John Reel’s Blog

While my previous post on banning “Is this a scam?” marketing got a lot of positive feedback, and I hope it will get people thinking and changing their affiliate agreements to stop people from using those tactics, it also brought up the topic of this post.  Who am I to be suggesting that other people change, when I’ve done some questionable things myself?

I’ll start with an aside:

I’ve been vegan for 21 years.  As anyone else who has pursued this alternative lifestyle can attest, people often get defensive just at the mention that you are vegan or vegetarian.  They seem to feel that my choice is an attack against their choice to eat meat, and they attack back.  I strongly suspect that they know that there is a lot of merit to my lifestyle choice, and they feel the need to defend their choice because they know it has ethical, environmental, and health implications that they aren’t comfortable with and don’t want to think about.  My existence makes them think about it.  (Personally, I don’t care one bit what they eat.)

When they ask why I’m vegan, I answer that I don’t like eating animal products.  It grosses me out, and that is the real reason I became vegan.  If they ask for other reasons, and they really want to know, I tell them about the way animals are factory farmed, the way they are treated, the chemicals that are put into them, the health ramifications of that way of farming on us, how the environmental impact of our species eating animal products is worse than the environmental impact of cars, how eating meat is not sustainable with our population growth, how rain forests are cut down to make room for grazing cattle, etc.  I guess I haven’t figured out how to answer their questions in a way they like, because this can really get them on the defensive, despite all the research that backs this up.

One of the arguments that people tend to give when attacking me for being vegan is that I’m the pot calling the kettle black.  They’ll start asking me questions like, “do you drive a car?” to catch me in an ethical conundrum, to make me into a hypocrite, and thus negate all of my reasons that being vegan is a better lifestyle for the planet.  If I don’t use a car, then they’ll search for something else, until they find something that makes them feel that they have put me in my place.  The look of relief that I see on their faces when they find something is profound.

If you don’t agree with me about being vegan, then fine.  I really don’t care.  But, we can choose to do something positive for our world, or we can choose to justify a lifestyle by saying, if you can’t live in perfect harmony with the world, then there is no point in trying.  To make a difference, some people may choose to be vegan, some may choose to telecommute instead of driving to work, some may choose to give money to charity, some may run for office, vote for the green party, or choose one of a hundred other things.  I made my choices in ways that I can reduce my impact on the planet, and continually try to reduce my impact and improve the world in small ways.  Your choices are probably different than mine and I’m okay with that.  I don’t judge even if you have no causes or beliefs that I can identify with.

Back to my previous post:

I find a lot of people cross lines in this industry of Internet marketing.  It encourages and rewards corruption, dirty tactics, and unethical behavior. I’m looking at the lines I’ve crossed, am not happy with it, and have changed. This particular rant on “scam” marketing is the first of many to come in an attempt to challenge other people to help us all clean up our acts and show people that Internet marketing can be done better, and more profitably - without resorting to these tactics.  You may agree or disagree, and that is fine.  All I hope you’ll do is consider and take action if something I suggest resonates with you.

What I hope you will not do, is to say that because I’ve crossed lines in the past, I have no right to grow, change for what I think is the better, or to put ideas out there on what we can do differently.  If that were the case, nobody could reflect and change.

Thank you,

John.

I once had enough money to do whatever I wanted thanks to a successful start-up.  Sadly, like most lottery winners, I was unprepared for this and mismanaged my new-found wealth.

This is what I learned from being rich for a little while:

1.  I can get rich.
I think one of the biggest things holding people back from getting rich is the belief that it is possible.  I did it once, getting past this roadblock by finding mentors to guide and inspire me.  I will do it again soon, better, and with more ease, simply because I know I can do it.

2.  Success begets dangerous opportunities.
When you do well, suddenly a lot of doors open up to you.  May I humbly suggest that you ignore them unless they are directly part of your plan.  Otherwise, you may find yourself distracted, spread too thin, and losing ground.  Related, I suggest flushing out fully everything to do with what made you successful in the first place before moving on to something else.  There probably are other ways to take what you’ve done to greater success, riding on the wave you’ve started instead of starting a new wave from scratch.

3. Money does buy you happiness.
To all the people who say otherwise, I say hogwash.  There was a dramatic change in my personality when I had money.  A tremendous weight was lifted when I suddenly went from a low income to (apparent) financial security.  In a society ruled by money, no longer having to worry about money is something very worthwhile that money can buy.  (Note:  I know very happy people with no money, living off the grid.  Money is not the only route to financial security!)

4. Stuff does not buy you happiness.
There is an image that our society as a whole seems to subscribe to of what it means to be rich, and a good part of that image is attached to buying stuff.  With a lack of a different role model, I found myself subscribing to that belief system, even as I questioned why the heck I needed these things.

Next time I’m rich I’m not going to attempt to fill holes in my life by purchasing stuff.  I’m going to use the money to do good and live a more extraordinary life, defined by what I do and experience, not what I own.  Stuff just ties you down and forces you to make yet more money.  You can be rich with a lot less money if you stop buying lots of stuff!

