Day-026-my need for greed

From my present perspective I have started to live the word greed since the first time I wanted the bigger piece of a cookie when my mother would brake it in half. That first moment I heard myself say "but his part is bigger than mine". That's greed to me. Mine! Mining for satisfaction of self interest. Always and only at the cost of others. The opposite can be greed as well. Where I pity myself and manipulate people into helping me. Where my behavior turns parasitic instead of predatorily. Where I lean on the crutches of others so to speak.The word 'greedy' has an old English / Germanic origin. In Dutch we say 'gretig' which means 'eager' which can easily be mistaken with enthusiasm. And that's how I primarily lived and projected greed into the world. My enthusiasm, 'my into me I am'. If I wanted something I became eager to get it and as a child I already learned how to manipulate by copying the principles from my parents and I saw greed in everyone. The word greed was simply a description of behavior like so many others. It never raised any real questions. It was simply something that everybody did and it was how the world I accepted functioned.I was introduced and started to see more perspective within the whole construct of greed as I went to school which was a catholic school and I heard all the bible stories. So as I got home and my mother told me I shouldn't eat so fast/greedy it made no sense to me. To me being hungry and having an apatite had nothing to do with Cain and Able.Within that context the concept of 'sharing things with others' is part of every parents vocabulary and morality construct within raising their children. It's an exact copy of what my parents said. But no parent lives his or her own words within it. So what can we expect of a child? I heard it often until it became part of my background noise. I had my own priorities for I was greedy. Share your toys, the playground, play together, share the fun, be nice. Fuck! Share the so called peace. Yeah whatever you fucking hypocrites. And there you have the arrogance of puberty. The freaked out pubic anger attack. Where every parent get's his or her last chance to look in the mirror before it cracks and shatters the fairytale of parenting children in a world where all parents live greedy ever after. My child before your child whatever happens. Go and reproduce ye little ones.As far as I can see that whole concept of greed existed within me as the polarity between selfishness  and generosity. Where greed became my primal motivation to become top dog and generosity the way to manipulate others to remain in position. Not understanding both mechanisms so essentially I was clueless and fucked myself oblivious. That's another story though.Giving is an investment and receiving the pay out. One can pretend to give unconditionally but it doesn't take a scientist to see how we live this principle as we create our reality as the human species trough it. And primarily that's how I see myself reflected back into this reality where I live out my greed as self interest within all my actions. That's like becoming my own corporation.Within that I see and realize that the concept of giving as I would like to receive made no sense because it was never explained to me into specificity what this equation entails. My parents and teachers like the ones before had no other option then to follow their preprogrammed path of destruction.Within that I see and realize that I have never done anything without wanting something for it in return. If I found a sick animal and brought it to the vet I thought I did it out of compassion. But I also wanted to get rid of a potential feeling of guild without remorse. I programmed myself to think that it was my moral obligation to act. Where did that come from? O yes education and religion. Good and bad and so on. I was educated and already part of a living reality based on winning and loosing, power versus weakness, hard versus soft, strategic intelligence versus lack of information, men versus animal. I see that not bringing the wounded animal to the vet might have caused me to feel guilty. In order to invest in feeling good in the future I reduced my 'feelings' of guild in the now. That's like protecting investments through intelligence. Then I brought the animal to the vet instead of helping him out of his misery because I had this whole morality thing about killing. The vet probably killed the little squirrel in the backyard as soon as I left the building. A perfect example of acting out greed and how I as the mind build the corporate structure that is me. Passing on karma without even knowing what it was at the time. Lol!I could go on and on about my participation within it. As an example as I got my first job I was one of the few people in holland working with Apple computers at the time. So I had an advantage and I knew if I kept studying the software and stayed ahead I would remain the power user I was at the time and the reason I got the job in the first place. So I was very eager to keep my skill set up to date and within this I got increasingly more scared of the future because I slowly started to understand that what happened in the bible was also happening to me. That there was competition rising and that I had become part of the equation. It started my quest for answers and it also fucked me up career wise because the rat race is not a race you step in or out of. You participate or leave the stadium. If I'm not part of the race I'm not competing on the world stage and without greed someone else will do the killing for me. In that regard nature is less cruel than I am. Nature is what it is I want to be more than 'I' am.Excessiveness is a disease, like the luxury to live a depression. A few years back I was able to do so because I had some financial reserves so I could lay on the couch for a few months smoking pot while feeling sorry for myself. Like I had more rights to be depressed than someone else and with that comes the guild. The catholic dogma coming full circle. Greed and guild is what made the dutch one of the wealthiest nations on earth. Like a lot of dutch I'm aware that we are guilty thus have committed a crime. But we tolerate crime and thus we became one of the richest and most liberal countries in the world because we breed the greed to do so. Welcome to my roots of greed.More to Come. Must Watch Documentaries if you are interested in understanding reality:The Century of the Self: Part 1- Happiness MachinesThe Power PrincipleThe TrapPsywarHuman Resources: Social Engineering in the 20th Century

