Archive for the 'mom' Category

Tinker don’t perfect

Published on September 14, 2009 in business, goals, mom and personal. Closed Tags: , , , , , , , , .

Sunrise shown in time lapse. The motions of S...

I’ve spoken to several entrepreneurs this week as well as spent some time thinking about my past endeavors, and one thought keeps popping in my head: “tinker, don’t perfect.”   When I look back on some things that I’ve worked on, some of them things I REALLY was  passionate about (have some thoughts about passion, but that’s another post), I realize that a common theme was I was trying to finish them before I started them.  A good example was All is Well.

My basic plan and goal with All is Well was to take an this image that my sister had found after my mom had passed away (to the right) and put it on t-shirts using cafepress, create a simple website to tell the story and sell the shirts, then split the proceeds between the company and several causes my mom cared about.  It quite frankly was a simple process, one that could have been wrapped up in a week or two.  And I was very close to doing just that…until I had a problem.  The programmer I was working with had basically agreed to put the site together for a very low rate because of the nature of the project.  Unfortunately they got stuck on one issue with cafepress and integrating it within wordpress. Now at this time you could actually buy the t-shirts on cafepress (in fact you still can) but I became obsessed with the site being perfect before I told anyone about it.  So I waited, and waited, and waited, and slowly I realized the programmer had moved on to something else.  The 2 week project became a month long project, which became a 3 month long project, and now a 2 year project.  With each passing day,  I beat myself up more for it not being completed, perfect, and live.  And the more I beat myself up about it, the less time I wanted to spend on it.

Now I will say that there is certainly a whole other layer of issues related to this particular project, and a lot of emotions attached to it, but the point I’m trying to make here is that I was afraid to do anything until I thought it was perfect.  If I had just been willing to accept that perfection, if ever possible, comes with time and tinkering, I most likely would have just gone with what I had, or actually gone with the simplest path to what matters: spreading the message through selling shirts.  So I guess there are 2 lessons I’m seeing here: 1.) tinker, don’t perfect 2.) remember what’s important. What’s the goal?  Don’t get bogged down on all sorts little things that in the end don’t mean all that much to what you’re trying to do.

So whatever you’re working on, give yourself a break.  It is not going to be perfect right away if ever.  But you’re better off playing and sharing and testing, than hiding and perfecting.  Get out there and see what happens.

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Baking cookies

Published on September 20, 2008 in grieving, mom and personal. Comments Tags: .

a famous birthday cake

I thought a lot about my mom today.   Julie and her friend were talking about something that happened a few years ago, and they couldn’t remember what year it occurred.  I said “well that was before my mom passed away, so it was early 2005.”  It was strange how normal that statement felt to me.  The fact that I could say “my mom passed away,” as easily as I could say “I am hungry,” really shocked me.  Honestly, it made me sad that it didn’t hurt to say that anymore.  No pain means I’m moving further away from her, and I don’t want to forget anything. As I was thinking about that for some reason this story popped into my head so I figured I’d record it.

This story isn’t necessarily a happy one, but it has a a special place in my heart.

My mom made the most amazing chocolate chip cookies.  I am sure most people say that about their mothers or grandmothers, but based on the responses of others I know my moms were pretty close to the best out there.  I was fortunate that she would make these cookies fairly regularly, but she also made lots of batches around Christmas time.  Actually she would make all kinds of cookies in the weeks leading up to Christmas, but chocolate chip were always my favorite.

She didn’t really get around to making cookies as she normally would have in December of 2005.  I couldn’t really blame her. The cancer had a stronghold in her brain, well actually in her whole body, so she had trouble with her balance as well as with her vision.  She complained of some blurriness and double vision, but I am sure it was much worse than that.  I would often catch her closing one eye and squinting as she tried to do the daily crossword puzzle in the paper.  She was one tough cookie and rarely admitted pain or discomfort, but I know she was in a lot of both.  Her balance was worsening very quickly as well.  At the start of the month she was able to get around on her own with relative ease, but by the end of the first week she couldn’t really walk anywhere without Tom or I supporting her weight.  Despite this, the Monday before she died (she died on Sunday the 18th of December) she decided she wanted to make some of her famous chocolate cookies.

Before that night my typical role in her cookie baking was to lick the batter and eat the super hot, moist cookies as they came out of the oven, but that night was different.  I got to help.  And I wanted to.  It was truly a surreal moment.  I knew it was one of those “last” moments.  It was like my brain kicked into extra attention mode.  I wanted to record every moment of it simply because I knew it would be the last time she’d be there with me making and eating her cookies.

