C.C. Chapman's Blog, page 9

Sometimes All You Need Is

Sometimes all you need is a couple of hours of conversation over a stack of ribs with a dear friend.

Sometimes all you need is to get offline and binge watch a full season of that show you’ve been meaning to check out.

Sometimes all you need is a close-knit group of friends that you know are out there and you can text anytime you need to.

Sometimes all you need is the realization that as bad as things are, you aren’t dead so keep on living.

Sometimes all you need is a good laugh.

Sometimes al...

A New School. Another Semester.

Spring semester at Wheaton College is officially over.

It was an eye-opening semester for me in multiple positive ways.

I was hired to teach Marketing, and while I’ve spent most of my career in the space, it was fun to go back to a textbook and the fundamentals. At the last moment, I was asked to teach a second class, and that was where a lot of the surprises came from.

The Business and Management major is one of the newest ones at the school, and it has quickly become a popular one. Many st...

Looking Back and Feeling Good For Once

Six years ago today I was standing inside of Princess Marie Louise Hospital in Ghana holding the hand of a young girl named Mercy.

Days later I would board a plane home. Weeks later she would die.

When I share this story, it is followed by the notion that when I returned home I determined that I “wanted to use my powers for good.”

Today, as I look back at what I’ve done since that day I find myself smiling.

The artist and entrepreneur in me will never be satisfied. It is the curse of the cre...

I’m Okay With Students Being Punished For Protesting

 

Earlier this week, tens of thousands of students around the country walked out of school to protest for changes in our country’s gun laws as part of the #NationalSchoolWalkout on the one month anniversary of the attack in Parkland, Florida.

Many schools recognized student’s rights to a peaceful protest. Our school provided a designated area to gather, and while they didn’t openly support it, they warned students that their teachers would decide on if to discipline them or not for leaving c...

America, You Need to Meet More Americans

These past seven days have followed a similar pattern that plays over and over. Outrage, anger, call for changes, finger pointing and then silence as something else grabs attention and pulls people away.

Ban this! Shut up snowflakes! Lock it all down! We demand change!

The technology we love has made it too easy to scream and thus harder to discuss.

When you are more inclined to only use your thumb to reflect your emotions, you can’t use your brain and heart.

I have some very strong beliefs...

Are You Prepared to Survive and Help Others Live?

Emotions are raw and hearts are heavy.

Another school day in America ended with screams, blood, and gunfire.

Since our paid-off government isn’t doing anything about updating our gun laws and I wasn’t in the mood to have those kinds of conversations today I decided to focus on a different issue that doesn’t get talked about enough.

I wondered aloud if people I knew were prepared to deal with and survive an incident that involved injuries around them.

Doesn’t matter if it is a car accident, a...

Looking Forward Rather Than Around

Before the sun rose this morning, A Futile And Stupid Gesture was playing on the television.

The coffee was strong, the dogs were sleeping and the weather people had completely botched the forecast of “a dusting at most” with the arrival of several inches of fresh powder.

Laura packed up and headed to work and as we hugged, I blurted out, “movies like this remind me that I’m not a complete fuck up.”

We shared a laugh and she left for the day. Schools are delayed by two hours since the guesse...

Technology Is Breaking Humanity

Technology is rapidly improving around us, all the while breaking us as humans.

A century from now, historians and scientists will look back at these years and write volumes on how technology evolved society in a negative way.

I’m not going Amish on you anytime soon, but as much as I love my gadgets and technology all around me I do hate watching how it is eroding a lot of what makes humans great.

When a celebrity decides to film, make jokes and then publish a video to their millions of fans...

Another End Of The Year Is Upon Us

The final hours of another year.

The ball will drop, people will kiss and tomorrow everyone tries to start over.

I pondered making a video wearing my Casey Neistat “Work Harder” hoodie while drinking from my Chuck Wendig “Art Harder Mother Fucker” coffee mug to motivate everyone to do more in 2018.

Those of you who know me just giggled because you know I could never do that with a straight face and that sentence was dripping with sarcastic honey.

The reality is, every December I look back an...

December: The Long And Short Month

December is my most reflective month. The end of the year. Another trip around the sun for me. The first flakes of snow and bitter cold in the lungs.

Life quiets down and speeds up at the same time. The mayhem of the holidays mixed with cuddling in front of a fire with those you love.

You want to look to the future. To plan for the next year. Determine your three words, say all the things you are going to do, promise to make the next twelve months better than the last.

The only thing I know...