Day-025-10.4 the 'copy cat' loop

This  is a (coincidental) follow up to
Day-024-Getting rid of headaches

Reacting too generalizations
Sometimes I catch myself within a reaction saying something a long the line of: "that's cool we should all do that" or "we should all learn from that". And I noticed that I'm not the only one doing this. Everybody I know has this particular line of code in their vocabulary. So if this phrase or reaction to our environment is common it must be part of our basic structure and operating system and by now I know that when I observe programs like these they are flag points. It's observing myself in the mirror as software looping within and as the mind instead of being here seeing myself looking in the mirror. Here I stop and breath and take a moment to reflect.

One but not the same (how is that possible?)
Within seeing myself reacting I immediately realized what I was doing. I was reacting preprogrammed like a dog barking with the pack not questioning why it is barking. Letting everybody within the pack know I was there with my particular sent and voice tonality. Arf, arf, bark, bark. Here I am the white dog with the blue eyes. 

This is me participating within the most basic form of communication and it makes me wonder about the word 'communication'.

Communication The imparting or exchanging of information or news. The successful conveying or sharing of ideas and feelings. Social contact. She gave him some hope of her return, or at least of their future communication.
ORIGIN late Middle English: from Old French comunicacion, from Latin communicatio(n-), from the verb communicare ‘to share’

See the new dictionary defenition says it's about greater understanding (software integration). The origin of the word communication dates back to the greek and theirs definition describes exactly that what it is is 'to share'. It's in fact nothing more than that. Even the word hope exists within this construct. 'Hope' and 'should'. Fruit from the same tree. So eventually it's simply sharing whatever it is that's there even a pile of bullshit. As long as it is shared and we do it together we feel accepted and safe within our 'sharing group'.

Projecting my religious assumptions
I see myself sharing and confirming my moral/religious statements as projections into the future 'we should...'. It holds no substance or relevance other than sharing a portion of my morality like a dork barking with the pack not making sense other than noise pollution as verbal diarrhea. Haleluyipikaye.

Adapting a religion as behavior within the hive
Why do I do this? What am I doing? As an example, an event takes place in my presence or I witness something while I am with other people and there is this common reaction one can have as a group. Here I witness myself as part of a pack as I silently agree too 'group protocol' and adapt group behavior, a religion with the sole purpose to gain access too another network or group solely for self interest. The hilarious part being that I'm too brainwashed to be aware of it. The leader of the pack mostly is not but that's another story.

"Yes this Bobcat and deer living together is a great example, we should learn from them"

or 

"Yes I prefer spirituality over religion as well, we should all be more spiritual"

or 

" I agree italian cars seem to have more character, the japanese should learn how to bring more character into their designs"

And so on...

Pasword, routines and program execution
So If I'm with a group of philosophers the focus will be on philosophy. Different perspectives, philosophers etc. Enough stuff to talk about and to have different opinions about and enough common demeanors to experience myself as part of a group and feel safe. With designers the pith of the matter will be focussed around design. All individuals have their set of preferences regarding design and esthetics they all more or less share the same background/education/programming. 

Within these networks I communicate about the same stuff from the past in the same dialect so to speak. Like preachers do every sunday. Preaching for and within my own church. And so I can sit with musicians and the whole evening will be filled with information about cords, amplifiers, drumheads, cymbals and the longest guitar solo ever. Photographers will talk about optical abriviation, color correction lens flare, until your head pops. It's all dead words because I'm  only sharing. I'm not producing any substance other than words. Dead words. Here I see myself producing lines of code from the past coming from the pool of information regarding design coming from the design community as the religion of design. And it's all about keeping the relationships as energy going within groups in relation too others too others etc. Indeed programs within programs with an occasional software upgrade or downgrade lol. Being with the program isn't that a much used phrase in spy thrillers? Am I in or out!

The should loop 
We should all follow Jezus. We should all love or neighbor... Should is is a shot in thin air. 'Should' is a first class fucker. I should remind myself of that lol. I could go on and on about the small details and constructs That i'm parroting from my own history books, the teachers I had and my social surroundings as the influenza of reality. The viral code I have accepted and allowed to compose a set of definitions that became my preferences on esthetics and design in general which became part of my personality as my projections towards reality as a whole. I should make this better, that faster and satisfy you more.

Focussing on the flaws (existing as a permanent critic) 
So when and as I make picture presentations of 'design' that conforms to the general religion as propagated by the authority of the elite as the group of designers as 'good design' I will immediately have judgement towards that object and within that e-value it. In my case literally energize it as enthusiasm or 'love' or hate. But it's at it's root all based on criticizing everything instead of practical enjoyment of something that's form follows function and simply functions and thus assists and supports me in doing whatever it is I have to do with it. Within that perspective I can have a look at myself as a design which I am. 

within this I see realize and understand that I apply this construct and it's mechanism unto my reality in all I do. I am permanently 'judging', evaluating and calibrating myself within my world and reality in relation to my preprogrammed religions because I fear the unknown. That which is not understood which is me. I'am literally living and projecting my past all the time! Consequently nothing 'new' will step forward nor will I be able to change who I am or what I am.