I remember her leaning against the counter, rubbing her forehead and pointing to the top cabinet where her book of recipes were.  I remember pulling out the bowls and the baking sheets, the butter and milk and sugar and toll house chocolate chips.  I can see her now closing one eye to focus and reading her recipe aloud from the book, as if she were finally revealing an ancient secret.  She called out “mix the flour, baking soda, salt…” When she didn’t start doing it, I quickly realized she wasn’t going to make cookies for me anymore, she was going to teach me how to make her cookies.  I remember running the mixer, and splitting the beaters with her.  She scooped out the batter and placed the cookies on the baking sheet. We all enjoyed the cookie smell filling the house as they baked.  As we waited she showed me some other recipes in her massive recipe book (which my sister has).

When she pulled the first batch out of the oven,  I was ready with a glass of milk.  I finished off a few hot, moist, amazing chocolate chip cookies just I had done 23 years before that.  My mom went to the couch with a few.  I sat on the ground next to her at her feet, with my cookies in a paper towel and a big glass a milk in hand.  She rubbed my head like only a mom could.  I felt safe, secure, happy, loved, and full.  I savored the moment.

This probably seems like a sad and odd story to share. I’m sure it seems strange too that I would write about this instead of the millions of other stories I have about my mom.  But I really loved that moment. For my mom and I, it really felt like we were in the eye of the storm.  Swirling around us was all the pain, the fear, the anger, the doubt, and the sheer exhaustion of what we were going through, but for about 15 minutes the storm clouds cleared and a “normal” moment appeared: A mom making her son some cookies.  Some of her famous cookies.

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“You’ve got to find what you love”

Published on April 29, 2008 in Uncategorized, business, mom and personal. Comments

I’m sure I’ve written on this speech one, two, or ten times already but for some reason it resurfaced this morning for me. I thought about it a little differently today. Steve pleads eloquently in the speech for us to blaze a path of passion in our lives:

Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.

But this morning it hit me: I don’t really know what this looks like or certainly not what this feels like. I’ve heard “follow your passion,” in about a million different ways, but the truth is this notion is really abstract for me. It’s like someone telling me “be a billionaire.” I might have some image in my head of what that may look like, and perhaps some ideas of what it may feel like, but ultimately I know almost nothing about living like a billionaire. The same is true for me when I hear people say “follow your passion.” I don’t know what that means, what that looks like, or where that is. So how do you get directions when you don’t know where you are going?

You get lost. I really want so badly for someone to sit me down and say “go there, do this,” but unfortunately this won’t work. It wouldn’t work for anyone. It reminds me a lot of the story my mom told me about learning to ride my bike. I tried to learn at a very early age, and I was determined to get it very quickly. I didn’t want to screw around with the process, I just wanted to ride. So after an hour or so of falling, I lost it. I screamed at my mom to just “tell me how to balance.” I felt that learning to balance was something you could be told how to do, as if my mom was holding the secret over me for her own enjoyment. That obviously was not the case. You have to feel your own way, fall a few (dozen) times, until it clicks.

The same is true for “finding what you love.” You can’t follow a recipe for success (although there is an enormous industry built on the premise that you can). There is no “one size” fits all here. But there are themes. I think you can read about, meet with, learn from those who apparently have found their way. I’m really interested in talking with and meeting more people who have “found what they love.” I know they can’t tell me how to do it, but perhaps I can learn a few tricks of their trade. This isn’t some ancient secret hidden from us all, this is something real people are doing everyday. I’m going to find my way, I figure I just might have to fall a few (dozen) times. It can’t hurt to talk to some people who already have their balance.

Dealing with bad news

Published on April 1, 2008 in grieving, links, mom and personal. Comments

There was an article in the WSJ this morning about supporting loved ones when they find out they have cancer. I immediately had opinions on the article because I remember my own experience very clearly with my mom.  I remember cleaning out my college apartment when she called me to give me the news, and I think my immediate reaction was somewhat selfish.  I reacted in a way I thought was right for her, I put on the “you can do this, you can fight this,” hat.  I was so absorbed in reassuring myself that I was completely unaware of what my mom needed at that moment.  Now I certainly won’t beat myself up for that because it was a really difficult thing to go through, but I think the article brings awareness to an important issue: how to offer support in a way that works for the person with the difficult news, not in a way that works just for you.

