Friday, June 28, 2013
Friday, June 21, 2013
MUST SEE: Unlocking The Truth
Have you seen this?
Unlocking The Truth - Malcolm Brickhouse & Jarad Dawkins
It's absolutely amazing. I'm fascinated by these two. How are they so composed? How do they have such a strong self awareness? And their honesty is inspiring.
Just watch, and fall in love with Unlocking The Truth. Props to Garvey on this one.
Unlocking The Truth - Malcolm Brickhouse & Jarad Dawkins
It's absolutely amazing. I'm fascinated by these two. How are they so composed? How do they have such a strong self awareness? And their honesty is inspiring.
Just watch, and fall in love with Unlocking The Truth. Props to Garvey on this one.
SOD: Dave Grohl, Josh Homme, Trent Reznor "Mantra"
Have you seen Sound City? If you like music you should. If you're at all interested in a microcosm of the recording studio life, this is a great look at one of its most memorable venues. The place had character, and was full of them. This wasn't the kind of place The Beatles or The Eagles would record in. This was the kind of place you went for a certain sound, and the aesthetics weren't even an afterthought.
The dingy Van Nuys recording facility that opened in 1969, was home to the Neve 8028 Mixing Console, of which only four were ever made. Rupert Neve is the man credited with the creation of the modern day mixing console, and this studio bought one for the generous sum of $75,175. That, coupled with the simply fortuitous "legendary sound quality" of the drums in Studio A, made this otherwise dirty-diaper of an establishment one of the premiere places to record. As the infamous and all-knowing Rick Rubin once said, "Guitars sound pretty much the same everywhere, but drums change from room to room and the sound at Sound City was among the best." The staff was like family, and the artists were treated the same way. The "anything goes" mentality of the place was akin to the attitudes of many of the great and wild personas in rock music through the ages. Groups like Nirvana, Foo Fighters, Neil Young, Grateful Dead, Tom Petty, Rick Springfield, Ratt, R.H.C.P., Rage Against The Machine, and on, all recorded one or multiple albums there.
The story of Sound City, directed and told through the lenses and words of Dave Grohl, is as much a retrospective on the people who ran the studio, and those who recorded in it. The incarnation of Fleetwood Mac that most people have come to know and love, may very well never have happened if it weren't for Sound City. Mick Fleewood happened to be in the studio looking for a guitarist at the same time Nicks and Buckingham were recording their debut album together. The rest is history. Neil Young cut After the Gold Rush there, and Rage Against The Machine finished half their debut album in one night with a group of their friends in the studio watching. Nirvana's behemoth Nevermind was recorded at this facility. Need I really say more? These are the kind of personal stories we get from the bands/artists themselves, which I don't think would have come out as well or genuine, without Grohl at the helm.
To appreciate the full scope and impact Sound City had on the recording artists and groups who dared to enter, you have to watch this movie with a clear and focused attention span. There's a lot in between the words of the interviews, and the notes of the music. A real emotion bleeds through from almost each and every subject. I found that a usually annoying and surface Rick Springfield came off genuinely remorseful that he had ruined a relationship with the owner, Joe Gottfried, whom Rick credited with making his career. When Joe died suddenly, you were privy to a very human side of Rick that I've never seen before. Tom Petty also had a leading roll in the film, and I learned a great deal more about how they wrote, recorded, and felt about what their sound and style should be in the early years. It can be as heartbreaking as it can be funny. I was impressed with Grohl's ability to create a cohesive story that incorporated what seemed like an endless amount of interviews and anecdotes, without ever dragging. For a debut film, the man has a knack for filmmaking.
A real twist came at the back end of the film, when the narrative shifted to a real-life, in the present documentary as opposed to the retrospective of the first hour or so. Essentially Dave Grohl bought the Neve Console from Sound City when it was forced to close down due to financial issues (caused by a move to the digital world of recording). Grohl had the console set up in his own private studio, where he could continue to foster his almost creepy love for the machine. He then proceeded to get a large group of artists together who had at one point all recorded at Studio City (and thus on the Neve Console), to make a brand new album. It came together in what seemed like a very fluid extension of making the documentary itself, with Grohl obviously taking the lead again.
Some of the artists who joined in recording the album with Dave Grohl were Tim Commerford and Brad Wilk (RATM), Stevie Nicks, Rick Springfield, Pat Smear and Krist Novoselic(Nirvana/Foo Fighters), Lee Ving (Fear), Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age/Them Crooked Vultures), Trent Reznor, and even though he never recorded on the Neve before, Sir Paul McCartney (though I wasn't a huge fan of his addition to the album).
