Nick Shamhart's Blog, page 4

Facebook Losing Face?

May 22, 2014

One of my readers sent me an email asking why she hadn’t seen my posts on Facebook and if I had stopped using that platform.

Not to worry, my accounts are still active and utilized on every social media site, folks. The thing is for those of us that have been using Facebook for years (odd to be able to say that) the changes have been dramatic. I will do my best not to criticize the company. It is after all a free service, but longtime users still do not understand why they don’t see every post from their friends, family, and favorite pages on their feed.

The first reason is that most people and pages refuse to pay-to-promote their posts. The second, from the page’s front, is that there are the verified pages that BIG NAME products and celebrities have that benefit Facebook financially by just having an account. Then there are the lesser known ones (Hi, nice to meet you. I’m one of those). And lastly the complete unknowns and random junk that is added to the social media trash heap daily. Facebook makes money off of us middle of the road, lesser knows. We are the ones with a reach but not the dynamic fame of say Beiber, Disney, Doritos, or any other mega product.  But our supporters still want to know what’s going on with our careers and whatnot. So the idea is that the Big Names don’t need to pay. The unknowns won’t pay… so, the middle class is supposed to. Hmm, sounds kind of familiar, doesn’t  it?

If you’re unwilling to jump platforms to the abbreviated world of Twitter (inane and really full of nonsense posts, but you’ll still see them if you’re following somebody) then the best solution is to try and utilize the Facebook algorithms. Don’t worry, it’s easy. If you want to see posts from a page or friend more often you have to increase your interaction with them  - quid pro quo. That means go to that page or profile and “Like” every damn post and picture (even if you don’t), comment (even if you have nothing to say add a happy face), and share the posts you really like on your profile. Do the same as you see new posts on your timeline and that will up the visibility of future posts.

Good luck!

~Nick

Still a Better Read Than “Fifty Shades of Grey”

May 15, 2014

Yes, Americans are lazy. Yes, they are (at times) stupid … and ignorant … and dumb … and, well, you take my meaning.

The thing is Americans can only shoulder so much of the blame for the plummet in reading statistics. The greed and foolishness of the publishing industry bears the Atlas-sized weight of it. When you trade quality for scandal, sensationalism, and a quick buck as publishers have, why should the people take the blame?

For too long the major publishing houses have been in control of what the world was supposed to read. They were (and still are) falsely considered judges of literature, gatekeepers for the art of storytelling. But they are a business. Never forget that. Money drives the machine, nothing more.

Case in point being that in a world with all time low book sales and fewer and fewer readers, Charles Ramsey was allotted a book – Dead Giveaway. Yes, the man did a good deed. In a neighborhood that, politely saying, isn’t the safest. You would never see any of the publishers who are selling his book there let me tell you. But. Let’s not forget that he heard a scream, put down his Big Mac, and opened a fucking door! That’s it! He didn’t fight the entire Castro clan single highhandedly, or rescue orphans from a burning building. He opened a fucking door! That does not make him an author. That does not mean he deserves to have his story told in print. Hell, I just told it! Scream, Big Mac, Door. That’s it. Story told.

Despite all that … Charles is being taken advantage of. What’s left of the reading public is being taken advantage of.

Rich white men who wouldn’t have spit on Charles if he were on fire a little over a year ago are now making money off of him – again. He is seen as a gimmick and not an individual. He deserves better. Everyone deserves better

The real bitch of it is that it’s still probably a better read than Fifty Shades of Grey.

~ Nick Shamhart

 

The Greed of Man vs. The Death of Art?

May 12, 2014

To look at the history of art is to look at the history of man. They are interrelated, symbiotic, and to a point – codependent. When our ancestors first began to tell stories, sing songs, pound out tattoos upon drums, sketch on cave walls, and carve stone, wood, and bone into shapes they hardly did so because they, “Like wanted to be famous and stuff. You know, like J.K. Rowling and the Twilight chick.”

I cannot count the number of people who have told me that they want to be writers. When I ask them why, none have yet to respond without some desire for fame and fortune behind their words. Greed does not create. Greed destroys.

Art is and always has been about creation. It connected us as people when we were singing to keep the dark at bay or telling stories to ebb our pervasive loneliness as the only sentient beings on our planet. With the songs, stories, paintings, and statues came companionship; a connection to other men and women. A candle in the dark. We are not alone in our feelings and dreams. Someone else sees images in the clouds.

It wasn’t always as greed-fueled as it is now. The Venus of Willendorf does’t have an asinine copyright or trademark stamped under her copious buttocks, accompanied by a chipped signature. Imagine the cavemen cocktail party conversations: “Oooo, did you see the new rock by Ug? It’s to die for!” … “How about Grunt’s new drum solo? I wish I could be like her!”

