Seasonal Paradise

Keep Getting Back Up

To my daughters: Resilience is key. Failure will never overtake you if your determination to succeed is strong enough! I hope you'll have the chance to do a sales job early-on in your career. Every no just brings you closer to a yes. Success is a numbers game really, once you have the right strategy in life. Its just about resilience, and focus and having the self-awareness to continually adapt and grow stronger.

Cheeky Gregory's Coffee in New York

Gregorys Coffee in New York are very cheeky.  When they saw my Starbucks mug they pointed it out to me, and then after I left, I noticed the cheeky buggers had put a Gregory's sticker on my mug.  Outrageous.  Love it!  Good for them.  How can your company breed that kind of brand-pride amongst its employees?




They're the yin to Starbucks yang.  They've effectively looked at the flaws in Starbucks business and out-Starbucked them.  Here's the main things I've noticed.

Walk-in Experience
Starbucks: Long line.  Wait, kick heels, feel slightly neglected.
Gregory's: Long line, but crazy fast service.  Within 5 seconds of walking in the door someone has taken my order.  Definitely not feeling at all neglected here, and the people are a little more perky and happy, and enjoying the busy-ness.

Coffee
Starbucks: Consistently good.
Gregorys: Consistently great!

Look n Feel
Starbucks:  Green and brown.  Armchairs, wood chairs.  
Gregorys:  Gray, dark purple, black, bright lights. Benches and steel chairs.  Not necessarily better, just a contrast to Starbucks.

Baristas
Starbucks:  Sometimes a little tired. 
Gregorys:  They seem a bit more involved, fun and irreverant.

Food
Starbucks:  Caged, refrigerated and packaged.  
Gregorys:  Fresh baked, not packaged or refrigerated.  The one on 46th Avenue and 5th even has a bakery in the back...



Here's an example of how Gregory's one-ups employee morale.  Over Valentines they ran a promotion.  Bring in a Valentines card or gift for the baristas, and get a free coffee.  Showing the love.  Nice!  

Gregorys tagline is we 'see coffee differently.'  I think they do.  

 

Freddie Combs, X Factor Voice

Irena and I are losing 38 lbs between us.  Freddie Combs has already lost 380lbs and has another ~300lbs to go!  

 
Freddie Combs, 40. Auditions #6 ~ The X Factor... by HumanSlinky

Plane Crash Proposal

We love this.

 

Whipple On Happiness

Tom Whipple at The Times writes about happiness.  Here’s the summary of his advice…

 

1 Whatever you do, don’t try to be happy

Happiness is a bit like an erection.  You can only get it when you are thinking about something else. Helping others only boosts happiness if you are not in it for yourself. Viktor Frankl, a Holocaust survivor, said: “Happiness cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself.”

2 A story or an experience?

A man listened to a symphony in a state of bliss. As it approached the climax, a scratch on the disc produced a horrible sound. “It ruined the whole experience.”  We love stories with happy endings. This has big implications for happiness. Take parenting.

3 Fast cars are overrated

Rich nations are no happier, on average, than poor ones (once basic needs are met. Contentment increases in line with pay until a threshold of £58,700, then levels off.

4 Don’t live under a flight path
Noise pollution is a catastrophe for happiness. In ruins our emotional equilibrium and creates nasty physiological effects, such as elevated cortisone

5 Would you enter the Matrix?
Would you plug yourself in? Most people say “no” prefering a real life, even one that is less happy, provided it was authentic. We should decide on what we really believe before living our lives, not the other way around.

Full article at The Times

St Peters Cathedral

Valentines visit to St Peters and The Vatican.

Two Versions Of 'The Story Of Stuff'

The Story Of Stuff a la Annie Leonard

and 

The Story Of Stuff a la George Carlin

Focus, And Be Happier

An interesting Harvard study was reviewed in an article in today's NY Times. When the Mind Wanders, Happiness Also Strays. Apparently if you're focusing on something, you're more likely to be happy. Our  minds wander about half the time. The 2,200 people in the Harvard study reported that sex, exercise, listening to music, walking, eating and praying/meditating were the top 6 most enjoyable activities. When you do something you enjoy, your mind is less likely to wander. Endorphines are released with physical activity, to naturally make you feel good. So pay attention and be more aware...focus, hit the gym, and get outdoors more often.

We're All F*&^%ed, Unless...

We're F*&^%ed... If you believe what whistleblower Michael Ruppert (book: Confronting Collapse), and Matt Savinar (lifeaftertheoilcrash.net), and Cal Tech physicist David Goodstein (book: Out Of Gas) have to say about us passing our peak of oil production (in 2005) and this leading to our demise and that the end of civilization is due sometime this century because of the lack of power to support the human race ...Then we're kinda screwed. Not to mention the problem of global warming, water and food shortages.

I've been thinking about this over the last few days. Poor Sasha and Victoria.

But Irena and I have faith in the ingenuity of mankind. At the same time that we're running out of resources, we're building our life spans, markedly. Futurists Kurzweil and Grossman (book: Transcend – nine steps to living well forever) tell us that we should be able to extend our lives to hundreds of years, from the gene-therapy and nano-technology that will be rapidly developed in the next 25 years.