The closing track, Mantra, was a Josh Homme, Dave Grohl, Trent Reznor, jam session. The piece grows as organically as a twisted vine. It's ethereal and atmospheric, with a cumulative growth from its stripped down beginnings. It's transcendent qualities were duly noted, and the song received very positive reviews. Personally, it was my top choice on the album. There is a clear chemistry between the three of them, and though Josh Homme and Dave Grohl played together previously in Them Crooked Vultures, you can tell that Reznor had the lead on this piece. Aside from the drum part, this has more of his signature on it than anyone else. Theres an unnerving harmony in their styles and voices that made me wish this track was merely one of many to come.
The dingy Van Nuys recording facility that opened in 1969, was home to the Neve 8028 Mixing Console, of which only four were ever made. Rupert Neve is the man credited with the creation of the modern day mixing console, and this studio bought one for the generous sum of $75,175. That, coupled with the simply fortuitous "legendary sound quality" of the drums in Studio A, made this otherwise dirty-diaper of an establishment one of the premiere places to record. As the infamous and all-knowing Rick Rubin once said, "Guitars sound pretty much the same everywhere, but drums change from room to room and the sound at Sound City was among the best." The staff was like family, and the artists were treated the same way. The "anything goes" mentality of the place was akin to the attitudes of many of the great and wild personas in rock music through the ages. Groups like Nirvana, Foo Fighters, Neil Young, Grateful Dead, Tom Petty, Rick Springfield, Ratt, R.H.C.P., Rage Against The Machine, and on, all recorded one or multiple albums there.
The story of Sound City, directed and told through the lenses and words of Dave Grohl, is as much a retrospective on the people who ran the studio, and those who recorded in it. The incarnation of Fleetwood Mac that most people have come to know and love, may very well never have happened if it weren't for Sound City. Mick Fleewood happened to be in the studio looking for a guitarist at the same time Nicks and Buckingham were recording their debut album together. The rest is history. Neil Young cut After the Gold Rush there, and Rage Against The Machine finished half their debut album in one night with a group of their friends in the studio watching. Nirvana's behemoth Nevermind was recorded at this facility. Need I really say more? These are the kind of personal stories we get from the bands/artists themselves, which I don't think would have come out as well or genuine, without Grohl at the helm.
To appreciate the full scope and impact Sound City had on the recording artists and groups who dared to enter, you have to watch this movie with a clear and focused attention span. There's a lot in between the words of the interviews, and the notes of the music. A real emotion bleeds through from almost each and every subject. I found that a usually annoying and surface Rick Springfield came off genuinely remorseful that he had ruined a relationship with the owner, Joe Gottfried, whom Rick credited with making his career. When Joe died suddenly, you were privy to a very human side of Rick that I've never seen before. Tom Petty also had a leading roll in the film, and I learned a great deal more about how they wrote, recorded, and felt about what their sound and style should be in the early years. It can be as heartbreaking as it can be funny. I was impressed with Grohl's ability to create a cohesive story that incorporated what seemed like an endless amount of interviews and anecdotes, without ever dragging. For a debut film, the man has a knack for filmmaking.
A real twist came at the back end of the film, when the narrative shifted to a real-life, in the present documentary as opposed to the retrospective of the first hour or so. Essentially Dave Grohl bought the Neve Console from Sound City when it was forced to close down due to financial issues (caused by a move to the digital world of recording). Grohl had the console set up in his own private studio, where he could continue to foster his almost creepy love for the machine. He then proceeded to get a large group of artists together who had at one point all recorded at Studio City (and thus on the Neve Console), to make a brand new album. It came together in what seemed like a very fluid extension of making the documentary itself, with Grohl obviously taking the lead again.
Some of the artists who joined in recording the album with Dave Grohl were Tim Commerford and Brad Wilk (RATM), Stevie Nicks, Rick Springfield, Pat Smear and Krist Novoselic(Nirvana/Foo Fighters), Lee Ving (Fear), Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age/Them Crooked Vultures), Trent Reznor, and even though he never recorded on the Neve before, Sir Paul McCartney (though I wasn't a huge fan of his addition to the album).
