Frustration

I am frustrated in life. With most everything. This is who I am and where I mentally reside. Maybe it's a personality thing or a depression thing. Maybe it is nothing more than life experiences catching up with me and overwhelming any sense of optimism. I honestly don't know the answer to this one. There are many things in life where I can easily say I'm being stupid or I'm living in sin by not confessing this worry or fear or whatever but the reason I'm not so sure about this one is that I don't see where there is necessarily anything wrong with having a dose of reality to work with and around.
This post is a bit of a complaint and a bit of questioning I guess.

I am frustrated by society. Not just from a spiritual standpoint of gross destruction of morality but from believers who throw away all sense of who they claim they are to support those who not only aren't one of us but will actively shut down our freedoms by being the biggest bully on the block.

I am frustrated by those who do not work. I can't stand it. I'm not talking about those who, try as they may, cannot seem to find it. I'm talking about those who are perpetually in school. Who are perpetually looking for part time. Who are just sucking the ever living life out of those of us who are already struggling to survive but by golly we have to keep paying more and more to support your lazy a**.

I am frustrated by the church. Not the church as in the actual believers who are the body of Christ but those who love to claim they are "Christians". I realize they must be fakes that are part of the destruction of "religion" in America but I am still frustrated by it. Stop talking if you are conflating Jesus with social justice. Stop talking if you conflate Jesus with stopping "man-made climate change". It's complete crap. If you think that these things and others like them are somehow "spiritual", shut up.

I am frustrated with trying. It feels hopeless. No matter how much I feel like I do what I can it feels never good enough. I guess failure would be the operative word here. This is not a condemnation but a frustration factor speaking. The middle is never held and it all falls apart. This is the seeming story of my life.

I am frustrated with the elections. Too many years of voting for the lesser of two evils has us voting for the 2 worst candidates in presidential elections in my lifetime. One is the worst of us and the other is a literal fake pretending to be a Republican when he is DEFINITELY a Democrat. The duping of all the people into believing he's one of them is down right AGGRAVATING. However, the only bright spot in the whole thing is all the democrats who hate someone who has their principles. Too funny.

I'm not sure when I'm going to get to the other posts but they won't stop buzzing my head. I'll have to get into them so they can stop running circles in my head. That is frustrating as well.

Regret

As if life isn't hard enough we waste a lot of time on foolish things such as regret. I know I do. I know I do and yet I still do it. I'm not sure if it's sin or frustration or just getting lost in my own head but it is a hard one to overcome.
I think back on things all the time. Not as a matter of intent or want but rather my mind, running from place to place as it does, takes me down roads I do not intend and would frankly rather not. I think back to so many mistakes or choices made or even choices not made and I become negatively lost in regret. So many mistakes that it is a wonder to my mind how I not only got through any of it but how I even get up and keep moving in the mornings. Some days I simply do not wish to and lay in bed until I have absolutely no choice but to get moving or risk staying in bed the whole day and wasting away. Yes, that thought has entered my brain. Many times.
Shame and embarrassment take over in those situations. Is it right? I doubt it. It's not something I want to be dwelling on obviously but sometimes it just pops right in there.
I don't know about anyone else but I figure I'm not alone in dealing with regret. However, as a sinner, father, son and husband my plate of regret is overflowing. Change is always a necessity and forward progress a must but the plate is already full and no matter my best intentions I will undoubtedly add more too it.
The immensity of my regret is great and what I regret most sometimes changes but with circumstances as they are now my regrets as a father are currently out in front of me. Front. And. Center. As always I will step forward and continue my life but probably a bit more sluggish today than others.

Life Part #SomethingOrOther

I have blog points on Marriage, Grief, Stress and Driving that I've been putting off. Life keeps getting in the way. My personal life as well as my work life have been hectic and crazy. I feel like there is no keeping up with normal life let alone taking time to post here. This blog has been a thought dropping point for me. My mind gets so busy with thoughts and ideas that I can't seem to stop running, in my head anyway, and these things occupy my sleep as well as waking time and adds to my normal exhaustion. This blog has really helped me to unload some of them.
Maybe this long weekend I'll be able to finally unload some of these and stop them from bouncing around in my mind with a, seemingly, will of their own.
Anyway, here's hoping.

Work

It's been rough the last couple months. Yeah, I know, boo hoo. Work is tough and you just need to get over it. Let me squash that.

We are a newer company that has had a meteoric rise in sales and going through all the pains that success brings. I won't go into that but suffice to say we've been overwhelmingly busy. Then, out of the blue one of our key people was discovered to have Leukemia. Life took an ugly turn for them and I found myself having to do around 60% of their work. It's not their fault and I'm not upset or angry but frankly I have a lot more to do. I've struggled to keep my head above water.

