The Real Brian Show

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12: Experience Life | A Life of Balance | The Monday Experience Feb 13, 2017

Show notes

It's Monday and we're glad you're joining us on the new format journey of The Real Brian Show! Starting this week, you will find three installments of the podcast ready for your consumption on Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings. Monday is Encouragement Day! Using stories and experiences from his own life, Brian will guide conversations toward making the most out of our day, out of our week, and hopefully set us all off to a great start.

Experience Life

My life has been a little crazy lately. I've been an entrepreneur most of my life, behind the mic and piano most of my life, and the blessing and curse of engaging in those activities is that there are always opportunities with potential. Some work out, some really work out, but many don't. You spend a lot of time working for little to no return. On the other side of that, when you do the right thing... things rock! I've spent a lot of time with people lately, wanting to make a difference, but have had to stop and ask myself recently whether I'm actually enjoying life. Am I really living, and not just exisiting?

Of course, work is essential; providing for a family, putting food on the table and upholding responsibilities. But is it really all essential? We hear and read about the litany of To-Dos: make money, be healthy, never eat sugar, exercise, have 8-pack abs like Oliver Queen, sleep 20 hours a day and work 8 day-26 hour weeks, stop watching TV and movies. Just work, work, work until you get there.

Today I want to talk about how we seem to be stuck in this endless loop of existence and insanity, within which we rarely lookup and ask what we're doing. We rarely stop to experience life or really live. We live on autopilot. After a conversation with my wife, Sarah, on Thursday, I came up with this idea for experiencing life. It isn't just about experiencing life, but experiencing balance in life. And in order to do this, I've come up with a few things that I can take action on:

Only take on what is essential. Do less, and do it better. (More on this next week!)
Having balance in life.
Mindset. Attitude.

What would happen if I just focused on experiencing life and living a life of balance? Be healthy, but enjoy my favorite junk food every now and then. Work hard, but more importantly, work smart. Simplify my life so that I can really focuson, and do great with, a few things rather than trying to maintain interest and expertise in a wide variety of things (how stressful!). Fill my days, but get some sleep! Watch TV shows and movies, but only watch the ones that captivate me and are healthy for me.

In the slightly paraphrased words of William Wallace: "Everyone dies. Not everyone truly lives."

11: Scratch Your Own Niche! | Coffee Cupping | Doing Less but Better | Hidden Figures | Split Feb 08, 2017

Show notes

Welcome to the Real Brian Show! This week we're in a scratch your own niche sort of mood, so this shorter-than-usual episode is chock full of recommendations and reviews about the things Brian has discovered.

In This Episode

Coffee cupping
Expounding on the new show format.
Music: BrunuhVille, Future of Forestry
TV: Stranger Things, Speechless, Powerless
Movies: Hidden Figures, Split

Scratch Your Own Niche

We always want people to scratch our niche, don't we? We want them to give us what we want. Sometimes, here at the Real Brian Show, we just want to let our freak flags fly and tell you whatever we want. And so that's a lot of what this episode is! If you've been listening to Brian, or if you're here for the first time, this episode is literally outlined with some of his most favorite things.

Give use your music, tv show, and movie recommendations in the blog post comments!

Music

I knew I recognized the name BrunuhVille when Brian brought it up. As a programmer, by trade, sometimes it's difficult to write code while I'm listening to music that has words in it. So I spend a little time making playlists that have videos with an hour or two of "epic music". BrunuhVille has a couple such videos (which are really just music and a background image). Do a search for them or listen to this!

It has been years since I've listened to Future of Forestry. I got into them after college and then, as things go, they just faded from my playlist. I first heard the EP Travel III and fell in love with Bold and Underlined and Did You Lose Yourself?. This group is a melodic, ambient rock group from SoCal. They feature compelling, thoughtful lyrics and clever artistry. Check out Hold My Hand

I would be remiss not to comment on Stranger Things. I watched this series this summer and was drawn in by its similar feel to my favorite show, Fringe. I was born in the late 80s, so I don't remember these styles or bed sheets the way Brian might, but I've heard from a lot of people that it takes great pains to be accurate.