From the WSJ article:

“Loved ones don’t know what to do, and they don’t want to make a terrible error,” says Marisa Weiss, an oncologist and founder of Breastcancer.org, a nonprofit organization. “This fear keeps people from doing anything.”

While that’s the worst mistake you can make, experts say, there are a number of other slip-ups. Well-meaning friends and family members often ask inappropriate questions, such as the patient’s prognosis. They offer theories on why their loved one got sick, give unsolicited advice or insist that “everything is going to be just fine.”

That was certainly the case for my mom.  She chose to deal with cancer in a manner that shocked and maybe even frustrated a lot of people: She didn’t want to talk about it.  She wanted to have life just go on, she wanted to more or less ignore its presence as much as possible.  And she wanted everyone around her to do the same.  She didn’t want to be a “sick person,” she just wanted to be her usual self.  She didn’t want to go to support groups, she didn’t want to have people call her out of the blue to offer words of encouragement, she just wanted to feel normal.  This approach included not fully knowing the details of her illness.  She chose instead for the doctors to treat her as they saw fit, but to keep her in the dark.  She not only wanted to feel normal, she wanted to maintain a very positive attitude.  This really drove people crazy.  Actually at times it even drove me crazy.  “How can you not know what you’re up against,” some people would say.  But that wasn’t their question to ask.  It was my mom’s.

From my experience, the best advice:

In general, experts say, you should take your lead from the person who is sick. If she wants to talk about her illness, then listen. Don’t be afraid of emotions. “Being there, listening and being supportive is a powerful role,” Dr. Weiss says. “If the person feels comfortable crying in front of you, be honored, because you fulfilled a really important need.”

I broke that bit of advice many times.  I once had a bunch of my mom’s friends send her letters of support. She was not happy about that to say the least.  I missed what was most important to her in her fight…the feeling of normal.  I struggled…how could she not want words of encouragement from so many that love her? Because normal life provided her the encouragement she wanted.  Extra attention from others made her feel sick, more vulnerable.  I didn’t understand then.  I do now.

In retrospect I hold a tremendous amount of respect for my mom’s approach.  It had to be SO hard to not know the details (especially for such an inquisitive person).  The unknown is a scary thing, especially when it relates to your health.  But there’s even more genius in her approach.  Not just because it allowed her to stay positive, and not just because it empowered her mind to think she was healthier than she actually was, but because it was ultimately HER way of dealing with it.  Not mine.  Not Tom’s.  Not her friends.  Hers.

Dealing with bad news is hard enough, offer support to someone as they need it, not how you think you would.

Relationships: they’re work (in a good way)

Published on March 25, 2008 in mom and personal. Comments

I had a long talk with my sister this morning about relationships and it reminded me of something my Mom used to tell me: relationships (of all kinds) take work.  I’m amazed really at how easily people forget this (myself definitely included).  Expecting a relationship, whether between you and your significant other or your friend or sibling or children, to just be great all the time without any effort is crazy.  It’s the same as expecting to be in tip top shape physically without ever going to the gym. It just doesn’t happen.  Yes, some people are more naturally gifted and can stay more physically fit without any work just as some relationships just naturally click better than others, but those are the exception and not the rule.

I consider myself lucky to have an amazing girl like Julie in my life, and we do get along very well.  Actually I think we have a pretty good relationship.  It is not perfect by any measure, but I the foundation is good..we love each other and we like to be around each other.  I just realized recently that life had done its part to dull things for us.  It’s not that things got worse, it’s just that we stopped putting effort into the relationship.  I try to spend at least an hour a day on my body at the gym, but recently I have not even spent that much time deepening my relationship with her.  Now we both are very busy, and it is hard when we finally connect around 9pm after a long day to do much other than talk a little and watch some tv.  I suspect this is the case for lots of couples, and I can only imagine it gets more difficult when you have kids. But it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see why we have recently felt a little distant, why things don’t feel like they did when we first got together.  It’s not because we don’t care for each other, and it’s not because we don’t work well together, it’s because we’re not putting in any effort.  Relationships, good ones, take work (movies are wrong).

If you’re spending more time on your blackberry writing emails than you are talking with your significant other, it’s only a matter of time before things “don’t feel like they used to.”  I’m not saying you have to give up everything else in your life, I’m just saying you don’t expect to get washboard abs by avoiding the gym so why do you expect your relationships to just be great without any effort?

