Archive for category Life Lessons

Mr. Verge…

Posted by Shaun McNicholas in Family and Friends, Fine Arts, Illustration, Life Lessons on August 9, 2010

You never know how much of an impact you are having on the world you live in. Live a quiet peaceful life and although everything doesn’t work out as well as you would like for it to work out, you have an amazing impact on the people who’s lives you touch. I’ve not in my short life so far been impacted as much by this reality as I have been this past year. After losing my job in Chicago I moved back close to my home town in Tampa, Florida, and in the move I’ve re-connected with many friends and family who have impacted my life profoundly over the years.

Most of the people who have had the largest impact in my life have done so in similar ways as my art teacher from high-school. He was a completely different kind of “teacher” than any I had experienced before. He had a formal lesson plan for the year, every year, but when a student in his class showed some level of both talent and desire to learn, instead of making us conform to the lesson plan he laid out for the year he allowed us to develop our own plan of action with some mutual advice from him and his experience in working with the educational system. Especially in 11th and 12th grades while we were preparing to go off to college and develop some form of a career. Instead of forcing us to succumb to tests and evaluations he allowed us to find what our talents would uncover by the natural progression of being surrounded by artistic inspiration and competition.

Competition was a key for me, I loved to win. I wasn’t much of a person in the athletic arena, I weighed only 110lbs from 9th grade until I was about 26 years old. But put a piece of paper in front of me, or a piece of chalk, or even a pencil and a napkin, and I will demand the attention of everyone around me by creating something out of nothing. I have always loved to do that. It actually began all the way back in 5th grade when I began drawing cartoons on the playground – the girls all wanted me to do a drawing for them – and I very quickly realized that this was a much less painful method of wooing the girls than the athletic competition happening on the jungle gym or the football or baseball fields. Don’t get me wrong I was pretty decent in most sports and played baseball, football, ran track and took Shotokan for several years. But I was never one of the best at any of those things and I always felt that God put me here to be the best at something. Not just one of those guys on the team, there was somewhere that I was supposed to be the captain, the leader, the president and something inside me would settle for nothing less. Of course after high school I have yet to become the president of anything substantial, but I am still searching!

Mr Verge’s teaching style was incredibly refreshing, we actually used to sneak out of other classes by forging notes claiming to be from Mr. Verge and go to his class to work on whatever piece we were working on at the time. How many students do you know that skip school or classes – not to leave school and get into some kind of mischief – but to go to another classroom to work on a project for college entrances and scholarship competitions? Mr. Verge created an atmosphere of comfort and freedom that didn’t exist in most other places. My father didn’t understand the value of that freedom until the end of 11th grade when I began wining competitions worth money! But he eventually came around and became a huge advocate for my career.

It took me almost 25 years to come back home and reconnect with Mr. Verge and many of the students from those days in school. Now I find out that I was only one of many many students that thrived under Mr. Verge’s unique style. Florida’s educational system will have a very large void to fill indeed after he retires from teaching!

Thank you Mr. Verge for giving all of your students over the years such a welcome place of solitude and freedom for all of us to find ourselves. We all owe you a great deal…. http://suncoastpasco.tbo.com/content/2010/may/18/190000/pe-students-frame-a-perfect-ending-for-art-teacher/

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Sir Ken Robinson: Bring on the learning revolution!

Posted by Shaun McNicholas in Life Lessons, My Beautiful Children on June 9, 2010

Isn’t this why homeschooling is becoming so popular?
In a homeschool environment a parent can individualize education and teach them at the pace appropriate for that individual.
If only our American public school system could embrace these kinds of ideas!
Get involved in the political process, vote for people with originality and brilliant ideas!

The first video below starts his conversation from February of 2006, the second video is his followup from this past February of 2010.

February 2006

February 2010

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A compelling argument for why we should play more games!

Posted by Shaun McNicholas in Life Lessons, Social Networking, Web Development on March 22, 2010

What do you think?????

