It has been one week since my official work responsibilities changed. Ten years of lesson plans and late-night grading sessions and “pressures” from various levels in an industry that doesn’t seem to want to succeed…all gone. It’s sort of miraculous. I woke up at my normal weekday-alarm time this morning, and instead of watching television or turning on the Xbox, I started thinking about what the people we admire have done to change themselves. I don’t mean celebrities, and I don’t mean the improbable success stories. I am talking about the people with whom we are in contact on a consistent basis. Real-life people, or, for those of you dividing your time between physical reality and cyber-reality, people IRL.

Today on Facebook I saw a Marine doing ab exercises that were clinically insane. Most of his movement involved a pull-up, but his core was so strong, he did all kinds of airwalks and anti-gravity stabilization-style stuff based on his abs, after he did the push-up. I found it amazing, and slightly ridiculous. However, I am not motivated by that. I am inspired by Holly, with whom I worked in possibly one of the most physically unhealthy environments around when I was in my early 20s–Mountaineer Casino. I worked night shifts, developed a taste for calorie-dense craft beer, and second-hand smoked an impressive amount, all while shuffling back and forth across a casino floor. Before I continue, let me clarify: I am not a victim of my environment, nor was I then. I’m just setting the stage.  That was quite a while ago.

I watched maybe thirty or forty seconds of the Marine’s workout until I moved on. I let my mind wander as I scrolled down the wall, I saw something from Holly, and I remembered a pic of when she ran a turkey trot in what seemed like god-awful weather (it’s 70 degrees in greater Little Rock as I type this), and I thought: here is someone who is doing. I messaged her and asked her a few questions about her motivation and what she does. Briefly, Holly didn’t feel great and after having children, her body wasn’t what she wanted. So she did something about it. Here is the best part: what she does is free. The catch? She does it. Seems simple enough, doesn’t it? Because we know each other, I asked her more questions, to kind of pick her brain a little bit, as everyone is different, but Holly is a motivator because she does it. Holly runs every day, lifts free weights, and does a little resistance training. She balances her workouts: some days are more running-intensive, and less strength/resistance-based. She keeps a workout log and keeps track of her food as well. I get excited when my phone shows that I covered more than two miles. For the day. Pitiful.

So, today is a day of doing. I’m not going to run six miles, as that would likely kill me, but I am taking a page from Holly’s book and starting an experiment on myself. I’ll let all of you in on it.

Holly, thanks for the information, and congrats on your transformation.

This week I was thinking of how quickly it all goes. When we’re not careful, thirty years have passed and we settle into retirement. I am not comfortable with this. I am not okay with just keeping my head down and my powder dry. There is too much to say. There is too much to show. In the last forty-eight hours, I have considered the following:

Rootofgood.com is a blog describing how a man retired at age 33. His wife retired not long after him, and although they have three kids, neither one of them broke the six-figure mark individually, yet the website describes in great detail how they saved more than 1.3 million in roughly ten years. Fascinating.

The amount of click-bait infused into a standard web-browsing experience is disconcerting. Yahoo has fallen mightily (and How!), but the last time I signed in, I was more than a little put off by how long I had to wait for the banner ads to load. All of us except for the few who entered marketing and advertising at the dawn of the Digital Age missed that boat. Most of us don’t realize the true extent of the barrage of modern advertising. How many ads did you ignore on your last five clicks? Exactly.

Unapologetically I have been nonstop absorbing Gary Vaynerchuk in his barrage of all current social media platforms. I’ll let you search and decide if he is for you, but I confess this: I haven’t listened to or read anyone like him. There is a positivity lurking just beneath a slightly vulgar exterior, and, truth be told, his proclivity for swearing is refreshingly honest for my consumer needs. I could give a shit about anyone else’s preferences.

Parting shot: I miss my Pittsburgh side-hustle. I miss it more than I thought I would. Seven years of additional food service (have I ever really left it, truly?) and the surreal and lucrative experience of cheesesteak slinging created a hole I cannot fill with intellectual pursuits. I need the comradery of The Line, and all the included shenanigans. 

Opportunities continue to arrive for me and mine, and I am excited to see what lurks. There is some sort of balance approaching. May we all embrace it.

One of the best scenarios ever is the Doomed Expedition. I gravitate toward any plot arcs that feature the mission destined to fail, or, better yet, the goal that can be reached, but only at such an extreme cost, it is hard to understand the value of that undertaking. Pyrrhic victories.

I think this resonates most with an audience sensitive to overwhelming odds, or to those susceptible to that little voice inside–that slim notion that suggests, “Do you think you can make it?” It’s an underdog setup, and to me, there is nothing more gratifying than the long shot. For what else are we here?

I have begun switching up my reading and my information consumption considerably over the last two weeks. Something has occurred to me: we aren’t coming back. This is it, kids. Seven-year-old Vince wasn’t riding his red BMX to the pool at Cannon Air Force Base, saying, “Boy, at 37 I hope I plateau in an industry designing its own demise. I can’t wait to settle for a mediocre salary and the slow death of my creative dreams.” And yet here we are. It’s a Doomed Expedition, but only if we close our eyes as the ride accelerates at the end. I have a tuck-and-roll loading.

