Writing

A Writer Shares A Thought

July 25, 2016 by Jack Steiner 2 Comments

Beams of sunlight are supposed to gently rouse your body from its slumber, but that is not always how it goes.

Maybe that is why some people use blackout shades or do things to help ease their way into a wakeful state.

I am not really looking out at the mountains or staring at the beach below.

I wish I was staring at either of those places and that I was the writer who had enough money and or resources to set up shop wherever I want to.

It is not because I think it would bestow magical powers upon my skills as a writer and storyteller.

No, it is a simple and selfish reason.

Because I think it would be cool and because my imagination tells me if I could afford to do that I would be a happier and more peaceful person.

It is a theory Iâ€™d like to test one day but I have a sneaking suspicion there is no truth to it.

Money and resources may ease some of my concerns but they are unlikely tofix all of them

It Wonâ€™t Make More People Read

It wonâ€™t make more people read my words here or at TheJackB.

Might make it easier to promote and reach more potential readers, but it is not going to make them stick around.

That doesnâ€™t happen without providing interesting, engaging and entertaining content.

I know from experience that this is not a theory and that a good imagination can help take you a long way so maybe it is not really a big deal to not have those resources.

But damn, it sure would be nice not to have to worry about paying the bills once in a while.

Five Posts Worth Reading

July 18, 2016 by Jack Steiner Leave a Comment

I am jammed for time and racing to get things done but I haven’t forgotten about the blog or the good people that visit here.

If things go well I’ll have fresh content up later today or tomorrowÂ but in the interim here are posts worth reading that you may or may not have seen.

Oops, guess there are more than five posts here. 🙂

We’re More Than A Resume

June 6, 2016 by Jack Steiner 2 Comments

When my children or people I know ask me to tell them about how I became a huge success I’ll tell them it was a simple path and point to the picture above.

Or I’ll draw a squiggly line and then when I know they are staring at it I’ll kick them in the ass, slap them across the face and poke them in the eye.

When they get upset I’ll tell them to suck it up and remember that life is full of surprises and not all of them are the kind that are nice.

Some are very unpleasant and are things we would choose to avoid or skip over, if we had the choice.

But we don’t always get that choice and more often than not we need to soldier through and get to the other side.

Don’t believe me?

Ask your parents and or do some reading about how to become successful and take a gander at the posts that tell you why failure is a good thing.

Really.

Yeah, some of that is serious and some of it is snark.

We’re More Than A Resume

Steiner the minor and I spent a few minutes talking about what is really involved in getting a job.

He was dismayed when I told him how the process works and explained you don’t always get an interview, let alone a response to your application.

“Dad, how can they do that? Don’t they know we are not just words on a page?”

“Technically they do know that we’re more than a resume, but sometimes the way they take the measure of a man is far too simple.”

Don’t mistake any of this to suggest that I am in between jobs because I am pleased to say I am not. I am employed full time and have been for more than a year.

It still feels and sounds funny to say that because my father had one job and held onto for almost forty years.

In the more than 20 years since I graduated from college I have held multiple jobs, several of them were for a chunk of years, but not all.

That bothers me, even though I know it is not entirely my fault and that the world has changed since my dad was a regular Joe with a daily grind.

But it is hard not to measure myself against him.

The man worked really hard and it paid off, he retired before he turned 60. I doubt that I am going to be able to do that.

It is ok with me, honestly it is, but there are moments where I forget about then not being now and wonder what I did wrong.

Accountability.

Ma and Pa Steiner taught me to be accountable and responsible for my actions. I have done my best to pass it along to my children.

But I have learned and come to accept that our control is limited and sometimes it doesn’t matter whether we are accountable or responsible.

I didn’t cause the layoff I got stuck in nor did I perpetrate 9-11 and wreak havoc upon people and companies that did business with a company I worked for.

Sometimes shit happens.

So I teach the children to be prepared to roll with things and I wonder if I should push them to adopt a trade or pick a particular line of work like Occupational or Physical Therapy.

