A Little Creative Spirit

"The opposite of war isn't peace. It's creation."
-Mark, from the musical Rent

We all have a little creative spirit in us. Whether you consciously or unknowingly tap it, it's there. The hard part is learning how to foster it. How to cultivate it. How to nurture it and watch it grow. And because it's hard is what makes it so worthwhile.

Of one thing I am convinced - you will never accomplish anything noteworthy unless you tap into this creativity and listen to the voice that speaks to you and you alone. This creativity can manifest itself in countless forms - literally countless.

• A campaign slogan
• The Post-It Note
• A marketing plan
• The light bulb
• A stand-up comedian
• A one-liner you create on the spot
• The cotton gin
• A new filing system for purchase orders
  
• The comb-over (I mean really, who thought of that?)
• A dick in a box
  
• A simple sentence, with all its commas, prepositional phrases and direct objects
  
• A dance routine
• Mathematical equations - bringing to mind the concept of creativity within a set of rules
  
• A different way of saying something that's been said a thousand times before
  

Clear your mind of the useless mental chatter. The creativity will flow through you if you can do your best to stop unconscious thought. It sounds hard because it is. You must learn to think literally of nothing, or at least of nothing besides what you're creating (and even then, limit the number of thoughts).

When I write, I let the pencil guide my hand. I'll begin a scene and have a general idea of where it's going to end up, but the details along the way are decided by the characters, not me. I've had a scene change its course entirely because of one hand motion from a minor character. I've had a good character turn out to be evil because of something she said. And I've had one minor character take on a leading role because I discovered, during a battle scene, that he was in love with the main female protagonist.

Messed up, I know. But each twist and turn happened when I let the pencil in my hand move of its own free will; when I started the idea and ran with whatever popped into this ol' brain of mine. Only because I was able to clear it and focus on nothing but my writing. On nothing but what I wanted to create.

The greatest minds are the ones with original thought. But originality requires creativity. And creativity represents part of the essence of what defines us as human.

Different Paths

"There are many paths to enlightenment. Be sure to take one with a heart."
-Lao Tzu, Chinese philosopher, author of the Tao Te Ching, founder of Taoism

This past weekend I made a big decision (please note I will not tell you what it was - get over it). I made a phone call, did the deed and hung up. That was supposed to be it. I was supposed to be able to walk away from what I did with no cause for alarm. But for the next two hours, my stomach wouldn't stop twisting itself into knots. I was helping a friend of mine assemble a futon and I couldn't concentrate during the simple act of screwing in a bolt, I was in such a daze. Something in my gut was telling me that I did something wrong, that this was something I would lose sleep over, that what I did was not the way things were actually supposed to be. For two hours I let this gut-wrenching continue until I decided to do something about it. I called back and undid the deed. I then proceeded to sleep like a baby.

For some reason, this brings to the forefront of my mind the concept of fate vs. free will. Which line of thinking is the truer?

• Are we predestined at the moment of our birth with no way to alter our course?
• Do the decisions we make along life's road alter our destiny, with different paths leading to different end-results based on our actions?
• Or is there no such thing as predetermined results? Maybe free will, coincidence and luck govern our lives, all actions and reactions based solely on chance.

It's an age-old argument, and one I doubt this blog post will settle.

Why did I get that gut-wrenching feeling that I did something wrong, making me call a second time? I've said this before, but I'm a guy who goes with his gut. When faced with major life-altering decisions, many people make pros and cons lists, debating the benefits and drawbacks of one course of action over another. That's all well and good for the analytical sort, of which I tend not to be. If my gut tells me I should do something, I do it - the same goes for the negative form of that statement. This past weekend, my instincts were screaming at me that I had messed up. So I listened.

I'm a believer of the second above bullet point, myself. I believe there is such a thing as fate, although not necessarily holding to any religious, dogmatic perception of predestination. However, I think you can change your fate when life-altering turning points are encountered. Think of it as a path through a forest. You start off on one singular path, but along the way many paths branch off of that singular one, and even more off of those. The small, everyday decisions don't necessarily turn you down another way, but the big ones can change your course as surely as you were born: what college you attend, what jobs you take, how you treat your body, what friends you associate with, who you date, who you marry and so on and so forth.

The gut-wrenching feeling I got after I made that first phone call was an indicator to me that I should not have done what I did. That I pissed off the cosmos and altered my fate, but not for the better. Hence, the second phone call.

I am meant for something, just as you are. Maybe I'm fulfilling that "destiny" as I write this blog post, or as I drive to work every day, or as I talk to my girlfriend at night. Maybe I'm just ambling along toward it, not having fulfilled my full purpose. Regardless, I'm going to listen to my gut/heart/instincts - whatever you want to call it - and trust them to guide me along my journey.

