Christopher L. Hedges's Blog, page 9

Cold Called by a Parasite (10/16/14)

Is is just me or do you have a problem with the bottom-feeders who make no real contributions to society, but manage to find a way to bleed the system dry like a blood sucking parasite. I have seen mosquitoes the size of small birds in Florida so I’m used to dealing with abnormally large parasites, but I’m growing ever so tired of them.

I was cleaning out my inbox and found three different emails from people who were cold calling me to sell me domain names. I originally went with AverageJoesStory.com because my first choice was taken. Mind you it was in the possession of one of these social vampires since the mid 1990’s, and for the discount price of $20,000.00 he would be more than happy to sell it. For that price that parasite will probably be sitting on it indefinitely because the people who want it can’t justify the price tag. This version of the bottom-feeder is bad, but he’s speculating on sound logic.

The version of the bottom-feeder I’m referring to is slightly different. The social parasite that solicited me basically goes out, collects some information based on what other people are doing, and tries to make a quick buck off of their sweat equity. I bought a .com domain name that no one wanted for $15, or whatever the basic cost was. Three months later someone wanted to sell me the .org, .net, and .everything else for $499 a piece.

Where did this bottom-feeder mentality come from? Who is to blame for this attitude? This “Takers” parasitic attitude of making a living off of someone else’s hard work disgusts me because it hurts everyone. It might not seem like a big deal that someone wants $500 for a domain name based on the fact that I already have a similar domain name and a book based on the name; so let’s take a look at how the bottom feeder phenomenon affects society in some other areas.

Someone buys a cup of coffee that has “Extremely Hot!” plastered all over it, spills the coffee on himself, and then sues the vendor because he burnt himself. As a result the company punishes any future applicants because someone felt they were entitled to a big pay day. You have people who are willing to stage accidents just to get an insurance payout out, consequences be damned. As a result everyone’s insurance goes up, and let’s not forget the potential threat to the lives of other innocent bystanders. How about we take it one step further. A technologically proficient parasite sits in the confines of his home, and with complete anonymity steals the personal information of hundreds of thousands of unsuspecting victims. To support his lifestyle he sells off the personal information to identity thieves all over the world, and the victims lose everything.

I had lunch with a friend in Toronto recently, and we were talking about the power that words have. We were specifically speaking about the word hate, and how destructive it is. Hate is so absolute that I’m leery of ever using it, but in this instance I can’t get away from it. I hate the bottom-feeder mentality that is so pervasive in society today, and I wish I knew where it started so that I knew where to direct my ire. It’s an attitude of destruction that negatively impacts us all, as a result collectively we all suffer at the hands of the parasite, but maybe it’s just me that feels that way.

Getting Lost on my way to Syracuse (10/15/14)

I stopped watching the news a long time ago. Part of my reason for my ongoing 10 year boycott of the news is that I don’t believe journalists report the news any more. I think they at best provide a biased view of world events, and at worst misrepresent or fabricate what is happening altogether. The world is always coming to an end. Then someone who is supposed to be looking out for the best interests of the people parades in front of the camera to scare the public into believing him or her while simultaneously attacking his or her competition.

I’ll be willing to bet that those elected officials parading on TV have never gotten lost on the back roads like I did in New York and Connecticut on my way up to Syracuse. If they did they were either not paying attention or worse yet they simply didn’t care. What I saw were people living on the street looking for somewhere to keep warm at night. I saw boarded up store fronts and vacant rundown factories.

I would go so far as to say it was a terrifying sight to see. Everyone I saw was at best living paycheck to paycheck scraping to get by, and they were only one moderately negative event away from being destitute. So if I can see this so plainly why is it that the people who profess to be fighting for their constituents blind to the fact, or is it that they are fighting for their own self interests and not their constituents?

I bring this up because my friend Freeman told me it was going to be a hard-sell for me to convince people that I was an Average Joe based on my background. To a certain degree Freeman was correct. When I talk to most people what I get from them is that Average Joe is tied to mediocrity. I guess where my point of view differs is that I see Average Joe as a person who doesn’t position himself or herself as superior to anyone else, just one of the guys. Mark Cuban has a billion dollars in the bank, is an iconic person, and from what I’ve seen of him he’s an Average Joe.

