Whoever said it was easy?

I have had the burden in the last four weeks or so to see five couples that I know separate on the way to divorce. Three of the five in the last five days. Not one of them is sans children. I am currently shaking with anger at the one I just found out about less than an hour ago. What I have to say on marriage is one that I hold very strongly and dear to my heart, so please understand that this is my opinion and based upon biblical truth.

At one point all of these people fell in love and decided to spend the rest of their lives here on this rock as a couple, united together as one. They went and spent much more money than they should have to have family and friends come to celebrate with them this day that they took vows that would start the rest of their lives together.  They said words that mentioned good times and wonderful lives and health and prosperity and promised to be a family and all was wonderful. If these people said similar vows to mine that I took almost fifteen years ago they also said they would be with that other person in bad times, poorness, sickness and when it all seemed like nothing good was ahead of them.

Have they forgotten that part? Have we just decided that marriage is all of what I can get out of it? Have we forgotten that it takes work? That because we are all human and are not perfect because of sin that we will make mistakes? Some of those mistakes will be terrible, but we need to work at it. We need to stand up and take responsibility for our word. It is not a renewable contract. It is a forever contract.

If your word can not be trusted with one you love and whom you vowed to stay with forever; with one whom you had children with and spent the most intimate parts of your life with; then what good is your word for anything else? How can anyone trust that you will do what you say? How will your children ever be able to know if you are telling them the truth? This is not the tooth fairy or santa claus. This is their father or mother that you said you would spend the rest of your life with and then decided it was not good enough for you. It was too much work. It did not fit into your life plans.

I am sorry, but that is not what marriage is. It is not all about you. It is sacrifice. It is work. It is hard. You will fight. You will say things you don’t mean and so will your partner. You have to forgive. You have to say you are sorry. You have to move on. You said you would forever.

I do not accept that you can’t do it anymore. Ultimately you mean you won’t do it anymore. The choice is ultimately yours. I won’t stop loving you because you make a bad choice. We all do. I will however watch how you get back up from that. Do you make it right? Can I trust you? Will you do what you know is right? Is your word worth as much as you once thought it was?

In Colossians 2:8 it says, “Don’t let anyone capture you with empty philosophies and high-sounding nonsense that come from human thinking and from the spiritual powers of this world, rather than from Christ.” (NLT) For all of you out there going through this, listen to what the Bible has to say. Heed the warnings it has. Love its wisdom. It has been time tested and proven true time and again. Divorce is a empty philosophy. Do you really think you will be any happier without your spouse? Do you think your life will be easier? Do you know that you will still be dealing with them for the rest of your lives, especially with children involved. Every holiday, every birthday, every special occasion you will still be sharing with that ex spouse.

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Who are they?

Since my favorite coffee shop in town closed I have been frequenting one that is actually closer to home on an almost daily basis. I usually start my work day there and then in mid to late morning go into the office. With it being summer I have been spending many of my mornings on the patio of said coffee shop and just about every morning a couple come on bicycles get their coffee and paper and sit on the exact opposite side of the window from me.

They are probably in their early sixties. They look like they enjoy life and each others company. Besides that bit of visual information I know nothing about them. Who are they? What is their story? Where are they from? We are literally separated by inches on a daily basis.

How many times in life are we around people, even family on a regular basis and we just don’t take the time to really get to know them? How many opportunities do we have on a daily basis to touch someone’s life, to make a positive influence and we let it pass by? Either we are too busy or too shy to get involved. We are called to love our neighbor as ourselves. We are called to community – our community. Yet we don’t know our neighbor and their needs, cares, concerns or choose to get involved in their lives.

I am challenging myself to get to know my neighbors and to be involved in their lives. To love them and step out of my comfortable environment. To not prejudge based on initial actions or looks. Help make the community we live in a better place by knowing and caring for those who are your neighbors.

Posted in Radom Thoughts, Theology | Leave a comment

New Starbuck’s Creamer?

Coffemate spotted at Starbucks I started my morning from a Starbucks just down the road from my office and while working I glanced out the window next to me and saw something that made me do a triple take. And then take out my phone for a photo opp.