Art kept our souls alight. It drug us out of the world of tooth and claw. Why did that change? Why did greed corrupt our art? And, is it too late to take it back?

Will future generations look at our “art” and laugh at its vanity and hubris, pandering to carnal desires for a dollar? Or, will our greed only spread further and art (the externalization of the internal) become so tarnished that it is only a business to be consumed? A mental fast food hamburger, all greasy and limp that only vaguely resembles sustenance.

The greatest artist to ever live is the girl whistling a nameless tune in a graveyard to keep the dark and dead at bay.

~Nick Shamhart

 

Education Is a Community Issue

*The specifics of this message are for my chosen hometown of Olmsted Falls, but the broader concerns and sentiments are applicable anywhere.

Community is a noun that seems to be devaluing as our world contracts. It seems we spend more time in here (in the world of pixels and social media) where our friends and neighbors are represented by a profile picture and not a handshake. Our personal community grows as our expanded community shrinks.

Perhaps it is raising a mentally handicapped child who cannot speak. A child that needs a buffer, translator, and guardian from the world around her that makes community such a poignant concept to me. I need to trust that the people around me would protect her as if she were their own. I do my best to lend a hand where I can to all the other children in my community as if they were mine. Call it humane reciprocity, I will not deny it, but…why should we treat other people’s children with less dignity and respect that we do our flesh and blood?

Educating our youth…is there a nobler purpose? Passing on what knowledge we have gained so they may grow and have more opportunities than we had? Isn’t that human instinct? If not…then it should be.

In a perfect world education would be free. Look around. The world is far from perfect. If you believe that education is important then you will pass that on to your children, to your neighbor’s children, to your friend’s children, and maybe we can keep our community growing without as well as within.

Vote “Yes” on Issue 4 tomorrow, Tuesday, May 6th. Education is never a poor investment.

~Nick Shamhart

 

Why Stupid People Are Angry

May 2, 2014

I find it to be the epitome of irony that we live in the Information Age and we are now, with all that knowledge at out fingertips, discovering just how ignorant we have become.

There is an agitation simmering in the world. It was always there. But with everyone shouting their opinions to the heavens for all to hear, that aggressive negativity is more in-your-face and culturally pervasive. Aggression and anger are direct human reactions to fear, and fear’s favorite bedfellow is ignorance. Fear of the unknown.

There is nothing wrong with ignorance in and of itself. We were all, and still are, ignorant of so many things. We learn. That’s how we combat ignorance and fear. But people are prideful apes. We don’t like for the other monkeys to think that we are ignorant. So, on topics that we only have the slightest knowledge of – topics that we are too ashamed to admit our ignorance to – we lash out. We fight. It’s a fear response that has saved our collective genetics asses for quite some time now.

It’s humorous because when we have an extensive mental lexicon on any given subject we tend not to argue about it. The fear that breeds aggressive zealotry is sated by comprehensive knowledge, and we arrive at the realization that if another person is so agitated at their own ignorance that they are verbally lashing out (the truest sign of doubt is in overcompensation) it only stems from their ignorance and there is no plausibility that countering their argument will change that. Your knowledge cannot, and will not, convince them of their ignorance. They already know they are spouting, shouting, and raving as a product of their insecurity. The problem is accepting that they can only learn if they are willing to set aside their anger response to fear.

There are angry people all over the world, digital agitators filled with spleen, malice, and resentment, transferring their insecurities and fears into online bitterness. I guess that’s the morality tale that is the internet: Learn from it…or wallow in ignorance. The information is there. It’s your choice to open your mind and grow, or close it and stagnate.

~Nick Shamhart

I Tried to Use That Map-Thingy But I Couldn’t Find the Key to Turn It On.

April 30, 2014

I’m often asked the naive (yet well-meaning) question of, “What’s it like to be a writer?”

My response depends on my mood, and quite frankly the size of the audience. I was recently posed this query at a smaller venue. The girl was very sincere when she asked, “What’s it like to be a writer?”

Without missing a beat, I replied, “Honestly? It’s like being a cartographer in a world of GPS.”

She asked, “What’s a cartographer?”

I nodded, sadly, and said, “Well there’s the answer to your first question, kiddo, and I suggest Googling the second.”

~Nick Shamhart

Why Books Will Always Be Superior to Movies

April 26, 2014

Despite trends and statistics, books will always be superior to film. There is an exercise I like people to try whenever I speak at a creative writing class or an author panel. Give it a try.