OPEC is sitting on a trillion barrels of oil which accounts for about 75% of the planet's supply. We're using upwards of 35 billion barrels a year. So sometime in the next 10 years the human race will finally 'get it' and understand that the game is up as far as oil is concerned, and some degree of panic will set in, which should wreck the financial markets. Growth can't occur without our power needs being met. The world population has boomed in the last century because of the proliferation of oil as a power source, and as a key ingredient in most of the consumer goods we consume and distribute around the globe.

Unless... It seems our best hope is in the work that is being done at Lawrence Livermore labs. (thanks for forwarding this to me Kevin, it made my year). By 2012 we should realize Nuclear Fusion. This just blows my mind! I just hope, we don't blow the planet up in the process. Even 'do no evil' Google is seeing the light, and has taken it upon themselves to invest $200 million into off-coast wind farms.

The other key to getting over oil, is getting local. Real local. And lowering our ridiculously insatiable consumerism. Ultimately, humans stand to gain from consuming less, and enjoying their local communities and resources more. We can stand to drive less, use public transportation more, and buy and live more locally. The developing world is less happy, less locally 'involved,' and more transient than ever before in history. As resources become depleted, it will force us to become more locally ingrained, and I think happier as a consequence. Those who do not find and foster more local ties, will simply perish, if Ruppert is right?

Irena and I are helping out by...

• Not having a car: we walk, cycle and use taxis and planes and buses

• Consuming locally grown goods and food as much as possible

• Wanting for little, but having everything we want, living (somewhat) minimally

• Using a distributed work force for our company, Courtland Brooks, zero commutes for everyone!

We're NOT helping out by...

• Consuming too much power, especially air conditioning: its hot in Malta!

• Flying frequently

We plan on doing better in the future by...

• Losing 10-20lbs body weight so we don't feel so hot in the summers and don't need quite so much air conditioning

• Condensing our travels so we cover more ground with less round trip flights. e.g. I'm visiting London, Toronto, L.A., San Fran, Dallas, Miami, Tampa, London, on a trip starting Thursday. Then we're staying put until the January iDate conference. Then April, then June. Sheesh, I guess we do travel a fair amount. What to do? Carbon offsets?

I still feel this is all rather feeble. What else can we do? What else can YOU do?

But Will It Make You Happy?

New studies of consumption and happiness show that people are happier when they spend money on experiences instead of material objects.

Emboldened by a Web site that challenges consumers to live with just 100 personal items, Ms. Strobel winnowed down her wardrobe and toiletries to precisely that number.  Today, her husband, Mr. Smith is completing a doctorate in physiology; Ms. Strobel happily works from home as a Web designer and freelance writer.  Income of ~$24k covers their bills. They're car-free but have bikes.  “I really believe that the acquisition of material goods doesn’t bring about happiness.”

“We’re moving from a conspicuous consumption — which is ‘buy without regard’ — to a calculated consumption,” says Marshal Cohen, an analyst at a retailing research firm.  Consumers saved 6.4% of their after-tax income in June. Before the recession, the rate was 1% to 2%.

“We buy a new house, we get accustomed to it,” says Professor Lyubomirsky, who studies “hedonic adaptation,” a phenomenon in which people quickly become used to changes, great or terrible, in order to maintain a stable level of happiness.  Over time, that means the buzz from a new purchase is pushed toward the emotional norm.  “We stop getting pleasure from it,” she says.  And then, of course, we buy new things.

Ms. Strobel, our heroine who moved into a 400-sq ft apartment, is now an advocate of simple living, writing in her spare time about her own life choices at Rowdykittens.com. 
FULL ARTICLE @ NY TIMES

Mark Brooks: Pigeons and whales.  I'm sometimes jealous of them.  They live simple lives with zero belongings.  They look happy enough.  I wonder if they think humans are silly?  Irena, Sasha, Victoria and I are car-less, and can fit most of our belongings into 4 suit cases now.  I realized 15 years ago that true happiness and fulfillment is in the experiential.  Everything else is mental chaff.  The things you own, end up owning you. 

Heroes: Jack LaLanne

In 1936 Jack opened a gym, and grew his company to 200+ gyms which became Bally's.  Here's Jack in his show from the 50's.  

and here he is at 95.

and here's a great article on him in Washington Post.

He's an inspiration.  I love his energy and passion for helping people find health and fitness.  He's one of my heroes. 

The Burj Birdmen

The best way to get perspective of how tall the incredible Burj Khalifa is, to jump off it. Fast forward to 4:15 for the jump.

My father lived in Abu Dhabi for 25+ years.  We considered moving to Dubai, but decided against it when we learned that many internet dating sites are blocked there.  That's not cool.  Its certainly not good for business.  We'll take a vacation there some time, and visit the Burj.  Our favorite tall building is still the Jinmao Tower. Our stay on the 76th floor in 2007 was just breathtaking.

Storytelling In 5 Minutes Flat

Today I filmed my first Online Personals Watch news summary in Prague.  It was pretty poor, but probably does the job.  It made me realise its not that easy being on camera.  Also, its tough to tell a story in 5 minutes.  However, some people have an incredible talent for story telling, like Ted Cheung.  This story managed to move me almost to tears.

Jackie Chan

Chinese acrobatics schools are VERY tough.  But Jackie Chan has pushed himself to ridiculous limits,  beyond anything even they could inflict upon him.