Along comes a software renewal. We needed to make some changes to the billing after it running on auto renew for years. We tried to logon and make the change. We couldn't find anywhere to affect the billing. Well, I was told to call them and figure it out. Side note, this was a third party purchase of another companies software. I called them and spent several hours on hold because of "higher than normal volume of calls". Frustrating but needed to be done though. I talked to them and was told they no longer support the other companies product and I need to deal with them. Frustrated. I call the software producer and go through it all with them and they insist that I need to go through the other company. Now three days behind on non-critical work. It's piling up. Screw it, I'm done with this crap. I tell my boss where I'm at with it and go home late after finishing up the more critical items.
Monday. I get there and put my head down for one heck of a busy day and work on the 3 day backlog. I leave a little late but I am on track for the first time in weeks. Was exhausted but felt good about what was done.

Tuesday. Shortly after arriving my boss gets all over me about a solution to the situation. I try to keep up with my work while spending several hours going back and forth between companies getting passed from person to person and the buck being passed over and over and neither of them getting me even one step closer to figuring this out. I'm a half day behind when I get out for the day. Very frustrated after all I had gone through the day before. I tell my boss and go home.

Wednesday. My boss has seemingly forgotten all he was told about my efforts and tells me I need to get on this right now. I do my best to balance everything while getting passed between companies but manage to find a few helpful people. I'm making progress and I'm now convinced that it is company A that will be the ultimate endgame but company B has told me to call them back for a renewal with them when this is all done. I leave a little late but not horribly.

Thursday. That fateful day. I get some stuff out of the way and make a call to company A. Did I mention that the day before I had found someone who was particularly competent. I emailed them again with better details on Wednesday so I now had chat, email and phone calls simultaneously to get through this disaster. Anyway, I spend 4 hours on hold. Let that sink in. 4 hours. Three hours in someone walked through my office and I made them stand in there while I went to refill my water bottles and then use the bathroom. I came back and was still on hold for another hour. I got a hold of someone and they were shocked at my wait time. I may have made an issue of it. They said they had never heard of someone having to wait so long. I think they just hadn't heard of it because most people get sick of it and hang up. That's my opinion. I explained the problem and they said that wasn't their division, I needed to call a different number. That ain't happening. I told them that in the email THEIR company sent this was the number to call. THEIR domain name was in the email. THEIR logo was built into it. THEIR reply to address was at the top and bottom of the email. He wasn't convinced and told me it was the other company. I said bull, give my your email address and I'll send it to you. I did. He agreed it came from their company. But said the number at the bottom belonged to someone else and I should try that. I said no it doesn't, this is the number I called that led me to you and it is correct. I didn't wait on hold for this long to be pushed off for the dozenth time. He asked me to hold while he called the number. .

He comes back and says he needs to get with his supervisor. He spends some time away and comes back telling me that apparently that division of their company was closed down. I have info. We talk back and forth about why we are being billed and come not closer to a real answer but they promise a call back and we part ways. A somewhat frustrating phone call but progress is made.

About an hour later. I get an email from the woman from earlier. She has tracked it all down and given me all the answers I have needed all along, in writing no less! I thank her profusely. I can't believe the difference finding the right people can make. Oh, and she was just a part time worker.

Time to start pricing new software.

I am only a day behind now....

Love your neighbor...

I have watched with a measure of aggravation people, who are clearly not true Christ followers beat down others with "Love your neighbor as yourself" as some sort of justification to accept anything wrong as right. I think the problem is that unbelievers, whether they just are unbelievers or are just fake believers, cannot understand real love. It's not a slam. It is truth.
Love your neighbor as yourself is not agreeing with evil deeds out of some fake notion of love, it is love your neighbor as yourself knowing that they are wrong. Few can or will grasp what seems like a fine line.
Love is not participating in evil or wrong deeds but loving the person even if it means walking away and letting them continue in their sin. This runs counter to culture and will earn you much hate.

Blog

I have not abandoned my tiny platform. I have been stressed and busy. I will get back to it soon. Stress can take a break, for some typing. Busy cannot.