How to stop living in the past if I'm all ready dead
A phrase I heard often. "Stop living in the past". Hilariously good advice to give each other. We 'should' do that all the time agree? Mean while I refuse to change and continue to spread my historic bullshit and even worse, I'm sharing it with with my child as well culminating into this reality that is world war 3 in full blast and we are not even aware it's going on. It's everywhere and these religious projections about a reality we do not understand ourselves lying to our children and child abuse of epic proportion. Living the past in the present. Is it really that simple? If this is form follows function then the purpose our basic design must be total destruction. Because the fuckness I find myself in as this world is nothing more then a reflection of who I am in the past.

How lost I am within and as the mind. It's cool to see how I am able trough writing this shit out show myself how I operate within these parts.

Ten four out.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to react to generalizations

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to judge people, objects, concepts as cool, not so cool, awful and awesome

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to not stop myself and instead participate within judging people, objects, concepts as cool, not so cool, awful and awesome

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to judge myself as a dog barking with the pack

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to not question myself when I go into a reaction towards reality where I judge people, objects, concepts as cool, not so cool, awful and awesome

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to compromise myself because I want to be part of a group making noise and manifesting myself solely for sake of manifesting myself in order to be seen like a product on a shelf fighting for attention on the scene within the scenery

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to make claims to what should be done or what I should be doing and not doing them making my words dead fish in the water not even causing a ripple in the ocean called reality

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to judge people, objects, concepts as cool, not so cool, awful and awesome in relation to laws and rules made by myself as part of the elite that define what is good and bad and wrong and right seeing realizing that I'm simply part of the polarity play out yin yanging myself trough space and time  

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to not see that the fundamental design of reality is me as polarity all the time in order to generate energy within and as these play outs judging everything within every frame I capture with my minds eye

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to become addicted to Identifying myself with the outside reality instead of realizing that I'm doing this out of fear of what I might find investigating my reality within

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to use the phrase "Stop living in the past". Seeing realizing I myself am not able to stand as an example of that point as a whole thus becoming part of the pool of bullshit that is turning this world into the whole of pity it is.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to project my historic bullshit as my own propaganda within and unto my relationships as these religious projections seeing realizing I'm thus becoming part of the problem instead of a solution that's best for all

http://desteni.org/
http://desteniiprocess.com/
http://eqafe.com/
http://destonians.com/

Day-023-E-value ate the money

I was looking at some of my experiences over the past week. A week that was filled with ridiculous deadlines, stress, irritation, tiredness, confusion, suppression and lunacy. All because the money has to flow to a specific point more than to another. Its kind of mathematical and I'm not talking about the whole planet although exactly the same thing is happening on a macroeconomic scale and because I am a participant I'm confronted with the 'value for money discussion' on a minute to minute bases.

I make money so I'm a cost point. One of many that causes stress. That's what money does and it's measured in space and time. I'm confronted with this principle within almost every decision I make during my day, in fact all people are. Even the ones that have no money are part of the 'deal'.

So like the ones before me I accept the shite as part of the package and although it has always bugged the fucking hell out of me I was somehow able to suppress the anger and frustration with lot's of distraction in the form of so called free time and entertainment. That pattern however is kind of changing as my Facebook page illustrates.

The past always visits me as I find myself in doubt during my projects. This week I got a vivid perspective of myself within and as the patterns I exist as 'personally and professionally'. I had a few volcanic moments and at one point. I snapped and allowed myself to become completely possessed by anger and frustration. It was not a pleasant experience. It disgusts me to find myself in that total possession and looking back I can see that trying to avoid the experience is one of the reasons I have lost or quit jobs in the past.

This week like so many before felt like being submerged in energy and I couldn't earth myself to remove the static. It's like I see myself go I know what will follow but I'm unable to change direction. It's almost like an addiction. No, it is an addiction it's a pattern *flag point. It's knowing only one way and being to scared to even think of another that's it. Today as I finally take this moment for myself to put one and two in perspective where I'm cleaning up my house, doing the laundry, walking the dog and I become aware of my body as this collection of tension is when I realize I'm actually the sum of my the parts that make up the equation.

This is my fucking value for money!

It would be extremely funny if it wasn't killing us. All this tension because we have bills to pay. Slowly cannibalizing myself as the days pas by. And it hit me today that it makes sense. What Value? From every purchase or every sum of money spent. Value for money is based not only on the minimum purchase price but also on the maximum efficiency and effectiveness of the purchase. The interesting question however should be, what is our 'valuepoint' of reference regarding value that is permanently changing according to our own preprogrammed behavior? In other words my unstoppable appetite to have more than others. I am part of the fucking feedback loop. I'm feeding the monster by my own participation. Ah it's genius we all faced the same question. Stand or deliver? We all deliver and fall collectively for the highest bidder which is our own mind.