The closing track, Mantra, was a Josh Homme, Dave Grohl, Trent Reznor, jam session. The piece grows as organically as a twisted vine. It's ethereal and atmospheric, with a cumulative growth from its stripped down beginnings. It's transcendent qualities were duly noted, and the song received very positive reviews. Personally, it was my top choice on the album. There is a clear chemistry between the three of them, and though Josh Homme and Dave Grohl played together previously in Them Crooked Vultures, you can tell that Reznor had the lead on this piece. Aside from the drum part, this has more of his signature on it than anyone else. Theres an unnerving harmony in their styles and voices that made me wish this track was merely one of many to come.
Thursday, June 20, 2013
Entitlement
Disclaimer: I'm back and I'm getting heavy.
Entitlement is a right. It's a guarantee of something and in many instances, specifically law, it's an important basis for which our individual rights are based (i.e. all are entitled to a fair trial).
But in our day to day world, "entitlement" takes on a different and perhaps more meaningful definition when used in the casual and unfortunately pejorative sense. Having a "sense of entitlement" is no flattering thing. It is a narcissistic personality trait of the overtly self-involved. And as much as I truly do hate to admit it, it's a festering infection that much of my generation suffers from. This may be regarded as opinion, but it is based off years of analyzing what I see on a day to day basis with both the people I call peers, and even friends.
There lives a notion in many of us that we are deserving of the gifts that have been bestowed upon us since birth, and that we have a lifelong right to receive them. Without having accomplished any feat of particular brilliance, especially considering how much we have at our disposal, we have a deeply ingrained volition of extra self-worth. Confidence, is not what I am referring to. It's a personal understanding that the universe doesn't revolve around you, but your certainly worth more of it's time and attention than most. I'm not completely clear where this feeling came from originally. Parents are certainly an enabler of this mentality and it's long been the American way to teach our children that everybody's special in their own amazing way. I'm not saying a "Tiger-Mom" is any better but those are both extremes whether or not we want to admit it. A capitalistic society is certainly great soil to foster that kind of growth in its young sprouts. With no ceiling on what you're told you can attain, all that's left to want is more. Watching your parents break their backs for the better house, car, and espresso machine will certainly leave its mark, and the fact that we all put so much importance on wealth and "what you make" as a measure of our achievement and self-worth, has very real and lasting effects. Everything becomes a status symbol, and status is based on what you have, not who you are.
But it's not so much the cause that I'm concerned with. Psychologists may be, but I'm more focused right now on the effect this mentality is having on my life, on my friends lives, and on the lives of the children many of us may hope to have. I'm also worried that nobody see's this problem in themselves, and that surely I'm wasting my words. I mean after all, who wants to admit to themselves or anyone else that they may have a complex like this? It's not the kind of description a person wants to be given. Everyone likes to think of themselves as humble but confident, strong and silent but verbal when necessary. Everyone wants to think their words have meaning, and their principles are strong. But the truth is, that most of the things we want to be inside, are oxy-moronic when tested out in the world. The strong are rarely silent, and the humble are usually introverts with low self-esteem (even if their talents are noteworthy), and principles are easy to talk about, but the very few times they're put to the test in our lives, we usually compromise with them and are never as hard-nosed as we want to believe.
The sense of entitlement that I speak of, is in many ways akin to the false sense of entitlement that so much has been written on in the field of child psychology and parenting, but "grown-up" a bit. My problem is that some of us never out grew it originally, and that little monster is now a fucking beast. That entitlement grows from being the somewhat natural instinct of a child to want everything immediately, to the unnaturally obscenity of an adult thinking they deserve everything because they've done something to warrant it all along. The idea of a sense of entitlement itself is very Freudian, and its no wonder many of the theories I am drawn to are psychoanalytical. Just type "ENTITLEMENT" into wikipedia (yea, I went there), and you'll get a great quote from second-generation psychoanalyst Otto Fenichel (who sadly I did have to read about in my collegiate studies) equating entitlement to a narcissistic personality disorder in people who "because of early frustrations...arrogate to themselves the right to demand lifelong reimbursement from fate."