Victory

I feel most of the time like a failure. This is not some self pity writing but an honest look into my mind.
I feel, yes feel, that I cannot "win" whatever that means. I offer warnings and no one listens. I try to get ahead and calamity befalls me. I plan only to have life spit in my face and then laugh at me.I spend some money and within hours the gates of hell open against me. I won't clarify that one further but it definitely feels true. I try to prove myself and only show failure.
I could go on with vague example of wrought and ruin but I think the point is made. Whether I plan or no, it feels as if life itself is conspiring to ruin me. Victory is not an option and the wins do not pile up.
No amount of "positive" thinking will EVER change anyone's life and it feels as if my prayers are frequently ignored. It can be said that we often bring pain and sorrow on ourselves and that is certainly true but I feel often as if I'm being targeted for pain. Maybe there are lessons I'm supposed to be learning but mostly if feels as if I'm the proverbial punching bag. Again, before you accuse me of self pity realize this, I understand that everything and everyone has a purpose. If people were born sick, lame and blind for the express purpose of Jesus showing his power then I may not be off the mark in feeling like a punching bag.
I just keep waiting for that miracle that will show God's power and bring people to Him. In the mean time I will try not to devolve into some sort of depression over my circumstances but rather do my best to wait. And wait. And wait.

Variety

I'm not even sure where to start. This is another of those that has been on my mind a while and coherent structure along a linear path eludes me.

Variety is the spice of life. If you are an adult you've heard this. If you are a teenager you've likely heard this. If you are in the generation that is soon to come, I doubt most will ever hear this phrase.
It is a statement of society and culture that will have this old statement disappearing from us.

Ok, this has pissed me off for a while and I have to get this off my chest. People will say it's just a saying with a good sentiment but I think it is a big problem. When it comes to race relations they say how we all need to be color blind or some stupid variation of it. Now, before you throw stones hear me out. Or not, I don't really care. Let's apply this stupidity to the rest of life and see what the 2 people who read this think.

Sight. What if everything was one color? We maybe could see outlines but essentially it was one color.
Smell. What if we had no sense of smell? Good or bad it would get old.
Taste. What if there was only a dull sense of flavor and everything tasted like chicken as the joke goes?

Where is the joy in the diversity? The God of the universe created a seemingly infinite number of sights, sounds and tastes. Why? FOR OUR ENJOYMENT. If we reduce race to color blind (or the more socially correct statement equality) there is no enjoyment in the immense diversity that God gave us. And get this addendum that I'm sure will send people running away screaming and holding their ears, Sometimes we don't enjoy every sight. Sometimes we don't enjoy every smell. Sometimes we don't enjoy every taste. GASP! Did he just think that? How dare he! But wait, What I mean by this is that we don't ENJOY everything. This is not some blanket excuse to discriminate. This means that we don't like everything but all these things are diverse for a reason. Variety. God gave us variety and instead of trying to reduce the significance to a nonsense statement we ought to look past the coy catch phrases and look for the better answer.

And that's what's on my mind.

Tears

When I cry, I cry alone. Whether day or dark I weep alone. When life rolls I tumble down. When I fall I struggle up.

Life is hard and seems so long. I hear from the aged that it is so short. But right this time it seems so long. Why struggle for all is vain.

All efforts you make matter not. All is loss, there is no gain. No matter how you work it's already set. There is no victory. The words I speak, the thoughts I think, all they do is point me dark.

That's where my mind is this week.

I'll try to put Variety up soon. I need to get out of this hole first before I can articulate properly.

Anger

I have thought about this post for a long time but never really gotten around to it for one reason or another. Life and the right words and all that entails. Even further where to start has stuck in my mind. Do I start with the morality of it? The emotion of it? My story of it? If I lay it all out will anybody understand my thought process? Will anyone even care? Well, that last one kind of doesn't matter I guess. This is a blog about my mind and what goes on there. There are things I don't think will ever go in here. That's just the nature of humanity. Not necessarily secrets per se but private thoughts that no one else would really get or for that matter needs to know about. So, I guess you could say this blog is a glimpse into the mind of Stephen.

Anyway. Anger is an emotion. That seems like the right spot to start. The obvious. But I think that we should look past the obvious statement that anger is an emotion. In day to day life we don't think about our emotions as emotions. We think of them as nothing more than who we are. I'm outspoken. I'm shy. I'm passionate. I'm withdrawn. I'm, I'm, I'm. This is not a bad thing per se. We just think of them in terms of ME. We equate our emotions as ourselves. This is a bit backwards. We are humanity. Created in the image of God. Built from dirt to live, breath and give Him praise and glory. That is who we are. Or at least a little closer to reality. The emotions are a add-on to the free will. A variety if you will. In a future blog I'm going to go into this a bit more with the whole variety thing but for today's purposes I will not. Let's just say that despite all the negative connotations that are often equated to emotions, life would be really dull without the variety.

So, point one. Anger is an emotion.