One of the most important points of the book is that “they” aren’t different than us. Are the icons,  celebrities, and affluent different than the 99%? Absolutely! We are all unique and by definition we are different, but we aren’t fundamentally different. Even “royalty” is no different than you or me. They can claim that they were ordained by their creator if they want to, but at the end of the day a long time ago someone in their family seized control of their country by force and they remained in power because no one wanted to challenge them, end of story.

This myth of superiority has been around forever, and it’s about time we let it just die. It is the foundation of what holds us back from pursuing our dreams. The truth is the only difference between where we are and where we want to be is that we don’t truly want to be there yet. You don’t want to commit to the sacrifices it takes to get there, and that’s okay. That is honestly the most powerful realization I have ever had because it puts all the power into my hands. The only drawback is that once you believe it you become accountable for your successes and your failures; that’s a scary proposition.

First Thoughts Driving Through Small Town USA (10/14/14)

I have noticed that I have really gotten lazy in some areas of my life. Most notably, having been on the road for a few weeks now driving around the country I have developed an unhealthy dependence on my GPS and the pink line that tells me where to go. Mind you my Garmin does its best, but it’s a thoughtless machine that works off of algorithms and incomplete data.

The best example I could give you is the course it plotted for me through New York City. It put me on all highway, which one might think was the best route to take. Truth be told Garmin probably mapped out the worst possible route imaginable. It was without a doubt the most direct route, but that’s where the route’s advantages stopped. With the traffic on the highways running through New York it probably took me an additional two hours to crawl through the area. It also cost me close to $100 in tolls, a price I wouldn’t mind paying if the roads weren’t pitted with potholes the size of city blocks .

I probably could have alleviated the migraine I will call New York City driving by pulling out a map and using it, but like I said there are some areas where I’ve gotten lazy. Even though Garmin doesn’t always use the best judgement in calculating my route it has been very helpful. There have been several occasions where I’ve been running on autopilot, missed a turn, and Garmin was there to save the day by recalculating a new path.

Getting lost offered up the opportunity to see the way a different group of people lived. I wasn’t blowing by them on some major interstate, but rather weaving through the streets they lived on. I didn’t even have to stop to learn something about myself on those minor detours.

Driving through parts of the northeast I saw towns and cities where residents had probably never been further than 100 miles from home, whereas I have been all over the globe. We actually shared one common thread. It’s not a question of never seeing a big city verses having seen the world. It’s a question of being a prisoner of your environment. I realized that I was no different than those small town residents because deep down inside we were both scared of leaving the familiarity of our surroundings.

The enormity of the world is too much for them, but their small town life leaves me feeling claustrophobic. Those small town residents and I couldn’t be more night and day, but we are both controlled by the fear of unfamiliarity. Their safety net was a small community where everyone knew each other, and mine was a world of strangers and possibilities.

A Couple Book Tour Benchmarks (10/13/14)

The first important benchmark for me after lining up a publisher was when Carol Aebersold sent me an email saying , “It’s a wonderful book-­-so open, honest and heartfelt. I certainly appreciate the nice things you wrote on my behalf, but I also appreciate the inspiration your Average Joe’s Story gave me.” This was positive feedback from someone who has not only been on the journey I’ve embarked on, but has attained the kind of success I would some day like to attain. The next important benchmark came after I met Kim at the Montville Rotary Club. She booked me as her club’s speaker for their morning meeting. Besides providing me a great audience to talk with, Kim was also an avid reader. “Have you read Outliers? This book really reminds me of it.”

Kim’s statement was important because I fashion myself to be a similar style writer as Malcolm Gladwell, the author of Outliers. In fact I incorporated things that I learned from all of Malcolm’s books that I’ve read into my book, its promotion, and the book tour. For someone to recognize the origins of what I had created made me feel that the way I was thinking wasn’t off-base. So many other things had gone wrong up until this point I was beginning to second guess myself.

I now felt a little more comfortable with the book itself. If someone can recognize its origins then people may buy into what I was tying to do with the book. Perhaps somewhere down the road someone else will come up and say that Average Joe’s Story: Quest for Confidence was like 7 Steps to Achieving True Success. You see Average Joe’s Story was written to be inline with other books like that, but it was also written to stand apart from them. Most of the books I have read that come from that genre give you a guideline of things to do, and you do them because you want the same results as the person telling you the story.