Maybe I should push them to become doctors or nurses.

Healthcare is never going to goÂ out of style.

But that doesn’t change the fact that dear old dad loves that Einstein quote above and thinks it is applicable to his life.

Or should I stop the third person crap and say my life.

I know that the people who look at my resume aren’t getting the full story or measure of who I am and what I have to offer.

It is not tied into how well it is written because the best resume only gives a short snaphot and synopsis and I don’t think mine is the best out there.

Good maybe, but not the best.

I want better, but mostly I want people to bring me in and hear me.

I want them to see me.

I want them to not let fear of mistakes prevent them from taking a chance on someone who may not hit every keyword listed in the damn job description.

We’re more than just words on a page.

We’re people with experience, skills and abilities that are transferable that can do more than just fill a desk.

The Bottom Line

That fire in my belly is burning bright and pushing me to move from the place I currently occupy into the one I know I need.

Push the envelope, stretch the limits and go beyond it all.

I can’t live a partial life. Can’t stomach a half measure.

Have to get more, have to do more.

The question isn’t when but how.

It is not even about money as much as it is about time. I know I can always find a way to make more money but I can’t make more time.

We’re more than just words on a page.

Do You Need A Reason To Blog?

May 27, 2016 by Jack Steiner Leave a Comment

A woman once looked me in the eye and asked me to explain myself to her.

“I am not that great, I don’t understand why you have a thing for me.”

I told her she was acting like an idiot and to shut up which if you know me says something because “shut up” is one of those expressions that sets me off.

Don’t know why, but if you tell me to “shut up” there is a good chance you are going to find a less than friendly Taurus looking to catch you on his horns, but only after he has thoroughly trampled you.

I am not prude and I swear like a sailor but that is just one thing that makes me see red.

So when I used it, well that was me trying to tell her that I found the question beyond ridiculous. I didn’t spend my time looking at her flaws and faults and believe me I knew what they were.

They didn’t matter because I accepted her, all of her for who she was and what she meant to me.

That is not always easy for people to do. We don’t just lie to others, we lie to ourselves.

Don’t misunderstand that to mean that I think everyone is a liar or that we never tell the truth because that is not it at all.

But I do think we spend a fair amount of time glossing over some things because it is polite and or easier.

So ask me do you need a reason to blog and I just might quote Dostoyevsky.

Â â€œAbove all, don’t lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love.â€
â€• Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov

I Need To Write More

Don’t know about you, but I need to write more.

Some of it is because writing is where I clear my mind and clear the mess between my ears.

Writing is always where I figure out what I think and believe or at least where I come to accept it. Something about reading what I think crystallizes and clarifies it all for me.

Been reading more than I have in a long time and am grateful for that because it is part of becoming a better writer and better storyteller but it is not enough.

Writing is required, more than I am doing.

Twenty-five years or so ago when I was responsible for myself and no one else I spent hours in the gym.

I loved it and when I didn’t make time for lifting I missed it, made me grumpy.

Part of what I loved was feeling myself get stronger and knowing that if I pushed a bit I’d get past whatever plateau I had reached.

That is how it feels now.

Haunting Photos

It is Memorial Day weekend and IÂ have come across the usual posts about giving thanks to our servicemen, especially the families of those who fell.

I do and I appreciate all that they have done.

But sometimes I think we need to look at some of these photos and be reminded in starker detail about who bears the cost.

My share is limited to however my tax contribution breaks down but it is not the same as the parents, siblings, children and spouses who lost a loved one.

Somewhere in the archives here is a shot I took of a moment at Newark.

In the midst of walking through the airport I noticed everything had stopped and it only took a moment to see why.

I looked out the window and saw the coffins being offloaded from a plane, men in uniform saluting, tears falling down faces of some of the people around me.

Can’t say if they were family or friends of the deceased or just moved by what they saw, just know they were there.

Couldn’t help but think about how awful that must feel and stared at my then 11 year-old son and prayed he’d never have to go off to fight.

