What Do You DO, Anyway?

I've been getting a lot of questions like this, since announcing that I'd become a full-time Interactive Project Manager, and when I get that blank stare I've always had this great quote from Sports Night running through my head (emphasis mine):

You guys know who Philo Farnsworth was? He invented television. I don't mean he invented television like Uncle Milty, I mean he invented the television. In a little house in Provo, Utah. At a time when the idea of transmitting moving pictures through the air would be like me saying I've figured out a way to beam us aboard the Starship Enterprise. He was a visionary and he died broke and without fanfare. The guy I really like though was his brother-in-law, Cliff Gardner. He said to Philo, "I know everyone thinks you're crazy, but I want to be a part of this. I don't have your head for science, so I'm not gonna be much help with the design and mechanics of the invention. But it sounds like, you're gonna need glass tubes. See Philo was inventing the cathode receptor, and even though Cliff didn't know what that meant or how it worked, he'd seen Philo's drawing and he knew he was gonna need glass tubes. And since television hadn't been invented yet, it's not like you could get 'em at the local TV repair shop."I want to be a part of this", Cliff said, "and I don't have your head for science. How would it be if I taught myself to be a glassblower? And I could set up a little shop in the backyard. And I could make all the tubes you'll need for testing." There oughta be Congressional medals for people like that. I've looked over the notes you've been giving over the last year or so, and I have to say that they exhibit an almost total lack of understanding of how to get the best from talented people. You said before that for whatever reason, I seem to be able to exert authority around here. I assure you, it's not 'cause they like me. It's because they knew two minutes after I walked in the door that I'm somebody who knows how to do something. I can help. I can make glass tubes. That's what they need.

By the way, if you've never seen Sports Night you oughta get that on your Netflix list right now. William H. Macy delivers that line, and boy does he sell it.

The New Job

Well, since my wife basically called me out, I should probably get back here and blog about my new job and what's been keeping me so busy. This is a long post, but I want to tell you the whole story of what's gone on here, since there's been a lot of changes and a WHOLE lot of God working in our lives.

So as a lot of you know, I'd been working at Texas Instruments, as a contractor. And for the record, I liked it there! I liked what I was doing (because I'd basically carved out my own role), and I liked who I was working with. There were really only two things wrong with my situation: my salary was below market value, and the benefits package I was getting as a contractor wasn't near what I could get as an actual employee.

Sure, there were a lot of other factors that irked me about being a contractor. Sure, it was hard to be the Project Manager and Get People To Get Stuff Done when they were employees and I was a contractor (blue badges vs. red badges... and don't get me started on those yellow badges!). Sure, they instituted this weird policy where employees could work from home but contractors couldn't - even though we both had the same equipment and were (assumedly) both sets of trustworthy adults. One of my contractor friends and I started calling this the Chinese Water Torture - no one droplet freaks you out, but add these things up and it gets overbearing. I wasn't to that point, but I can't say it didn't factor in.

So I'd been looking, for a while. Job boards, emails, interviews - the whole bit. At one point, I got a pretty serious interview from a company offering WAY more than I was making. Only one catch: the business was right on the edge of my moral standards. A lot of other people might not have felt a moment's regret doing this kind of thing, but I did. I told them that I probably wasn't their ideal candidate. That was one of the first interviews I had in my looking process, and it really colored my experience through every other encounter with a company. Others got serious (and I even got an offer at one point), but they never were in that stratosphere. I was glad to get interviews and offers, but in the back of my mind, I was always wondering if my value was actually way up there, instead of somewhere below.

I prayed a lot about this, and my friends from my church small group know that I wrestled a lot with this. Christians, on the whole, aren't taught a lot about how to deal with Ambition. We're allowed to strive for spiritual perfection, we all know that, but what about the rest? Is it wrong for a Christian to want to succeed in their career because they believe they can? Is it wrong to use money as one of the ways you measure that success? Is it wrong for me to want my family to live more comfortably? This search for the Contentment that isn't Stagnation is still something I'm trying to figure out.

My search seemingly concluded with an offer from the startup internet company GodTube, and I was really pumped about it. After all, it's been one of my passions to investigate this realm where Christianity and Cyberspace collide, and this seemed like the perfect opportunity to do so. I accepted the offer, knowing that the benefits and vacation weren't at all as good as I wanted, but believing that God had led me here and would work that part out.