Briefly, the premise of this show centers around the disappearance of 12-year Will Byers in Hawkins, Indiana. Throughout the series, three independent investigations are going on: Will's three friends, Will's mother, and the town sheriff. A mysterious young girl with bizarre abilities meets Will's friends and joins them in their search for him, all the while lending some clues as to why not just Will, but another woman, has disappeared. As the story unfolds, all three parties find their investigations leading to a common center.

This show has everything you want out of a suspenseful, sci-fi thriller. It's got a monster, it's got scary little children, it's got the crazy mother (Winona Ryder), and it even has some light-hearted moments from the well-cast child actors. Brian says he's three episodes in and it hasn't totally drawn him in yet, and I'd probably say that is fine. If the concept interests you and you're intrigued by the general premise, I'd encourage you to keep going because every week another layer of the mystery is peeled back and the science fiction goes deeper. Just like Fringe did, really, which is why I loved that show.

Links

10: Become the BEST YOU! | Jason Van Orden | New TRB Show Format | The Shadow Feb 02, 2017

Show notes

Hello and welcome to The Real Brian Show! Whether you're coming across this podcast for the first time or you've been with us from the beginning, we're so glad that you found us! We hope that it won't be a one-way street, either. Let us know who you are, either by joining our Facebook group or leaving a comment in this blog post.

In This Episode

The hobbit hole has undergone a remodel.
Jason Van Orden of Internet Business Mastery joins us!
Ready to become the best you? The ingredients vary.
Ideas for changing up the format of the podcast.
The Shadow pops in!

Become the Best You

If anyone has ever told you, play to your strengths, you'll perhaps understand why it is such a commonly used phrase. The things that come naturally to us, whatever that might be, are inherent skills that are essential to leverage. These skills come so easy that it feels like we're cheating when we use them.

Hint: you're not cheating!

The discussion on the podcast this week, between Brian and special guest Jason Van Orden, has a lot to do with taking an inventory of life and breaking it down into bite sized pieces. In order to become the best you, it certainly is necessary (or helpful, at the very least) to know thyself. But it's hard to be successful in our diverse world when all we know is ourself. There is a discovery task, inherent in know thyself that requires us to participate in the world and understand the people with whom we live and work so that we might deliver what is needed or wanted rather than something we think is needed or wanted.

I've heard Jason interviewed a couple times and have always been impressed with his origin story. Borne of the entrepreneur vein, his highly marketable skill of software engineering fit the mold of what I just wrote above. He recognized his own skill and found an avenue through which that skill was profitable to the wider world. But in the course of breaking down what exactly that skill was, he discovered a more granular ability that allowed him to break away from a cubicle and embrace a wider audience.

New TRBS Format

Brian has an idea for how to change things up on the show and would love your feedback! Right now, every week you get one episode a week that's anywhere between an hour and just under two hours long. We feature special guests, interesting interviews, character interviews, discussions about current events and hot button social issues, and, as always, recommendations from Brian about the music, movies, and tea he's into.

Here's how he wants to switch things up: Monday: 5 - 10 minutes of encouragement, wisdom, or a shared experiment to get your week started off right. Tuesday: 30 minute interview with a special guest, as you've come to expect on The Real Brian Show! Wednesday: Interview with a character (i.e. Han Solo, The Shadow, Dobby) Friday: 60 minute discussion with a friend, new or old, about something fun, interesting, relevant, or whatever! Sky's the limit.

