What Do You Do With Fear?

Thought this was a really good perspective on fear.

“You have two options:

Forget Everything And Run

Or

Face Everything And Rise”

It the old fight or flight!

– Running may be good when you can avoid a devastating fight and get yourself and your loved one to safety.

– But sometimes you don’t have that option and you have to “fight the good fight” and overcome the devils you face. 

Everyone is afraid of something(s) and/or somebodies. 

If someone isn’t afraid then they are brain dead!

Strengthen yourselves, ready yourselves, and pray. 

What do you fear and how will you face it? 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Help Is Coming

So I used to have a boss who said something really funny.

He used to go, “Everybody says they want to help us” and then bemoaningly he would seem to repeat that a few times. 

The next part which he didn’t need to explicitly say was that “But no one does!”

It was the words, but also much the tone–yes, the walls could be caving in, the ship could be sinking, everything going up in flames, and of course, everyone is there looking on, shaking their heads pitifully, and seemingly stretching out their hand in an offer of help. 

For this boss though, the help couldn’t come fast enough or with enough resources to help resolve all the issues going on at the time. 

I suppose first and foremost, we have to help ourselves. 

Secondly, there needs to be a core understanding from the beginning of what is really doable and what is simply fantasy fare. 

Third, if help is on the way–great, but it’s got to be timely enough and come with enough raw horsepower to make a genuine difference. 

Finally, sometimes miracles do happen and everything works out great–the day is saved–but even then so much underlying damage has been done that you need to rebuild from the core foundations again. 

And for the next time, you’ll need to ensure capabilities beyond what was ever imagined before. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Helping Kids To Stand On Their Own

So my wife and I have a longstanding disagreement on the best way of teaching children. 

Her perspective:

TEACH TO CARE – Get the kids to do them for themselves, learn to be independent, by doing they learn to stand on their own two feet, don’t baby them, by teaching them to do for themselves you are caring for the kids, if you jump every time they ask then there is no reason for them to try themselves.

His perspective:

CARE TO TEACH – Do for the kids when they are young, by showing them how then they start to learn how to do it for themselves later in life, children need to be shown love and caring so they can learn to one day care for themselves as well as for others, by loving and giving selflessly to children they learn that they are valuable human beings and grow to a healthy maturity. 

The reality:

CARE AND TEACH – We need to show care and love to children, but also need to teach them to do for themselves. We can’t smother children nor can we send them out into the world unprepared. Care for them at an early age, show them how, and then give them opportunities to do it for themselves and become full adults. 

Like with most things in marriage, and relationships in general, the bringing together of two heads and hearts is better than just one alone. We balance each other, complement each other, and synergize each other–one is alone and deficient, two is together and with G-d making three, it is a whole. 

And always tell your wife she was right. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Kid’s Games, For Survival Mostly

Some nights, I dream of fighting and others of running for my very life.  

This last night, I woke up from the dream, and thought how these instincts of fight or flight are so pervasive in our lives, and even in our sleep. 

But more than that, we are literally from the youngest age, programmed for survival (of the fittest). 

Ok, here’s a simple hypothesis about kid’s play:  

Kid’s play is not just play, but rather the preparation through acting out of these basic human survival instincts.

At it’s core, kids games mimic the fundamental human tendencies of fight or flight. 

Think for a second of some of the most popular games that kids play…the ones that mostly have been around forever, and kids from the youngest of ages gravitate too.

Tag — Running after from someone else running after you. 

Hide and Go Seek — Running to hide from someone looking to find you.

Play Fighting — Fighting an opponent to see who is stronger and can overcome the other. 

Action Figures — Often superheroes and villians that once again, fight each other.

Dress Up — Girls often dress as the beautiful princesses to be admired by boys who are in turn dressed as (macho) heroes that seek to protect them. 

Video Games — The most popular ones, first-person shooter (fighting) and racing (running away, faster than anyone else, and over the finish line or into the safety zone). 

Whether we are playing games, sleeping and dreaming, or going about our daily life activities, make no mistake, we are in survival mode. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Monday Blues

This was a funny sign on the large computer display overhung in a prominent medical facility around Washington, D.C. 

I remember as a kid, Monday’s were notorious for being called “Blue Monday.”

Further, Blue Mondays were in stark contrast to Sunday Fundays!

Already on Sunday evenings, many people would start getting the doldrums and sort of want to just mellow after 5 or 6 pm–I think mostly to deal with the anxiety of a new week. 

My father always used to tell me never to worry, instead to have faith in G-d that he will always do what is best for you–essentially, that faith and fear do not mix. 

