“What should young people do with their lives today? Many things, obviously. But the most daring thing is to create stable communities in which the terrible disease of loneliness can be cured.” ― Kurt Vonnegut

Daring Thing

Kurt Vonnegut was an author known for his satirical and darkly humorous novels. Over fifty years he published fourteen novels, three short-story collections, five plays, and five nonfiction works. I was reading one of his novels for pure enjoyment, sitting comfortably on an airplane, on my way out of town.

The flight was just over two hours in length, so I was able to make good headway into the novel and I knew time had flown along too. I looked out the window searching for a geographical bearing to determine how soon we’d be landing before beginning the upcoming, lengthy chapter. The scenery made the decision for me. I’d never finish that long chapter before landing. Yet, I had a few minutes, so I read “about the author,” which contained an impactful, noteworthy passage.

“What should young people do with their lives today? Many things, obviously. But the most daring thing is to create stable communities in which the terrible disease of loneliness can be cured,” Kurt Vonnegut said as part of an autobiographical collage.

I pondered this message through the final minutes of the flight and while taxing to the gate. Then, as passengers began to disembark it came to life in an unexpected way.

My travel bag happened to be in an overhead compartment, across the aisle and two rows back. You know how it is. In order for me to retrieve my bag as other passengers yearned to exit the aluminum tube would have been analogous to a salmon swimming against the current, hoping to spawn. So, I settled into my seat while thinking I’d simply wait until everyone had left the plane. It was not to be so.

Just as I had settled I felt a gentle pressure on my right shoulder and heard a kind voice from behind. It was a young man. The man directly behind me; someone unknown to me. 

“Isn’t your bag a couple of rows back?” he inquired.

“Yes, it is that blue bag across the aisle,” I responded with surprised gratitude.

“I can get that for you,” he said as he reached back carefully, over heads and through other bodies until he captured my bag and handed it to me.

“Thank you! You’re so kind,” I said with my brightest, gratitude-broadened smile, while contemplating the impact of a young man’s, “daring act to cure the terrible disease of loneliness!”

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I’ve helped thousands of people, as a real estate & lifestyle expert, to discover where and how they want to live and work; to achieve Realesation. That’s why I bring you American Dream TV, Both Sides of the Fence, About the Dish, Monday’s Warm Cocoa and Home By Design Magazine to stir your heart and mind. Contact me so I can join you along your own unique path of discovery.

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“Nothing extraordinary has ever been found on the path of least resistance.” 

– Douglas McCarter

Putting Betrayal in its Place 

James had just finished a presentation marathon. Now he was sitting at a round table with a drink in one hand and a fork in the other. He was relaxing after a grueling day and evening. 

I came to sit across the table from him while thinking, “Does a former Marine Corps Intelligence NCO ever really relax?”

That’s when his smile, hidden most of the time behind his trimmed facial hair, broke through to answer my question. It was a smile that was easy and unburdened. It was the expression of someone at peace with self, a person with quiet, confirmed confidence, a confidence derived from having walked a challenging path.

“This is the second company I’ve created,” James said right before deepening his story with background. “I wouldn’t have been able to start Shadowscape without buttressed learning and companionship from my wife and my father, Douglas McCarter.”

Douglas McCarter grew up in poverty, but he wasn’t penurious in spirit. He was ambitious. He was the first person in his family to attend and graduate from college. He earned his MBA from UCLA and his BS in mechanical engineering at UCSB. After graduation he went on to become a senior member of the corporate planning staff for Morrison-Knudsen, was CFO of Emkay Development for a time and started several successful construction companies. He continually worked hard and even when the economic conditions of the Great Recession crushed his business he taught James a phrase that provided him with fortitude when his business partners betrayed him while selling their company.

“Nothing Extraordinary has ever been found on the path of least resistance,” Douglas imparted to James.

The other founders of James’ former company enriched themselves and left him with virtually nothing.

“That’s when my wife, during my deepest despair, said, ‘We have each other and even though we don’t have much money, we have a roof over our heads and love binding us together. Start a new company and I’ll be here with you through it all, win or lose!’”

So, James started a new company, Shadowscape, with his wife and father by his side.

James knows a thing or two about what it’s like to live life’s path. He knows the importance of living with people who will walk the path toward the extraordinary with him. He knows the pain of living through and with betrayal. Now, he knows the feeling of putting betrayal in its place; on the path behind him. That’s its place.

James is firmly on the path toward finding the extraordinary, with his loved ones by his side. 

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I’ve helped thousands of people, as a real estate & lifestyle expert, to discover where and how they want to live and work; to achieve Realesation. That’s why I bring you American Dream TV, Both Sides of the Fence, About the Dish, Monday’s Warm Cocoa and Home By Design Magazine to stir your heart and mind:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1M8ru02iWVObDzGsbKB1xUYyRMxfiYlez/view?usp=sharing

    William James

“It’s the little things that make the big things possible.” – J. Willard Marriott

Inches

“I knew the answer before I made my comment to the entire Board of Directors,” Chris said as he talked about his experience of being asked to fire a large percentage of his sales team.