About halfway into my two-week notice in my job at TI (what one should do during that lame-duck time is probably a blog post in itself), a friend there asked me if I'd be interested in another job opportunity. He had a friend at Rapp Collins, a full-service marketing agency, and they were having a BEAR of a time finding someone to come in as an Interactive Project Manager. The pay range was higher than what I'd accepted at GodTube, and I knew from my previous jobs with Ad/Marketing agencies that their benefits were usually pretty nice, too. So after praying about it, talking about it with my wife, and getting the input of respected friends, I decided to go ahead and interview there. This was a clear example of letting God show you the way he's planned, because I knew there were some hurdles to get over to get me working somewhere else after I'd already accepted another company's offer.

The interivew at Rapp went very well, and they were completely understanding of my situation. After 24 of the more stressful hours I've ever had, they contacted me with an offer. The benefits were there, the hurdles were overcome, and the pay was even back in the range of that first job - the one that had been nagging me ever since. I accepted, and had to inform GodTube that I'd been "made an offer I couldn't refuse."

I've been at the new job for a couple of weeks now, and I'm starting to see what God had in mind when he put me here. There's a lot of chaos, and a lot of work flow processes that have been cobbled together and held by sheer manual human labor because "they've worked so far." My new boss is extremely open to automating and streamlining these things, and has given me the task of doing just that. It's like a blacksmith creating his own hammer and anvil before starting a job - you're in a better position to do a good job because you made the tools. The word is that we've got a job coming in to do a complete redesign of a local corporation's web site, and I'm gonna be the guy Getting Things Done on that.

It's been a long journey, but I'm rejuvenated by my new surroundings. I lost the opportunity to pursue this "God and The Web" passion directly, but I'm going to start a new side project on that soon - keep looking here for details. What's more, I'm getting new leads to do some freelance design work, so I'm still gonna have the chance to get my hands dirty with some code and Photoshop. God's led me a long way to get here, and I praise Him for what He's done. Here's to more blogging from a new work address.

Yep, It's Valentine's Day

Larissa and I already had our Valentine's Day celebration last weekend, by giving the Squid away to his Mema and Granddad for a weekend (you can catch her take on it here), so we aren't planning any specific festivities this evening. But, it's still saying "St. Valentine's Day" on my calendar, so I'd feel very remiss if I didn't take a moment to tell you all how amazingly wonderful my valentine (and wife! what a bonus!) is and has been for the last 4.5 years.

Over there is my favorite picture of her so far - smiling while holding our son for the first time. That was an insane and wild night, and we were all drained - emotionally and physically. And yet, even though Lukas isn't looking too happy about the situation in that photo, this was a moment of peace and joy for everyone. My wife has become an incredible Mom, just as I knew she would when I married her. I wouldn't have ANYONE else raising our son. Some women are just blessed by God with all the skills, common sense, and patience it takes to be a stay-at-home Mom, some aren't. I know Riss thinks some days that she can't do this mothering at home thing any more, but I always know that she has more than it takes. I'm so excited for our son, because he's going to get the best start from the best educator I know.

Now, lemme tell you, this lady here didn't just become amazing when she started changing diapers regularly. I'm utterly stunned over and over by how wonderful she is to ME, especially on those days when "brain-dead, blithering idiot" is the nicest description I deserve. We've had hard times and good, and we're still figuring out what it means to be "us", but I LOVE the journey we're on. Being her husband can be something easy to take for granted, because her presence has become something like air - always present, life giving, and something you don't think about always. But on today, this day when some Saint did something special that I have no clue about, I get to bring this love to the forefront and shine a big ol' cyber-spotlight on it.

Happy Valentine's day, darling. I love you.

Technorati Tags: valentines, valentine, love, mom, wife, baby

STONE SOUP

Anyone out there remember this story? It was one of my favorites in the reading center in kindergarten.



I was just reminded of this moral from the story:

If you want to get people to do something, don't tell them how desperately they are needed. Don't try to appeal to their sympathy and kindness. Instead, create the impression that you are giving them the opportunity to be part of your success.

I think we can all use that one in our lives, right now.

Technorati Tags: story, childhood, stone soup, lifehacks, life

TIPS I'VE LEARNED

I started writing these down one time - just thought I'd post them for you.

• If you're approaching a door with one of those bar-style push handles that goes across the whole thing, and you don't know which direction it's going to open, hold out both hands and as you're walking through, lightly push on both sides of the door. One direction will give, and you can open the door without a struggle.


• If your mouth gets dry, try chewing your tongue a little - it will start saliva flowing again in your mouth. Be warned, however - I've been told you can only do this trick once every hour or so.