There is no value and that's why it is what it is. Even if my life would be that of luxury and splendor there would be no value because value is created in the mind and that can't be done without creating debt. From my perceptive it explains the way I experience myself within my work. I do not dare to say professional career because what is a professional standard? It is part of the same value system that is part of the money system and if you have the whole of humanity including myself trying to buy more for less this is what you get. Over time no value was created we only created debt so I have no value only debt and it's so huge I can only pretend it does not exist and deny its existence because facing my responsibility within it is just to big and to shameful.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to become possessed by energy because I did not give myself clarity within the chaos surrounding my professional activities over the past week.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to panic instead of getting a clear perspective on the impossibilities of the work that had to be done within the given amount of time and take self responsibility within communicating these points clearly and effectively with all people involved.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to not place myself within strict boundaries regarding my priorities and to be realistic about what can be done and not be done and communicate that, taking into consideration that the reaction I get might not be a pleasant one seeing realizing that placing boundaries will always cause someone somewhere to hit the fence within that I see realize and understand that I'm not responsible for the way people deal with their emotions and that it's not my responsibility to have all the answers

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself for not seeing realizing and understanding that one of my tasks is to alway be clear within my communication because without clear communication on my part there can only be assumptions that become projections regarding me and the status of my work

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to within my work loose my professional stance



http://desteni.org/
http://desteniiprocess.com/
http://eqafe.com/
http://destonians.com/

The burning Daredevil

As a child, being one of the ‘dreamers’ in the classroom made me part of the small group of ‘different ones’. You know, the children that are mostly last in line when the soccer players are selected. Not that I liked playing soccer in the first place but you know what I mean.

As years past by I adapted this ‘being different’ as my personality. I mean it’s what was reflected back to me all the time so that’s kind of how I shaped my personality. My parents ‘lovingly’ reassured me that that I was ok and that there was ‘not much’ wrong with me. Which was great to hear but it didn’t change the course of events that followed and became ‘my life’.

I got into increasingly more trouble with my surroundings and started to move away from what was ‘socially’ accepted. I mean remove yourself from any given structure you are part of and you are on your own. That’s looking at it from my current perspective but at the time I was developing a personality which makes it a bit more complicated. So what became of that little boy I called me at the time?

Well there was a lot of frustration and anger because I didn’t feel accepted and there was my developing body that got stronger. I was a very ‘physical’ child, aware of what I could do with my body and I loved to experiment with it. So without being really aware of it I was always playing around with my ‘physical’ abilities and just looking how far I could push myself. At times this was pretty far compared to other children and sometimes I noticed that other kids would kind of be hypnotized by what I was doing. Grown ups started calling me a ‘daredevil’. I kind of thought it was a compliment although I didn’t understand the meaning of the word.

What’s a daredevil?

daredevil |ˈde(ə)rˌdevəl|
a reckless person who enjoys doing dangerous things.
adjective [ attrib. ] reckless and daring.

reckless |ˈrekləs|
Adjective (of a person or their actions) without thinking or caring about the consequences of an action
ORIGIN Old English reccelēas, from the Germanic base (meaning [care] ) of reck .

daring |ˈde(ə)ri ng |
(of a person or action) adventurous or audaciously bold : a daring crime.
• boldly unconventional: : a pretty girl in daring clothes.
adventurous courage : the zeal and daring of climbers.

ORIGIN Old English durran, of Germanic origin; related to Gothic gadaursan, from an Indo-European root shared by Greek tharsein and Sanskrit dhṛṣ- ‘be bold.’

Anger
By definition I was a reckless child and around that time I had a little bike I would drive around the neighborhood making engine noises as I drove a long with my tongue hanging out. This could be considered normal because that's what most boys do at that age. But whenever I was frustrated or angry I would find myself on my little bike driving around like a lunatic. Al my anger and frustration was pumped into my pedals and pulling the handlebars. Sometimes I would visualize pulling the whole bike into pieces. I was often that angry (energetically charged). A side effect of me doing this shit regularly every time I had to ‘release’ was that I got really fast on my little bike. Then BMX hit the scene back in the eighties and I was ‘hooked’. In school though, I was still this insecure inverted inside out kid with poor social skills that didn’t understand group dynamics and was looked upon as ‘the daredevil’.

Thus ‘I’ became Daredevil? my alter ego, my other self. And as time went by I completely accepted that persona in word and deed. Al my insecurity was replaced by bravura. Interesting that within the definition of a daredevil there is: ‘without thinking or caring about the consequences of an action’. My personality became a blown balloon full of lunacy, anti authority, non conformism, theater, drama etc. An insecure mister knowitall hiding behind larger than life stories. The outcome from my present perspective was predictable.