And during the journey, I must continue telling myself to "be present."

Why So Serious?

"Get stuck in the never-ending drama (worrying about what irrelevant people think) and you'll never get anything done."
-Seth Godin, author, marketing expert

We all need to lighten up. We take ourselves way too seriously for our own good. Half the things we freak out about don't mean shit in the long run. So it begs the question...why so serious?

I read a blog post by Seth Godin the other day that talked about high school, explaining that the "winners" (which I took to mean the popular kids) were the ones who didn't take high school too seriously. Now some might argue that the popular kids weren't the winners - the whole idea of how the nerd in high school will one day be the football captain's boss in the work world - but I disagree to an extent.

During my tenure in high school, I found myself somewhere in the middle of the nerd and the popular kid. I had one large group of friends (my posse) plus smaller pockets of friends scattered across the social spectrum - from the nerds and bandos in the AP classes to the jocks and punk rock princesses in the general - so I feel I had a pretty wide range of social interaction to give me a fair vantage point. Thus, I will conclude that the popular kids were the winners, not the nerds who buried themselves in books and got a 4.2 GPA. Why? Because the popular kids successfully lived in the moment, at least moreso in comparison to the bookworms. The popular kids, the winners, made the memories on which they can look back fondly.

A microcosm of this theory: One night I was nose deep in some 800-page, hard-bound book studying for a test in God knows what class. I got a phone call from four of my closest friends saying they were going to drive around town playing strip padiddle and wanted me to come. I respectfully declined their tempting offer, choosing a pedantic night over their joy-riding. Looking back, you know what I remember about that test? Nothing. Not the class, not the grade, not the teacher. Not even the night of studying. What could I have remembered from that night? Dave, Katie, Jacquie and Shannon half-naked in a minivan driving around North Olmsted for no other purpose than to prove to ourselves that we were alive...yep, not sure I would have forgotten that. To this day I can still tell you who was in what car seat when they pulled up to my house to coerce me into joining. I remember who was more naked than the others.

They were the winners that night. Not me.

Now I'm not saying "Don't ever study. Go out and have fun every chance you get." There just comes a time where you should say, as I often tell my students, "Fuck it." Recognize what matters in the long run.

If you find yourself overanalyzing everything, take a step back. If you find yourself a little too OCD for even the most catatonic schizophrenic, chill out and go sit in your favorite chair.

But the next time four of your best friends pull up in a minivan half naked and laughing hysterically, think about what you'll remember five years down the road...and get in the damn car!

My Mentor: Experience

"We must all fear evil men. But there is one evil that we must fear most...and that is, the indifference of good men."
-Priest, Boondock Saints

Does everyone suffer from overpowering fits of apathy, or is it just me? There are times in my life, albeit few and far between, where I just feel...well...nothing. I don't give a shit about anything. I had about a three-day spree of that pretty recently. I didn't want to write. I didn't want to go out. When I did go out, I didn't want to talk to anybody. I didn't want to listen to music. I didn't want to learn anything. I saw the negative in absolutely everything. For the first time in years, I was actually bored. And I never get bored.

I always preach about appreciating the small things in life. So when I don't practice what I preach, when I don't realize the very things I write about in this blog and talk about during my daily life, I become a hypocrite. And hypocrisy is one of the worst sorts of crimes.

But right after I came out of this atypical fit of apathy, a strange thing happened. I got a Facebook friend request from someone I met this past winter. When I went to check out her profile (I always enjoy reading people's quotes) I found a quote that summarized the exact reason that helped me snap out of it. Odd timing, but fateful maybe? Please excuse the cliche feel that is about to overcome you:

"The grand essentialls of happiness are: something to do, something to love, and something to hope for."
-Allan K. Chalmers

The cynic in me can find many things wrong in this quote and can pick it apart, demonstrating why it is invariably false. But the idealist in me accepts it wholeheartedly. And at the moment I think I'm an idealist...for now, anyway... but I'm a happy cynic when I am one (NOTE: please ignore the contradiction inherent in that statement).

What helped me snap out of my apathetic state was that I came to realize what it is we all must fight during our daily act of living - we must combat boredom. Above all else, we must avoid being bored at all costs. Find a way to stay active, to stay mentally fresh. This is not a new concept by any means. In fact, when I came to my realization regarding apathy and boredom, I looked up the concept and found hundreds of quotes on the topic:

"The life of the creative man is lead, directed and controlled by boredom. Avoiding boredom is one of our most important purposes."
-Saul Steinberg, cartoonist for The New Yorker

"Since boredom advances and boredom is the root of all evil, no wonder, then, that the world goes backwards, that evil spreads. This can be traced back to the very beginning of the world. The gods were bored; therefore they created human beings."
-Soren Kierkegaard, philosopher

"Yet it is in our idleness, in our dreams, that the submerged truth sometimes comes to the top."
-Virginia Woolf, novelist

And so in this last quote we have the reason for the inducement of my apathetic state - I needed to come to this conclusion on my own...the conclusion that boredom is my enemy. Something to be combated. Something to avoid. Something to stomp the life out of lest it permeate all aspects of your life.