How do you start working on it?  I’m not sure exactly, but talking is a pretty good place to start.  Ask them what’s on their mind, what’s going on their life, what they like, what they want from the relationship…and then see where it goes from there.

I know this is a subject most people don’t like to talk about (guys especially), and I think that’s the problem.  It was on my mind, so I posted it…

Happy Birthday Mom

Published on March 10, 2008 in grieving, mom and personal. Comments

(from my trip last weekend to Deep Creek Lake, MD)
So my mom would have turned 55 today.  It’s hard to believe a 3rd birthday has passed since her death.  I definitely do miss her everyday, but it’s strange how life goes on.  It is so weird to see all the cards and letters I saved from her yellow in age.  I forget that she never saw me move to New York, that she never met my beautiful little niece Olivia or my crazy dog Izzy (she always told me I wasn’t ready for a dog until I had a yard).  I forget that we haven’t been able to discuss so many amazing events that have occurred in my life over the last 3 years.  I forget that life has gone on without her.

I guess that is what life is supposed to do, go on, but it sure is hard to let go sometimes.  Part of me loves each moment that ticks by because I notice her absence a little bit less, but the other part of me hates those ticking moments for the very same reason.

I am very grateful for how my life is at the moment.  I feel very lucky to have such wonderful people around me, to have so much freedom and opportunity to do things I love, to live in an amazing city, and to travel at will.  I owe so much of that to you mom.  Happy Birthday…it’s another year we’re apart but you’re certainly not forgotten.

Put it in perspective

Published on December 17, 2007 in mom. Comments

So today I really have felt sort of down in the dumps.  I’ve had some things come up related to work that weren’t good, and part of me really just wanted to crawl under a rock and disappear.  Actually to be honest, I just wanted something to fix it all for me…That started a chain reaction, where everything felt like it was going down the toilet.  But outlook is a choice, it’s a choice of perspective.  I can look at everything and see the bad, or I can look at everything and see the opportunity.  In the past, I was just overwhelmed emotionally in situations like this, and react the same quickly: I head for the exit. I didn’t have a choice, now I do.

Instead of just going down the same path, I’m aware of the situation, how it makes me feel, and how I want to act.  It helps to put everything in perspective.  Sometimes things seem scarier than they really are.   Nothing is impossible to deal with.  I sit here thinking of where I was 2 years ago almost to the day, and I’m quickly reminded of the power of perspective. I was sitting at my old house, listening to my mother’s last few breaths rattling through the hallway upstairs, bracing for my final moments with her.  That was a scary moment.  Actually that was a moment so full of emotion, I’m still dealing with it all today.  But I came through it, and I’m so much better for it.  So what am I so afraid of at this moment?  It seems to me that the monster in the closet we’re so afraid of usually doesn’t even exist.  We were just scared of our own thoughts.

2 year ago…

Published on October 24, 2007 in mom and personal. Comments

IMG_0684
(this pic was taken at the lake erie house mentioned below…taken in Jan of 06)

It came and I didn’t even catch it. I really can’t believe it’s been almost 2 years since my mom passed away. Roughly 2 years ago today, I entered the most difficult period of my life. The point where my mom’s battle with breast cancer went from something I knew that would work itself out to something that consumed my life for the next month.

I remember it so clearly. Julie and I had been fighting and we were driving up to her parent’s house at Lake Erie. Then the silence in the car was shattered by the ring of my cell phone. It was Tom, my mom’s fiance, calling, which I immediately knew wasn’t good. My heart sunk into my shoes. I answered with a fake “I”m ok voice,” and he told me he was in Houston with my mom, he had Andrea (my sister) on the line as well, and that my mom had a seizure yesterday. He went on..”they did some test, and the cancer has spread to your mother’s brain.” Wow, did it hurt. You can never really imagine how you’ll feel when you hear words like that about someone you love so much. I think I went into shock because I remained somewhat calm. Tom got off the phone and I talked with Andrea for awhile. We both were somewhat calm, and actually did our best to remain positive. I felt my spirits lift a bit, my mom was one tough cookie and I knew that some people made it through seemingly impossible odds, so why not her? Julie pulled off the highway into a Burger King parking lot and I got off the phone. Then I lost it. Never cried so hard in my life, my arms were shaking, my legs were shaking, and I couldn’t catch my breath. It was truly one of those surreal moments you could never imagine, where you are filled with such deep, intense emotions. It was something I’ll certainly remember for the rest of my life.