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The Known Universe

Posted by Shaun McNicholas in Life Lessons, Social Networking on December 21, 2009

I have a theory about our known universe. Most people believe that the universe is expanding outward, but I believe that God created the universe in an instant and the light has traveled from all the known universe to us giving us a globe image of what exists in the universe. As time passes we see more of what God created because the light has traveled from it’s origin to us, so as the Earth ages we see more of what God created out to infinity. It’s not that nothing exists beyond what we have seen, but the light has not yet reached us, so we just haven’t seen it yet.

Consider this: If we know so little about so little, why do we strive so hard to understand things beyond our ability to understand. Why not instead accept that it is beyond our ability to grasp. Paul says of Jesus in Philippians 2:5-8 that Jesus becoming a human gave up his ability to understand in order to show us how to live without understanding. We can only observe and react to what we observe. Our small little brains do not have the capacity to comprehend the vastness of the universe, we are barely beginning to understand our own bodies, still don’t know how many species of fish live in our own oceans, still don’t know how to predict the weather accurately; how small and insignificant we really are! “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?” Psalm 8:3,4

We don’t have the mental capacity to even comprehend all of the books humans have written, all of the paintings and sculptures and architectural creations made by humans, all of the music created by humans. Yet we strive to explain the unexplainable. God cannot be explained any more than the universe can be, he/she/it should always be explained as “I AM” Exodus 3. God has as many faces and descriptions and names as the number of humans who have tried to comprehend. In the end if you want to know then search for understanding and wisdom, but don’t criticize people who do not wish to understand. Ignorance is a wisdom of it’s own. Innocence is lost with knowledge. Striving to understand is like eating the forbidden fruit, the more we understand the more arrogant we become and the less faithful and innocent our hearts.

The Known Universe — By the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH)

Carl Sagan’s Pale Blue Dot:

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I Hate Religious People!

Posted by Shaun McNicholas in Causes, Life Lessons on November 3, 2009

You are sitting in your living room watching a movie enjoying a cup of coffee and relaxing, maybe you are working on a painting, working out, reading a book, organizing all your tools, or balancing your budget, whatever you do to relax. You’ve taken a day off just for yourself to unwind, the kids are at school, your spouse is at work and you’ve just settled in to start “You” time. You get that knock on the door and there in the doorway are two finely dressed individuals, each bearing a leather briefcase and holding a few small brochures or pamphlets in one hand. You know the rest of the exchange if you even open the door.

The problem with this exchange for most of us is the pushy or intrusive experience we’ve all had; whether it happened with a religious person or just a car salesman. We’ve all had some bad experience with an over zealous sales person trying to force you to buy something you really don’t want to buy, or aren’t ready to buy. The salesman comes in many different disguises: men, women, elderly and young; wealthy or poor, beautiful or not. We all have a certain button that when pushed makes us respond to situations with passionate resistance; whether you verbalize your resistance outwardly or not your body language tells the story of your emotional reaction.

On the other hand, we also have a passionate salesman inside each of us that when set in action makes us respond with great passion to situations trying to convince others that our point of view on a subject is right and should be the point of view that all people hold. I find that with most people those who are pushy salespeople also are the most passionate when confronted by another pushy salesperson.

Who are you and what are your buttons?
Please share your stories and oppinions with me I would love to hear any and all of them especially the taboo topics religion, sex, politics, culture, war.

I don’t really hate religious people, I am just very easily annoyed by pushy salespeople, or people with little or no training or sensitivity in etiquette.

Every culture has phrases they use that in some other culture is going to offend people. In many religious circles people say “amen” frequently, call everyone “bro”, hug everyone, say things like “praise the lord” or “Hallelujah”. This is fine in that particular culture but when the words and phrases are used in another cultural setting it can be a very uncomfortable catalyst causing damage in some of the relationships you have. If you are religious and want to share your convictions with everyone around you the first step in getting other people to “want” to hear your opinions is to make it comfortable for people to want to speak with you, want to hear your opinions, and want to share enough time with you for you to share what it is that you feel so strongly about.

I often hear preachers sharing the analogy, if you just discovered the cure for cancer would you keep it to yourself or would you run around sharing your cure with everyone. The problem is that when you’re talking about religion, politics, sex, marriage, war, etc… the “cure” is not such a cut and dry or black and white solution. For some people garlic is the answer for many ailments, for others a trip to the hospital due to a severe allergic reaction. Words are kind of like food, to one person saying “that outfit is FAT” or “that outfit is the BOMB” is a compliment and for others it’s an insult.

