Tyler Jorgenson

You don’t have to live your life the way other people expect you to. You can do good things for yourself and make the world a better place at the same time. – Chris Guillebeau

If you haven’t read about how Chris Guillebeau is changing the world, you need to visit his site, follow him on twitter, become a facebook fan, etc.  He has four basic tenants of his philosophy.

The essence of my philosophy is this:

1. You don’t have to live your life the way other people expect you to.

2. If you don’t decide for yourself what you want to get out of life, someone else will probably end up deciding for you.

3. There is usually more than one way to accomplish something.

4. You can do good things for yourself and help other people at the same time.

Most people that I know live their life based on projected values and desires.  For example a son may become a Lawyer because his Father always told him he should.  One thing I see happen quite often is the dating/marriage/baby/home cycle.  A couple dates, then gets married because that’s the next step.  Soon they take the next step and have a baby.  Of course now they need to buy their own home because, well, that’s the next step.  Of course non of these steps is wrong, evil or bad.  They are all great steps IF it’s what the couple wants.

Recently Baker over at Man Vs. Debt packed up the few possessions he and his little family owned and jumped into an RV to travel the United States for a year.  It may not be common and the idea may scare some people but it was what they wanted to do, so they did it.  Baker got his blogging fame started by selling his ‘stuff’ and going on a global expedition.  How many people do you know that can list all of their possessions on a one page excel spreadsheet?

I was in the real estate and finance business for about 8 years.  More than once I advised my potential clients against buying a home.  Buying a home can be a great investment and can be the right thing for somebody looking to put down roots for a while.  Many times though my clients could not answer my questions about how long they plan to be there, if they liked the area for the long term or what type of home they want to raise their family in?

We get so caught up in checking things off the list we sometimes forget to evaluate the list and make sure it’s something we want.

The idea on nonconformity is not the same as being different for the sake of being different.  Sometimes what you want is to have a Mac, other times you do it because you want to be different from the guys with the PC’s.  Do things that you want, and do them the way you want.  Remember Chris’s #3. There is usually more than one way to accomplish something.

What do you want out of life?

Ok, now really. What do YOU want out of life?

This isn’t it.  But this is a precursor to the big announcement, and it can still be fun.

Introducing the 31 days of Blog Awesomeness!

Each day in January I will have a blog post on something that you, my wonderful readers, want to learn more about.  If you don’t ask or share with me what you want to hear I’ll just post something that I think is cool.  It will be more fun if you give me the topics.  Do you want to learn more about facebook fan pages? Facebook adverstising?  Setting up a website? Motivation? Manufacturing? Hypnosis? Training your dog? If I don’t know the answer off hand (I have zero dog training experience) I’ll research it or bring in an expert to help.

Leave a comment here on this post (If you’re reading this on facebook or elsewhere visit http://blog.tylerjorgenson.com/2010/12/the-big-announcement/ to leave a comment) with what you’d like to learn more about and I’ll see if I can’t work it into the lineup.

The interview had gone really well up to this point and the USC admissions director, closing the interview, said “Is there anything else that you feel the admissions committee should know about you?”

“I think you should see my socks.” I replied.

Most days I now wear socks like this.  They’re great quality and very comfortable and they serve two additional purposes.

1. They remind me to never take myself too seriously.  Life is to be enjoyed and is far too short to be lived in an uptight manner.  For me, these socks remind me to laugh, to live and to savor every moment of it all as my unique life experience.

2. They remind me that anything is possible.  Jonah Staw and a few friends started a company back in 2004 with the idea of answering the problem of the missing sock by selling 3 mis matched pairs to a pack.  Their target market usually doesn’t even have their own money, 8-12 year old girls.  Seth Godin mentioned that their annual sales are now over 40 Million USD.  Check out Little Miss Matched.

The interview went really well and the socks were just the extra touch I was hoping they would be.  I got my acceptance letter to the USC MBA program last week.  Time to come up with some $$ to pay for tuition.

I’ve been working from home recently.  Usually I have work stuff out of the house at least a few times per week but I’ve been staying close recently since my wife is nearly 9 months pregnant with our fourth child.  People often ask if working from home ‘works’.  Usually it does.  I can close the office door when needed and have been getting a lot done.  The real problem is the proximity to food.

I’m sure I’ve put on some sympathy weight this pregnancy!  I’m going to have to start using that gym membership soon.  I wonder if I can find the card.

I talked a little while back on what I call ‘The Aladdin Syndrome’. Somebody felt, I assumed, that they had to eat and that my truck represented a little bread. Turns out it was a little less of the Aladdin Syndrome and a little more of the ‘Robin Hood Paradox’. The RHP is the concept that stealing from somebody that apparently had more than you do in an effort to equal things out actually lowers the thief’s state further despite the increase in wealth, goods, etc. My truck was recovered on Easter morning.

The suspects were seen with their (my) high beams on at 1:45am as they drove past an officer in the neighboring city of Ontario, CA. When the officer turned around to inspect he saw that there was a suspicious dealer plaque and ‘Hello Kitty’ license plate holder. He turned on his lights to pull the vehicle over. A high speed chase ensued ending in this:

The sad part about seeing my truck was seeing all of their beer, cologne, CD’s of filth and other items of ‘the World’ mixed in with remnants of my families memories. Although they were ‘rollin with the homies’ with the seats thrown back and open beer in the cup holders they didn’t take the time to clean up the Alpha-bits my kids had thrown the weekend before.

I feel for those that think it is acceptable and even justifiable to take that which is not theirs. Now I just hope the insurance company is nice regarding the valuation of the vehicle.

This is a couple of days old, but I just had to share.

Ascension – Learn How To Settle Your Credit Cards

Compare these two videos:

1.

2.

And all this time I thought we were tough for chasing the Giraffe.

How about an ice cold… Frozen Yogurt?

I can just hear them now:

Rough and tough Man #1 – “Man, I’m getting tired from all this jack hammering.”
Rough and tough Man #2 – “I feel ya, I could really use a nice cold one.”
Rough and tough Man #1 – “Me too, an original sweet tart with strawberries and gummy bears would sure hit the spot.”

I love that thanks to my iphone I always have a camera on me to capture memorable moments such as this.

Since I’m promoting chocolate today, I thought I’d give another plug. One of my good childhood friends has come up with one of the most creative products that I have seen in a long time. Not only is it creative… it’s delicious.

Check out his site and buy some chocolate weapons. http://www.chocolateweapons.com/

I have a tin of the chocolate bullets and I can attest that they are quite delicious. As mentioned on one of the videos on the site, “it’s not that cheap, crappy chocolate” it’s the good stuff.

Craig and Sara like to dip things in chocolate. If you would like to dip things in chocolate, perhaps at a party, wedding, mitzfah (either bar or bat), shower, corporate event, etc then check out http://www.bluminup.com/