You will meet success. And for most of us, you will meet an equal amount of failure.

Dealing with success can be challenging.

The inability to deal with failure can be crippling.

Handling success requires simple humility.

Overcoming failure requires a strong will and indomitable spirit.

Or in short. You get up. 

When you lose the will to pick yourself up and do it again you are done.

So boys, do what I’m doing today. Get up. Learn from the failure. Do better.

Get up. Get up. Get up!

It is nearly inconceivable to me that there is so much intellectual dishonesty in our national debate.

As a person who works with and loves words I am horrified by how they are used to obscure fact.  I am particularly vexed by the catchphrase ‘class warfare’.

Let’s be intellectually honest. Short of a revolution, the only side that wins in class warfare is the side that has, not the side that has not. It is equally true that our national wealth has shifted disproportionately to the top 2% of Americans. Not many people, but in their hands lie our national wealth.

Nothing wrong with that other than our system was predicated on a bell curve in which the proportion of extreme wealth is to correlate to proportionately to those living in extreme poverty. It does not. With over 30% of the country living on less than $30,000 annually, our balance is out of whack.

Today we are left with a disproportional few who have richly benefitted from a free enterprise system … and who in turn are asked to make a disproportionately large contribution to the greater good.

It’s not warfare. It’s not wealth redistribution. It’s simply the reality that our country can not  run a champagne budget on the backs of those with a beer wallet.

The simple math is this. An annual income of $1,000,000 taxed at 30% leaves the individual with $700,000. The annual income of $30,000 taxed at 20% leaves the person $24,000 to spend.  That’s a $294,000 swing on one person. The math is clear. To provide the desired social net in our country those with more will have to pay more. Who desires the safety net? I guess that is a question of ox and goring.

But I note that everyone in Congress claps for a strong military. There seems to be agreement that our national infrastructure,both physical and digital, needs to be restored.  We all agree that a well trained police force, fire department services, litter free public spaces, etc. all serve the common good. Many of us want their to be subsidized health services for those of lower incomes or higher age. These elements of a social safety net come at a significant price.

But is that the price of freedom? Of social justice? Or a nation that fosters equality of man and of opportunity? And in the absence of the net, what is the preferred lifestyle choice?  European ghettos? A system of feifdoms? Or simply the machine gun nested neighborhoods that protect those of affluence in cities throughout the world?

It is simply not true that the wealthy in America require fewer government services. The services required are simply different… as greater affluence affords greater access .. to the public roads, airways, protective services and the like.

Obama got one thing right last night. We are better as a country when we work together to solve a particular challenge.  No amount of jingoism changes the fact that our most fortunate citizens are our most valuable financial resource.  To protect our current way of life, the rich must do more. It may not seem fair, but who with an income of over $500,000 annually would trade places with the homeless, the unemployed, or even the typical American wage earner.

It’s not class warfare. It’s the American way of life. It should be defended at all costs. That is the same warfare that our founding fathers waged against the occupying British rulers. King George was wrong then. And those who argue as George did that the bounty of the new world was his to discharge at will are equally as wrong today.

Or so I think.

It’s a professional dilemma that frankly I have never fully worked out.

In my heart of hearts, boys, I believe that when you do what you love, and you do it well, money will follow.

The fact is, if you love house cleaning, and you do it well, it’s highly improbable that will turn into a pot of plenty.

So to an extent, you guys will have to choose a job or a profession that has a reasonable chance of providing opportunity for both love and for money.

You know how they say that money can’t buy you happiness. They neglect to mention that very few people without financial resource are happy either. Again, it’s a quagmire.

I know this. My most financially successful friends have created greater wealth because they love making money. That in an of itself becomes the source of the passion. So whether they are in the assisted living business or in the cement business, their satisfaction comes from managing a business successfully.

I know this. If you don’t put making money on the list of life/career objectives, the decisions you make will likely not lead you towards the cash.

Realistically, I just have to say that money matters. It never mattered enough to me to leave the advertising marketing world and move to sales where the dollars would have been larger but for me the personal reward smaller.

At 21 it’s easy to believe that you don’t need material things.  Certainly a large house, a new car every three years, a club membership and a boat won’t necessarily make you and your spouse happy. But having the opportunity to determine how much or how little you need only comes from pursuing a career where significant income opportunities are present.

Mom and I made the top 10%. But the reality is that only the folks in the top 1% can self-determine every day. And if you aren’t in the top 10% in America today, you are simply going to struggle to make ends meet on a daily basis.