I blurred out the faces of the “innocent”, but that is a bottle of Coffeemate® creamer on the table with them. I did not go outside and ask if it was flavored or plain. Either way it was pretty a gutsy move.

What will we see next? Cafe International?

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Contest mistake that turns out a win

I wanted to share this today as I think it is a great example of doing the right thing even when it costs you. In this case it may have only cost pride, but it could have easily just been brushed under the carpet.

So I got the following email this morning.

Congratulations!

You will be receiving a complimentary autographed copy of Pete Wilson’s Plan B from MichaelHyatt.com <http://MichaelHyatt.com> .

I hope that you enjoy the book.

Thanks,
Lindsey

Well needless to say I was very excited to get a free book, but at the same time did not remember entering the giveaway that Lindsey had mentioned. I had entered other giveaways on Michael Hyatt’s blog previously, just not this one. I was a fan of the author, Pete Wilson. I follow him on Twitter and occasionally read his blog, WithoutWax.tv.

I did not give much more thought to the book until after lunch. After lunch I had the following email in my inbox.

Hey everyone,

A few of you might be wondering how you “won” a free autographed copy of Plan B as you didn’t enter the giveaway on Michaelhyatt.com. Well, I messed up. When I pulled the list this morning, I accidentally grabbed an old data file. (Dumb.)

All this to say – you will still be getting a free autographed copy of Plan B. And we will also take care of selecting winners from the correct data file.

Next time, I won’t deal with spreadsheets before ingesting my daily supply of caffeine.

I apologize for any confusion this might have caused. I hope you enjoy Pete’s book.

Have a great day.
Lindsey

Well now it made sense why I did not remember entering the contest. But more importantly was how the problem was resolved. They did the right thing. Lindsey did not have to send out the second email. She could have just sent the books to the actual winners and to the recipients of the initial email. Most of us would not have been the wiser.

Instead she took the high road and confessed that she had made a mistake. She was humbly sincere and had a way to fix the problem. I am sure on the back side it was an even more humbling experience going to her boss and telling him she had made this mistake and needed help fixing it. Then possibly having to find a way not only to get more books, but to get Pete Wilson to sign them.

She did find a way and this resolution has done multiple things for me the consumer. One, it showed me that these people really care about others. Two, it shows a spirit of truth and honesty which makes me trust them even more. Three, in an indirect way it makes me trust Pete Wilson even more because he is being represented by a group that is upfront and honest in it’s practices.

If you are going to do business, do it right. Be upfront, honest and trustworthy. We all make mistakes and Lindsey – well done in making your mistake turn into a win. I will let you all know how the books is.

Follow Lindsey (@lindseynobles), Michael (@micahaelhyatt) or Pete (@pwilson) on Twitter.

(A side note, Pete’s blog has a post that came out two days before this posting about what to do when you screw up. Check it out.)

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GMail’s Intelligence

Google Alert I have been using Gmail since it was by invite only and once in the club you only had 5 invites to bring in friends. So I have seen it go through the gamut of changes but stumbled upon this one yesterday and honestly it is kind of scary. Google’s artificial intelligence knows that I have referenced an attachment in my email body but there is none attached.

On the surface and for most of my emails this is a great service because many times I do forget to attach files in my haste to get my thoughts down and out to whomever I need to communicate with. But at the same time it does mean the machine is getting smarter. It means that Gmail knows what I am typing and the context of its meaning.

This is not new Google launched something very similar a few months ago with its contextual search where you start to type in a search term and Google will try to finish it with multiple suggestions listed below. To me that feels a bit different. A search feels more of a public act where as email feels more personal. It feels like I am being watched. I know that one of Google’s core philosophies is  “You can make money without doing evil.” And I trust that they do. Not being a conspiracy theorist personally it is an interesting trend to watch.

If you see other things like this in the Google universe leave them in the comments.

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Quick Response code coming of age

Lowes Scan

I was at the garden center at Lowe’s home improvement store yesterday and noticed the image above right at the entrance. The whole piece was about 11 in x 17 in. so the Quick Response (QR) code was about 8 x 8. The code once scanned takes you to m.bonnieplants.com. Bonnie plants is the major nursery for this Lowes location. The site if you don’t have the time to visit gives you a bunch of information on plants to choose, recipes, info for new gardeners and more. This is a great example of how smart phones and modern technology are getting you more information right away.