Links

Reach out to Jason and thank him for being on the show! @jasonvo
JasonVanOrden Dot Com
Internet Business Mastery
Join our Facebook Group

9: Create the Life You Want | Pay it Forward | Kate Erickson Jan 26, 2017

Show notes

Ever wondered how you might create the life you want? We'll be the first to admit that the answer isn't one-size-fits-all, but the conversation in this episode of The Real Brian Show can help refocus the path to that life. When I choose to adopt these methodologies in my own life, I am surprised to find that the life I want while I'm living selflessly is very different from what I want when I'm living for myself. How does living differently change what we want? Perspective.

In this Episode

Tired of the negativity...
Developing a new morning routine!
New Music. Check out Danger Silent
Ostrich meat, Apple Cider Vinegar, Cinnamon Cubano
Welcome Kate Erickson!
Attitude and how it can change the world.

Keep the Bedroom Sacred

I know where your mind went with that header! Reel it back in so that I can expound on this sacredness I speak of. Brian explains his new morning routine in this episode and it involves not keeping his cellphone in his bedroom. No more with the cellphone alarm clock! no more with the social media wake up ritual! What do you think you'd do instead when you wake up in the morning without technology within reach?

If the routine itself isn't appealing to you, maybe science will change your mind. Several years ago, when smart phones really began to explode, we began to see a lot of fundamental aspects of our culture change. In addition to texting while driving, looking at your phone while crossing the street, and Googling (or asking Siri about) everything you don't know, the physical side effects of LCD screens began to emerge.

According to many scientists, LCD screens have a legitimate negative effect on our health. Eye strain (including blinking less and what is called "Near Point Stress Syndrome"), headaches, sleepless nights... they are not just things Mom said to get us to put down our phones. Articles in everyday publications, such as Forbes, brought up the excellent point of LCD being non-existent throughout human history up until the last thirty years. Until the last ten years or so, the human body has never been exposed to the degree of exposure to LCD screens that we force on them now. Some scientists would posit that these screens go so far as to trick our bodies into thinking it's daylight when it may be the middle of the night. Have you ever crawled in bed, tired and exhausted, feeling like you could fall asleep within seconds... but then you pull out your phone, maybe for something as innocent as turning it to silent mode or setting the alarm, only to find a half-hour has passed and you've thoroughly perused Facebook? And at that point you're not even tired anymore?

We have a problem! Bringing that distracting nonsense into the bedroom is not necessary. Try keeping the bedroom sacred, remove LCD screens from the bedroom for a couple weeks and see what changes.

Create the Life You Want

What an incredible conversation with Kate this week. I've heard Kate interviewed many times, not just by Brian too (she was a guest on Profitcast), and I'm always thrilled to hear her articulate aspects of herself that I am unable to put into words about myself. Early in this episode she talks about her behavior when entering a party or a group of people, and her approach deeply resonates with me.

I followed up Brian's discussion of standing up for ourselves last week with a little commentary of my own and basically tried to get across that what finally clicked for me was understanding the connection I had to a group of people that enabled me to do what I was good at confidently. Not unlike Kate's own realization of, "What am I doing?" when carefully evaluating her approach to mingling, I realized, as far as networking and socializing is concerned, that what was missing for me, to be bold in the midst of strangers, was a lack of connection. I didn't know how I connected to all these people. Instead of it being a point of fear, I used it as a challenge. I rose up out of my introverted, I'd-rather-be-home-with-a-good-book nature and created the atmosphere I wanted. The entire interview with Kate is filled with so much excellent material that I don't even want to approach a recap of it all here. They talk about paying it forward, being nice to people and saying hello, and how that can fundamentally change your own day as well as perfect strangers. They talk about how attitude is the front-runner to perspective, how without a good attitude everything that happens results in a perspective with a murky lens. The picture they paint for us, the conversation as a whole, sets up this model of what it means to create the life you want. The life we want is full of choices; and that's not just, 'What do I want to do for a living?' or 'Should I get married?' But daily asking ourselves, 'What attitude am I going to wear today?' and 'How can I treat those around me with the respect they deserve?'