All these years later I realize he is just a few years away from signing up for Selective Service and though there is no draft, it is impossible not to think about it just a little bit.

Not going to worry about what isn’t relevant now, but it doesn’t mean it won’t cross my mind from time to time.

I was one of those children who wanted to be an astronaut. Don’t remember being interested in being a cop or fireman but it wasn’t because I thought poorly of them.

I just liked the idea of being in outer space or a professional baseball player better.

I still want to go into space, still want to explore the final frontier and find out what lies out in the deep and the dark.

Still curious to see what it feels like to be weightless and to enjoy the benefits that come with it all.

Do You Need A Reason To Blog?

If you are asking me if I need a reason it should be evident I don’t.

If anything I need more reasons not to spend time pounding upon this keyboard, but I think I have found a good balance of online and offline so I feel pretty good about it.

What about you? Why are you writing and if you aren’t, well why aren’t you?

Do you have any interest in doing so or are you here for other reasons?

There aren’t right or wrong answers, just my own curiosity.

The Blog Posts No One Reads

May 17, 2016 by Jack Steiner 10 Comments

In the old days I used to refer to blog posts that didn’t have any comments as orphans.

People thought it was clever and sort of witty but they also found my audioblogging posts about wandering through Target or the grocery store to be exceptionally good too.

But in the good old days of 2004-06 comments were usually plentiful and it was unusual, cool and progressive to have video or audio on your posts.

Some of my international readers would tell me they thought my accent was really cool and I would laugh and say “what accent? You are the one with the accent.”

Back then I was just a blogger and I never worried about being ranked for Dad, dad blogger, daddy blogger or any other keyword. I just wrote my stuff and had fun.

The Blog Posts No One Reads

Back then if no one commented I figured it was a poorly written post or checked to see if Blogger/WP was having some sort of technical issue because that was almost always the answer.

Now the orphan posts are not unusual and I wonder more if people are actually reading the material I crank out and not just because I crank out a lot of it.

But because we are besieged by content, by bells, beeps and whistles that demand our attention and require our eyeballs, or at least try to.

****

So here I sit, writing while on hold, listening to awful music sharing these thoughts with you, wondering how much of the noise catches our attention long enough for us to actually read what is out there.

Wondering if you are like me and have winnowed the number of things you subscribe to down because you don’t have time to read the things you really want to.

Asking myself how much of my best stuff goes unread, unseen and unheard because we just didn’t have the time to read it.

Thinking that it is not just about marketing our material and tooting our horns. That is a part and a piece, but it is not all of it.

I suppose it is also part of why I link to posts like Where Fire Meets Water andÂ The Finish Line Isnâ€™t As Close As You ThinkÂ because it gives them a chance to be read and seen.

Lately I have done that less to get them read and more because they make sense to me, or should I say something I wrote calls out to me.

Something that I saw, said, heard or observed resonates now and so I put it out again because part of the reason I write is to learn about myself and clarify my thoughts and ideas.

Comment There & Get A Comment Here

Some of the newbies and the old timers will tell you if you comment there you will get a comment here, meaning you can drive traffic to your blog by commenting on others.

There is a lot of truth to that but some of it is growing old for me.

Maybe it is because I have a crazy amount of stuff happening in my personal and professional lives or maybe it is because 12 years into this game I am tired.

What I know for certain is I want comments here because someone was moved by my words and not just because I commented on their blog.

Comment here because the words made you feel, think or see. Comment because you want to be part of a discussion and not because you hope it will make me comment there.

Final Words- For This Post That Is

The funny thing about blogging is that you never do know what will resonate with others and what won’t.

Your best work will be met with scorn and disdain and or ignored while your worst will receive the opposite treatment.

If you jump on the treadmill you’ll run with a million rats chasing cheese and fighting over some crumbs.

It is a cruel and obnoxious way to put it, but it is sometimes true.

Some bloggers will bully others or at least try to and they’ll go after you guns blazing if you disagree.

But there are other approaches and ways to view the world.