For all of the valuable information that comes from these “self-help” books I honestly think they are more destructive than constructive. That may sound counter intuitive, but I have very logical reasons for believing this to be true. Self help is about the individual going out and making a positive change in their life. When you read a self help book you stop thinking and you start doing. Self help books are just the results another person has accomplished from various personal life experiences. What I have noticed take place in society as a whole is that we have stopped thinking for ourselves. We have moved to this ideas of just tell me the answers, and I’ll go do it. The problem with that rational is that you need to know the why before you can do it, or when you don’t see the results in a timely enough fashion you’ll just quit.

Average Joe’s Story give you some of the answers you might be looking for, but more importantly it makes you ask questions. It makes you think as well as read between the lines, and that is important because we need to return to being a society of thinkers.

Try to Enjoy the Downtime (10/10/14)

One of the downsides of this book tour is the amount of downtime that you have to deal with. Considering inefficiency is like dragging nails across a chalk board for me the downtime I’m dealing with could be one of the few things that pushes me off the deep end.

When I started out I was more concerned about having too much to do, and taking on a schedule that would put my health at risk. I would have done three or four activities a day if they were logistically feasible. Fortunately as a new author it’s almost impossible to overwork yourself. Bookstores don’t want to deal with you until you are a guaranteed commodity, there has been about a 30% response rate from clubs about speaking engagements, and TV and radio was always a long-shot. Trying to do this trip bare-bones (believe me not by choice) limits what you can do on a social aspect too. If something really interests me I may spend a few bucks on some of the local sights if something really intrigues me, but there isn’t an real disposable income to throw around on the finer things each city has to offer. So far I’ve seen Mark Twain’s house, and I skipped my staple McDonald’s meal to go to a Longhorn Steakhouse with my new friends Scott and Shauna once.

However, this is truly only the dawn of this trip and things have just gotten started. I knew interaction wise things would become more interesting when I made it to Texas, Utah, Arizona, and a few other places where I have friends. There my friends could tell me where to go, what to do, and if I wasn’t eating alone I would even go so far as to man up for a meal that costs more than $13.00. Further down the line the people that I have talked to may even do what I envisioned they would, talk about the book and what the author is trying to do.

I gambled a small fortune on the possibility of creating a Tipping Point that could take a completely nobody to a household name. Even though the level of apathy I have witnessed to date on this book tour would make you think that creating a Tipping Point would be impossible I still believe somewhere deep inside of every person there is a desire to connect.I will look at it as the calm before the storm. I have had little squall lines of activity, and they took their toll on me physically. So in the meantime I will try to enjoy the downtime.

Walking Away From the Book Tour (10/9/14)

I almost packed things up on this book tour before I ever left the house, and if I hadn’t already lined up 30 speaking engagements I probably would have done just that.

Three weeks before I was supposed to head north I had a minor gastrointestinal issue that left me basically bedridden for the better part of two weeks. I think I just happened to eat something that didn’t agree with me, but I couldn’t tell you for sure. All I can say is that I was in severe pain and as a result I was averaging around two hours of sleep per night. Then I had my first complication with Marriott Hotels’ online reservation system, and got to experience their ANTI Customer Service Department. Lastly, five days before I was set to leave the family dog came down with something serious. I had to wait a day and a half to get her into the vet’s office. Luckily when her blood work came back negative. The vet said she probably hurt her back, he gave her some pain killers and steroids, and sent us on our way.

With the way things started off I will be the first to admit that I have become a little insensitive with certain people on this trip. I can’t stand being on the road with drivers who are so self absorbed that they don’t consider the welfare of anyone around them. Believe me I experienced my fair share as I made my way up to New England. And I despise dealing with corporate drones who have such disregard for their customers that they completely dismiss them.

Complete dismissal was my reception from Marriott Hotel’s Corporate Customer Service Department. Now I understand that the corporate philosophy honestly is we don’t care until we have something to lose, and that corporate worker bees wouldn’t dare actually question the company line. However, there are times in life where you actually have to consider revising your position, even if you are a multibillion dollar corporation and you are dealing with some Average Joe. There are times as an employee where the handbook doesn’t apply, and you have to consider thinking for yourself.