There is a man standing in the doorway. He has his arms crossed and the wooden frame supports the bulk of his weight where his shoulder rests.  Long swimmer’s limbs suggest he could easily add on muscle, but the mischievous glint in his eye hints that there are more important things to occupy his time than lifting weights. A few days stubble and hair that seems perpetually in need of cutting are slovenly attributes he uses to his advantage.  A smirk travels up one side of his face, crinkling and bunching at the corner of his eye. He chuckles, and shaking his head, walks away.

All right, you have this man firmly pictured in your mind, correct? One paragraph of description that makes him wholly unique to you – the reader. Your experiences, attention, and memory make him distinct. Perhaps your man had a scar? Blue eyes? Was he black or white? All of those details were filled in by your imagination.

Now. Lets take that paragraph and make it into a movie. Are you ready for the Hollywood screenplay?

Brad Pitt stands in a doorway.

There may be minor alterations, but for the most part you are all picturing the same thing. If it were on the screen you would all be seeing the exact same thing down to the same shirt, shoes, jeans, face, build, and every little detail that can be spoon-fed to your mind.

Everyone born with the sense of sight can watch a movie. Reading is a skill we are taught. Since skill is required, a book will always be superior to a movie.

~Nick Shamhart

Is God Real?

April 21, 2014

The question is not, nor has it ever been, “Is God real?” This may seem like an issue of semantics, but trust me, it isn’t. God is the question of reality.

What is real?

Our minds’ interactions with our five senses dictate what we, as humans, perceive as real. We are the only species on our planet to build churches, mosques, shrines, and other such complexities to our God or gods. Ants may herd aphids. Dolphins and apes may have recognition of self. But, despite these complexities, none of those animals have a structured dogma. If they practice a faith it is so ingrained in their daily lives as to be indistinguishable from acts of instinct or survival.

So, God is the question of reality. If God only exists in our minds, is that any different from the concept of a separate entity? The classic Zen kōan: If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound? The tree exists. The tree makes a sound. The mind to perceive it is what is absent.

There is an individualistic taste to God. That has to do with the mind’s relationship to the concept – to reality. Why is God a paternal creator figure to some, and a destructive force to others? Which is real? The mind that interprets the stimulus defines the concept of real.

Again. Whether or not God is real does not matter, because God is the question of reality.

~Nick Shamhart

Like a Walrus With a Finger Jammed Up Its Ass

April 17, 2014

Kids love to stand on their heads, turn cartwheels, roll somersaults, even flip, and pretty much anything else they can do that inverts their perspectives. Their bodies and minds are so fluid and limber that juxtaposing earth and sky is an activity to giggle about. When was the last time you non-yogis tried it? I just did, and trust me, the noise I made didn’t come close to a giggle – more like a walrus having a proctological exam.

That fluidity of the physical is probably way behind me now, but, what about the mind? Children accept things at face-value, don’t they? That’s not always an issue of innocence and ignorance. Sometimes it is the suppleness of a mind unburdened with the weight of age. Can we drop that weight and allow our minds somersault again?

Cause and effect  are what most of human knowledge is built upon. That is the progression. But? What caused the Big Bang? Was it God speaking? Was it a repetitive cycle of collapse and expansion that has always existed? Is that possible? Perpetual universal motion outward then in, but again, where or what was the cause?

Perhaps to see the universe for what it is we need to stand on our heads like children do. Perhaps for things to make sense we have to unmake our beliefs. Perhaps, sometimes, the effect has to come before the cause? Perhaps to giggle again all we need to do is roll along with life as it sweeps us head over heels…

Or, we can just keep on grunting like a walrus with a finger jammed up its ass.

~Nick Shamhart

The Meaning of Life

April 11, 2014

I’m not overreaching. I do believe that I know the meaning of life. It’s simple. It’s something we all know and fear – Change.

Whether it is through the hands of God, Allah, Yahweh, or the complex system that chains so much together through guanine, adenine, thymine, or cytosine  it is still change. The universe needs to be in constant flux. If stagnation occurred it would spread, destroying everything. That progression, that elemental stimulation has so far culminated in sentient mind. Humanity’s meaning in this life is to be a catalyst for change. Good or bad, and other such labels have no bearing on change. Those are foisted on deeds and actions by humanity. The meaning is change. There is only change. We have evolved by design. We eliminate stagnation. We destroy. We create. We change.

Made in God’s image. He creates and destroys. Made of molecules and compounds evolved to create and destroy through ingestion, respiration, defecation, procreation, and more.

The meaning is change…but, the decision to view it  in a certain light is strictly a human characteristic. It can be a wondrously horrific change, or a monstrously delightful one. You choose how you see it. You choose the meaning of change.

~Nick Shamhart