Don Kowalewski
Writer. Ad Sales and Marketing. Social Media Content Creator. Aeropress Coffee. Makes the best salsa in the world.
A Christmas Tree Saved is a Christmas Tree Earned
We started a new tradition last year. We went to a tree farm in northern Michigan and chopped down a tree and brought it home. Tied it to the roof of our van, we did. I didn’t have string, so I borrowed some “line” from my father-in-law. It was “rope” now that I look back.
We’ve always gotten a real tree. Usually we go to a tree lot in the suburbs of Detroit and pay way too much (ahem, $90 anyone)? But it’s all about the charm of letting the kids run around and hide in between the trees and stuff like that. Then we pay too much for a wreath, etc. So, we thought we’d save some money (half, actually) and hit a tree farm. The kids still had a blast and the only complaint from last year was that I walked, saw in hand, half a mile into the tree lot before I found the perfect tree and then I had to drag said tree a half mile to my car. Oops.
This year wasn’t much different. Maybe I only dragged this really big Douglas Fir about a quarter-mile. I was noticeably less out of breath. But this year, I didn’t have “rope.” I had brought a roll of my own twine.
Did you know not all twine is made equal?
Well, I mention I’ve always bought “real trees” to demonstrate I’ve tied many trees to the top of my vehicle over these past 16 years of marriage. Never had a problem. There’s not much to it. Three lines are all I’ve ever needed. One at the base. One at the top. One around the middle just for good measure.
But with inferior twine, well, it’s a different story.
About a 1/2-mile down the highway after leaving the tree farm, I heard a “whoosh” and looked in my rear-view mirror and saw a fat Christmas tree bouncing and rolling down the right lane of I-127. And behind that tree, dozens of car (turning into a hundred cars) all slamming on their breaks. Me? In the blink of an eye? I became that a-hole that backs up traffic for miles. I pulled over to the shoulder and while everyone was backed up, merging into the left hand lane to avoid my tree, I backed up a few hundred yards back to my tree, put my hazard lights on, then ran into the highway to retrieve my tree.
My bad luck was slightly muted by the fact there was a snow-plow guy who pulled over to help and he put on his flashers. Truth be told, this guy was too helpful and not at all afraid of the cars whizzing by at 60 or 70 m.p.h. just a few feet from my vehicle (with my family inside) and me climbing all over my car trying to get the tree back on. He even kept kinda stepping into the right lane of the highway. He was far too confident that everyone would be paying full attention and not texting and driving.
Me? I wanted to tie the tree on at the minimum level needed to drive, slowly, about a 1/2 mile up to this house/driveway just off the highway. He wanted to make knots worthy of Boy Scouts or sailors of the 1400s.
He and I tied 6 lines to it and then I insisted we “get off the road” and I bid him farewell. I proceeded to the driveway, as was my plan, and then used the rest of my entire roll of twine to secure the tree (which was now on my roof fat-side/bottom-side forward). But when a guy stops and is helping you and puts himself in harms way, I wasn’t about to ask him to turn the tree around.
Three lines is usually all I need. On this day, after the incident, I had about 17 ties going across and around the tree. Gulliver himself wasn’t as securely tied down.
And I made it home, but all I could think the entire way home was, “if this tree flies off my roof, can I be convicted of manslaughter?” And while I slowly drove 65 m.p.h. in the right lane, I kept seeing other people coming from tree farms and their trees were secure in a netting type bag.
The lesson here? Maybe it’s worth the $40 to just buy it in the neighborhood or maybe I need to learn to tie knots.
All I can say is this …the tree has earned it’s place in our living room.
Switching it Up
December 2nd. One month left in 2014. It’s the final push for whatever I said I was going to do this year. You?
My right hand has been going numb recently. I’m moving my computer mouse to my left hand. I’m going to scroll through Twitter and Facebook on my phone using my left hand or my left ring finger.