The Doomed Expedition is one of the first stories I have begun to write for the book that is central. Essential. I have roughly thirteen vignettes set up so far, but I think the Story is so big that at some point, it is really going to write itself. All of you are part of it. You always were.

Radio silence on my end for a few weeks as I have been watching too much television and overconsuming. Middle-of-the-night wake-ups and the nagging feeling of would-be subatomic reactions and neurological firestorms, but not necessarily paired with direct action. Somethingsomethingsomething Kinetic vs Potential, et cetera.

This is the part where I impart some wisdom. This is the part where we alter our behavior. This is the part where a string of words creates a chain reaction in you and in me and years from now we remember this as the high-water mark. This is the part where everything smoldering explodes in a brilliant supernova and you destroy your old life.

Modern angst getting you down? Check out Gary Vaynerchuk. Super random encounter online and long-dead circuits began whirring again. This terrible machine is alive. I will never let it die again.

Esquire publishes “What I’ve Learned”–a collection of wit and wisdom from American icons. Some are more iconic than others. They are extended Top Ten lists, and mostly, they are great. 

However, it depends on the speaker. The voice of the Learned.

Every day I drive to work to a job that does not fulfill me, and I think about what I have learned. On the drive home, a similar pattern.

Disclaimers:

I’ve actively participated in CBT. I still do. I read voraciously. I am not pursuing my dreams right now. This is a holding pattern.

Today five of my favorite stayed after school to work ahead of their peers. They met the deadline others did not. Our easy laughter and their dedication to better themselves reminded me why this job matters, and why these moments count. Yet the draw remains. A mysterious pull towards an Other. It will be this way for a while.

November is ending again. This is the thirty-seventh one. December is a couple thousand miles, but the number of broken promises will be substantially fewer than before. 

There are yet a few things I have left to show you, friends. There is always more behind the curtain. Not just for me. For all of us. 

Draw your line. I’ll draw mine. Here: our fortifications.

For today’s exercise we will be working with a simpler time in your life

As I count backward 

(Ten)

Focus on your breathing

Pay attention to the sound of the fan

Or to the heat breathing from the register

(Nine)

Start with your arms and legs

Really feel them 

Acknowledge the weight they carry

And still feeling how much they push everyday

(Eight)

Return your focus to the long exhalations

In through your nose

Slight hold

And

Back 

Out 

Again

(Seven)

You and resting perfectly still

And paying attention to your breathing

You notice that it is quiet

So incredibly quiet

When you want it to be

(Six)

All of the things you think about

Worry about

Struggle with

They

Aren’t 

Here

(Five)

You are breathing and 

Focusing

On how you want to feel

Each moment

(Four)

The insanity of the constant race

Does not affect you here

In your only true sacred place

(Three)

Here you are

Even

Balanced

Free

(Two)

To become whatever you wanted to be

Before the world swallowed you up

Or you let it eat you every

Single 

Day

By the choices you make

Remember 

As you continue to breathe slowly

Focusing on the gradual release

And the realization that

(One)

You create the world around you

After spending more than a quarter of my life in a classroom, I have joined thousands of young people progressing through one of the hardest times in their lives, already in progress.

I started working in education at age 26, with is a non-traditional age to jump in.The eldest of my students from those early years are now in careers, and some have families. Some are pursuing their dreams, and others are hard at work figuring out what they would like to try next.

Through the years, it has been the evolution of the students that has been most rewarding. I’m not a great teacher, and I have many problems with the System, but I love learning.  My best days are completely off-the-cuff and most likely inspired by the most random of thoughts. The pay sucks (see also: ten years of extra jobs), the hours are long, and teaching is a continuous madness of non-stop change and failed initiatives. However, we don’t get anywhere at all unless we try. Oh, and how we try!

At some point, I believe the formula for this era of my life looked something like this:

Stage One of adult life: study/embrace/see something and put everything you have into it.

Stage Two of adult life: find out it’s nothing like you thought it would be.

One of my favorite things is learning what makes students tick, and, by proxy, sometimes sharing in their joys of life, however brief. This last year was full of big moments and transitions, and I left a school in which I was comfortable for a new life, with a lovely wife. Many days we miss our old haunts, and we really miss the larger-than-life personalities and energies of our students. Then, as often happens at the strangest times, unlikely opportunities present themselves, and new paths barely cleared must be followed for a while.

Today I pitched a perfect game in my classroom–the last year I will be in one. And it wasn’t that I was the most skilled player on the field, or that my unwavering dedication to the diamond lifted me above all obstacles. Today, simply, plainly, and sincerely, I and my scholars looked for some truths in our short time together, and we reveled in information and the little details that make each hour so interesting. I may not have a day like this again this year. I could have another one tomorrow. Who knows?

In peaceful reflection on the drive home, I encountered the foundation for the success of the day: you, dear students. Through the years, your energy lifted me during times of great duress and sadness and struggle, and I hope I beamed for you just enough in dark times that you understood what I really wanted for you: everything.