So my skill set was far from what’s preferable in a rigid corporate system you are supposed to embrace as you grow up or into. On top of that, coming from a social left wing family background money was a dirty word in the first place. Yes you always end up walking the path of your predecessors until that first self-honest question is answered. Who the fuck am ‘I’ really?

I despised (financial) successful people and money out of inferiority. Why? Because those people had all the characteristics of the kids that did good in school. Kids that where able to adapt into the system with great ease. Learning the tricks of the trade and do the trading. Now it makes a whole lot of sense to me that what I despise will not come to me. This is exactly what happened in my life. Complaining about the lack of ‘resources’ and at the same time spiting them. That’s not a recipe for success is it. You can be a daredevil in this system but make sure you are head of a bank or a corporation first.

Being that daredevil upside down in a tree is looking at myself through a veil of perceptions. Replacing that veil with a mirror would have reflected the inner demon of my self accepted ego that fucked me time after time. It trapped me into that perceived persona of the daredevil. As a result I have lived limitation al my life only because I accepted and allowed myself to be what was reflected instead of looking what was really there. Such stupidity. Now standing up from this and walking back the manifested consequences is the story unfolding. It’s the toughest most painful thing I ever did and at the same time the most rewarding and soothing because I’m bringing myself back to me.

Daredevilism is a set of skills applied to a certain set of physical challenges that have no real application other than entertainment and satisfaction of the ego of the daredevil in question. The Daredevil can only transform by altering the starting point and definitions regarding ‘him-self’ as the Daredevil. This can only be done with the support and reflection of people doing the same thing otherwise he would walk blinded into the next self created stunt or disaster.

There is a Daredevil in all of us. Investigate and you’l be amazed by what we create in this reality we call ourselves. My journey with Desteni so far made everything I did as a daredevil look pathetic. Seeing myself in self honesty took more courage then anything I ever did in my life. It's like being Evil Knievel stuck in his own burning tunnel burning to death.

My Daredevil ego goes wild when it get's no attention. Often I look away for a second which is enough to let it fuck me up completely. That’s where the real challenge of self-honesty begins for me. No rewards for my ego. Time after time again. Every day, every second and every breath until it’s done.

Let's start a business

Why I started my first business
Back in 1993 I was the 3th of my 6 years in Art School. I was a student leading a student life. Meaning that I had a rather optimistic and careless view on my future and did a lot of partying. I did jobs on the side for a signage company on a regular bases. I didn’t have a lot of money to spent but I would say that I was able to lead a rather careless life. If I really ran into financial problems my parents would help with the little assets they had and I could always drop by for dinner. So I had my own place, education, food, friends and off coarse my bike. I drove my bike everyday. I never made  long term plans for the future. I always thought that the future would turn out fine if I just kept going. What I was doing was far from what so called ‘normal’ people where doing. I was painting abstract paintings, building objects, studied graphic design and typography and I was reading a lot. Most of my reading had nothing to do with Art or Graphic Design. It was on Philosophy, psychology, religion, and science. One subject that was always on my mind was ‘the truth’. As long as I can remember this question bugged the hell out of me. And off coarse I felt rather special.

I think I knew
I was 21 years old and somehow I knew that it was impossible to answer this ‘truth’ question definitively. If the answer had to come from ‘a brain’ we would all be fucked. No matter how intelligent the being might be the answer could not be trusted. From all I read the only conclusion I could draw was that it was all energy, vibration, frequency. Plus-minus, ying-yang, light-dark, rich-poor, warm-cold etc. Looking around the only thing I saw was extreme polarity. I found Quantum mechanics one of the most intriguing subjects at the time. I read a lot of that stuff and was fascinated. It made ‘sense’ because it didn’t make sense and that was as close to reality as it got for me. Strangely enough it also touched a lot of subjects that where very well and scientifically described in the Vedic scriptures I was reading. These where however more than 5000 years old and that raised another book of questions. Are we 5000 years behind? And if so, what the fuck happened during that time? These questions kept me pretty occupied with myself most of the time.

More Money?
Now if money wouldn’t have been a problem this ‘truth’ thing would probably have become my life’s work as an artist. Most of the things I made in school all related back to my central question ‘truth’. At that time I really thought I would become an artist. Living the ‘free’ life. No office cubicles, no nine to five. I felt superior to everything middle-class or had authority. I would become more or less famous and my art would tell the story. Money wouldn’t be a problem. However as time went by ‘reality’ started to burst my bubble. I was paying the rent and it went up every year. I was paying taxes and they went up every year. I did my groceries and they became more expensive every year. In the mean time it seemed like everybody got richer around me and everything got more expensive. It was very upsetting and I realized that I probably missed out an important part of this reality and that was economics.