I’m going to start getting up at 5:30 a.m. every morning and (a) taking the dog for a 45-minute walk (weather permitting) or (b) do a half-hour of this Insanity Workout DVD collection I bought at a garage sale.
I’m going to make myself go to bed at 10:00 p.m. every night.
I’m going to blog every day about something.
And I’ll be getting a jump start on 2015. Too many people use this final month to say, “well, I’m going to just play out this year and then next year I’m really going to ______, and ______, and _____.”
But why not start, now? I’ve blogged about it before, but starting workouts now and eating more fiber now will make it much easier on January 5th (the day I predict most people will officially and earnestly start all the great things they have on their to-do list for 2015.
Not me. Not you. Let’s start, now! Call it a year-end push. Call it a 2015 jump-start. Call it habit-forming (ya know …they say a habit takes 30 days to create or destroy). Call it a 2015 sneak peak.
Oh, I like that. It’s a sneak peak at how awesome I’m going to be in 2015.
I’m going to be using my mouse with my left hand in 2015. Bam! Call me Mr. Awesome!
Can you top left-hand mouse-usage? Whatcha got?
Advertising Myself (Brand Me)
The picture says it all, so there’s no real reason to support it with a blog entry, right? Well, this is a blog, so …ya know. I’m gonna blog something.
The picture is my “why?”
Why do you waste time blogging, Don?
Why do you love Twitter so much, Don?
What good is all this extra writing doing for you? What’s this about you ghost-writing?
What if you spent the time you spend blogging and engaging on social media just working?
I guess I’ll answer your question with a question? Do you have hobbies? Do you golf? Do you scrapbook? Do you gamble or play fantasy football?
Without a creative outlet, personally, I’d be less than what I am. It’s a hobby. And I like to think, maybe someday, the stars will align and – boom, poof – I’ll have 10,000 readers and a publisher will all but beg me to write a book. Or that won’t happen, and I’ll just have a buncha blog entries that explained who I was and what led to who I am.
I am a radio advertising professional. I love radio as a medium. I am a writer. I am a ghost-writer. I am a blogger. I am a part time social media consultant. I am a content creator.
I enjoy it. And, something happened along the way – I learned to market myself. It’s made me a better version of the person I try to be in my day job.
It’s about passion. Want to know my passions? Want to know what excites me in the middle of the night and gets me out of bed and running to my iPad to jot down a “great idea for a blog entry?”
I want to know what does that for you.
Follow me at @donkowalewski.
What Can I Do Before the End of the Year?
Here we go. 60 days remain in 2014. What did you want to accomplish? Here’s what I have left to do before the end of the year.
- Reorganize my Twitter
- Reorganize/update my Yahoo! Contacts (and sync with my iPhone)
- Finish the script for the television pilot that my friend and I have a green light to pitch.
- Write my book (well, write any book)
- Lose 15 pounds (not easy with Thanksgiving coming up)
- Blog at least every other day
It’s nothing earth shattering, but I find as the resolutions and to-do lists pile up and as the “stuff not getting done” piles up, I feel like I’m failing and drowning.
But, it’s the home stretch. I want to look back at 2014 as a big year full of steps forward and progress towards my dreams.
Ya know how runners have a good pace and then at the end of the race they dig deep and run to near failure, pushing toward the finish line …this is that last 1/2 mile of the marathon (please don’t do the math and tell me that 26.2 miles, if it were a year, means each month is about 2 miles and the true home stretch is actually just the last two weeks).
I’ve just passed the last water station, my best 6 running songs just came on my iPod, and I’m picking up the pace. I’m going to finish strong.
Ready, set, go.
All American
Where did I go wrong? What could I have done better? I got this mug (pictured at the top) at Christmas from my 7-year-old daughter and I should be flattered, but instead … I’m troubled.
Did she walk right past the “#1 Dad” mug, and have to reach behind the “World’s Greatest Dad” mug to find this one? Did she at one point stand at the Secret Santa shop holding a “Superdad” and “All American Dad” mug in each hand and then decide, “well, he’s not exactly ‘super‘.”