My thought is this:

1. You can make a more than fair wage in second tier professions (architecture, advertising, etc) provided that you are entrepreneurial enough to run your own business; corporate enough to work your way through the bureaucracy in New York, San Francisco or Tokyo; and flexible enough to uproot yourself and your family when greater opportunity presents itself somewhere away from home.  You guys both know how tough that is to do. But it is a part of the trade off we make for love and for money.

2. You can direct your efforts to a field in which money is made beyond the C-Suite — medicine, law,  international business requiring significant travel and multi-linguistic skills. Some skills simply are valued more than others and fewer people are qualified for the position. Scarcity creates financial success. Thus, guy with 65 IQ’s making millions catching a football.

3. You can create wealth through the development of a better mousetrap … and then managing that mousetrap company effectively until you can find a larger partner to buy out your brilliance.

4. You can become a great salesperson. Regardless of the industry in this world if you can close a deal you can make money.

In any of the three areas you still be easily derailed. It’s a competitive world and those who risk rising above the mass are always a target for others attack.

My best advice to you is this.  

Focus on being great at something. Set a clear course. Be persistent. Never lose sight of the financial  reward — in essence, know your worth.  If money matters, make decisions that you can reasonably predict a better financial outcome.

And always bear in mind that if money and the pursuit of money isn’t making you happy, then lose that objective and turn to others where happiness is found. Just don’t lie to yourself and say that money doesn’t mean anything to you until you are confident that you would rather live off the land, collect road kill for dinner, and plan your vacations around the location of a Super 8 or Motel 6.

That might seem harsh. But for many of us making and multiplying money is simply a never ending challenge. In retrospect, I think my failure (so to speak) was chasing my personal passion to the exclusion of chasing opportunities where financial reward would have been greater.

Don’t settle for less. Have a plan to make more. Then adjust as you determine what you need versus what you thought you wanted to have.

Simple? Hardly.

Just a part of the greater plan.

Amongst the greatest wastes in life is a missed opportunity.

Particularly when you miss the opportunity because you predetermined in your own mind that you couldn’t accomplish the task. 

Banish fear boys. Quell your self doubts. Don’t let outside influences rob you of your ability to determine your own fate.

If something matters enough to you to consider it as an option, please don’t stop before you have fully explored the opportunity.

We only regret what we did not take the chance to do.

Robert, I am so sorry that I did not convey this to you more clearly before now. 

85 years old. 

In most every way a remarkable life.

The medical cause will be Cancer. But I think we can all agree that he died of a broken heart. 

I’m not going to judge his actions here. It’s too easy to say what he could of done or should have done when none of us know what we would have done in similar circumstance. We have the benefit of distance. He had the responsibility of protecting young men, of representing a University, of living up to the expectations that millions had of him.

I suspect that the good Lord will welcome Joe with open arms. I hope the love of his family surrounded him with peace.

God speed Coach. We will remember you for the good you did in this world and for the thousands of young men you sent into life better prepared to find success have benefitted from your teaching and grace.

Smart is a gift and if given the choice I would never trade appearance or possession for intelligence.  Very difficult to contribute in life without a good head on your shoulders and the ability to reason. 

But smart by itself is not a ticket to success.  Smart gives you the first 10 – 20 yards in the race. Smart makes it easier to overcome mistakes and to course correct when you can see that the desired outcome is lost.

But persistence trumps smart, trumps athletic, trumps imaginative.  Virtually nothing worth achieving is achieved at the beginning of a race. Don’t talk to me about 40 times. I’ve been behind most every race in my life.

But when I have sustained success it has been because I have refused to give in to my ego, refused to accept my quick thinking and instead buckled down for the long haul.

There are plenty of people who don’t like me. Most of those folks will acknowledge I’m bright. But what they rarely have understood is that I will stick in the game longer than most to accomplish what I set out to achieve. It’s not that I outsmart people. I wish I could and am sometimes given too much credit in that area.  The truth is that smart tends to cause us to take stupid shortcuts. Smart tends to work for fast short term outcomes instead of long term gratification.  Smart gets you to the dance. But persistence is what makes you the contest winner at the end of the night.

I love you boys both for a lot of reasons. No doubt your innate intelligence is part of why mom and I think you are so interesting to be around. I just implore you not to settle for being smarter than the average bear. Be smart with a purpose. Drive past your own intelligence and look for people who can challenge you to think differently.  And for Goodness sakes please embrace the fact that what you learned yesterday is something to be built upon or even discarded and rethought today and tomorrow.  Smart people … .and you both are … distrust their own intelligence. They continually push the intellectual envelope. They embrace finding out that they were wrong more than they revel in having been right.  Most of all, smart people go the distance. They persevere. They challenge their own comfort levels. And they don’t stepladder their intelligence over the backs of others simply to assuage their own ego.  