To the creators and the dreamers, to the wanderers and schemers, may you see the colors of each leaf in autumn, and I hope the changes you need start small–just enough that you can see them–and then I hope they radiate outward in successive supernovas until you can barely remember the times you thought you’d never pass.

This is a tip of the hat and a hand over my heart for our thousands of days together, stomping and splashing through the gutters of this wondrous life. I’m happy to have traveled next to you for a little while.

I woke up Wednesday to one of the worst sicknesses I’ve had in more than ten years.

I spent 96 hours, give-or-take, between the couch and the bed, with weird, brief media breaks.

I wrote my resignation (beautifully, I might add), steeled myself and said, “Now, now, the best are still ahead of us, likesay,” and turned the corner healthwise sometime after Saturday afternoon. 

I woke up Sunday, had coffee with my wife, and remembered that there is only so much time in these flesh bags. I time-capsuled my quittin’ papers for the time being, and went back to looking for more Things to Learn.

Each day is a gift. I’ll unwrap them accordingly while powering my heart and mind. 

Join me?

I boarded the couch

And skipped the nighttime medicine

This time

Two days without a drop of booze

Has done wonders for clarity

If only everyone else aligns

With my rings

I can semi-guarantee harmony

But I cannot offer assurances

Just rounding three a.m.

I wish the coach would wave me in

Frantically

I have waited to slide home for years

“‘We’re short-term thinkers,’ Stallman says.’Do you remember when Microsoft said, ‘Where do you want to go today?’ I said, ‘How do you want to live in five or 10 years?’ That’s our question.”

Taken from the November/December issue of Psychology Today

I have been looking for something for two days. Technically, it’s been more like eight years instead of two days, but these last two days have really been revelatory. While social media posts of impending doom and fear and anguish grip the nation due to a certain president-elect, I have fully realized a search for Freedom not felt since childhood. Here, an explanation:

I work with teenagers. Neuroscience and behavioral psychology tell us what to expect from teenagers, if in sweeping generalizations. Of course there are exceptions, and I truly have had exceptional exceptions, but generally speaking, the aforementioned sciences do a pretty good job of identifying the constructs and challenges one might face should one work with teenagers. Now, something that many models get wrong: poverty, abuse, and/or drug use will radically skew all known models of neuroscientific and behavioral evidence. No matter how many alterations of studies might be performed on test groups, poverty, abuse, and/or drug use will render all suppositions nearly completely useless. This is a major reason why teachers vacate the profession in the first five years. There is no way to simulate the insane range of abilities and background a teacher will encounter in his or her students.

It’s no surprise that teenagers push back against what they perceive to be authority figures. This impulse is natural and nurtured. At some point, a teenager will resist “the system,” regardless of system. My current students have it all figured out, just like those before them, just like we did, and those before us, and so on. Nothing new there.

What happens when you are in your late thirties and you can see another twenty years ahead, and it is the same bullshit with which you have been dealing for ten years already? What if you can escape most of your chains and challenge the prescribed rut you helped build for yourself? Do you do it? Can you? How many have?

I see it, friends. I see the Trap clearly. Teacher Retirement System. Employer-matched contributions. Healthcare. Insurance. “Job security.” Never mind happiness: Industry and Market tell us to make ourselves happy. To find joy and peace outside work. Guess what? It’s not happening. I’ve been around the block a few times, too. I know when it’s me. I know when I am defeating myself and setting myself up to lose. I know when my behavior is destructive and obstructing my path. It’s not me this time.

What are the real reasons we stay in jobs we dislike? Financial obligations? Sure. Too much debt makes it unwise to throw caution to the wind. I get it. What if debt is eliminated? Still necessary to stay in the disliked job? “Oh, stop. Everyone dislikes his or her job. It’s called ‘Work.'” Perhaps…but I suspect that interview did not include people without debt who pursued their passions. I’m guessing those people are too busy enjoying life and doing what they should be doing, instead of willfully staying in the rut.

I do not possess the genius of Richard Stallman, MIT-affiliated software developer, and the source of the introductory quote. Stallman is largely responsible for GNU, and by proxy, Linux. The article in Psychology Today is utterly fascinating for its focus on Stallman’s eccentricities and unwavering stoicism. I do not have his level of intellect, not do I have his resources. However, Stallman is just like anyone else who is awake in the Matrix. Once you are up, it is impossible to go back to sleep.

When we are adults, I believe we sacrifice freedoms we forget we have. We were too busy worrying about 18, then 21, then maybe that sweet insurance discount at 25. We skipped past the part where there is a gigantic section of adult life in the folder “Do What You Want.” No offense to those of you with children, as your folder looks a little different from mine.  I really think it is this simple: Are you happy with what you are doing? If so, keep it up. If not, well…why are you still doing it?

What I have been looking for these last two days/eight years is permission. I forgot how to Do Something Different. I think it is time. I think TRS and matched contributions and healthcare and insurance and job security are going to have to take a back seat. I think it is time to live again, not just count down days until the end of a contract, the end of a school year, the trail to a once-a-year planned vacation, the end of life. I’m tired of counting. I’m ready to build.