I don’t know about wanting to “break up” with Monday, but it would sure be nice if the week instead started with Tuesday. 😉

(Source Photo: Dannielle Blumenthal)

Sweet Sweat, Bitter Blood

General George S. Patton had a saying that “The more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war.”

And while we shouldn’t sweat the small and unimportant stuff in life, we also can’t afford to overlook those things that are really important like our health, spiritual well-being, modest prosperity to care for ourselves and loved ones, and of course ensuring freedom and justice for all people.

It’s a balancing act to do everything and it takes hard work to try and be successful on so many fronts of life.

Some success strategies:

– Be aware of what’s going on around you–we live in a dynamic world and things are constantly changing.

– Work hard to always have a positive impact–it’s too easy to be negative and cynical, give up trying, and throw in the towel.

– Learn from mistakes–everyone makes them.

– Hope for the best, but also train and prepare for the worst–because you never really know.

Overall, I think the picture above says it well: It’s better to sweat in training, than bleed in battle.

So listen to the General: sweat now–really work it and don’t be afraid to push your limits–you’ll be glad you did, when the time comes and it really counts. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

What Happened To My Shoes?

So yesterday, I was on one of the hikes of my life.

After a certain period of time, I said that we had had better head back, leaving ourselves enough energy to make the return trek.

But after a number of times at this mountain, my daughter was determined to make it to the major overlook and do “the full circuit.”

I was so impressed with her determination and enthusiasm that I too caught “the bug” to just do it!

So we went and went–marker after marker–laughing, sort of, about how far we were really going–and would have to return.

But the weather was good–it had cooled off–and we felt that we could get there, and back, with some pushing.

At one point, we hit the summit, and put our rock on the tall pile with the others left by those before us, and we went on to make it to the overlook.

We took some pictures and sat down on the rocks to take it all in–it was magnificent.

Then I casually look down at my hiking shoes, and notice something–the rubber soles had actually come loose from the rest of the shoe–on both feet.

My first thought–great products, not! from this company–darn it. 😦

My second thought–%^(*#$ how am I going to get back in broken shoes?

Making a long story short, the shoes were wobbling over the rocks, tree trunks, and terrain–and I prayed that I did fall or end up getting stuck barefoot in the hills.

G-d was good to me and we made it back and I headed straight to the hiking store to get my money back for the shoes–I literally took them off at the counter and handed them in tatters to the customer service rep.

Now without shoes in the store, I walked around in socks to the shoe section and picked out a new pair–yay!

Some lessons:

– Enthusiasm is catchy and can spark you to do things you wouldn’t normally think you could achieve.

– Never say never–who would think your hiking shoes would literally fall apart in the middle of a hike, but they can and did!

– Always be prepared–mentally and physically–for all sorts of eventualities; life doesn’t just go the way we expect or want.

– Thank G-d for a happy ending–because it could easily go the other way.

– And finally don’t buy brand X for your hiking shoes–they really stink! 😉

(Source Photo: Rebecca Blumenthal)

When Aliens Come Calling

This is an out-of-this-world topic that I don’t think I have written about before…ALIENS–no seriously!

MSNBC ran an interview with Seth Shostak, the chairman of the International Academy of Astronautics’ SETI Permanent Study Group (27 June 2012).

SETI is the well-known orgnaization that conducts the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence–they employ 150 scientists, educators and support staff, and their projects have been sponsored by NASA, Department of Energy, U.S. Geological Survey, and many technology companies like HP, Sun, and more.

At SETI, they monitor radio transmissions and telescope observations for signals that “cannot be ascribed to noise.”

According to Shostak, he believes that we will detect alien signals by between 2025 and 2030, although he acknowledges that searching for alien life in the cosmos in like looking for a needle in a haystack, and it “never occurs when you expect them.”

However with advances in technology (specifically computer processing), we will get closer to be able to monitor “all-sky, all the time, all frequencies,” rather than searching a specific star system, for a specific time, at specific frequencies.

The really interesting question posed though is what happens if we actually detect an alien signal?

Apparently, most of the planning, according to Shostak is for the initial protocols for alerting everyone and even then “it takes something on the order of five days” to assess whether it is real or not.

The big concern is that “nobody is in charge” for handling such a global…no, intergalactic event.

And, he says “I don’t think there’s any large-scale effort to prepare humanity.”

Maybe, it’s that we don’t believe or want to believe that this eventuality will ever really occur.

Perhaps, it’s too frightening to think of ourselves as the native Americans being invaded by colonials with superior technology and firepower.