Even if I was calling about my bed being too uncomfortable I couldn’t rationalize someone saying, “I’m sorry there isn’t anything I can do for you.” You can send them a discount coupon. If they were really that unhappy they would never use in the first place, and if they weren’t you would have bought some goodwill. However, when you are talking about flaws in your booking system that affect your corporate partners you might want to rethink that position of sorry you are S.O.L..

I’m spending $45,000.00 at Marriott Hotels for over 300 nights this year. The problem I have comes down to being able to actually reserve a room with a credit card and use the $45,000.00 worth of rewards that I’m redeeming from American Express. “We’re sorry, but even though those gift cards say good as cash we are going to make your life hell and force you to use your credit card to pay anyway.”

So I lost my cool while dealing with Marriott Corporate Drone and here’s what I’m going to do now. I’m no longer going to call customer service and complain or try and remedy the situation. I have reached out to find the appropriate department at American Express and I will be voicing my complaints to them. If American Express can’t resolve the issue with their corporate partner then I will be using TV as my forum. I was looking for a new TV script to use to get booked in LA, and now I think I’ve found it, Corporate Culture Couldn’t Care less. That isn’t perfect yet, but I have a month to tweak it.

Writers’ Superiority? (10/8/14)

I read a post on LinkedIn a few weeks back asking whether or not authors thought they were superior to the people they wrote for. The response I gave was I didn’t think so. I don’t think you can lump everyone who falls within a specific category under one general description. On some level I also think most successful authors know that they are only successful because of their readers, without them they might be a corporate drone somewhere, and for that reason they don’t have superiority complexes.

All writers have to live through the same right of passage that comes with writing if they hope to one day be successful. It’s a rough road from anonymity to success. You are fighting an uphill battle filled with people who may not be cheering for you to fail, but they will be more than happy to tell you I told you so if you do. A writer’s life can be a lonely one. You spend the vast majority of your day writing in isolation. The rest of the time, if you hope to be successful, you become an entrepreneurial mercenary, working marketing, logistics, IT, and every other aspect of business no one ever told you was a prerequisite for being an author.

That’s why I try to give of my time, whenever possible, to anyone who is thinking or actively working at being an author. It’s a long, hard and lonely road that no one fully prepares you for. That’s why it boggles my mind that there would ever be an author, who has tasted success, that would in turn shun the up-incoming trailblazers of the future. However, I reached out to connect with one of these moderately successful authors, and all I got was crickets chirping. In my opinion that LinkedIn poster may have been wrong about the generalization of all writers, but I don’t think he wasn’t wrong about his question.

You have to get out and on the road (10/7/14)

Seth Godin talks about society moving from the industrial age to the age of connection. He talks about a massive shift taking place that is getting away from processes, procedures and being picked by someone else and gravitating to a point of choosing yourself, and creating things that matter.

One of the great things about my book tour is that I have been meeting people all over the place. Some cities I get to reconnect with old friends and some I’m lucky to meet new ones like in Nashua where I met Scott, Shauna, Michael, Don, and about 30 more people. What I have enjoyed is the possibility of learning from them, and in some way connecting and contributing to their lives. For example Michael recognizes that he has at least one great book in him, but there has always been something that has gotten in the way. More than anything from personal experience I think he just needs some positive reinforcement. So I said call me whenever you want or need to talk.

When I went out to dinner with Scott and Shauna I came to understand that Shauna and I have lived nearly identical lives. We had an amazing connection based on shared life experiences, and as a result we had nearly identical mindsets.

However, if I wasn’t willing to get on the road and out of my comfort zone I never would have had the opportunity to meet any of them. That lack of desire to be a part of life is one of the biggest problem’s I have noticed when communicating with people, and that belief system is something Don and I had in common. I’ve got a bag full of stories about the way things used to be. Those stories are kind of like the ones your grandparents would tell you about walking uphill to and from school in twelve feet of snow with only one shoe. Most of the time there might be just a little embellishment involved, but those stories are all based on some degree of truth.