Taking the short cut
I didn’t have any money and didn’t have a clue about how it worked. So one day this job offer comes in. It meant working with a Mac computer from 08:00 in the morning till 17:30 in the afternoon, inside an office, 5 days a week. The strange thing was that all my ambition and principles kind of went out the window the moment I heard what they where willing to pay me. It was ridiculous. It was more than three times the amount of money I got in at that time. Even my teachers in art school weren’t making that kind of money. So they told me to just go for it. And from one moment to the next I was a 23 year old middle class person in an office cubicle. I became ‘them’. I got my drivers licence. Refurbished my apartment. Paid of my debts. Went on holidays etc. Yes, I got used to money.  It changed my view on life dramatically. After one year I started to become really depressed. I saw people having affairs on the work floor. Dipping responsibilities, going home early. More or less everybody around me was fucking the company so in fact we all fucked each other. It was disturbing and you couldn’t do a damn thing about it except leave. Which I didn’t do because of the money. I felt guilty and at the same time I justified my guild with having no choice. Then the whole plan changed as they planned to move my department from the east of holland to amsterdam in the west. There wasn’t one hair on my head thinking of moving to amsterdam. So I waited till they asked me what I wanted to do. I said that I would not join them and politely refused. The moment they asked me what my plans where I heard myself say I was going to start my own company. Strangely enough a good friend of mine cancelled his plans for a trip around the world and of we where to start our own design/advertising agency.

My banking experience
Now if you don’t have any money to start a business, what do you do? You work and save till you have enough to do so. You use your scarce time to find clients and you build a network right? No. We just made a plan. My friend who is a good writer made a hell of a story out of it. I made a nice book for the story to fit inn. That book was taken to a bank where a nice man with a nice suit looked into it. This man called us back and said that lending us about 150.000 Dutch guilders wouldn’t be a problem. So without any business experience and 150.000 in the bank these two young adults go into business? We didn’t have a clue but we got work inn and we did some rather nice projects. The other story is that after 3 years we where totally busted, our friendship was down the drain and we owed the bank a lot of money. It would have been better to get the money from the Russian around the corner. The Russian was a much better motivator to young adults.

My inner experience
After all this time I know that the one thing that fucked me up the most in doing business was a complete lack of self-honesty. The blind eye is a trap that traps a lot of self employed people. Identify yourself enough with what you do and think and it takes you over completely. I became a jabbering kind of advertising robot spewing out the lingo. After this ordeal I promised myself to never loan from banks ever again. Debt is the shackle that has chained reality. You and I are fucked within the system. Camouflaged with paper and computers and decentralized responsibility. You can’t touch them but they can touch you for sure. Who’s getting the best out of this deal? We are all participating in the biggest pyramid scheme ever and it’s called -economics- Yeah I know, you never see the truth when it’s standing right in front of you. Well this is where that truth finding mission ended for me. This game is the end game and it nears it’s saturation point. This is my wake up call to an equal money system. And now I must make some money, got to eat tomorrow.

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’

Killing my own darlings

25 01 2011

Where my money comes from?
I wasn’t consistent in my daily writings the past few weeks. Been working hard in the matrix because the money point needed attention big time. Lot's of fears and I was drifting all over the place. April 2010 I started working on a rather big project. For a company that does 24 million euros in revenues a year. I mainly work on corporate identity projects. These projects take time which means I don’t have to be in involved in cold acquisition every month. I wouldn’t survive the horror of having to do that. Anyway It’s a lot of work meaning a lot of hours. Doing one big project a year brings in about 10-15.000,- on top off the small stuff. This is just enough for me to survive and pay the morgage.

Moving inside the wolfpack
Make no mistake, this is the corporate world. I love my work but 'that world' is a different story. The corporate world is 'fuckup' beyond believe. I’m independent since 2006 but earning money in this system is no fairy-tale. I mostly deal with people on general management level. This means I as an outsider always step into a group in which the rules are already laid out. So before I can do my thing I have to know the rules of the pack I’m getting myself into.

The pack from the inside out 
Imagine people closely working together for more than eleven years. They have there own codes, lingo and group behaviour. I’m never sure if what I see is what I get. There are so many unwritten rules and secrets. So much psychology I’m not aware of and at the same time I’m responsible for fairly intensive periods of change within an organisation. In theory you could say it’s their own wish, they want to change and they need the expert advice. Getting this done is another story though. I’m dealing with people and confront them with change that wil affect their daily lives. These are the hard facts about working inside a pack. The pack is always more important then the individual. This relates back to the 'corporate identity', meaning that I will be confronted with different opinions, ego’s and resistance sooner or later.