• Whenever you get a new gadget with a plug adapter, they usually come wrapped with a rubber-coated wire tie. When you unpack your new gadget, wrap the wire tie around the cord near the plug. This way you'll always have something to keep the cord coiled up when you need to pack it up.


• When filling up your car, pick a nice even dollar amount that's close to what it costs to fill your tank and only pump to that point. This saves you time with your checkbook later, and if you do it consistently, makes it easier to calculate your fuel/commute budget.


• If you grab your lunch from a restaurant and eat it at your desk, always make sure to pick up TONS of napkins when you get your food. You can put the extras in a drawer and use them to clean up random minor spills. They can even act as tissues in a pinch.

Technorati Tags: tips, lifehacks, productivity, life, better me

THE RESURRECTION EGGS-PERIENCE

So the dear wife and I were out looking for a Secret Sister gift from a local Christian Bookstore, and we noticed that they not only HAD these cute little items, but were running a special on them! They're called Resurrection Eggs, and I thought I was going to write a big blog entry referencing the Origin of the Easter Bunny, and why it was silly to use an ancient, pagan symbol of fertility (the Egg, not the plastic) to educate kids about the Lord Our Savior Jesus Christ.

But then, I decided to actually use my brain.

Kids don't care about the eggs. Kids don't think of them as a pagan symbol, and kids have no clue where the Easter Bunny comes from, nor do they care - as long as they get candy. Easter Eggs are about discovery, surprises, and rewards.

And actually, that's what the Resurrection is about, too.


Technorati Tags: eggs, easter, resurrection, christian, bunny

THE MORE MONITORS, THE BETTER!

You know those times you thought I was singing the praises of the extra monitor just because I'm a geek? Well how 'bout these apples!

Microsoft researchers haven't perfected the genie, but they've found a tool that can increase your productivity by 9 to 50 percent and make your work day easier. And you can begin using it right away.

The researchers conducted user studies that proved the effectiveness of adding a second or even third monitor to your workstation, creating a wide-screen effect. In addition, they found out how the operating system needs to change to accommodate a larger screen area.

Yep, it's ALL true.

Technorati Tags: monitors web research

SICK DAY

Things haven't been intensely great out here at the Swan household of late. In short, the Spouse of Swan and I are sick. Nothing mental, just the standard respiratory agony - sinuses filling, noses sneezing, mouths coughing, chests... congesting? Anway, it's been rough recently.

So maybe being in bed with an open laptop for a few days isn't all bad - I've updated the blog! Yep, new look, new widgets (really, that's what they're called), new... oh... I usually like to do these things in "3"s and I totally don't have anything else at the moment.

And, if you can believe it, I've kinda missed blogging regularly. I'll get topics in my head randomly and think "that would make such a good blog topic!" Yeah, seriously, I do. Being the good blogger I've written these moments of epiphany down, and plan to talk about them greatly.

Oh, and have I mentioned the best topic of all: Swan the Sequel: Spawn of Swan!



More on that later. :-)

ZEN AND THE ART OF CUBICLE LIFE

I'm going to be stringing a few different concepts together here, so bear with me...

My Dad works as an engineer, fixing complicated data storage sytems in mostly oil companies and government hush-hush black holes around the world. He's got a favorite saying: when resolving an issue depends much more on the natures of the people involved than the physical electron-routing problem itself, he likes to call this an "Electro-Political Issue."

Apt title, if you ask me. And I know that even if you work at McDonalds flipping burgers for a livin', you deal with politics to some degree. People want to get what they want, and sometimes that means that the right thing, the thing that needs to happen, doesn't. What's more, in order to do the thing you're being paid to do, sometimes you're going to have to bend over backward to get someone else what they want.

I've always been intrigued with the concept of Zen. It's become a very fashionable term: "That's so Zen," or "I just had to zen out," or even Everything Zen. If you take a look at the true meaning of the word, it comes from a form of Buddhism - a religion whose main goal is the end of suffering. Zen seeks to obtain insight into the end of suffering through long periods of meditation; specifically, a seated meditation called zazen. This is a moment of complete self-denial, in which one seeks to completely remove the mind of all thought, so that it may be opened to a new enlightenment. Again, this is the true key of Zen, whether practiced in meditation, archery or even motorcycle maintenance - complete denial of self-thought to focus on a task, even if that task is to clear the mind entirely.

If you work very long in a corporate setting, you'll find plenty of people who want very much to be successful. They put their whole heart and soul into a task to squeeze every last drop of gain, improvement or recognition. Workaholics, we may call them, because their exhaustive grip of passion is so engaged with their work that they can't take a moment to detach and nourish their personal lives. And through this process, could we call them truly successful? Even if they earn tons of money, can we call them a success if their personal lives are in such shambles they have nothing of true worth to spend it on?