Very inspiring quick read: 10 Unexpected Costs Of Owing Things

[As an aside:  It seems almost a right of passage with many Internet entrepreneurs to buy a really expensive car.  Why?  Why?  Why?  If I really wanted to spend that kind of cash on myself, I would get a full-time personal chef.  Now that's a luxury!]

5.  It’s important to know why you want to be rich.
Money is a means to an end, not the end in of itself.  With the pace expected of Internet entrepreneurs, the means tends to become all consuming, and when the money comes, I think many people forget what the point of it all was and continue doing what they were doing, just on grander scales.  That’s what I did. I squandered the freedom of being able to do whatever I want, and it took (temporarily) losing the option to allow me to discover what I really want to be doing with my life.

I’m actually glad that I have had this experience of gaining and losing wealth.  It has given me more balance to my life now.  It has also prepared me to gain wealth again, keep it, and live my life in a much more intentional way doing things that really make me happy.

By the way, in future posts I will write about all the things I did right and wrong in my start-up, and the lessons I learned in the process.

Got 40 minutes or so? I really enjoyed this. It’s like looking into a crystal ball and seeing the future of this blog, muhah ha hah ha!

UPDATE: Direct link is http://www.drhorrible.com/

This is what’s on my mind at the moment, something I’ve thought about often.

In general I am quite dismayed by television, though I have found some shows that really inspire me. I’ll tell you about them below after I make my case for why television programming desperately needs to be rethought.

Social-proof works for all types of behavior from influencing what we buy to how we live our lives and even how we die. There is a concept called “The Werther Effect” where the reporting of one suicide actually results in an increase in suicides over the following weeks or much longer depending on circumstances. This is because it is normalized and it becomes a more acceptable looking solution to a problem.

The Werther Effect is so strong that many countries ban reporting of suicides, yet our society has no problem sensationalizing murders and glorifying the ones responsible for the act. Hmm.

As strongly as I feel about that, I’m not talking about video games and violent TV turning kids into killers at their high schools. (Of course, the more sensational press it gets each time it happens, the more normalized it gets and the more of an acceptable solution it seems to people who are anywhere near the edge, and the more it will happen.)

What I’m talking about is much more subtle. My dismay with television programming is that it is a fountain of social-proof and it demonstrates really poor role models. Often these are people’s most significant role models and even if you try to avoid it, this stuff soaks into all levels of our culture as sure as it’s bad to wear socks with sandals. Says who? Everyone! Why? Where did that come from dang-nab-it. Sometimes I like to wear socks with sandals! Shun me! shun me!

Television was (and is still mostly) driving into our culture many very bad examples of how to socialize, communicate and problem-solve, turning our society into a much less happy place than it could be if our social media were more positive.

Of particular annoyance are many of the half-hour sitcoms that show family-life where the main couple is outright nasty to each other and it’s funny. Oh sure, I’ve laughed at it, but I felt dirty afterwards. Worse yet, I sometimes catch myself mimicking them in an attempt to be funny with my friends or someone closer. Guess what? The person on the other side doesn’t even get that it is a joke. It isn’t funny in real life but it insidiously finds its way there and I suspect it ‘innocently’ harms family life and interpersonal relationships for most people on so many levels it’s staggering.

Culturally, I think we believe that we can separate entertainment from how we act in similar situations - that we are intellectually above influence. But the truth is that we just are not. That’s why there is so much advertising and why product placement makes shows so much money. We are strongly affected and shaped by what we watch on T.V.

So what shows do I really like? I watch very little TV now, but I do have some shows that really make me feel good to watch. Two of them were on tonight with new episodes, or new to me in any case.

Boston Legal: This show is awe inspiring and I have a great deal of respect for everyone involved with it. With few exceptions I can aspire to be as good a person as any the characters on the show. They are good people with strength of conviction. They deal with very controversial issues eloquently, bringing things out in the open that need to be talked about… and I laugh out loud many times during the show, imagining how much fun they were having when they were filming it. Thank you for that show!

Family Guy: Yes, Family Guy. My parents hate that show and I can understand why, however; after Boston Legal tonight I watched this show and was delighted at how brilliant it was. I admire the creator’s bravery at having nothing be off limits in shockingly exposing our failings as a society and at their creative ability to take you in unexpected, riotously funny directions from moment to moment. Thank you to them as well.

Television is one of the biggest influences in our culture, if not the biggest. People spend hours a day in this private school with the best teachers money can buy, and the curriculum is to turn us against each other. Much of it makes our society a worse place by getting us alone and giving lessons on how to interact in a very detrimental fashion for when we leave the classroom. Sound like brain-washing to anyone?

I hope more shows come out that help shake us up and make us take notice of some of our crazy belief systems and mind-bogglingly bizarre priorities. I hope more shows follow Boston Legal’s guide by giving us people we can really look up to, both the fictional ones and the performers and writers for taking a stand and being a positive influence and making us better people in the process.

BTW, my television is currently for sale on Kijiji.