I have something to do. I have something to love. And I have something to hope for.

Your best teacher, your best mentor, your best coach, is your own experience.

Before, After and Thank You

"It hurts up to a point and then it doesn't get any worse."
-Ann Trason



Notice the hat at the end there. I ran the entire 26.2 miles with that horseshoe haircut, so I wasn't showing it off a second longer than I had to after the race! You probably can't tell too much of a difference between the before and after besides the hair, but I was absolutely exhausted after the race.

The first 13 miles went swimmingly - aside from the bowel movements at mile 5 :) - then between 13 and 18 I was just trying to keep my mile time under 10 minutes. Once I hit mile 22 I felt like death was coming for me....no, not really, but I was hurting. I was essentially waddling at mile 24, no lies. Then just before mile 25 I got a burst of motivation (not energy - motivation), and took off, running an 8.30 pace for about the last mile and a half. My time ended up being 4.20, while my goal was 3.40. But after the race I didn't give a damn what my time was - I was just glad I had finished!

The ending was incredibly inspirational - running about a quarter of a mile with people cheering you on from all sides (even if you did have a bad haircut). The journey to the end was just as inspirational as the finish, though, with more than 30 people donating to autism research, raising a total of $1,074.82. Our own group within the Organization for Autism Research raised more than $10,000, the best out of any OAR group in the marathon. Woot!

Thank you to everyone who donated, and everyone who offered moral support throughout my training and fundraising. It was very neat to see the outpouring of support via Twitter, Facebook, phone calls, text messaging, and at the marathon, itself. People offered advice when they had no vested interest in my marathon, whatsoever, and for that I thank them.

But most of all, a big thanks to my sister Jessie. While she initially tried to dissuade me from doing the full marathon, she and my dad were the initial catalysts that got me into training and helped motivate me to keep putting one foot in front of the other. If she wouldn't have formed our OAR group and essentially ordered me to come to the first meeting, I probably never would have helped raise more than $10,000 for autism research, nor run a full marathon. So thanks sis!

And once again, a big thank you to everyone who helped me along the way. Without your support, there never would have been a young, dumb 22-year-old running his first race longer than a 5K with a horseshoe haircut.

Marathon Training and Hairstyles

"Life is an endless struggle full of frustrations and challenges, but eventually you find a hair stylist you like."
-Anonymous, and definitely more for women...but that's OK



The smallest donation helps. As little as $5 goes a long way toward helping further the cause of autism research, helping scientists prescribe better treatments and giving parents more resources with which to learn about their child's syndrome as well as how to cope with and manage it.

Visit my donation page here to donate or click on the widget at the top right of this screen. And just for review, here are the categories of hair styles:

Up to 20% - comb over
Up to 24% - Nick Carter
Up to 28% - mohawk
Up to 35% - cowboy hat
Over 35% - horseshoe, just like Papa Hirz featured in the above video

Follow me on Twitter @JHirz and stay tuned for more updates and a couple more videos for your viewing pleasure. Thank you for your support.

$2100 In 21 Days

"Impossible is nothing."
- Muhammad Ali

Can it be done? You have to decide...



I am raising money for the Organization for Autism Research (OAR) by running the Cleveland Marathon on May 17. Recent statistics tell us that autism strikes 1 in 150 children born these days. Four years ago it was 1 in 166. Fifteen years ago it was 1 in 500. Twenty-four years ago it was 1 in 5,000. The situation is worsening, which is why research needs to match the pace at which this brain disorder's diagnoses are increasing. We need your help - and that's no lie.

OAR is an organization that allows runners to help their cause by obtaining friends' and family members' financial support through online donations. You can see mine at www.firstgiving.com/jeffhirz (or click on the widget in the right sidebar).

Things to watch out for on this blog in the coming week(s):

• An update on how I will cut my hair for race day based on how much money is raised
• An update on calling out Twitter celebrities to match the amount of money raised at the end (a long shot, but it can't hurt the cause - only embarrass me, which I can handle)
• Weekly updates on my "training" and how well it's going...similar to what you just watched

Follow me on Twitter @JHirz for more updates as the weeks progress leading up to the Cleveland Marathon.