I break that thought up into two very important ideas:
First, ...arrogate to themselves. Forget the rest of it for a moment. Here's the crux of it all. If you're arrogating anything to yourself, it's undeservedly. And that is exactly what a sense of entitlement has come to mean these days. So to arrogate to oneself the right to demand lifelong reimbursement, is to collect on something you never earned in the first place. This is a all to perfectly exemplified in modern day lawsuits. People say to themselves, "Life handed me this shitty situation of debt and detriment, so I deserve some compensation." It's not about the accident or instance or immoral way the money is being obtained, it's about the fact that you got fucked (probably because of your own incompetence in the first place), so now The World owes you a debt. And lawsuits are just an example. That mentality seeps into every porous pocket of our being. The entitlement grows, and then you start taking for granted the good things people do for you. You start justifying it to yourself. "Oh well, Tom should pay for dinner he's loaded with a great job and he doesn't even work that hard. I've been struggling for years!" Though the name's changed, that's literally a direct quote.
The Second Part of Otto's premise is also something to note. "... demand lifelong reimbursement from fate." There's a bit more of the hypothetical entwined in this, but its still pertinent. The idea of fate intrigues me, because whether or not people believe in fate, it's always there and often it's notions are bought into by non-believers. Simply asking yourself the rhetorical version of the question, "why did this happen to me" implies that there are answers out there somewhere in the grand scheme of things. The reason I say this is because I think almost everyone believes, even if its only vaguely or simply an acknowledgement that they don't have all the answers, that life has some riddle like qualities to it. Coincidence, chance, luck, these things are out there, and many people put a lot of stock in them. You don't have to, but the fact that others do will unfortunately cause these things to impact your life. So the idea that a reimbursement from fate can somehow be the reason, for what otherwise has no reason, is believable to me. The sense of entitlement is built upon nothing because in the end, it's not deserved. But the person with the entitlement needs something to base it on, so why not make it something as big as say, the plan of the universe? That, in my perception, is soundly in-tune with most narcissistic people I've met. Justification is an important part of convincing yourself why you're actually deserving in the first place. Have I lost you yet?
I know, I'm saying a lot, and I have my "theories". But anyone who knows me, knows the motor's always running in this truck, and even though I've gone far down some of the stranger paths, it's with good intent. Examples however are like low hanging fruit with this particular one though. This entitlement, once residing with someone for some time, starts to effect other behaviors as well. How could such a great and verbose belief not permeate to adjacent parts of the personality? Respect, courtesy, etiquette, these are the first to go. When the world owes you, there's little time (or need) to give others their due. The me-first attitude always takes precedence, friends can start to look like competition, or worse yet, stepping stones. You forget the manners you were once taught (or not), and the fight to the top is a ruthless one. When we stop respecting people and devolve into these assholes we see in our daily lives who curse out the people behind the counter for not "snapping to it" quickly enough, will we even realize what we've become? Is that the behavior you want your young to emulate?
Its hard to believe, but I see these things happen with people I know every day. It scares me to think that they don't even realize when their actions take on this form. Worse yet if they are aware of it, they don't see it as problematic. It scares me even more to ask myself, have I been that person? I sincerely hope not, though I know I've had my moments of ungratefulness and contempt. It's never so overt as to encapsulate everything said above all the time, and it doesn't mean that the people who exhibit this are not smart, or intellectual, or even enjoyable in most cases. In fact, most of these people are all these things and more. But they lack an understanding of how people should be treated, and what they themselves are truly deserving of. Because the truth as I see it, is that we haven't done enough with what we have, and in most cases, haven't really tried. I haven't done enough with all I've been given, I know that. I try to work hard, and be respectful of everyone, and everything. And that's my standard. If there is one word that would be the most important word to base your entire life around, for me, it would be Respect. Give it, but demand it. Strive to get it, and remember to return it when it's earned. Have it in yourself, but for the right reasons. Always show it to your elders and to women, because history has shown that they have had to work harder for it. Teach it, preach it, and pass it along.
Now it must be said, that when accomplishments are achieved, gratitude and compensation are absolutely deserved. Confidence should be high, and the good productive kind of confidence, not the false inflated kind. Being rewarded for doing well, that should be the American way. You should get more if you've earned more, and that should give you a certain sense of pride. But pride at the expense of others is never acceptable. Not to me at least. And it may sound like I think I have all the answers, but I know I don't. I don't know how to change peoples perceptions of what is important, and I wouldn't even begin to know how to get them to change their approach towards getting those things. All I can do I guess, is try and practice what I preach, which after a post like this, may be an undertaking in itself. We all slip up and do things we know we shouldn't have. Maybe the first step is admitting to just that, and making an effort to be more concerned about bettering ourselves, than comparing ourselves to others. Take a step back, look at what you've got and decide what's really important. Finding worth in yourself and your place, shouldn't rely on where anyone else in the world is. Competition is a good thing, it pushes people to do better, and rises humanity to new heights. But it should have no bearing on your intrinsic value and happiness.