Links

Fighting Back Against the Health Menace of LCD Screens (Forbes)
Kate Erickson: EOFire Audio Blog
@KateLErickson
Find Another Way to Live by Danger Silent

8: Nerds in the Wild | Steven Brandon | Self Advocacy | Gollum vs Dobby Jan 18, 2017

Show notes

Welcome back to The Real Brian Show! We've got a great lineup for you today, including a discussion with Steven Brandon. Brian and Steven were paired together to cover The Big Bang Theory for TV Talk several years back and have kept in touch ever since.

In This Episode

Welcome Steven!
Finding love in reality... shows
Saying yes. Trying everything.

Hailing from the Land Down Under, Steven brought his talent and prowess to the U.S. where he now works and lives. From an appearance on Wipeout (the blind date edition) in 2010 to Dating Naked in 2014, Steven has stretched his theater muscles in a variety of ways that have now landed him in L.A. with the Canned Laughter entertainment company. Currently, Brandon is working on a musical version of Game of Thrones which will debut in February 2017.

After listening to Steven talk for awhile, it's no surprise that one of his primary super powers is creativity. He's buzzing with energy and has a philosophy well suited for an extrovert: say yes, try everything. It has, undoubtedly, provided some unique experiences for him! Three words: naked ATV ride. To understand what I'm talking about, you're going to have to listen.

Links

Steven on Twitter: @stevenb29
Steven on Instagram: @steveb29b
Game of Thrones: The Musical

7: Come Back to My Room and See the View - You're Addicted to Your Phone | The Borg Interviewed | The Flash Returns Jan 12, 2017

Show notes

Welcome back to The Real Brian Show! We'd like to invite you back to our room in this episode to see the view, if you know what we mean. Don't know what we mean? Well, then it's good we brought Martin (aka The Flash) back.

In This Episode

Texting & Driving. Really?!
The Flash returns!
Phone and Social Media Addiction

Come See the View

I'll let Brian and Martin share the full story of where this line became a comedic staple of our friendship, but it falls into the category of not realizing what you've said until after you've said it! Witty banter and friendly jabbing requires a healthy dose of euphemisms and double entendres. If I'm not mistaken, we stumbled into this particular double entendre at DragonCon with the second guest of this episode, Martin (aka The Flash). It was a memorable weekend and lives on through the inside jokes we carefully cultivated.

Over the last several years, many of the best friendship I've developed have been as a result of podcasting. We've had Martin guest host on The Real Brian Show before, but the first time we ever got to chat with him was way back on The Flash podcast Brian and I hosted for a half-season at Golden Spiral Media. Martin, being a pretty big Flash fan himself, was an expert witness in our ramp-up episodes. Prior to that, Martin became a huge part of the TV Talk community by providing regular contributions to the shows he watched and listened to and it's been amazing to see how one thing has led to another.

And before we knew it, Brian was inviting him back to his room to see the view. Or was he inviting me? I can never remember. Ha. Haha.

Phone and Social Media Addiction

Martin and Brian touch on an increasingly popular topic in this episode, that of millennials in the workplace. The discussion was spawned by this Simon Sinek interview on Inside Quest with Tom Bilyeu, in which he highlights the perceived problem of millennial's performance in the workplace and their social media-driven dopamine addiction.

I was born in the late 80s and am technically considered a Millennial, so as much as I often agree with the observations put out there by folks like Simon, I also know that there are exceptions. Interestingly, I was reading an article this past weekend about how I am on the cusp of the Millennial generation. Even though I fall into that era, I still remember what a household without a personal computer was like. I still remember the novelty of using an old Mac to play an 8-bit version of Oregon Trail in the school computer lab. I went through junior high and high school without social media (heck, I didn't even have a cell phone).

My parents raised me in a frugal household, not an entitled one. And for that I am tremendously thankful. I watched my dad's incredible work ethic and strive every day to emulate his example. That said, I really was on the cusp of the Millennial generation and I don't think I am either the exception or the rule; I think it was about my graduation class that began to go either way, until social media helped spur on the de-evolution of our society. My opinion, obviously.