The misconception of 'value'
A lot of corporate identity issues have to do with ‘perceived value or intrinsic value’. This means that a lot of what is communicated has nothing to do with measurable facts or 'real' value. Being in this process of confronting myself in self-honesty is the opposite of my daily work. It’s schizophrenic beyond words. Corporate communication is the business of professional liars and spin-doctors. All those companies claim human values and the whole spectrum of clichés that go with it. I’m on the inside observing from the war rooms of deception. The company I was working for employs 75 people that they hire out to large institutions in the Netherlands. Hospitals, schools, government and large companies. Big IT projects that need management. I soon found out that the management team knew exactly what they where inn for. In contrast to the CEO who was still completely in the dark

Being part of the illusion
After my first presentation about the strategy and proposed identity they where very impressed and they liked the strategy, visionary aspects and points off change I presented. I got my first uncensored feedback from people below the general management and the CEO. People that where in the field. The breathing living workforce that makes an organisation what it is. The physical reality of this brand. They addressed the pressure points spot on. That’s when I started to feel really uncomfortable. They asked exactly the same questions I asked the CEO 3 months earlier. He told me he was going to create an internal team of people that would take on the task of internalising the new strategies within the organisation. So to be confronted with the fact that this didn’t happen in the middle of a presentation in front of all employees had to be rather embarrassing for mister CEO. But what I observed blew my mind. He stepped forward and without hesitation and full of confidence started ranting about the future, sharing, personal targets etc. etc. He was completely in his own world as I watched in horror how 75 people slowly but steadily lost complete interest or got hypnotized by words without any substance.

Stuck in nothingness
I felt ashamed to be there. I felt like the people in the audience. Being fucked with a straight face. And there I am. Me, my, a company consultant next to this person who completely believes his own story. I can’t even blame him. I mean I’m just as mindfucked as he is, it’s just in a different place. But in that moment I somehow knew this was not going to work. It was not real and my strategy was built on real values that had to be in place otherwise this strategy would not work. Afterwards People on the board (asskissers to the CEO) spoke to me. I got compliments, taps on the back you know the drill. So I’m driving home in this snowblast not being able to really drive and my mind is everywhere. It’s not going to work. He does not understand or sees it. Doesn’t take himself serious enough and he’s leading the company not me. What can I do?

To do or not to do?
Nothing. There is absolutely nothing I can do. Making a stand would mean confronting this man. The outcome of telling men with ego’s the size of aircraft carriers the painful truth is shockingly simple. You get eliminated as a threat. Removed from their matrix and replaced by someone who doesn’t ask questions. I’m inside a part of the moneysystem generator. It’s so clear, shockingly clear. In these moments I really lose it. Horrible fear! Sickening vibes in my stomach. Not a clou of how I would be able to apply myself in this line of work in the future.

Not being directive enough
Third big project as an independent consultant and I more or less knew this one was not going to have an happy ending. I decided to just stick to it. I needed the money. So in that moment I kind of decided I would be prostituting myself. And If I was to be making money I would have to keep doing it. This would get to a point where money would meet my ethics and self-honesty and I would brake and loose it. To cut a long story short. Because of his complete lack of knowledge on the subject a lot of hours had to be added in what could have been a fairly straightforward process. So eventually I add up the hours over a two month period and this ads up to 227 billable hours. The CEO promised me he would straighten out the financial aspects with me before he went on a four week holiday with his family.

Consequences
I mailed him several times and a day before he would fly I got him on the telephone. He promised to have a proposal on my desk before he flew. He flew without the promised proposal. That’s where it cracked. So I wrote my first honest mail. In which I confronted him as a person that not stood to his own word. In other words I called him a liar. This is not done in business. I received a reply full off apologies and the next promise that he would have everything in order the moment he returned from his holiday. I was on him the same day he returned. Nothing. Fried air and bullshit-bingo excuses. In that moment I played out the only card I had wich was the very expensive corporate brochure that was going into production. Half of it was paid in advance so his MONEY was in there. I told him that legally I owned the creative and intellectual contents of that brochure (which is actually true but very hard and EXPENSIVE! to defend in court). So this worked. I also told him I wanted all the money he owed me at once. No more spread out payments or tax constructs. Pay the fucking money. I wrote a mail that was angry, personal and had all the raw facts of his behaviour in it. The money was transferred and I committed commercial suicide. That was yesterday. That’s the moneyfuck.

Tomorrow I will be Walking the streets again looking for another customer to screw. It sickens me. Tomorrow I’m going to apply for a job. Again!

It's in my DNA

25 02 2011

New client evokes 'energy'
So, let’s do this. Ok. Had a productive and enjoyable day (business wise). Which brings me to my daily words-thoughts and feelings. This morning I was invited to a strategic brainstorm regarding the biggest city in the east of holland called Enschede. Every big city makes claims and we had to come up with one for Enschede. For example Vegas used to claim “what happens in Vegas stays in vegas”. Easy to remember with a drip of humor so it sticks in ones mind. In advertising this trick is called “brain positioning” and there are a lot of strategies/ways to do this (great job in psychological warfare I have). But I have a few principles otherwise the schizophrenia in relation to my process would be unbearable. In this particular case it was rather fun and enjoyable.