Yet according to a National Geographic survey, more than a third (36%) of people surveyed think aliens exist. And how many more people are afraid to admit it?

Aliens could be a good thing–coming here benevolently to share with us or they could act alien and try to take from us. From our own Earthly experiences, it seems the latter is far more likely.

We have a lot of fingers and weapons pointed at each other all time, I wonder whether we need to spend more time and effort thinking, planning, and preparing for something much more scary and threatening than each other.

(Source Photo: here with attribution to Chris at Oblong Pictures)

A Race To The Future

This last week, we learned of the new defense policy that shifts the U.S. from a full two war capability to a “win-spoil” plan, where we have the ability to fight one war, but still disrupt the military aspirations of another adversary elsewhere.

While we would all like to have unconstrained capabilities for both “guns and butter”, budget realities do not permit limitless spending on anything or anytime.

The Wall Street Journal (7-8 January 2012) had an interesting editorial that cautioned against reduced military spending and latched on specifically to focusing too much on the Asia-Pacific region and somehow neglecting other danger spots around the globe.

Basically, the author says it is dangerous for us to put all our proverbial eggs in one basket. As he writes, this single-focus approach or “strategic monism” is predicated on our ability to accurately predict where the trouble spots will be and what defensive and offensive capabilities we will need to counter them.

In contrast, the author promotes an approach that is more multifaceted and based on “strategic pluralism,” where we prepare ourselves for any number of different threat scenarios, with a broad array of capabilities to handle whatever may come.

What is compelling about this argument is that generally we are not very good at forecasting the future, and the author points out that “the U.S. has suffered a significant surprise once a decade since 1940” including Pearl Harbor (1941), North Korea’s invasion of the South (1950), the Soviet testing of the Hydrogen bomb (1953), the Soviet resupply of Egypt in the Yom Kippur War (1973), the Iranian Shah’s fall from power (1979), the Soviet Union collapse (1991), and the terrorist attacks of 9-11 (2001).

Similarly, Fortune Magazine (16 January 2012) calls out “the dangers inherent in…long-term forecasting” and points how almost comically “the 1899 U.S. patent chief declares that anything that can be invented has been.”

The Fortune article goes on to say that a number of the experts interviewed for their Guide To The Future issue stated that “cyberterrorism, resource shortages, and political instability around the world are all inevitable.”

In short, the potential for any number of catastrophes is no more relevant now in the 21st century, than at any other time in history, despite all our technological advances and maybe because of it.

In fact, Bloomberg Businessweek (19-25 December 2012) actually rates on a scale of low to high various threats, many of which are a direct result of our technology advancement and the possibility that we are not able to control these. From low to high risk–there is climate change, synthetic biology, nuclear apocalypse, nanotechnology weaponry, the unknown, and machine super intelligence.  Note, the second highest risk is “unknown risks,” since they consider “the biggest threat may yet be unknown.”

So while risks abound and we acknowledge that we cannot predict them all or forecast their probability or impact accurately, we need to be very well prepared for all eventualities.

But unfortunately, being prepared, maintaining lots of options, and overall strategic pluralism does not come cheaply.

In fact, when faced with weapons of mass destruction, threats to our homeland, and human rights abuses is there any amount of money that is really enough to prepare, protect, and defend?

There is no choice but to take the threats–both known and unknown seriously–and to devote substantial resources across all platforms to countering these. We cannot afford to be caught off-guard or prepared to fight the wrong fight.

Our adversaries and potential adversaries are not standing still–in fact, they are gaining momentum, so how much can we afford to recoil?

We are caught between the sins of the past in terms of a sizable and threatening national deficit and an unpredictable future with no shortage of dangers.

While everyone has their pet projects, we’ve got to stop fighting each other (I believe they call this pork barrel politics) and start pulling for the greater good or else we all risk ending up on the spit ourselves.

There is no option but to press firmly on the accelerator of scientific and technological advancement and break the deficit bounds that are strangling us and leap far ahead of those who would do us harm.

(All opinions my own)

(Source Photo: here)

Vigilance on a Wrist

I just wanted to share this product with readers of my blog.

It is the Vigilant Emergency Wrist Alarm.

At the press of a button, you activate a piercing alarm (up to 30 minutes) and flashing locator lights right from this wrist band.

While I am not endorsing any particular vendor or product, this type of self-defense product can really be important.

This could potentially save the lives of loved ones about to be violently attacked, abducted, or even raped, G-d forbid.

From the Amazon site, I was impressed also to see that a portion of each sale is even donated to missing children’s funds.

At a price of only $16.99 per wrist alarm, how much is there really to think about?

Stay safe out there!