Simon draws attention to some of the inadvertent behaviors Millennials exhibit in the workplace; behaviors that aren't entirely their fault, and yet are invalid excuses in the real world. Parents treating their children with an entitled hand, for example (i.e. participation trophies), are setting kids up for disappointments later in life. It's not entirely the child's fault, other than the fact that they aren't being taught to simultaneously stand up to hand-outs. We've talked about adversity on this show and how even when we're faced with a bad lot in life, it's entirely possible to use adversity to fuel our rise to success. But how do you tell a generation of children who were given participation trophies that the real enemy isn't their employers who expect them to show up to work on time...but an entire childhood worth of "you're special!" commentary? Of course they're special; but they're not so special that they can show up to work 2 hours late every day and expect to keep their job.

One of my favorite aspects to this interview Simon gave is the emphasis he puts on imbalance as the ultimate culprit, not the behavior. The behavior is a result of imbalance; there is nothing inherently wrong with Facebook, but too much time spent on Facebook is wrong. The behavior can be corrected by fixing the imbalance and will never be corrected by criticizing or attacking the behavior itself.

What is your take on the Simon interview? Let us know!

Links

6: Give Someone Else a Chance | Social Media Woes | Great Harvest Bread | Julie Damschroder Jan 06, 2017

Show notes

Welcome back to The Real Brian Show! We hope you had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! The end of the year was chalked up with some interesting events to cap off what can only be labeled an interesting year. To get us back in the groove and start off 2017 on a note of positivity and generosity, Brian catches up with Julie Damschroder, a lawyer-turned-franchise owner, and gets a glimpse into her experiences. Leaving her desk behind, Julie realized her passion for baking could be realized with a bit of elbow grease and a whole lot of love.

In this Episode

Social Media: Love it or Lose it?
Wind is the devil's breath.
Finding lots of good music!
Currently watching: new TV/rewatching Rogue One
Welcome Julie! Fort Collins Baking Nerd.
Giving someone else a chance

Great Harvest Bread

Do you have a Great Harvest Bread near you? We have them here in Minnesota and I never pass up an opportunity to pick up a loaf of Pumpkin Bread. I did not realize, however, that each location is an instantiation of a franchise! After hearing Julie's story, however, it makes a lot of sense. I've never had a loaf of bread from Great Harvest that I haven't loved entirely, and it's because the person who runs the store has an opportunity to express their skill and creativity through a lot of decisions that are often made, in non-franchises, over the head of local shops.

Julie brings her own ideas to the franchise and has an incredible passion for giving back to the community by never letting bread go to waste. From utilizing local markets to grinding their own wheat, from providing generous samples of the bread in-store to providing loaves to hungry children, Julie is in the business of spreading love through rich, healthy bread.

Comfort through bread, that's the vibe I get from Julie in this episode. While she is running a business, it's not all about making money. She wants to give back to the community and is able to do so with a natural passion for baking, a natural, holistic approach to life, and a deep desire to see healthy lives around her.

Give Someone Else a Chance

If you change your mind, I'll be first in line. Honey I'm still free, take a chance on me.

I couldn't help it. I had this song stuck in my head after listening to Brian discuss this idea of giving someone a chance! Then, of course, I was reminded of the scene from The Office when Andy is asking Angela out with his a cappella group and they use this song.

After I crawled out of the black hole of a YouTube rabbit trail, I thought about the song as it relates to the discussion you'll hear in this episode. While Abba's song is clearly talking about a romance, the sentiment still applies. Giving someone a chance, investing in someone, can produce an incredible result. Many of us get to the point where we cannot help every single person who asks for it, but I think the biggest distinction we're trying to draw here is building a spirit of generosity and selflessness within ourselves. Every person has to earn their own way in life. But there are some those who can't, due to physical or mental limitations, or won't, due to despondency.