Chris knew that as soon as he refused to fire the people who had been keeping his company afloat, as a result of their exceptional work that he would be losing his own job and position as a Director. 

“What was being asked of me was not the moral thing to do,” he said. “I knew everyone sitting around that boardroom table would view me as not being a team player; not being reasonable. At the same time, I was not willing to do a wrong thing, just so I could keep my job, especially when company leadership had just proven themselves to be morally bankrupt.”

Chris would not budge one inch! And, at the same time, he soon learned the benefits of adhering to the principle of “Unreasonable Transformation.”

That’s when specific, pertinent words of William James came to rushing to mind, as if part of the cool breeze brushing past, and produced by Chris’ story, “Most people live, whether physically, intellectually or morally, in a very restricted circle of their potential being. They make use of a very small portion of their possible consciousness, and of their soul’s resources in general, much like a man who, out of his whole bodily organism, should get into a habit of using and moving only his little finger. Great emergencies and crises show us how much greater our vital resources are than we had supposed.”

Chris had just created his own personal emergency! Yet, he understood the majesty of possessing a moral character. At the same time, he had removed a surety of continuous internal struggle, had he succumbed to the antithesis of his core beliefs. Now it was time to move another inch, past the crisis.

 “I learned that the answer to most pernicious business dilemmas is to give more, not less; and that magic happens as a result,” Chris elucidated.

So, he made a call to a recruiter and rather than asking for her to help him find a new position he asked her to help him find a business he could buy in to.

“She said, ‘when can you have coffee with me?’ Then I moved the next inch by having coffee with her while we structured our new partnership!”

Today, Chris and Linda, his business partner, help their clients to move forward one inch at a time by having faith in the same process; Unreasonable Transformation, because they know “It’s the little things that make the big things possible.”

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I’ve helped thousands of people, as a real estate & lifestyle expert, to discover where and how they want to live and work; to achieve Realesation. That’s why I bring you American Dream TV, Both Sides of the Fence, About the Dish, Monday’s Warm Cocoa and Home By Design Magazine to stir your heart and mind:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1M8ru02iWVObDzGsbKB1xUYyRMxfiYlez/view?usp=sharing

 

“I love the way our community has come together!” – Randy Duncan

Unbroken

“I love the way our community has come together! As a result, we’ve made amazing clean-up progress,” Randy Duncan said with authenticity. 

He and his family were out of town, in Branson, when a group of twelve tornados simultaneously attacked Benton County, Arkansas very early Sunday morning, the day before Memorial Day.

“We had just settled back in our hotel room at about 1:30 a.m. when I got a call from my sister,” Randy explained. “She asked if we were alright. I said, ‘Yes. Why?’ Then she told me our community had been hit by a gaggle of tornados.”

Randy and his family stayed for the rest of the night in their hotel room. They needed the rest, as they had spent the evening enjoying a concert and knew they’d need a lot of emotional and physical stamina to deal with whatever awaited them back home.

Luckily, when they got home in Rogers, they found their home in tact, but buried in green debris.

“I was able to get my chain saw out to cut the broken trees strewn across my property,” he continued. “When I got all that debris piled up I finished checking my home’s structure. We were lucky!”

Roger’s father lives about two miles away and he was not as lucky. His home was positioned at the start of a F2 tornado that flowed east for 1.8 miles. That funnel went on a rampage from his house through thousands of businesses and homes leaving destruction along its entire path. That single tornado was a major destructor. But, it wasn’t alone.

There was a F3 tornado just up the road that set a record for width in Arkansas. It was 1.8 miles wide and it left the town of Decatur obliterated. Thad Eiland’s eyes were filled with sadness when he added, “It completely destroyed businesses, homes, barns, shops, crops and animals.”

“Benton County looks like a war zone,” Randy continued. “There is so much loss. Businesses are gone. City Halls are gone. Homes are gone. But our community stands. We are ok. But so many, SO MANY, are not and our souls ache from experiencing this devastation to our community.” 

The destruction was confirmed by a Rogers City police statement saying that conditions remain dangerous because of 1,200 downed power poles and gas leaks. They asked people not to come into closed areas while professionals work over days, weeks and months to make hardest hit areas safe again. Their official statement continued.

“What can you do? Check on your neighbors. Make sure they’re okay.” 

And, that’s what neighbors have done and will be doing for a long time!

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I’ve helped thousands of people, as a real estate & lifestyle expert, to discover where and how they want to live and work; to achieve Realesation. That’s why I bring you American Dream TV, Both Sides of the Fence, About the Dish, Monday’s Warm Cocoa and Home By Design Magazine to stir your heart and mind:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1M8ru02iWVObDzGsbKB1xUYyRMxfiYlez/view?usp=sharing