BASTARD VEGAS HAMSTER WHEEL

It was the world series… of poker in Vegas, I was there for a month and I was not down with the get down.

I was not growing into anything, just a surviving human in a pretty jacked up situation driving into the brightest lights and the saddest souls. I just knew this was not the story I was meant to live. Surely the world is made of more beauty and purpose than the exchange of way too much cash, the hustling of sex and the illusion of a party.

The vibe pushed down on me, it made me sad for everyone who lived to work, worked to party and partied to escape work… and the hamster wheel rolls on and on. We are infinitely capable human beings, can’t we jump off of that wheel and choose our lives? We can choose to live better, to value people and not things, to cultivate with intentionality all of the things inside of us that we breathe in and out into the world.

Vegas came to an end, I got back to Nashville and broke up with the dude that insisted I go to Vegas in the first place. From there I flew to Hawaii, and began working on a project meant to help people that feel stuck in life. I met with athletes who had been cut from their teams and lost the one thing they believed gave them value, a father who had lost his wife to cancer, girls in abusive relationships, people in office jobs that were making them feel pointless and depressed, drug addicts. So many people, so many stories, so many untold stories from people no one would have thought were struggling. I found that people hadn’t told their stories, or really talked to anyone about what was really brewing inside of them because there is this pervasive idea that people only like and want to spend time with happy people.

I wanted to challenge this idea. I wanted to find a way to give purpose to the pain.

Film can make things seem real; exposing the reality and the isolating idea that you are the only one struggling in a particular way. It can challenge ideas we’ve held about people we haven’t understood, and help us explore a deeper connection to each other. So, let’s just say working in film beats Vegas all day everyday.

(Originally written for http://www.fancyrhino.com)

You’re a good man (Charlie Brown)

I was listening to this guy talk a few weeks ago, and he said that when he was a kid his father would always tell him that he was great at sticking it through the tough times, that he was one of those people that would always rise to the occasion. He said that he may not have actually been that guy when he was a boy, but because his father just kept telling him this good narrative about who he was, that he really did become that guy.  I was thinking about that tonight as I was gearing up to write out notes to my family and a few friends for Christmas, and you know… it seems like a good time to say some nice things.

There is one person I wasn’t feeling too keen on writing anything super nice to, but I started thinking about how there is a reason for why everyone is they way they are, and we should consider writing or talking to the people in our lives who have maybe been jerks to us, or have been having a rough go of it, and just need to remember what is good about them. Maybe then, they will feel encouraged to believe, and live the good story that they’ve been reminded of, instead of the one our heads sometimes tell us. It’s easy to feel defined by our mistakes, it’s easy to define other people by that moment they were a jerk to us. Anyway, it doesn’t take much time to help soften a bad narrative and encourage a good one, so maybe pop in a little note of appreciation or encouragement to a few folks that might really need it.

Merry Christmas!