General

A decade or two ago I started a personal tradition of acknowledging and celebrating the day before a birthday. It’s a great time to reflect on the year that has gone by and a perfect time to set intentions for the next year or years to come. With that in mind, I thought I would share 49 things I’ve learned or use as guiding principles as my 49th time around the sun comes to a conclusion.

49 practical tips and tidbits for better living

1. Start off each day by doing one positive thing to help improve your or someone else’s life. It will frame the whole day in a better light.
2. Write down your goals. You are more likely to achieve them.
3. Listen more than you speak.
4. Plan for the future and live in the moment.
5. Fashions may change. Having style does not.
6. Hold the door open for the person behind you.
7. Details matter.
8. Be nicer than is necessary. It costs nothing and makes the world a better place.
9. When it comes to interests, hobbies, and career paths pick one. Your choice doesn’t have to be forever. Simply choose and start. You have more time than you realize to fit in many new things throughout your life. Become amazing at something and then choose again.
10. It’s better to find out than to not know.
11. Confidence is key. If you don’t have it, act as if you do. No one will notice the difference.
12. The truth is, appearance matters. The better you look, the more opportunities come your way. It’s your job to show substance once your foot is in the door.
13. Send flowers for no reason.
14. Appreciate every moment you have with others. You never know when it will be the last one.
15. Learn to meditate and do it regularly.
16. What you choose to ingest on a regular basis can make your world heavenly or hellish. Altering your choices can morph your life for better or ill.
17. With enough determination, persistence, effort, and faith virtually anything is possible.
18. Keep your passport current. You never know where the night may lead.
19. Save and invest 10% of everything you earn. The sooner you do this, the easier your life will become in the future.
20. Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.
21. The only thing that heals a broken heart is time. No amount of alcohol, drugs, partners, or food can heal that pain.
22. Three hundred and fifty dollar dress shoes save you money in the long run as long as you take care of them.
23. Find small ways to bring positive, unexpected surprises to others. One kind act can alter the course of a person’s day and perhaps even their life.
24. Listen when people talk. You’d be surprised what they tell you.
25. Celebrate often.
26. Don’t be attached to the timeframe. Set the intention. It will happen, in time, with action and faith.
27. Books stimulate your mind. TV dulls it.
28. You don’t need to be in love. You want to be in love. Knowing this makes a big difference.
29. If you’re not trying things that scare you at least a little, you aren’t really growing.
30. If your boss wears a suit, you should too.
31. Remember tomorrow may never come.
32. Your thoughts create your reality.
33. You should act as if your every action affects 1,000 people for 1,000 years, because it does.
34. At least once in your life get a massage.
35. People like others who smell good. This doesn’t mean bathe in perfume or cologne.
36. Always have a bottle of champagne chilled, ready to go. You never know when you’ll have something to celebrate.
37. Moisturize your face. You will thank yourself when you are 60.
38. Allow yourself to become yourself.
39. Never settle for less than what you want, but understand it may be a long time before you get it.
40. People can change when they realize that the pleasure of changing is greater than the pain of staying the same.
41. Don’t post anything you wouldn’t say in person.
42. Far too many of us allow making a living to get in the way of making a life.
43. Just for today, be the best you that you can be. The past has passed.
44. When you are more than a couple of minutes late for an appointment, it shows how much (or little) you value that person.
45. Begin the day with a glass or two of water. Yes, even before coffee.
46. Push yourself. You can do more than you fathom.
47. The thing to remember is this, you always have a choice. Always.
48. You are an example to more people than you can possibly understand. Be a good one.
49. The best is yet to come.

Seeing the price of used cars is a reality check for me. I’ve been quietly looking for a new ride for some time. With the average car price now being $29,011 for a used model, maybe I need to adjust my budget or at the minimum my expectations. That’s around $520 per month when financed. Going for a new vehicle will set you back nearly $46,000 on average.

It seems like the older I get, the more difficult it is to realize how much things cost in today’s dollars.

In America while in a wheelchair, you can be shot in the back and side nine times, killed by a police officer for allegedly shoplifting.

Tucson, Arizona police officer who fatally shot a man in a wheelchair 9 times from behind is fired.

Common sense ideas that don’t seem very common

Ladies & Love

• Walk between the person you are with and the curb.
• Open the car door for a lady.
• Send flowers for no reason.
• Women like men who smell good. That doesn’t mean bathe in cologne.
• You don’t need to be in love. You want to be in love. Knowing this makes a big difference.
• The only thing that heals a broken heart is time. No amount of alcohol, drugs, women, or food can heal that pain.
• Love, while a great concept, is seldom an easy thing.
• Appreciate every moment you have with her. You never know when it will be the last one.