It’s a story that highlights the power of perspective, and how quickly things can turn on a dime. Literally moments before the call, Julie and I were at arm’s length arguing about who knows what, I was stressed and overwhelmed with how things were going with my business, and I was fighting off those anxious voices in my head saying “you’ve got to do this, and got to do that….” They all went away the moment I saw my caller-id. Sometimes life sends you a wake up call…”hey step out of the muck, and look at the big picture for a moment…what really matters most to you?”

My post from that weekend 2 years ago

My post from last year (which just reading now I realized is very similar to what I’ve written above)

Today’s a game

Published on October 18, 2007 in business, goals, mom, personal and uniqe ability. Closed

(via mecredis on flickr under cc)

As I was sitting eating lunch and thinking about my last post I had somewhat of a revelation. I really don’t like work.

Looking back on my first business, Enviar, I didn’t start that as a business. I really started that with the approach of “this puzzle looks fun.” It was more like I see this piece and I see this piece, and I see that no one else is putting them together but if I do I win (and get paid). So I tried it, and it worked, so I tried it again and worked…and off it went. I gained momentum, I gained contacts in the industry, and I made some money, all while solving these puzzles. But something happened along the way…Some sort of pressure started coming in. I guess it was the “shoulds.”

Somewhere along the way I started saying “well you should do this,” and you “should be doing that.” And suddenly it didn’t feel like a puzzle anymore, it started to feel like work. I guess I define work as stuff you HAVE to do that isn’t fun, and that is how this started to feel. But coupled with the shoulds (I should keep working on this), I stuck with it. I told myself I have to work to make this work, and I should not stop. This is when I started hitting coffee shops for “work.” After all, you can’t do work at home and you’re supposed to be doing work at least from 8am to 5pm. Somewhere along the way this rule became ingrained in me. I’m supposed to be working from 8am to 5pm, no exceptions. So ever since then I’ve made it a habit to do work at that time, and usually most of it at a coffee shop (because again, work needs a “formal” place).

But the interesting thing for me looking back is I can now see where things went awry. I started treating everything like work (which I hate) instead of like a game/puzzle (which I love), and you can get a lot further in life when each day is another exciting puzzle instead of just another day at work.

How can you make today a game?

Long time…

Published on October 4, 2007 in business, future, mom and personal. Closed

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(shot at sunset in Guanacaste, Costa Rica…beautiful place)

It’s been awhile since I last posted to this blog. It’s not because I’ve been particularly busy, it’s just that I fell out of that “blogging state of mind,” where you can constantly see blog worthy topics in your day to day life.

Anyway, those of you who know me and have followed this blog know that over the last almost 2 years now, since my mom passed away, I’ve really been spending a lot of time thinking about “my purpose.” After my mom passed away, it really became important for me to do things that had a deeper meaning, a deeper connection to who I am and what I have to offer, than just to do things for the sake of being busy. I put myself in between quite a rock and a hard place: I wouldn’t act unless there was meaning, and I couldn’t find meaning if I wasn’t acting. I guess this was just my route through the “dark, dark wood.”

The “dark, dark, wood,” is that very confusing, self journey that we all go through at some point or another in our lives. If you’ve ever asked “what am I doing with my life.” or “how can I be happy?” Then you most likely have spent some time here, but believe it or not, it’s a very good thing. It’s your time spent there where you dig deep within, asking key questions about who you are, what drives you, what pleases you, what triggers anger, sadness, action. It’s the place where you can really learn who you are. I’ve spent a lot of time there over the last few years. I want to be clear that I have been pretty happy over this time, actually very happy. I just always felt an itch of confusion about my life that I’ve been working through. An itch that led me to really ask “what should I do next?”

I was fortunate that itch led me to ask a lot of powerful questions, and to seek advice from some very smart people. That itch led me to the place where I am now: a moment of clarity. I know what I want to do next. I want to focus on inspiring others to go into the “dark, dark wood,” and come out on the other side with the same sense of empowerment and clarity I feel now.

So with that said, the question is: Where do I begin? How do I build a sustainable (and profitable) enterprise around solving this problem for others? How have people answered the question “what should I do with my life,” in the past? How can I make it better. It’s all a complicated puzzle that I look forward to trying to solve…