Sometimes we get so caught up in playing the game: working the people, gaining the influence, putting my pedestal higher and higher, running after this dangling carrot of a goal. We run and run and run, and even if we finally reach what we want, we find it wasn't worth it in the first place.

What we need at work is a good dose of ZEN, and I think it's the completely Christian thing to do.

I'll show you: take a look at this verse:

"And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him." -- Colossians 3:17

You see, we get all entangled within the vain passions of work when we do it for US. When we put in those extra hours so that WE can get noticed or WE can produce more than the next guy. Our priorities get out of whack because WE think that we can sacrifice the personal to gain in the professional. And yet, when we follow that kind of path, it seems like both suffer in the long run.

Paul here advocates a Zen-like approach to work - a complete denial of self by doing EVERYTHING for God. We don't work to promote ourselves or our agenda, we work because that's what God has put in front of us, and we give it the attention and passion it deserves. BUT, when God puts something else in front of us, like a family that's expecting us home for dinner and kids that need a strong parental role model, we put down the one task to take up the other. There's no regret or hesitation in doing this, because we're completely focused on HIS agenda, not ours. Considering whether a task is worthy of our time takes on a higher meaning, because we've got a whole new paradigm to frame it in.

And, when the office gets political, when things get snippy and catty, when people promote themselves within the guise of a job, we don't take the bait. Why? Because we're only doing God's work on this Earth, and we don't NEED the recognition of a false sense of accomplishment. We don't need to hang our self-worth on an initiative or program, because God makes the call, and we are genuinely content with His answer.

There's a concept in sports called "pushing" or "forcing" your game. It happens when you're so driven to succeed, you start to make rash decisions in the hope of an ever diminishing return. You drive the ball instead of passing, because you want that next hoop so bad. You swing at a pitch that's outside the strike zone, because you want that RBI for your stats so much. You really try to smack the ball off the tee as hard as you can, because you want those extra few yards on your drive. Of course, the result of this phenomenon is that you actually end up getting LESS: more misses, more whiffs, less distance.

When we give up our own agenda in the workplace through a Zen-like medition on what's important to God, we protect ourselves from pushing our own game. When you're not forcing a task into place - trying to will a job to work the way YOU think it should - you're actually MORE productive. Denial of self actually makes your self work BETTER.

Perhaps the Psalmist says it best:

"Commit your way to the Lord,
Trust also in Him,
And He shall bring it to pass."
-- Psalms 37:5

Technorati Tags: zen, God, sports, work, life, cubicle, politics, self improvement

FIGHTING "THE MAN"

Just found a great article via lifehacker about how to wrestle with your cell phone company and get what you want. The principles here can easily be applied to other customer-service-call nightmares as well.

The Art of Leveraged Bargaining, #2




(Photo courtesy of Threadless)


Technorati Tags: phone customer cellphone lifehack advice

ALMA MATER

I had the joy of visting my dear alma mater this Easter weekend, for the spectacle we all know as Spring Sing. I try to tell people at work why in the world I'm heading back to Arkansas, but they never seem to really get it. By far, the best part about the whole event for my wife and me is getting to see people we were in college with - friends we can reconnect with over shared bonds of wild experiences and lessons learned since. The best time to see everyone is the cast party after the Saturday night show - a tradition that spans at least a decade and has always been in the same place, so all the old folks know where it is. We all gather 'round, do all that sharing, sing our crazy club songs for each other and swelter in an overcrowded room with college students burning up from activity, excitement and adrenaline.

We stayed up late (well, late for us old married folks) into the night, then had to wake up for church at an hour that seemed so early it could probably be only represented by an imaginary number. Blearily my wife and I stumbled into Sunday-appropriate clothes and steadied each other down the shuffling walk to the hotel complimentary breakfast. We'd reached that state of tired where the caffeine wakes your body up just enough that it realizes truly how tired you are and only wants to sleep more. Adding condiments with that level of fine motor control is just a joke, as I managed to turn my preprocessed egg patties into a salty mess in very short order. With the in-laws driving (thankfully), we made it to early service at church and found seats quickly, hoping nobody noticed our almost-a-hangover.

I don't know how you get when you're truly tired, but when I'm at that point, I find that my emotions come to me frighteningly fast. It's as though that buffer of my usual good sense is stripped away by fatigue, and everything I'm feeling strikes to the top in vivid color in every case. I tell you all this to say that while all that tempted me to just dismiss what I felt at worship that day, I couldn't shake these emotions because they seemed grounded in a deeper truth than I planned on encountering.