Yea I know, this is a mouthful. Maybe even a bit verbose. But you know what, I think somebody had to say something. Even if nobody is listening.
Entitlement is a right. It's a guarantee of something and in many instances, specifically law, it's an important basis for which our individual rights are based (i.e. all are entitled to a fair trial).
But in our day to day world, "entitlement" takes on a different and perhaps more meaningful definition when used in the casual and unfortunately pejorative sense. Having a "sense of entitlement" is no flattering thing. It is a narcissistic personality trait of the overtly self-involved. And as much as I truly do hate to admit it, it's a festering infection that much of my generation suffers from. This may be regarded as opinion, but it is based off years of analyzing what I see on a day to day basis with both the people I call peers, and even friends.
There lives a notion in many of us that we are deserving of the gifts that have been bestowed upon us since birth, and that we have a lifelong right to receive them. Without having accomplished any feat of particular brilliance, especially considering how much we have at our disposal, we have a deeply ingrained volition of extra self-worth. Confidence, is not what I am referring to. It's a personal understanding that the universe doesn't revolve around you, but your certainly worth more of it's time and attention than most. I'm not completely clear where this feeling came from originally. Parents are certainly an enabler of this mentality and it's long been the American way to teach our children that everybody's special in their own amazing way. I'm not saying a "Tiger-Mom" is any better but those are both extremes whether or not we want to admit it. A capitalistic society is certainly great soil to foster that kind of growth in its young sprouts. With no ceiling on what you're told you can attain, all that's left to want is more. Watching your parents break their backs for the better house, car, and espresso machine will certainly leave its mark, and the fact that we all put so much importance on wealth and "what you make" as a measure of our achievement and self-worth, has very real and lasting effects. Everything becomes a status symbol, and status is based on what you have, not who you are.
But it's not so much the cause that I'm concerned with. Psychologists may be, but I'm more focused right now on the effect this mentality is having on my life, on my friends lives, and on the lives of the children many of us may hope to have. I'm also worried that nobody see's this problem in themselves, and that surely I'm wasting my words. I mean after all, who wants to admit to themselves or anyone else that they may have a complex like this? It's not the kind of description a person wants to be given. Everyone likes to think of themselves as humble but confident, strong and silent but verbal when necessary. Everyone wants to think their words have meaning, and their principles are strong. But the truth is, that most of the things we want to be inside, are oxy-moronic when tested out in the world. The strong are rarely silent, and the humble are usually introverts with low self-esteem (even if their talents are noteworthy), and principles are easy to talk about, but the very few times they're put to the test in our lives, we usually compromise with them and are never as hard-nosed as we want to believe.
The sense of entitlement that I speak of, is in many ways akin to the false sense of entitlement that so much has been written on in the field of child psychology and parenting, but "grown-up" a bit. My problem is that some of us never out grew it originally, and that little monster is now a fucking beast. That entitlement grows from being the somewhat natural instinct of a child to want everything immediately, to the unnaturally obscenity of an adult thinking they deserve everything because they've done something to warrant it all along. The idea of a sense of entitlement itself is very Freudian, and its no wonder many of the theories I am drawn to are psychoanalytical. Just type "ENTITLEMENT" into wikipedia (yea, I went there), and you'll get a great quote from second-generation psychoanalyst Otto Fenichel (who sadly I did have to read about in my collegiate studies) equating entitlement to a narcissistic personality disorder in people who "because of early frustrations...arrogate to themselves the right to demand lifelong reimbursement from fate."
I break that thought up into two very important ideas:
First, ...arrogate to themselves. Forget the rest of it for a moment. Here's the crux of it all. If you're arrogating anything to yourself, it's undeservedly. And that is exactly what a sense of entitlement has come to mean these days. So to arrogate to oneself the right to demand lifelong reimbursement, is to collect on something you never earned in the first place. This is a all to perfectly exemplified in modern day lawsuits. People say to themselves, "Life handed me this shitty situation of debt and detriment, so I deserve some compensation." It's not about the accident or instance or immoral way the money is being obtained, it's about the fact that you got fucked (probably because of your own incompetence in the first place), so now The World owes you a debt. And lawsuits are just an example. That mentality seeps into every porous pocket of our being. The entitlement grows, and then you start taking for granted the good things people do for you. You start justifying it to yourself. "Oh well, Tom should pay for dinner he's loaded with a great job and he doesn't even work that hard. I've been struggling for years!" Though the name's changed, that's literally a direct quote.