Brian has some great things to say on this topic, and I wanted to add to the discussion by remembering a subset of people who often get passed over for chances. Sometimes it feels like the younger generations gradually lose their will to work hard or develop a serious work ethic. Whether they're privileged or being raised by a generation of Participation-Trophy winners, it's hard to say. But it is extremely difficult, and almost not even thought of, to take a chance on someone who doesn't seem to want the help or care about the leg up. Without evidence that someone will take our teaching moments and reap a plentiful harvest from it, it's hard to really throw ourselves into it.

Kids hardly ever know what they want, right? Whether they're being raised now or a hundred years ago. Life was much different in my grandparents' childhood. Listening to stories Papa tells about tending to the strawberry patches as a child make me feel lazy, but then I look at how his work ethic translated in the lives of his children and I can see that for each generation a new version of the same work ethic is implemented. In the spirit of not letting that go to waste, it is on my mind this year to start looking for opportunities to give younger people the encouragement they need to work hard and witness the fruit of their labor.

Giving someone a chance doesn't always mean they come to you begging for an opportunity to prove themselves, but it certainly may! With the global sentiment of 2016 being what it is (generally that the year sucked), it would not hurt us all to adopt a heart of generosity and recognize the difference between giving someone a chance and giving out freebies.

Links

5: You Wear That Cookie Well - Nicholas McCarthy | Reducing Stress | Visualization | Merry Christmas Dec 22, 2016

Show notes

Merry Christmas!

From all of us at the Real Brian Show, a very Merry Christmas! In this farewell-to-2016 installment of the podcast, we bring you yet more Star Wars, plenty of talk about Christmas, and an amazing conversation with Nicholas McCarthy about his experiences as a concert pianist.

In This Episode

Buddy the Elf pops in!
Christmas & Star Wars with Martin Donison
Nicholas McCarthy has a unique handicap for a concert pianist...and yet, WOW!

Wear That Cookie Well

Nicholas McCarthy was born without his right hand, but he was also born with an extraordinary aptitude for piano. If that combination doesn't make sense, you will be astounded by the interview in this week's episode of The Real Brian Show. Brian and Nicholas dig in to the prejudice produced by the inherent handicap having only one hand presents and how the challenges he faced as a young person grew him into exactly who he needed to be as an adult.

More than simply rising to the occasion, or facing adversity head-on, Nicholas's story is one of those rare and unique, and totally authentic, tributes to a calling deep within the human spirit. We can each have a strong desire to do or to be something, but facing the word "No" or experiencing rejection can be a show stopper. Nicholas's skills tickling ivory were too great to allow any form of rejection to get in his way, and it is incredibly inspiring.

The Noise of Negativity

Negativity makes a lot of noise. Nicholas and Brian talk about this noise and how it can seem to drown out everything else around you. No matter how many people tell you something positive, the negatives are what seem to make the most noise. This manifests in a lot of ways. After the 2016 presidential election, for example, the negativity around the results was extremely loud and prolonged. All I remember from the first couple days after the election are the riots. A couple years ago, on the other side of this, Brian and I interviewed Greg Weisman (known for his work on comic-book and animated television series). He brought up the excellent point that when reading reviews about his own work, he can recite the negative reviews verbatim, and yet recall very little from the positive reviews.

Constructive criticism is my bread and butter. The only way to grow and improve is to keep at what you love doing and use the input from others to make adjustments as necessary. But, in the words of my one of my favorite authors, "few of us really have the heart to be in love without encouragement." It is hard to love anyone, or anything, without the encouragement to do so. While it's useful to have people in our lives who tell us the truth, in a more critical way, it is equally important to receive positive feedback. Even more importantly, it is important to listen to and trust positive feedback.

If you aren't getting any positive reinforcement for your endeavor, don't give up yet - make some adjustments. Try a new audience. As for feedback differently. Try to get to the root of why you're surrounded by negativity. Don't let the noise overwhelm you, try to drown it out with a healthy balance of input from the opposing force.