Worship was great - a well-paced combination of scriptures and songs, with very few moments taken for sermonizing or announcements. My father in-law was so thankful for a tempo that kept him from sleep that he thanked the minister personally! The fully planned part of the service ended with the traditional invitation, a moment that only signalled to my fuzzy mind that it was time to stand, and that the end was near at last. I can honestly say that my mind was upon things Divine during the worship, but I can also say that the chance to eat again and hopefully regain some portion of my energy at lunch was definitely thought of.

With the invitation song fully in stride, and everyone standing to clear the aisles, a father and his daughter made their way to the front row of seats. The girl could only have been 14 or 15 at the most, and she must have had something like Cerebral Palsy or Spina Bifida, because her motions were forced through tremoring muscles and wavering steps.

She leaned in a familiar way upon her father as she pushed her disobedient body down an aisle that must have seemed 60 feet long to her, even though it would be only 6 feet to a ruler. It was hard to watch her body force her to make several attempts at sitting down, but she seemed to have a peculiar expression on her face - a mixture of determination, happiness and anxiety. The preacher came down to meet her at the front, and a whole row of college students (that probably didn't know her) left their seats to find ones behind her in support.

The song ended and we all sat back down, some finally seeing over the crowd what all the hubub was about. The preacher returned to his pulpit to tell us the good news: Kaitlin, this girl, wanted to be baptized. From that moment, it just caught me; I was so emotionally touched by seeing this girl, wrestling not only with the life questions that come with being a teenager, but also the ones screamed out by this degenerative disease, seeing that in the face of all of this her soul had found it's one true and supreme Love - and that she wanted to show her love in practice. A definite lump lodged itself in my throat and defied any attempts at manly supression. This girl was going to demonstrate to me something deeper than I'd come prepared to see: a naked and beautiful truth about the One I chose for my Lord and Master.

Her father rose to his feet, and lended his strength to help his daughter to hers. He told us that they had rehearsed this occasion thoroughly the night before, but that Kaitlin found herself to be very nervous this Easter morning in the face of all of the reality and all the people (a packed auditorium of easily 500). A muffled laugh swept through the crowd as we all remembered our baptism Day, or just empathized with her stage fright. The father told us he would just go through all the points they talked about, and let her just affirm her answers.

"Do you believe that Jesus is the Son of God?"

Nod.

"And do you believe that he came down to Earth?"

Another nod.

"And that He died for our sins and rose again?"

More nods, as the signals for this motion echoed through her neck's muscles.

"And do you believe that He's coming back one day to take us with Him to be in Heaven with the Father?"

"Yes!" - uncertain lips unable to restrain a certain voice.

The father said through tears and joy that he was so proud of her, and that they were now going to baptize her for the remission of her sins. A spotty "Amen" wove through the crowd, and my view of the scene distorted as my eyes suddenly found themselves handling more water than they were capable.

Men and women came forward to help as the parties were separated to their respective sides of the baptistry, where the daughter donned a "gown" (more like a waterproof bag with holes and a zipper), and the father strapped on Arkansas-redneck-appropriate camoflauge waders. The two came together again in the middle through sounds of rustling water, and the daughter again clung to her father for support. Her father's words dropped sotto voce as a crash course in "How to Survive Baptism Without Drowning" with the ever-essential "Chapter 5 - Hold on to Your Nose" was administered. He returned to full volume with words I've always found to be simply magical:

"...I now baptize you in the name of the Father, of the Son..."

The daughter broke the plane of the water, finding its symbolic burial below.

"..and of the Holy Spirit."

Her father pulled her from the water to what must have been an incredibly beautiful scene - his "newborn" daughter taking the first breath of her second life. Dry clothes and propriety aside, the father held his daughter tight in joy and love - and I noticed something.

For the first time since I'd seen her begin this journey, she wasn't shaking.

And as I applauded with the rest of the congregation, I couldn't help but think...

My life is wracked daily with the struggles of sin. My spirit has to force my body to walk a straight path each and every second of my life. I lean on my Father, and should do so familiarly as He guides me through my struggle. We walk a path that to His eternal eye seems but a few steps, and seems to me to be the fullness of decades. He washes me in the power of His Redemption through His grace and mercy. And one day He will call me up from the plane I inhabit, and He will view his favorite sight: His child taking the first breath of an eternal life with Him. And even though I may have lived decades, I will cling to Him with joy and love as a child.

And never again will I be shaken.