The pie is bigger than we think and realize.

There is an enormous opportunity and if you open your eyes and manage your expectations you just might find you get what you need and maybe even what you want.

It is a hell of a ride, this blogging game. See you in the comments….maybe.

987 Critical Challenges Every Blogger Faces

May 11, 2016 by Jack Steiner 4 Comments

Do you think that lion in the picture above is sad or just contemplating life?

Is he wondering why the King Of The Jungle still has to deal with the ticky-tack challenges and niggling details that crop up and prevent us from enjoying a smooth passage from point A to B?

I’m not a lion so I can’t tell you but I have some experience dealing with some of these issues and even though I am a Taurus that is no bull.

Because when you start delving into becoming The Best Daddy Blogger ever and start looking at how to make your blog into a Blog because you think it can be something more, well you learn a few things.

Hell, the truth is you don’t have to try to make your blog into anything special to understand and appreciate some of the challenges and hiccups that come with this because in many ways it is no different than life in general.

987 Critical Challenges Every Blogger Faces

Some of you might think that is hyperbole and perhaps it is, but there are times when it feels like there are 5 million challenges.

Ask anyone who is self-hosted what happens when there is an outage and customer service at the hosting company isn’t able to provide them with a satisfactory explanation about what is going on.

Or ask them what happens when they run into some other kind of technical issue and they can’t figure out how to fix it because they know there is a problem but can’t figure out how to identify what it is.

Hard to find a solution when you aren’t really sure what is going on.

Sometimes you know what the issue is but you still aren’t sure how to fix things.

but I don’t have links on my blog to most of those posts because many of those bloggers have taken down their blogs.

There was a time when I used to push people to check out my Other Places You Can Find Me page because I had guest postedÂ at around 50 or so different blogs.

I thought highlighting that would help market my work and give something back to those other bloggers by providing them with a good link.

It worked for a while and then someone told me they had come across a bunch of bad links and I discovered a bunch of those bloggers had taken down their blogs or made them private.

Others were still live but the links to my posts were bad so I reached out and asked what had happened.

Some told me they had changed the URLs and some never responded at all. I wasn’t about to yell at them or whine about it so I just took down the links.

It is frustrating because what I really want to do is focus on my writing and becoming a better storyteller.

Isn’t one of the benefits of having children in middle and high school knowing they are responsible kids and you don’t have to worry about them the same way you did when they were infants and toddlers.

It is not like I have to ask them 10,000 times to clean their rooms or do their homework. Right.

Right. 🙂

The last time I changed my theme I did so because I thought it improved the experience for those of you who are kind enough to read my words.

I thought that providing a way to insert bigger pictures would enhance the texture and add layers which would also benefit my ability to tell a story.

Based upon feedback and my experience it seems to have done that quite nicely but it also created a number of technical issues too.

I don’t have time to go through 10,000 posts to make sure all of them work as they should but I do try to do a little bit of work on it each day.

Sometimes I wonder if that means I am not determined to break through the brick walls.

Sometimes I wonder if it is tied into some of the disdain I feel about the need to always get first place.

I am not someone who requires a lot of validation. Doesn’t mean I would be upset if I was named the best whatever because that is always nice, but it is not what makes me wake up and get out of bed.

The Real Question

The real question here isn’t about creating a list of all of the challenges bloggers face and that is not just because list posts are the lazy bloggers ways to create content.

It is about asking what happens when you face one or more of these challenges.

What do you do when you discover your home internet service is down for an extended period (thank you Time Warner) or the kids are screaming while you try to write.

I do my best to look at all in the same terms my good friend Ralph suggests:

â€œBad times have a scientific value. These are occasions a good learner would not miss.â€â€• Ralph Waldo Emerson

And then I’ll tell you I’m also known to toss in an extended stream of colorful language.

Sometimes parenting, life and blogging are best described as not being for the faint of heart.

You will be challenged. You will be inspired. You will be angered and exasperated but if you do it right you’ll have a lot of fun too.