Links

Join The Real Brian Show Facebook Community!
Tomorrow's Legends (A Legends of Tomorrow Podcast with Martin Donison)
Nicholas McCarthy's YouTube Channel
Nicholas McCarthy (Everything You Need and Want to Know)

Merry Christmas! -- Emilee

4: Dang… I’m Looking Good! | Image | Rogue One | Kyle Roussel | Han Solo Dec 13, 2016

Show notes

Welcome to The Real Brian Show! Because Star Wars: Rogue One will be gracing the big screen this coming weekend, a heavy focus of this episode will be on that upcoming blockbuster. As always, we'd love for you to join the conversation! Please visit our website for details on how to get in touch or leave a comment on this blog post. Unsure what to say? Start by telling us what your favorite Christmas movie is. Mine, you ask? It's a Wonderful Life. Hands. Down.

In This Episode

A chat with Han Solo
Nitro. Cold Brew. Coffee.
It's the most wonderful time of the year.
What's your favorite Christmas movie?
Welcome, Kyle! Let's talk about ROGUE ONE!
The line between being respectful... and flat out fake.

Rogue One

I enjoy the Star Wars story. I enjoy any story that does "world building", by which I mean... establishes a strong framework or foundation for its premise and commits to revealing as much as it can of that world through dialogue, costume and scenery. Star Wars commits, and I appreciate that. I would not call myself a fanatic or an expert, though, which is why I was recently pleasantly surprised to learn of the premise for Rogue One.

Perhaps the seasoned Star Wars fan could discern from the trailer, but alas, I could not. The story of Rogue One actually takes place between Episode III and Episode IV, which I find fascinating. It is the first in what is being called an anthology of Star Wars films. Here is a good premise:

"Rogue One: A Star Wars Story" takes place before the 1977 original film, "Star Wars: Episode IV — A New Hope." In "A New Hope," Princess Leia hides the plans to destroy the superweapon, the Death Star, inside her droid, R2-D2. "Rogue One" will follow the team of rebel fighters as they attempt to find the plans for the Death Star. Spoiler: We know they eventually end up in Leia's hands, but this is our in-depth look at how it happened. via BusinessInsider Read more...

After hearing Brian and Kyle discuss and anticipate the movie, I am even more excited to see it on Saturday!

Image

Our culture spends a lot of time worrying about image. Yes, worrying. (Worry (v): to give way to anxiety or unease.) We worry about the way we look and, even worse, worry about the way others look. Like most things in life, attention to appearance has extremes. Either we care so little about the way we look that we disrespect others by the way we dress or we care so much about the way we look that it becomes our sole focus.

Personally, I've always had issues dressing myself. I'm not incredibly girly and most of what I know about doing my hair has come from desperately seeking out YouTube how-tos. But I've learned a lot over the last couple years and a little goes a long way. After learning how to assemble the various components to looking nice, it's not as much of a chore anymore to put myself together for a party.

As with so much in life, I do believe that managing image comes back to balance. Brian reminds us that the way we put ourselves together is how the world sees us. As much as it is an impression of ourselves, it's also an opportunity to make an impression. Even though we're treated differently by what people see on the outside, the motivation for putting on nice clothes and making ourselves presentable should be to respect others instead of elevating our own stature.

A couple things change when I dress up, and I wonder if you feel the same way. First, I behave differently. I'm not as reckless in "nice clothes". I walk differently and I'm more careful. I like to walk on low walls, swing around poles and jump over fences... but I tend to not do those things when I'm more dressed up. And that is typically a good thing, because the way I am dressed usually lends to itself to how I should behave. Second, I'm more aware of my surroundings. Because I've taken the time to get dressed up, I notice others, I notice details, and I enter into that world... instead of keeping it at a distance or operating outside of it.