My point is this: If you want people to listen to your convictions or buy your products first ask lots of questions and get to know the cultural sensitivities of the person you are trying to share with. The greatest salespeople in the word ask more questions and listen to the people they are trying to sell to more than trying to “push” their products onto an audience who doesn’t want or need them. We all need to work much harder on our sensitivity.

How does this subject apply to sales tactics on the Internet in your opinion?

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Free Advice

Posted by Shaun McNicholas in Life Lessons, Social Networking, Web Development on October 16, 2009

It always amazes me how many people exist in the world – and are actually making money giving people advice or “consulting” or “coaching” on things that are available for free. The question is: what do you have time for, or more importantly what has the most VALUE to you. For me it’s time. More than likely for you the answer will be the same. So if you can afford it then pay someone to manage all of this stuff for you, after all your time is better spent on more profitable things. Like sipping margaritas with your friends – of course only if that’s how you make MONEY and provide for yourself and your family if you have one.

Of course if you are not named Ashton Kutcher, or Madonna, or that guy that just has a symbol for his name – or does he call himself Prince now??? I don’t know, anyway… if you need to manage all of this stuff for yourself for now – until you get your first big break… read on.

You are a brand, whether you want to believe it or not in today’s world you are actually a brand.

Do a search in google for your name. When someone new meets you in a club, at church, at the local show you just attended, a friend of a friend and yes especially at work, or a potential new job. You are actually being looked at online. Do you know what the internet says about you? Do it yourself, what does google say about you?

A couple of months ago I did this for myself and realized there were quite a few people that shared my name:

There are probably more people but that is all I can find now in the first few pages of google search results. And I don’t mind being confused for a moment with a guy who is a Director for the Center for English Language.

I think the best advice I could offer anyone in the professional world today is to go through this practice yourself. If you can’t find yourself online – then you aren’t saying anything and you need to register on as many free web sites, portals and social media sites as you can; and start talking. You are probably a great person, a professional with valuable skills and a high level of integrity. Maybe you are thinking about breaking out of the corporate world to go into something you are more passionate about, perhaps you have lost your job and just need to get your name in front of as many people as possible so that your skills are out in the open and you can be found be prospective employers. Maybe you just like attention and you just want people to know who you are. Hey go for it! You don’t necessarily need to be selling something to have a presence online, and more than likely there is a presence online. If you don’t have one you are building yourself talking about your good and admirable skills and qualities, people will simply get directed to a site like intelius.com where for a small fee they can find out every location you have ever lived and much more embarrassing information like that time you spent in jail for driving on a suspended license when you were 19 years old. Or that drunk and disorderly from college. There are much worse examples but I’ll leave that up to the rest of you to imagine what embarrassing things there are as a matter of public record that people might find out about you.

On a much lighter note – for me: I just moved back to my home town of Tampa Florida from Chicago and started aggressively marketing myself as a consultant and designer/illustrator. So it was important to me that all the places online that might have my information or a profile about me have complete and up to date information. I found many sites referencing past places I had lived because I registered at one time or another and never used the site and never went in an updated my information. So I took some time and went out there and updated my information everywhere I could find a reference to the person who is supposed to be me.

Next thing: get yourself registered everywhere! Linked-In, Facebook, Twitter, Google
Most of the social media and profile sites are free.
Here is an interesting practice:
Check this page out! http://www.prelovac.com/vladimir/top-list-of-social-media-sites
That’s just the top 100 – there are thousands of sites out there the important thing is to be on all of the top ones, and make sure your info and the description of who you are and what you do is accurate. Especially for your industry!

Here’s a challenge – get your name registered – pay for a hosting package and just start a basic blogging site for your name, you can do this for under $50 per year! (That will be a different post) Then register in all 100 top sites and make sure your name, phone, email and about you description are all up to date and pointing to your blog. Then register for the free google analytics package (MORE FREE STUFF) and start tracking your results. You’ll be surprised how quickly people start finding you online!