Where I come from
In the early 20th century Enschede belonged to the biggest textile producing city’s in the world. And strange as it may sound it was also the biggest advertising capital in holland sharing this position wit Amsterdam. Amsterdam was about money and goods, Enschede was about Textile. It’s still called Textown by a lot of people. The whole region where I live was dependant on textile. Whole villages lived from the local textile factory that was present. In the village where I live (haaksbergen) you can still see this. The big houses that belonged to the daily factory management where closest to where the factory would be. The further from the factory, the smaller the houses. These houses are still called ‘labour houses’. They where build by the textile baron (dictator) same as the theater, the museum, the park. All textile money. Then you had the have not’s who didn’t belong to this structure. They where on there own and left to there own devices. Very poor mostly living of the land in huts you can hardly call homes. I talked to my grandmother about this wen she was still alive so it’s close to me. It’s really the world reduced to a village and a textile factory. Sounds familiar? America was build on exactly the same principle with railways connecting the city’s together. A bit like what the internet is doing right now. America is a European concept imported with the Europeans as was Apartheid in South Africa.

My birthplace and herritage
Everybody knew everybody in town so there was ‘social control’ as well. There would always be ears and eyes. George Orwell stuff really. So my father, just like his father was preprogrammed to end up behind a machine in a textile factory. Which off coarse happened. He was 14 years old wen he started working in a noisy, dusty plant. There where simply no other options. This is where the Desteni material comes inn. If you where born into a ‘management’ family you would live out your life according to the boundaries set for that group. If you where born in a ‘workers’ family etc. Now here is the strange thing. My grandfather was born as a ‘Lammers’ but the family couldn’t find any traces that went further back than that? That’s at least strange in a village where everybody knows everybody. I mean if you would fart in church your name would be known, halleluja.

The privilige of guild
A few years back wen my grandmother died we discovered that my great grandfather was a 'Jordaan' and not a 'Lammers'. He was a member of the big textile family that ruled over the little village. This man had a very illusive reputation and a female housekeeper that got pregnant. She was forced to marry a factory worker also called Derk (Lammers). This 'created' family got their own little door in the wall surrounding the factory. Completely bizarre. No other factory worker ever was given this privilege I mean this is really creepy. My father was never told by his own parents. They had to die first before the secret came out. The moment I got this news I wondered what this meant in relation to my family tree and DNA. I mean, how big can the contrast be. My bloodline runs back into two completely different families. One of them being the bourgeois the other poor factory workers. I also wonder if the above has anything to do with my father being able to eventually work his way up to become a print designer for The Jorzelino brand. This normally would have been impossible for the 'normal' folk.

Inventing Enschede
Eventually in the 60s asia became the centre for textile production in the world and the whole region where we lived went into a deep recession. Imagine how this must have been. The hole structure was build on textile and it collapsed completely. So it took everything and everybody with it. The whole region was forced to reinvent its self. So wen the session kicked of this morning, it was said that Enschede really needed transformation. This was worked into one of the first remarks I gave during this brainstorm. I said that this was a process that all ready started back in the sixties nothing shocking. So if there was one starting point for positioning this town it would be ‘Transformation’.

Information inside my body
All this family stuff was with me as we started to brainstorm at the communication agency this morning. I noticed that I was one of the few people that really new the region and it’s particulars. Most people present where not as well informed as I was on this subject so I was able to put a lot into the group and we really kicked ass this morning. I felt at ease with myself also because I limited my sleeping hours this week to a minimum. I stopped weed last week and having little sleep helps me to stay more or less relaxed during the day. I don’t get hyped up so much because I’m simply to tired. I was more focussed than I normally am. I was also more able to listen what was coming over the table from the other participants. It felt rather good and I was really trying hard to be professional and not let my ego or pride fuck things up. I loose my self very easily wen I get enthusiastic. Which is an emotion anyway thus not real. Anyway I made some very good contacts and made my money in the process. I did OK today and I was professional and productive which feels refreshingly good (which is an emotion thus not real). It was quite cool to be able to observe myself and at the same time be really productive and part of a group making money at the same time. I couldn’t help thinking about this strange outflow regarding my family though. I felt authority on the subject running trough my vanes (which is ego thus not real). But it helped me to stand in the matrix equal to the money I want as the Professional they hired to do a job.

A bit intimidated
There where a few moments I got carried away because of the dynamics of the group. I mean MT was there who is kind of the godfather of advertising in the east of holland and founder of the famous M agency. He and I had a very nice creative vibe going. It was the first cool professional day I had in years. But I was very aware of my emotions as I drove back home. Kept breathing and kept myself stable and calm reasonably well. I heart J’s voice next to my on a couple of occasions. Reminding me to shut up and listen unconditionally. Today was a learning experience in the physical and it was cool. Another point that keeps coming up is my yearning for a dog. I always had dogs and I wonder if it would be good for me to go find a pup. This house has only me in it. I think it needs more life. I really do.