Anger is not sin. By itself and barring the influence of a sin nature built into all of us (thanks Adam) it is (see above) nothing more than an emotion. You see? This is why I wasn't sure where to begin. Due to the circular way that my brain often works it is hard to put it in a coherent linear process. Again, anyway. There is nothing wrong with being angry. It can often push us to do or accomplish things that we otherwise would not get to or want to. Sometimes to do things that we would NOT otherwise do. It is the influence of sin (or "bad feelings" for some of you) that pushes our actions into good or bad responses. This is the key I think. I'm not really sure what else to say about it. Our actions make or break what the emotion becomes.

I though of a number of analogies but ultimately it just comes down to our actions. We choose to be ruled by our emotions, in this case anger, or we rule our emotions. This is important.

We all have every emotion. But we are given them to greater or lesser degrees. We have a responsibility to use them as intended. To have a measure  of self control in all we do. Moderation is another word that works here. We should learn to control them. I have had to learn this. Most people assume that I have them under control. That I am just laid back and cool. While there is an element of truth to that, it is not the whole story.

My story? Simple. I had an anger problem. I learned to keep cool on the outside and thereby keep it hidden. I was a cauldron of anger that was boiling into rage. I don't know that there was any specific reason. In fact, looking back I don't believe there was anything. I was just letting it quietly eat me alive. That's the thing with emotions. They are meant to be used and I was mostly letting mine boil inside. For those who struggle with recognizing those who, like me, are holding it in, it is really easy to tell. Passionate arguer. Arguments happen. Disagreements happen. But arguing every point is one of the signs of someone who has an anger problem. I see it in others and it is like a beacon that lights the sky. I can see it as clearly as I see them. I don't know how to really explain it but their face is different. Again, it's not the same as a normal disagreement look. I really don't know how else to explain it.

But as I became a teenager it was close to the exploding point. I could see it. I could feel it. I was aware of it. And I was at best keeping it secret. Nothing more. It was controlling me. You know the old cartoons where the person would turn red starting at their feet and it would burn all the way up to their heads? That is almost exactly what it's like. The only thing wrong is that it starts in the head and boils down toward the feet. You stop thinking and the rage takes over. Your skin burns. Your blood boils and in the worst cases you will sweat. The feeling to lash out becomes strong. It all came to head one day when I was being irrationally disagreeable to someone. All day. I was shaking from the rage that was building inside me and I finally had enough and I took a swing. At the very last second I realized what I was doing and I pulled the punch. It landed but it was very light in the end. I call that my pivot point. That was where I became not just aware of my problem but realized that the path I was headed down was one of complete and utter disaster. I began the journey of controlling my anger and using self-control. We like to say how we hand things to God and he delivered us but I don't think He works that way. He expects us to do the work. And it took a long time to change from hiding the anger to not succumbing to it. Self-control is important. I am not idle in my desire to show peace. When people are being rotten or even just the scum of the earth my brain is frantically maintaining control. I become thoughtful and introverted as I put the figurative reigns on and slow things down. I let slip occasionally and my argumentativeness comes out but rarely do I give in to the anger in such a way as to boil. It always takes time to come down from such an event. I clearly see how people give in and lose all control but it is a cliff I choose not to jump over. I allow the anger like electricity to flow through  me and wash out the bottom. Self-control. It is part of growing up, maturing and becoming an adult. And more than that it is honoring to God that we show self control and not let our passions or emotions run wild. Praise God for that moment of clarity all those years ago.

That is what's on my mind and now finally written down. If it can help someone that's great. If not, maybe it will give you a little better understanding of the flashes that go through my brain and why I am often silent. I am just letting things process. It saves me a lot of trouble in the long term.

Conversations

Due to the never ending stream of content burning through my mind all the time I frequently think of things to put down but by the time I have a real chance to sit down and type them out my brain has moved many subjects down the road and I lose, for a time, what I intended to say. This is a multi scale issue. First, and easiest is the fact that these things don't get "written" down. Second, I interrupt people because I know that if I don't spit it out right now it may be gone for a while if not forever which is directly related to three which is the appearance of being a forgetful person. It's not generally that I've forgotten so much as it's been left so far in the past that it takes a while to bring it back up. I usually remember things but at the worst possible time such as a week after it needed done. This has over the years led me to a LOT of problems. I own the forgetfulness. I certainly don't lose things in my brain intentionally but I do frequently seem unable to really get a grip and hold onto it. I do my best. I know if frustrates the crap out of people but the best I can do is my best and it is not generally enough to slow things down a little.