If you want or need help with anything shoot me an email – I am always glad to offer help. I only charge for complicated things that you couldn’t do for free somewhere else!!!!! And in today’s internet society you would be surprised how much power you have in that little box on your desk with the keyboard attached to it.

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Hope in Manila

Posted by Shaun McNicholas in Causes, Life Lessons on September 29, 2009

One of the charities I personally support and have committed to donating 10% of my annual business revenue from PSM Design, Inc. to is Hope World Wide. If you would like to learn more about hope and the kinds of projects they do around the world you can visit them here. http://www.hopeww.org

This is one of the most recent things they are involved in:

We’ve all had hard times in our lives, but our lifestyle in America even at the worst of times is far better than most of the people in the world. When is the last time you personally gave to someone in need? There are always opportunities, in your neighborhood, community, city, country, and the world. Hope is one of those charities that I can fully trust to do what they say they have committed to doing, and they run their programs with more integrity than most.

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Life is all about change

Posted by Shaun McNicholas in Life Lessons on September 15, 2009

Change by definition is: to make the form, nature, content, future course, etc., of (something) different from what it is or from what it would be if left alone.

Life is always changing, that is, where you are in life, your course of action, dreams, aspirations, goals, plans, everything about your life is in a constant state of change. The question is how do you respond to those changes. Are those changes good or bad, beneficial for the goals you have set for your life or damaging to those goals. The problem is you never really know what is going to happen. The uncertainty can be unsettling and yet exciting at best, depressing and terrifying at worst.

I was laid off from my full time job this past February in the midst of the worst economic depression since “The Great Depression” of the 1920s. I knew it was coming several months before it happened but there was no amount of planning I could do to prevent the devastating effects of the situation. My wife and I had talked for years about the possibility of moving to a southern climate and experiencing a different atmosphere. We had always wanted the opportunity to move to another location, somewhere warmer than Chicago. The problem is there was never any compelling circumstances for such a change. We always dreamed of a great job offer to come along, some amazing opportunity that would present itself that would be just too good to be true and we would have a pleasant and comfortable opportunity to move to another place in the world. The reality is not what we had imagined or dreamed about.

When I reflect about the past, the greatest changes always take place through pain. The birth of your children is probably the most traumatic event you face in your young adult life, yet you wouldn’t consider it a “bad” thing. Even though for the mother it is the most painful event she will ever face in her life, she will still, in most circumstances, not say that it was a negative thing. Actually quite the opposite, she would probably, again in most circumstances, say this was the greatest event of her life up to this point, especially if it is her first child. Yet there are so many painful things involved in raising children: the financial impact, the disappointments that come from the dreams you have for them, having to face the challenges of dealing with the vast amount of mental and emotional challenges they will face while they are looking to you for direction. Yet no matter the amount of pain you wouldn’t change a thing about having your children, and you wouldn’t want them any other way. Pain and heartache makes the good times so much sweeter. Suffering makes us appreciate the times of peace and prosperity. The day after I fully recover from having the flu I often think to myself that I can’t remember another time when I felt more alive or more full of energy, things taste better, smell better and taking a deep breath feels so good.

So in the light of my present sufferings I say this. Life is truly beautiful. I may be suffering at present, but very soon I will stand in my new home enjoying a very different life, appreciating the differences with eyes that see what I really have in my family and friends. Perhaps I would not have known how strong is the bond that ties us all together if I had not needed so much from my family and friends.

Thank you to all of you for standing with me, for sharing with me, for speaking to me when I am in the same room, for listening to my ramblings about so many different things, for allowing me to serve you, or for serving me when I was in need. I am truly honored to have so many friends and the suffering of my present circumstances has heightened my senses and helped me to truly see those that care for me and my family that the business of life so often clouds with trivial things.

“There is such a concept of loss. Loss and how we react to loss. We think of things in a straight line: birth-life-death. That’s not really how it works. You take those ends and you bend it into a circle so it’s birth-life-death-REbirth. So you have to be prepared when you lose something – when you go through a divorce, when your mother dies, when you lose your house you have to understand that nature has it no other way. There is a rebirth. The death is painful. It doesn’t change the pain of the death. But you gotta stay awake and stay focused for what’s the rebirth that God is about to offer you.”
- Will Smith, on Oprah 11/6/2008

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