To be perfectly honest I hope Seth is right because if he is there will be a drastic shift in attitudes from the way things are currently. With all of the advancements we have seen in recent times there has also been a great deal of regression in basic values. An entitlement attitude has replaced hard work. I remember day one at a new job, and the first thing I was told was, “Don’t work too hard it doesn’t get you anywhere at this place.” Morals and values have been replaced with entertainment. Just turn on the TV and you’ll see countless shows that are little more than carbon copies of each other that serve as little more than mind numbing distractions. Part of what Seth talks about is getting away from this uniform widget mentality that has been the predominant cause of our societal deterioration, and in order to do that people will have to rediscover some of those long lost values. Only time will tell, but I’m hoping Seth is a modern day Oracle.

As Seen On TV (10/6/14)

Social proof from someone else plugging you or self promotion, which is better?

I’m a believer that any exposure is good exposure, and while I’m just starting out I will take any free press I can get. Average Joe’s Story: Quest for Confidence got its first mainstream TV exposure courtesy of Starley Murray on FOX 29 in San Antonio. Mind you it wasn’t a piece on me or the book specifically for that matter, but it was a great sound bite and graphic none the less.

Average Joe’s Story used as a prop by Starley Murray on FOX 29 San Antonio

Ideally I would like to be the one on TV talking about my book. It positions me as the expert, and opens the door to big and better opportunities. However, you can’t discount what this image actually says. Starley, who is an image and branding expert, is using me as a prop that is part of a before and after scenario she is using on live TV. I’m the before (new starting out “expert”), and I believe she is comparing me to Tom Antion who is an established gazillionaire online marketing expert. Mind you I would much rather be sitting in Tom’s shoes, but you have to start somewhere and to be referenced as the point A to Tom’s point B ain’t too shabby.

There is also another added benefit to what happened here. If I was the one actually pitching Average Joe’s Story then like it or not I’m going to come off as selling. The viewer may not consciously be thinking it, but on a subconscious level when you are pitching yourself it’s selling. When someone else gives you a plug it’s social proof. That validation that comes from a third party is special because it means you have passed the smell test. Someone else already thinks that you have something to offer. When it comes from an industry expert it’s a premium plug because that person has added the weight of their reputation to the plug.

Will this necessarily add to more book sales? I don’t have a clue, but what I do know is that it gave me TV exposure, 7 social media postings, and a reference I can use when I pitch my next TV script and believe me I will. Don’t discount the little things; leverage the small wins that you get into bigger and better future opportunities.

 

I Want to Sell Books not Make Money (10/3/14)

I was telling a friend after my little ordeal with the bookstores that I was planning on doing my book tour without doing any book signings, and he asked, “Isn’t the purpose of the game to sell books?”

The answer to that question is yes and no. Every author is going to be different. The way I see things is I want to sell books, but I don’t care if I make any money off of Average Joe’s Story: Quest for Confidence. That’s why I have embarked on a $100,000.00 book tour. I want to meet people from everywhere. The truth is you don’t sell books by going to bookstores. You sell books by making connections, and the further apart those connections are the better. You want to meet people that are spread out so that their spheres of influence will only connect by going the full six degrees of separation. Why? Because by doing so you will connect to more people.

Think of the image of throwing a rock into a pool of water. You get some large ripples and those ripples eventually spread out. across the pool. Then throw a handful of small pebbles into the same pool. the ripples are smaller, but they cover the surface area in a much shorter period of time. The bookstores want authors to throw in a giant rock and wait. This is the idea of farming out around where you live and eventually moving to new markets. I’m taking the opposite approach. I’m talking to a ton of people all over the place, and I’m betting on the fact that eventually they will start talking about what I’m doing.

After about my 50th email to a bookstore I asked myself what is more depressing listening to your doctor tell you to prepare for the worst or bookstores that don’t want to work with authors. That’s when my friend made me feel so much better. He said, “I have never seen an industry that was more hellbent on on committing suicide.” What made me feel better was that I’m not the only one that has been left scratching my head about turning authors away.

I want to sell books, and bookstores want to make money. In fixating on the bottom-line the bookstores are forgetting to provide value to their customers. One of two things will happen some day. Either Amazon will capitalize on bookstores dropping the ball, or you will find an author standing in the bookstore parking lot with a sign that reads “This store doesn’t want me to come in to sign books for you. I want to pass along their share of the profits to you by way of savings. I’ll be here all day.” Who knows, maybe someday the people in charge of community relations will realize that they actually need authors to be successful if they want to have a job, and start working with them.