The final touch to every outfit should be a smile. When I was in my first year of college, I was not in a good place (emotionally) and wasn't afraid to let my bad attitude show. But one day, after my nutrition class, this girl comes running up to me and gets in my face, demanding to know what my problem with her is. I stare at her, blinking rapidly (as I recall), trying to figure out who this girl was. Turns out, she was in my nutrition class and thought I'd been glaring at her the entire period. I apologized, because my glares were not meant for her, I had never seen her before as far as I could recall. But she definitely opened my eyes to how my attitude affects those around me.

Since then, I've worked really hard to finalize every outfit with Happiness. It can be challenging, but putting on a smile affects my psyche as much as it affects those around me. I didn't need a YouTube video for that ensemble.

Nitro...what?

Nitro cold brew coffee, it's all the rage! Thought for Food has a great demonstration of what the process entails.

What's the big deal Two words: stronger, crispier, creamier. Nitro cold brew brings out the taste and texture of the brew without sacrificing caffeine levels. As the name suggests, it's coffee that is literally infused with nitrogen bubbles, which is what produces that creamy taste. In coffee shops it's kept in a keg, pressurized, and drawn from a tap when ordered.

So that is what the big deal is!

Links

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Watch a Trailer)
Tumbling Lightsaber Podcast
Podcast Guy Media (Jason! Thank you, dude!)

3: I LIKE Earthquakes! Racism | Bullying | Lee Stephen part 2 | Chewbacca Dec 08, 2016

Show notes

Welcome back to The Real Brian Show! We've got a great line-up for you in this episode as we talk about racism, and its more general ancestor - bullying. Racism is just one of the hot-button social issues that plagues our society. The cause and effects are deeply rooted into our society, but that doesn't make them untouchable. In fact, it makes them even more tangible.

In This Episode

Welcome to CJ Thunder (aka Carl)!
Super secret hot cocoa recipe...
Racism: what are it's roots?
Experiences with bullying.
How do we fight bullying?
Chewbacca joins the conversation
More from Lee Stephen, including comments on adversity, advice for aspiring writers, and some big truth bombs.

Bullying

The famous quote from Eleanor Roosevelt oft comes to mind when talking about adversity and bullying: "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." Also the old adage: "sticks and stones will break my bones, but words will never hurt me." Quotes and sayings, like these ones, might encourage us to take the power away from a bully, but they do little to acknowledge the fact that bullying does hurt.

Brian and Carl face the issue of racism with compassion. Words matter because we wield them in very specific ways in order to illicit a range of emotions from other people. We use them to manipulate, to incite fear, to wound. We use them to make someone fall in love with us, to tell someone how much we care, or to communicate difficult news in a delicate way. The conversation in this podcast addresses the fact that the people wielding words for evil purposes may, in fact, be hurting themselves. Instead of fighting fire with fire, fight back with an attitude of how you wish the other person had treated you.

Adversity

We face adversity when bullied. Whatever brand of bullying you've received, whether it is racism, like Carl, or discrimination, like Brian, that period of suffering is actually called adversity. My dad always used to say that our character is revealed the most when we are under adversity, because it's only when we're under pressure that we're truly challenged with wielding the tools most intrinsically important to human life.

I've been learning a lot about compassion in the last couple months, learning how to see suffering in others and find the patience to listen and hear the struggle they face. But compassion is about so much more than acknowledgement and patience, it's about the endurance of those qualities. Compassion feels to me to be the intrinsic opposite of bullying and, as such, the greatest weapon that can be wielded.

If adversity comes from times of struggle, and let's specifically target bullying since that is the topic of discussion here, the opposing force of struggle is peace or surrender. Carl made a great point about hitting a bully with kindness, in that showing a bully that you are unperturbed by their attack makes them more likely to back down. Retaliating with hurtful words or a punch to the face reinforces the attack from the bully, inciting the very response they want. They want to cause pain, because seeing others in pain is the fastest way to feel less of one's own.

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The banner image for this episode is taken from Howard Center, an organization that desires to enrich the lives of those in need.

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