Helping Comes In Different Shapes?

“Help me! Help me!” Said every damsel in distress ever, but does she really want the help or are you just not what she was expecting for help. It is a hot take of mine that if you ask for help from someone then you cannot dictate how that person helps you. For instance, you ask a friend to help you move and then you want them to move a 200-pound box, or you ask for assistance with painting a room but you want the helper to be there to do it at 7:30 in the morning. That is not how helping works. Your friend can only lift so much and your helper will come assist in the painting but you should have already started before they get there, if they come at all. In saying all this I am not saying that if the person is doing a bad job at helping you have to keep using their services. It is perfectly okay to ask them to stop helping and never ask them for assistance again. Also, on a side note, this does not apply to a situation where they are not doing it “your” way. Everyone has a way of doing things and as long as the job gets done without too much hassle you do not get to tell your helper how to do the job nor are you able to get frustrated because “your way is better.” However, there is a reverse to this hot take. That reverse applies if the potential assistant volunteers to help. They are offering their services so you get to direct them however you see fit. By volunteering, they are asking you how they can assist and that is your queue to dictate away. And to all the volunteers out there don’t offer your help unless you really mean it. No one needs that kind of half-assed, barely care, it was just an empty gesture kind of help that doesn’t actually get things done easier or faster. I truly believe that if people would follow these rules mindfully, then everyone would get the help they needed and friendships wouldn’t be ruined by one stress-filled day of help giving or help receiving all because someone is a micromanager. But that is just one man’s opinion. Thanks for listening to me ramble. I appreciate it. See you next time.

Keep on Moving, Keep on Trucking

It is a concept that confuses most of the people that know me, but I have a strict philosophy of never looking back. What I mean is anything I do I either accomplish the goal or complete the task or get as far as I can with that particular instance of life and then I move on. There are people who say “I am going back to college,” or they will leave a job to go to something that should be better and then when it doesn’t work out, they go back to their old position. I did the college thing and, honestly, even though there are parts of my degree I would like to further, I cannot ever see myself going back to that schooling world. Also, my work track record is quite large because I work a job for a while, and then when I see I can’t take the position I am in any further, I start looking for something better. I have been unemployed before and could have easily gone back to the old hum-drum of one of my old jobs, but I just don’t like to look back. I always think about what opportunities I might be missing out on if I went back to a comfortable place. That, I think, is the key words: “Comfortable Place.” I think we should all strive to be a little uncomfortable. Get used to living in the uncomfortable environment. You will find that there are far more opportunities in front of you, facing that uncomfortable feeling and continuing to move forward with your life than there are behind you while you look back. It is a little scary, but, in my mind, the scarier place is settling for something lesser-than because of living in the past. Moreover, our lives improve when we take a few unknown but educated chances and allow ourselves to enjoy that unknown. And while I have mostly talked about limited scenarios in this post, I think this philosophy does apply to all areas of our lives. I am talking to you person who is contemplating taking back that lowlife scumbag of a partner because at least you know them. I personally prefer the devil I don’t know. But that is just one man’s opinion. Thanks for listening to me ramble. I appreciate it. See you next time.

Workin' 9 to 5......NOT

For anybody reading these blogs that doesn’t know, I am into side hustles. I have discussed them before on this blog and I think that everyone should have some sort of side hustle that keeps them occupied in their off hours. However, the trend that is started to emerge is the lack of those ON hours. And no, I am not talking about people being unemployed, although that is an epidemic for another ramble. I am merely talking about people who choose a career path based on the “side hustle.” In other words, they don’t have a 9-5 job and work solely on their own time, hustling to make a dollar. Most of the time, a delivery job through routes like GrubHub or DoorDash comes to mind, but there are actually quite a few side hustles that can actually turn into a decent income. Things like Uber, which has all but replaced taxi services, or freelance jobs through websites like Fiverr, or even becoming a professional survey taker through websites like Swagbucks and PrizeRebel. And of course, we can’t forget about that ever-faithful source of good old-fashioned time-wasting videos: Youtube. There are people who have turned Youtube into not only a full-time job, but a very successful full-time job at that. The main difference in these so-called “jobs” and their shiftwork counterparts is that people are essentially becoming upstarts of their own businesses where they work all day and the traditional 9-5 is that frame of an eight hour workday. It is mind-blowing for some people to think about always being on the clock, but it really doesn’t work that way. It is not that these freelancers are always working, it is that their workday is spread out over more hours. They therefore end up having more free time throughout their day because the job can be “worked” any time of the day. I guess there will always be a need for the dayshift working class and their respective jobs, but honestly, the traditional way of working, and by extension, even the way people look at work, will eventually dissolve to the point that only a few select careers require that time frame. Of course, there are those who are still hoping that we will reach a Star Trek society, where nothing needs to be paid for, so therefore they don’t need to work. That is one part of society, 9-5 working class or side hustle that will always be the minority. But that is just one man’s opinion. Thanks for listening to me ramble. I appreciate it. See you next time.

Compliment Me and I'll Kill You

I’ve never been one to fish for compliments, mostly because I don’t care what others think. However, one trend that is slowly fading away in today’s time that was a real thing not that long ago is a true and honest compliment. People just don’t do it anymore, and it is an interesting scenario to see when someone is clearly pushing to be complimented and just can’t get the satisfaction. Some people just find it hard to compliment others, for a whole host of reasons. For one thing, modern society is a cavalcade of wallflowers whose faces turn red when they hiccup in public, so not only can they not take a compliment with a proper “Thank you,” but they have so much social anxiety that telling someone they like their hair-do might cause them to have a stroke. Also, while I do promote certain aspects of it, the introduction of the “Me Too” movement really put a halt on saying nice things to the female gender. One is never sure if they will enjoy the compliment or if they will take it as an insult because they think someone is ogling them. Sure, there is that class of neckbearded creeps that tip their fedora when they give a very inappropriate compliment, hoping for a “favor” in return, but I choose to believe they are a minority and do not represent the general population. Now I’m not saying I want society to devolve into those two chipmunks that can’t get anything done because they won’t stop saying “Thank you,” but it would be nice to be told that I looked nice once in a while. And, yes, I realize in this format you can’t see me. So maybe a simple comment on how good a wordsmith I am, even if you can barely make sense of my tangents. But that is just one man’s opinion. Thanks for listening to me ramble. I appreciate it. See you next time.