I would’ve even been OK with “Dad of the Year” knowing I have to keep working hard and take nothing for granted.
What does “All American” even mean?
Or is it some sort of anti-immigration statement being made by this particular mug manufacturer or by my 7-year-old. And if so, who’s been letting my 7-year-old daughter watch Fox News?
And am I first team All-American or second team?
I know some of you might think I’m reading too much into it, but that’s what I do. I suppose I should just love it unconditionally as it came from a tiny 7-year-old heart that was so proud to give this to me because I love coffee and the mug says “Dad” on it. But coffee doesn’t taste as good when you know you’re not quite worthy of a “#1” or “Greatest.”
What now? What should I do now that I didn’t receive the proper praise and affection I wanted?
There’s a lesson here. And, yes, I know my 7-year-old wasn’t trying to send me a message. This wasn’t a performance review via a mug.
But what if it was?
It’s great to be recognized for your efforts and achievements. But sometimes you aren’t. And you have to be OK with that. If you are putting your heart and soul into something and nobody says, “thank you,” or, “golly gee we appreciate all your contributions to the team,” … we all need to learn to move on. And similarly, when we get a mug that says, “3rd Best Dad” or some review that doesn’t point out how great we are or how special we are, we need to learn from that. We can get better in those moments.
If you’re told you’re the “best” or the “greatest”, what then? Do you stop?
Again, my 7-year-old wasn’t firing a shot, but I can still use it as motivation. How can I ensure I’m “Best Dad Ever” or “#1 Dad” in the future? What if I spent more time playing board games or sitting and doing puzzles on Saturday morning instead of watching my son play Xbox while I click around on my iPad next to him? What if I tell my oldest daughter “I Love You” more than I currently do and what if instead of just saying, “I love you,” I mixed in a, “I love that you _______,” or, “I love you because you _______.”
Our next show-stopping performance doesn’t have to be to cross the Grand Canyon on a tight rope. It can be simple, little things. And just like it was a simple little thing that formed the Grand Canyon, one bucket of water at a time for thousands of years, so too will your life be as a “Greatest Dad Ever” or “Employee of the Year” or “Executive VP.”
Do something extra, today. Invent a new action today that will take a relationship or a project to a new level.
And have a cuppa coffee.
Follow me @donkowalewski on Twitter.
What Do You Love?
I blogged today. Just not here at Kaleidoscopic Raygun. Instead I blogged over at spunkybean, the pop-culture website I sorta co-founded and then sold for a bag of magic beans. I did one really great thing while running spunkybean – I found two of the most dedicated and talented writers I’ve ever met. Both reliable to a fault. And even when I flaked out and fell off the planet, they have been writing tirelessly and endlessly and that site is still going.
I used to write a ton about American Idol, and I wrote a lot about The Bachelor and The Bachelorette, and right now I’m writing a weekly column about Survivor.
I tell you that so you realize I’m still alive in Jeff Goins’s 21-Day Blogging Challenge. There were no rules on where one blogs. In fact, I’m kind of overachieving because I have multiple blogs.
Where is the life-lesson in this entry, you ask? It’s that you should pursue a passion or have a creative outlet to help keep your life in balance. For some, it’s golf. For some, it’s scrapbooking or photography. Whatever it is, we need something that makes us feel alive. I get sad when I see people having fun with a hobby and then quit, because dream-crushers make them feel less-than for having a hobby like photography or blogging. And sometimes these dream crushers are the same people who waste countless hours on things like fantasy football, golf, or great shows on HBO.
Nobody makes fun of someone who is into model trains? People don’t usually make fun of people who are 40 years old and play in a band.
For me? Blogging and writing is my garage band. It’s my golf league. And along the way I’ve picked up some clients who want me to write things for them. I’ve had the chance and been asked to speak to people. And from time to time someone comes up to me and says, “you’re really funny,” or, “you’re very inspiring,” and maybe that sounds egomaniacal, but I love that.
