New romance’s joys,
Intense fluttering heart-rates;
Ah, twitterpation!
Category: Personal Reflections
Lessons learned about life; pearls of wisdom I’ve gleaned through pain, failure and honest reflection
Word of the Day Haiku: Boomlet
Strangely these things come
Unannounced, then fading fast
Another boomlet
When I’m Gone
This is the most powerful thing I’ve read all week, perhaps longer. Zoehler’s very gifted as an invoker of emotion. I, a delighted invokee. Take a few minutes and give this a read. Please.
Word of the day haiku
Since I get dictionary.com’s Word of the Day, I thought these great writing prompts. So, let’s start the exploration, shall we?
Word of the day: noctambulous
Striding through the night
They wander while dreaming
The noctambulous
Time’s Edges
I feel time’s edges
As summer blazes forward.
Carried by the wind.
Hansel and Gretel’s Father
Children’s voices in town
Echoes in the forest
Crying out judgement
Of deep failure, trust
Crushed, sacrifices upon
Lust’s altar. Offerings
Offered to an uncaring
Soul. Reminders of
Horrors he willingly
Inflicted upon his beloved.
Accursed Mental Scripts
I woke early, my brain rattling. My mind blaring away these negative scripts, negation of myself, my vision. All kinds of internal challenges to my dreams.
Why am I so negative with myself, but positive with others? I notice this with others, too. This really puzzles me. I deeply value and encourage the talents of those around me. Why don’t I do that to myself? Why do so many struggle with this?
Then there are those who belittle everyone; the only way they can interact with others. I think these may have common roots. Perhaps it’s easier to negate everything than to seek the positive within oneself. Which really is sad.
Sadly funny how this miserable malaise takes hold. This drags us back, sucking so much potential out of life. Oh, these wretched internal scripts!
Dreamer’s edges
Mentally flitting
Gracefully above the earth
Within dreamers edge.
Overcoming fear
Overcoming fear
Refusing paralysis
Drinking deep from life
Focused on the stats
Recently, my son started exploring vlogging and video creation. Inspired by the fame acquired by those YouTubers he admires, he focuses on emulating their styles. And on his stats. He finds it frustrating that his follower growth is slow. The expectation, I suppose, was to post a few videos and have followers blaze in.
I constantly reinforce my belief: focus on quality, the followers will follow. Focusing only on stats and followers is much like the high-school kid who makes all their decisions based on maximizing social leverage, that which gains them the most popularity. It’s a short term proposition, and the proverbial “moving target”. Ultimately, you end up shallow and vacuous, with no depth or understanding.
Many times in my career, through my whole life really, this notion comes up. Whether a business struggling to appeal to everyone, or just my own ponderings of why some piece of content hasn’t taken off, I, too, look. Tis a struggle: focusing on quality over effect, upon numbers of views over engagement. It’s a dangerously seductive slide that I hope to help my son manage well, as well as my clients and colleagues. Wish me luck!