My realms of self-delusion

Being successful
The moment you decide to do business you are going to fuck people and you are going to be fucked by people. It’s the unwritten law of trade and every businessman knows this. Jump in, get the money, get out without to much collateral damage. Which is of coarse impossible because you are screwing yourself to such an extend that you start to justify the shit you are doing. It simply becomes part of your personality where it hides itself as part of you. If you would actually see this you would probably kill yourself or end up doing charity work for the homeless to try and get rid of your guild. I have seen so many frustrated people around me in my field of work and it’s only the last few years that it start’s to become more or less clear what the fuck is happening. We are getting scared because we are starting to see where it’s going and it scares the crap out of us.

Intelligent Marketeers
We all knew and we all saw it coming because we where on the fucking battlefield all the time. We have been collectively drinking our drinks on Friday afternoons because we new we couldn’t keep a straight face towards each other in a normal conversation. We all felt guilty about what we where doing and at the same time we kept on going because of the lifestyle we created and had to support. It’s time, it’s done. It cannot be compounded any further. Marketing, sales, consumerism. We know because we are just that. The cycles, the concepts, the lingo.

Can I have a ‘happy life’ please
Look at the things we had to sell, the claims we made and the shows we put on. It’s done. The switch is flipped and the dark hole is forming as we speak. We all know this. It surrounds us we are in the middle of it and we feel the pull getting stronger. Everybody in marketing is either shit scared, drugged, distracted or cashing in on the chaos that surrounds all wars. We survived the 80's and 90's are in our forties and on the brink of being able to buy the toys and dreams for a presumably happy future after selling the company. Cash inn and fuck the world.

"Yes we did"
Oh so you didn’t work your as off? You don’t find yourself responsible for the fucking mess you helped to create. Oh, you didn’t know? Nobody told you? Well that’s a surprise! Nobody told me either. But here it is. I’m one of you! Spit on me, despise me and ignore me. I know you will because you are either shit scared, drugged, distracted or cashing in on the chaos that surrounds all wars. Make your pic. It’s all I’ve seen to be honest. I participated, tried to break out, fell back inn because I was already fucked beyond repair just like all the rest.

How I did it
I decided to quit art school in the third year and take a job offer that was ridiculously good for a 21 year old with no working experience. This was around 1992 and the industry was on the brink of going digital. Because I was one of the lucky bastards that got his hands on and behind a Mac early in school I was part of what was then the ‘elite’. I didn’t know then and I wasn’t really aware of it. It was just that people like me where apparently in high demand. They where scratched out of every corner and the people that did didn’t have a clue what to look for. So with a little bit of bluff and some good manuals you where in the game. It got me into the game so easily. I could work Photoshop 1.6, QuarkXPress and Illustrator 2.0. That was it. No real in depth knowledge about advertising. David Ogilwho?

Loading my program
I made fucking money. Finally able to support myself buy those records and play them on a decent pickup. Go on a holiday in an old car to the south of France. It was ‘heaven’. I was alive and I was fucked. From that moment on there was only one route. The route of money. I started to pay taxes and the worst thing happened. I got older, I got relationships and I got sentimental. So I was in the game, played the game, became the game. I learned to design on a decent level and got good at what I did. Up to the point I met the boarders of my DNA, my basic programming. Why did I stop to progress? Why didn’t I get rich? Why was it that everything seemed to be going in the same cycles? So the blaming game began. I blamed my parents, my education, the part of the country I lived inn. I blamed everything except myself. Up to the point I got into spirituality. I somehow saw that it had to come from myself. So I did that whole cycle as well. Yoga, meditation, guru’s, God, etc. Only to find ever more conflict between me the world and the fucking money that had to be made.

Ain’t it a classic
7 years ago I worked in an advertising agency. One of the last steady jobs I had and it finally happened. I walked out of the office one sunny afternoon and everything went black. I had my first ‘burnout’ or whatever name you want go give that state. I was in a relationship, bought a houseboat 2 years earlier and there in front of the office it all stopped. The whole thing came down. So I find myself on sick leave and after about 3 months I decide to go back to work. Nothing had changed really. I still felt completely lost. The work didn’t mean anything to me and I was a zombie on auto pilot. Zombies have no place in the system. They don’t make money so as expected I was one of the first that had to go when the economy dipped. It was said that my release was because of economic reasons. There was indeed less work in advertising and apparently my boss was able to present the figures to go with that. Personally I think my boss simply didn’t like my presence and attitude. You have to be likable in the system don’t forget that kids.

The ‘being’ is expandable
To make it easier to get rid of me he changed my job description when he applied for governmental approval to break up my contract. It’s easier to get rid of people if you have more of the same people occupying the same space. So in order to get the costs down it’s just a matter of writing a plan screw the laws that don’t work in the first place and get rid of what is considered human cattle. I don’t have any illusions here because there have been moments that I was on the other side of this coin that was flipped. Fuck or be fucked. There is the law and there is the way money is to be made and that’s how it fucking works. Please prove me otherwise.

The Harakiri equation
This was after more than 3 years of brutal labour and long hours in what was then an advertising agency in startup. I had a very modest salary in relation to the hours I made, no pension and no bonuses or anything else for that matter. Actually the only thing that was good about that job where the colleagues I worked with. The rest was stress and long hours. I’m not complaining it was me who took the job so there you go. About 3 years before this happened I moved from Arnhem to Enschede specifically for this job that was offered to me by the same guy that was firing me. To finish it off my girlfriend became pregnant. In other words I made her pregnant and she accepted and allowed herself to become pregnant.

So here we where. I’m unemployed, on financial compensation (welfare), we are going to have a baby, we live on a houseboat that is way to small for the 3 of us and has all my savings in it. That was the moment where I completely crashed. I was able to sell the boat. I got a mortgage on a small house, got the baby, we moved,  but it was all done on adrenaline. We tried to provide a nest for this little girl and gave what was to give but it all ended in a broken relationship and 3 persons that where fucked. My former girlfriend has two work several jobs and is stuck in a live she never wanted for herself with a child she wants to give so much more. I’m in my process trying to get this thing of the ground as an independent consultant. I apply for part-time jobs that actually don’t exist in my line of work and I try to scratch enough money out of the system to pay my bills. The current money system is not working. If you are not born into a rich family or have the system work your way you are simply screwed. The current system robs people of everything that could be called a dignified life. And if you have children it becomes nearly impossible to move in any direction.

Choose life...
My daughter is a healthy intelligent girl that’s almost seven years old now. She’s my daughter and I’m her father. We are still part of the haves in this world. There is food on the table, education and enjoyment. But it’s all under enormous pressure and to be honest there isn’t a day in my life without money on my mind. No illusions about my life but I want my daughter and other children to live in a world where they can be who they really are as themselves instead of shackled slaves to this fucked up system. Last week she saw why she had to go to school. To learn to become a moneymaker because that’s what crown ups do and then she sees us wrestle and argue about it. We make money, consume and don’t have a fucking clue. It’s horrible, it’s a crime, it has to stop. That’s why I’m standing up for an equal money system. That’s why I want to apply myself and forgive myself, because I’m part of the shit that caused this fuck up to happen in the first place.

Stand up for ‘Equal-Money’