If you are not familiar with the QR codes they are a newer type of barcode that holds much more information than traditional barcodes. Traditional barcodes hold 13 characters or numbers. Where QR codes hold up to 1024 charaters. This gives you enough information to encode web site urls or phone numbers or other information that you may want to disseminate. UPS uses a form of this for package tracking.

Many mobile devices including iPod touch, iPhone and Android phones have apps that will read these codes and give you a readout of the encoded data or link you the web site if it is encoded.

The advantages of this is that now suppliers can save money on huge brochures or POP materials and link a customer to a web site to get more information like installation instructions, videos and image galleries. This helps the supplier become more environmentally conscious as less paper and materials are used to create the information the consumer needs. As well the consumer gets all the information they need accessible at the touch of a screen. The information does not become dated as new products come out because as we all know a web page is easier to update than it is to reprint 50,000 brochures.

It will be interesting going forward as to how many others join this trend in the retail environment. Keep your eyes open and if have seen this in other locations please leave them in the comments.

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Values by spending

Okay we have all heard it said that you vote with your money. In other words what you believe in is represented by whom you spend you money with. If you believe in low prices you shop Walmart. If you believe in quality craftsmanship furniture you probably have a custom built piece.

I recently saw a tweet about the following article (http://bit.ly/nl164 ). Basically the article if you don’t have time to read it is about a woman at a flash conference in Minneapolis that went to a high profile seminar and the presenter Hoss Gifford made sexually explicit jokes and dropped the f bomb through the presentation.

After reading the blog I can tell you I would probably not recommend this guy’s work even if he is the best of the best in flash, which he really isn’t. But the point is not even about this particular presenter, but online media in general. How do you know what we are getting is in line with our values and morals? Do you care or are you out for number one? Do the values of a company or individual that you are purchasing either a product or service matter to you?

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Post Twitter

Today I was sitting in on a webinar about engaging social media from a business and marketing perspective. I could not help but think about what this actually meant for social media giants such as Facebook and Twitter. I have already heard rumblings of early adopters looking for the next thing because of celebrity pollution on Twitter. If business starts coming in and pushing ads as are now on Facebook, what does that look like for the future of this technology?

I understand that individuals are just starting into the Facebook and Twitter realms, but does that mean that business has to be in that realm as well? Are these mediums the same as a web site? Is it beneficial for a business to business company to join the social network scene? Or what about a plumber? I am not sure that I would follow the tweets of a plumber and his daily activities in order to do business with him/her. Now for humor possibly I would follow the plumber and his daily exploits.

From my user experience these mediums are about engaging people that you have a common interest in or would like to have engage with in someway. I would be like businesses getting involved in and trying to market to a chatroom or Instant Message stream. It could be done, but is the ROI high enough to try? Let me know your thoughts.

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Insight into a dog's hunting skills

The day after Thanksgiving our family adopted a lovable though rather large chocolate lab from the local humane society. He was about a year when we adopted him and weighed 85 pounds, now 95. His name – Zeus, a logical name for a dog this large. Over all he is a great dog, listens fairly well and loves to be loved by the kids and all he comes in contact with.

My father keeps asking me if I think he is a hunting dog or not. I had no idea as we have not had a chance to do any kind of field tests or gun trials with him. Yesterday we found out that he does have some hunting skill in him. Continue reading

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Ad volume

An interesting marketing ploy was revealed to me yesterday. One that made a friend and I chuckle over lunch yesterday. We were at a local fast food shop watching CNN on their televisions. The volume was such that if you listened very close you could make out what the news anchors were saying. During the commercial breaks the volume was about the same level as the programming in general except for one ad.

The ad was for AARP. The volume was about 50% louder than any other ad during the commercial break. I thought to myself, “Wow, they know their audience or they just insulted a bunch of them.” Duly noted though that the older generation still needs the volume turned up. I wonder though if that is true for blogs. Maybe I SHOULD SPEAK UP WHEN WRITING FROM NOW ON.

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