I blog about a TV show. I have fun doing it. Some people read it every now and then and like it. I guess that’s what shooting par must feel like.
Where’s your fairway? What are you shooting for? What do you daydream about when you’re not thinking about a deadline at work or how you’ll pay for your kids college? Me? I think about things it would be fun to write about and what might make someone think or smile.
Make someone smile. No …wait …make yourself smile. And that’ll make me smile.
Learning Something Every Day
Inspiration can strike at any time. Today it happened for me at the dry-cleaner just after 7:30 a.m. when I picked up my shirts and a suit.
My dry cleaner had a little newspaper sitting there by the cash register. At first I laughed. I thought to myself how foolish and what a waste of time it is for a company to publish a little newspaper.
But then a headline jumped out at me and the article that followed blew me away.
I wash my bed sheets weekly. Check. We wash towels in our house, it seems, daily because the standard practice of my three children are to just drop them on the floor after they’ve been used and by the time my wife or I find those towels, they sometimes already smell musty, so into the washer they go. Oh, and my one daughter has no concept of “my towel” and will use whichever towel she can reach.
But …the pillow? Should be washed weekly(ish)? I thought I was good replacing my pillow once a year, but according to the cleaning experts at my dry-cleaner and their intrepid reporters, I’m laying my head down nightly on a germ factory and dust mite cemetery.
Today begins my 21-Day Blogging Challenge with Jeff Goins. My goal is to take simple things and blog about them, and offer a lesson.
What did I learn today? Respect other’s voices. Hell …I’m a guy with a blog and was part of founding spunkybean, a website about TV shows. And I want people to read and marvel at my wit. This newspaper at my dry-cleaner is someone else’s fun/good idea. A co-worker telling me about their commute or their recent conversation with a client …there’s a reason they’re telling me and I should listen.
I’m going to do a better job of respecting others voices and their stories. I’m going seek opportunities to learn and grow in more moments in my life.
So today, I didn’t just learn I should wash my pillow more, but I should lower my defenses and open my eyes and ears more.
Will you do the same?
Follow me at @donkowalewski
Living Deliberately. Blogging Intentionally.
There’s this concept called “living deliberately.” It means not letting life just sorta happen to you, but instead, controlling everything that happens to you (that you can). Things like when you wake up, if you exercise, whether you enjoy your job and control your workday, or it controls you (your time, your mind, your sleep).
Do you hit the snooze bar? Then you’re not living deliberately. And I’m talking the figurative “snooze bar” on your life and dreams, projects at work, phone calls to friends, as well as the literal snooze bar and when you wake up. If you want to get up at 6am, get up at 6am. Don’t set your alarm for 5:40 and hit the snooze 2 or 3 times and then get a late start.
Imagine a life where you make deliberate, well-reasoned decisions on just about everything. Wake at 5:15am. Walk the dog and listen to something interesting for a half-hour. Shave. Shower. Floss. Make coffee.
For me? This also includes “writing.” I like myself better when I’m writing. Super blogger guy, Jeff Goins, understands what I mean. It’s why I’m tackling his “21-Day Blogging Challenge.” It starts on October 8th. I guess this blog is my jump-start.
But, Don, you say. I’m not a blogger. It makes no never mind. Blogging for me isn’t totally about my becoming a writer. It’s a brain dump. As Jeff Goins also points out in his entry “Why You Should Start a Blog (Even If You’re Not a Writer)”, by organizing my thoughts and forcing myself to coherently communicate them in writing, they go from some random thoughts inside me head to deliberate, clear ideas I can see and read on the page. Some ideas don’t seem so great once you put them in writing and that’s OK. Other ideas turn out to be better and take shape once you force yourself to express them in a way that someone else could understand.
I’ve blogged for a long time. I’m going to keep blogging. And I will accept this 21-day challenge and see how the thoughts look once they get out of my head and onto my blog.
