young person who should ever ask me, I will say this. You MUST be able to do a variety of things to earn a living and DO NOT focus on just one particular thing. Develop multiple revenue streams because it is never known when one will become obsolete because of some new technology or some governmental regulation. 

That is why I don’t only focus on a comedy-hypnosis stage career. With that particular skill set I do a variety of things…hypnotherapy both group and individual, sales of hypnosis material and hypnotist training. Even the highlight videos I create from my shows are posted in a revenue-sharing program at YouTube.

There are other things I do as well. Even this blog generates revenue from ads embedded in it. 

So while I admitted, up front, that I might suffer from an affliction, in which I don’t even believe, I think it even helps me in that I can bounce from project to project which is necessary for me to do to try to survive in an economic environment that is wobbly at best, a disaster at worst.

Now I am thinking about lunch so that is what I am going to focus on now after I post this mess.

Done