Life lessons

As my brain wanders to and fro minute by minute, old memories and aggravations surface seemingly out of the blue. I am sure that there are things in everyone's environment that trigger such memories but I have as yet not figured out more than a few of them.
Over the years I have taught a number of kids to drive. Side note: teaching your own kids is way harder than others. I'm just saying. Anyway, one such driver I had taught how to drive told me some time later that their father told them my rule about not letting the RPM's go over 3 (3000 for you purists) was stupid, they were taking off too slow and that I had taught them wrong. This irritated me on several levels. The first one I will not deal with much here other than to say teach your own kid. But more to the point of the blog/story I was aggravated because months of teaching this had a reason. While I do not have the profound wisdom of an Okinawan Karate master I do have enough intelligence to teach to the child. I did not need the government to tell me how to teach. I had a problem and I came up with a solution. This driver would get in and put the pedal to the metal. No amount of telling them would stop it. I knew my car and I had learned the driver. So I imposed the 3 RPM rule. This forced them to learn pedal control. It had nothing to do with actual speed. It had to do with a definable goal to achieve. It was not an out of reach goal. At every stop there was an easily attainable goal on acceleration. It worked. They waxed on and waxed off until it became a habit. One for which they even took crap for later (yes, I'm bitter). But it got the job done
I think that there are lots of life lessons like that. We don't understand why in the world there seems to be an arbitrary rule in place or an insurmountable problem in the way but sometimes it is there as a goal to get through. Not the end game or destination but something with a short term goal to teach us a certain amount of control. I don't know about everyone else but I am fairly certain that I fail most of these. Heck, I'm not even sure that I recognized them as short term goals even after the fact. But I suspect that there are even goals in that...

College

As time rolls on I see life in the bigger picture more and more.
Which is funny (ish) as I tend to stress the details of the little things more and more.

The aside put aside for a moment, whether it is knowledge, wisdom, experience or just plain insanity my perspective on life has changed and potentially grown.

There is this pervasive thinking in America that college is a must. It is a goal to be achieved and attained. There is pressure from parents, family, culture and even politics that unless you attain this goal you are a failure or somehow less of a person. If I (meaning a some nebulous "I") do not go to college then I am a failure or doomed to a life of mediocrity or "meaningless" labor. We put all this pressure on TEENAGERS to make this decision that has an impact on the rest of their life that they feel they have to go through with it no matter the cost. I hear all too often and from a seemingly VERY large percentage of college graduates that they spent years and thousands of dollars learning something that they end up not using. Whether it's getting out into the real world and realizing that they just really don't want to spend the rest of their lives doing that or they did not learn all they needed to learn or just plain cannot find a job in that field. The latter being far more frequent. We waste a lot of time and pile a ton of stress on teenagers to make these choices and it ends up being a waste.

No, I will not now go into the ramifications of the "free" college push and what that means for these problems, but it is something to consider for a future discussion.

Now, that is not to say that there aren't plenty of teenagers who know what they want and/or have a desire to go but I think, with a nod to Mike Rowe, there are MORE opportunities out there that do not require a degree, are just as fulfilling and don't cost much if any money to get into. Society would have us believe that these are beneath us or are becoming obsolete so we ALL need to go to college and get a degree because that is the FUTURE! This is a lie. I'm sorry if I burst any bubbles. But it is a fact. Unless or until there is a completely machine automated workforce there will always be "lesser" jobs that need done and to be quite frank are going to be paying more than most college educated jobs. The whole "jobs people won't do" market is by necessity going to pay more and more as we become a nation of people who are to "weak" to do real work.

There is a "reset" coming. Where the top becomes too heavy and the whole system of college graduates collapses. There are those who are meant to go to college. There are those who are not. And more importantly there are those who aren't ready until later in life. How about we encourage our kids to not be so stressed about it or be in such a rush and encourage them to make the RIGHT decision for this time in their life. Opportunities come around. Wait for the right one.

Today's Temperature

I know I am in the minority but I am NOT ready for this kind of heat. I'm fine with warm temperatures and yes, even I get tired of winter but, I do not want to be soaking in my own sweat all the time. That is what I hate most about the heat. It's gross to be soaked in your own sweat. I'm just saying.

New update

Two weeks. Not too bad on time since last updated. I tend to focus so much on social media that I miss the blog world.
Life is really kicking hard. It just is. I have gotten to the point over the last several days where I realize that hope is a mythical thing as it applies to me. I've thought for a long time, many years, that old saying that "hope springs eternal" is missing a part. I believe the reality is that it should be "Hope springs eternal but reality is the drain plug". Recent events have reinforced that thinking. I see no light at the end of the tunnel. I have nothing else to really add to this.
On my next post maybe I will discuss pivot points, anger and control. We shall see.

Life

I don't keep up with this as often as I ever meant to. I have lot's of thoughts but I tend to not post them to Facebook as I assume people no longer pay any attention. It is what it is. Here's to posting again!