Common sense ideas that don’t seem very common

Life

• Listen when people talk. You’d be surprised what they tell you.
• Hold the door open for the person behind you.
• Remember tomorrow may never come.
• Plan for the future but live in the moment.
• Keep your passport current. You never know where the night may lead.
• Truth is, appearance matters. The better you look the more opportunities come your way. It is your job to show your substance once your foot is in the door.
• Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.
• Celebrate often.
• Books stimulate your mind. TV dulls it.
• Confidence is key. If you don’t have it, act as if you do. No one will notice the difference.
• A used Mercedes is still a Mercedes.
• Your thoughts create your reality.
• At least once in your life get a massage.
• Write down your goals. You are more likely to achieve them.
• Listen more than you speak.
• You should act as if your every action affects 1,000 people for 1,000 years, because it does.
• Never settle for less than what you want, but understand it may be a long time before you get it.
• If you have to tell someone you are classy, odds are you really aren’t.
• If you have more than four keys one your keychain, you live a scattered life.

The final installment tomorrow… Ladies & Love

Common sense ideas that don’t seem very common

Libations

• Beer is great with the guys or if you don’t care how your breath smells. Whisky is best in mixed company.
• Three drinks and call it quits. No one likes a drunk.
• Scotch and…. Don’t waste scotch with anything. It should be enjoyed by itself.
• Port comes from Portugal; champagne from France; anything else isn’t the real deal.
• Jack and Coke is acceptable but Jack without Coke shows you mean business.
• Champagne corks should not fly across the room.
• Always have a bottle of champagne chilled, ready to go. You never know when you will want to celebrate

Next up… Life

I tend to think of myself as a fairly simple person. Flashy doesn’t impress me much. True art, design, and magnificence show through in forms of simplicity.

This little series of entries is going to be shared over the next week all started when I noticed the silly things men wore in the office thinking they looked good. I never gave my sense of style much thought until I realized I had a personal set of simple rules that the women around me told me worked very well, at least at the office. These initial few rules turned into a small series of rules, thoughts, and philosophies. Most of them I follow, but like all rules sometimes they need to be broken too.

Common sense ideas that don’t seem very common

Style

• Fashions may change. Having style does not.
• Button-down collars should only be worn without a tie.
• Use brass collar stays.
• V-neck undershirts are for open collars.
• Crew necks are for shirts with ties.
• The tip of your tie should meet your waist or belt buckle.
• That little dimple in your tie makes a big difference.
• A four-in-one-hand knot is all you need.
• Match your socks to your pants.
• Three hundred dollar shoes are worth every dollar as long as you take care of them.
• Use cedar shoetrees.
• Light heather grey undershirts look better than white under a white dress shirt.
• Moisturize your face. You will thank yourself when you are 60.
• If your boss wears a suit, you should too.
• Short sleeve dress shirts and ties do not go together. Actually, there is not a good reason to wear short sleeve dress shirts… ever.
• Undershirts are a must. No one wants to see your man boobs or hairy chest poking through that shirt. Also, they help your dress shirts last longer as well as keep you warmer in cool weather and cool when it is warmer.

Up next… Libations

I read this question a few hours after I learned about the Connecticut elementary school shooting.

There are so many things wrong in our country, how can we ever fix it?

Here is my two cents.

How can we ever fix it? We fix it by building stronger communities. We fix it by getting to know our neighbors, our neighborhoods. We fix it by not just looking out for our individual children but everyone’s children. We fix it by taking care of each other, by being supportive instead of combative. We fix it by not just looking out for me but looking out for we. This is something much of this country lost a long time ago.

Tragedies are easy to blame on a crazy person, or guns, or terrorists, or poor laws. Our country, our cities, our individual communities need to not place blame, but rather remember how to build a caring community. Build the type of communities that see the fragile human being in each of us. It doesn’t help anyone to become a group of hard asses. In the long run it doesn’t even help the hard ass.

In our quest to be the best, to have the most, to keep up with the Jones’s and yes to try to one up them, we forget some fundamental truths. Fundamental truths like, we are all in this together.

The missing sense of a strong, compassionate family/community is the problem. This is why modern day gangs exist. The primal need to belong to a group, a group that looks out for you, is the driving force. Much of America has lost that strong family unit. There are so many of us that are “on our own”.

It is so easy to blame the incident. It is hard to look at the root cause and fix it.

In fact, this is why our health care system is broken. It tries patch ailments instead of determining causes to the problems. This is what is wrong with the education system. Throwing more money at it isn’t the solution. Finding why, as a community, we aren’t more engaged in educating our youth is the problem. Trumpeting athletic achievements over actual education and innovative thinking is the problem.

So many times when tragedies strike, whether on a personal or community level, we want to blame. We want to “fix” the problem. The real fix is finding out why these situations happen to begin with. The real fix is at a base level that many people don’t want to look at. It is much easier to say let’s ban guns, or make everyone go through naked body scanners when they travel, or give the group more money. These are band-aids that in the long run won’t give the desired result.

Getting involved in other people’s live from a compassionate perspective, this is where we begin to fix the country.