The Second Part of Otto's premise is also something to note. "... demand lifelong reimbursement from fate." There's a bit more of the hypothetical entwined in this, but its still pertinent. The idea of fate intrigues me, because whether or not people believe in fate, it's always there and often it's notions are bought into by non-believers. Simply asking yourself the rhetorical version of the question, "why did this happen to me" implies that there are answers out there somewhere in the grand scheme of things. The reason I say this is because I think almost everyone believes, even if its only vaguely or simply an acknowledgement that they don't have all the answers, that life has some riddle like qualities to it. Coincidence, chance, luck, these things are out there, and many people put a lot of stock in them. You don't have to, but the fact that others do will unfortunately cause these things to impact your life. So the idea that a reimbursement from fate can somehow be the reason, for what otherwise has no reason, is believable to me. The sense of entitlement is built upon nothing because in the end, it's not deserved. But the person with the entitlement needs something to base it on, so why not make it something as big as say, the plan of the universe? That, in my perception, is soundly in-tune with most narcissistic people I've met. Justification is an important part of convincing yourself why you're actually deserving in the first place. Have I lost you yet?
I know, I'm saying a lot, and I have my "theories". But anyone who knows me, knows the motor's always running in this truck, and even though I've gone far down some of the stranger paths, it's with good intent. Examples however are like low hanging fruit with this particular one though. This entitlement, once residing with someone for some time, starts to effect other behaviors as well. How could such a great and verbose belief not permeate to adjacent parts of the personality? Respect, courtesy, etiquette, these are the first to go. When the world owes you, there's little time (or need) to give others their due. The me-first attitude always takes precedence, friends can start to look like competition, or worse yet, stepping stones. You forget the manners you were once taught (or not), and the fight to the top is a ruthless one. When we stop respecting people and devolve into these assholes we see in our daily lives who curse out the people behind the counter for not "snapping to it" quickly enough, will we even realize what we've become? Is that the behavior you want your young to emulate?
Its hard to believe, but I see these things happen with people I know every day. It scares me to think that they don't even realize when their actions take on this form. Worse yet if they are aware of it, they don't see it as problematic. It scares me even more to ask myself, have I been that person? I sincerely hope not, though I know I've had my moments of ungratefulness and contempt. It's never so overt as to encapsulate everything said above all the time, and it doesn't mean that the people who exhibit this are not smart, or intellectual, or even enjoyable in most cases. In fact, most of these people are all these things and more. But they lack an understanding of how people should be treated, and what they themselves are truly deserving of. Because the truth as I see it, is that we haven't done enough with what we have, and in most cases, haven't really tried. I haven't done enough with all I've been given, I know that. I try to work hard, and be respectful of everyone, and everything. And that's my standard. If there is one word that would be the most important word to base your entire life around, for me, it would be Respect. Give it, but demand it. Strive to get it, and remember to return it when it's earned. Have it in yourself, but for the right reasons. Always show it to your elders and to women, because history has shown that they have had to work harder for it. Teach it, preach it, and pass it along.
Now it must be said, that when accomplishments are achieved, gratitude and compensation are absolutely deserved. Confidence should be high, and the good productive kind of confidence, not the false inflated kind. Being rewarded for doing well, that should be the American way. You should get more if you've earned more, and that should give you a certain sense of pride. But pride at the expense of others is never acceptable. Not to me at least. And it may sound like I think I have all the answers, but I know I don't. I don't know how to change peoples perceptions of what is important, and I wouldn't even begin to know how to get them to change their approach towards getting those things. All I can do I guess, is try and practice what I preach, which after a post like this, may be an undertaking in itself. We all slip up and do things we know we shouldn't have. Maybe the first step is admitting to just that, and making an effort to be more concerned about bettering ourselves, than comparing ourselves to others. Take a step back, look at what you've got and decide what's really important. Finding worth in yourself and your place, shouldn't rely on where anyone else in the world is. Competition is a good thing, it pushes people to do better, and rises humanity to new heights. But it should have no bearing on your intrinsic value and happiness.
Yea I know, this is a mouthful. Maybe even a bit verbose. But you know what, I think somebody had to say something. Even if nobody is listening.
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