Follow me at @donkowalewski
Twitter is Great
I talk about how much I love Twitter so much you’d think I own stock. I’ve convinced at least a half dozen people over the years to try it and they’ve almost all fallen in love with it. Not because they like Tweeting, but because you can use it to navigate any passion, hobby, or interest you have. You can use it to passively monitor the industry in which you work, or news in your community, or a hobby you just started.
So, this morning a super cool and motivated peer of mine at iHeartMedia had this idea to form a sales focused book club. For those of you in sales, you know the importance of reading books on sales to make sure you’re motivated and informed and that you keep re-inventing yourself. You know it helps to read books on self-improvement, or books on life balance and motivation. I’ve met very few sales people who don’t read books on sales, watch videos on sales, or attend workshops about selling and the sales process.
What does this at-work book club have to do with Twitter? Well, we picked a book called The Little Red Book of Selling by Jeffrey Gitomer. In it he suggests avoiding negativity and surrounding yourself with positive people and ideas and that is how I use Twitter. Think of it like this …you know you check your phone constantly. You look at Facebook. You send text messages. You check Facebook. You probably check Instagram. You check it in rush hour traffic, at the mall, waiting at stop lights, in line at the checkout, and probably sitting on your couch at night while the TV is on and your laptop is open next to you.
We’re addicted to our phones. Make that addiction count for something. Check twitter and follow things that make you smarter and motivate you, or that can give you an “a-ha moment” every now and then.
I told a guy who loved Fantasy Football to set-up his Twitter and follow everything he could find relating to the NFL, fantasy football tips, and football columnists and news sources he likes. He did. He’s a Twitter devotee. News and info come to him. He doesn’t have to go find it.
Another friend did this as it relates to TV shows and movies. Another friend did this as it relates to the automotive industry.
So, for my book club, I said, “start slow, but follow some gurus and authors you like,” and then I suggested some of the motivational type people and organizations listed below.
Here’s my initial list. You won’t be worse for starting with this list and growing from there.
https://twitter.com/ThisIsSethsBlog
https://twitter.com/TopSalesWorld
https://twitter.com/KeithRosen
https://twitter.com/lifehacker
https://twitter.com/BrendonBurchard
https://twitter.com/salesforce
https://twitter.com/SalesReadiness
Add to this list by leaving a comment. Try Twitter. Fall in love.
P.s. I’m the only male in this book club. So there’s that, too.
Where is the Starting Line?
I’m big on New Year’s Resolutions. In fact, I like resolutions so much, I invented mid-year resolutions that happen on July 1st. And last year, I even executed my first Fall Resolution which included my finding a new job and focus.
But why stop there? What about Weekly Resolutions? Or Daily Resolutions? Is there some magic to having a specific date and time where you’ll start or stop something?
Let’s say I want to start running again and my goal is to get to a point where I can “run” a 5k (as opposed to “briskly walking” a 5K due to my lung issues). Should I wait until October 1st? Or after Halloween? Or should I wait until Thanksgiving? And in the meantime, find the perfect couch-to-5K app that will track my progress and save to buy new shoes and some cool weather running gear? And map out some training routes and get a Garmin?
Or should I just start running? Run until I get winded and tired and then walk, and then try running again?
The answer is …start running. Learn better techniques and make it up as you go along. That’s what I did this morning.
How about blogging? Hey. Look what you’re reading? Guess what? I just decided to blog something. And did it.
How about blowing away your Q4 sales? How about dieting? How about forgiving a friend or relative for something? Or calling an old friend?
I was talking with my friend Nick this morning about a good closing line for a presentation I have coming up and he suggested this very thing. Don’t worry about the past. It’s past. Done. Can’t change it. And usually you can’t fix it. But you can decide, today, in this moment, to be better and do great things.
Here’s the starting line. Did you start? OK …here’s another starting line. Don’t worry if you missed it. Another starting line will be here in a second.
Start now.
Don Kowalewski 