Thank God for your intelligence. Demonstrate it by not becoming self-satisfied, smug, or egotistical about what inherently was gifted to you by the lucky sperm pool.

A dad’s words. Love in a run-on sentence.

To be hard spirited. Or to be kind.

Especially in the company of men, kindness is often confused for weakness.

But it takes a strong man to turn your back on the popular choice, the easy choice, and instead choose to be kind to a less fortunate soul.

The need for social acceptance causes us all to do things that we regret in later years. I’m asking you to give up the momentary satisfaction of being the ‘in’ guy and instead make the choice that can give light to someone who rarely sees it.

Kindness beats popularity 100 times out of 100. It distinguishes you as being a person of character. Someone unwilling to bend your ethics. Someone who can always be counted on to say and do the right thing.

Don’t go for the easy laugh. Don’t go for the quick friend fix. Go for the good inside of you.

In the end, maybe a long end, but nonetheless in the end, your reward will be the respect of all who know you.

Nice never goes out of style.

No doubt ours is a family where emotion can run high. It’s the fuel that your grand dad passed on to us. It’s fantastic for sustaining our energy and our drive particularly when the sun isn’t shining. 

But the problem with emotion, boys, is that it is the worst decision making tool. It’s the fog that overcomes sound judgement.

There are a lot of long lessons that I needed to share with you both. But one short, simple truth is this. When making decisions, wait til the emotion has been drained from the discussion. If you have to sit on the decision for an extra day, week, month or year, do it.

Some will say that opportunities are lost on slow decision making. It’s true. Being able to process information quickly and to move forward rapidly absolutely can make or break you. But you can overcome a missed opportunity far quicker than a poor decision. 

The old saying ‘let cooler heads prevail’. I wish that for you. Keep cool. Stay true to the course of your true North star. Wait until you are certain that the direction you are taking is one that gives you the greatest probablity of finding happiness. Won’t always turn out as you planned, but you will arrive at your destination with a clear head able to adjust to whatever the situation dictates.

Love,

Dad

Unfortunately by the time you do your kids have grown up and somehow you missed the chance to impart the wisdom. So here it is boys. On the odd chance you ever find my blog. Or someone else chooses to share it with you. These are the musings of an older me. One that loved you always, largely imperfectly, but always with the best intent.

Lesson one: life gives you back what you invest in it.

The return on your investment in life, in love, in work, in exercise, in friendship, in community … will be in direct proportion to the effort you expend.

If your job isn’t going quite right … check the energy you are committing towards it. Things not working out with your girlfriend. Stare at yourself hard in the mirror and be honest about your own level of commitment. Want more, give more. Want less, do less, Confused, do more and somehow the confusion will lift.

Nobody tells you this in school. But you should have figured it out by reading the report card. What’s the first column of measurement? Attendance. Simply showing up earns you a passing grade. True in school, true in life.

From that point forward its all a question of investment. Time. Energy. Passion. The more aggressively you pursue, the greater the likelihood to earn accolades. Dog it, you get dogged.

I should have made this clear when you were little. But I wasn’t sure. I thought it was talent, or magic or happenstance or genetics or some other sublimely stupid excuse I made for myself every time the world didn’t work out my way.  And it is to an extent true that where we start out is a hinderance to where we end up.

But in the end, the final outcome is far more a reflection on your own personal investment than it is on social circumstance.

Your definition of success is wholly your own to choose. However you define it, I am certain you can only achieve it by giving yourself entirely to it.

Easier said then done boys. But you know that already.

This begins a series of insights into the state of men (and future men) in America. Some believe we are the uncomplicated sex. Loyal as a Labrador amongst the clan of men motivated by little other than hunting for sex, fame and personal fortune. In truth the portrait of today’s American male is a bit more difficult to paint.

Let’s begin with demographics.

According to 2010 US Census men account for 49.1% of total US Population. We are a country of 312,471,327 people. 153,566,497 of us are men. Women outnumber men by over 5.3 million people … making most guys dating excuses appear that much more pathetic.

There are only three states in which men strongly outnumber women: Alaska (52%/ 108.5 male/female ratio), North Dakota (51%/102.1 male/female ratio) and Wyoming (51%/104.1 male/female ratio). Tough sledding there boys, both literally and figuratively. In fact, if you want to find where the girls aren’t, just look on the national weather map in January and you will be able to find the most places where guys are simply hanging out with other guys: Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, South Dakota and Utah join the aforementioned three states each having a slightly higher male to female ratio. Only Hawaii bucks the cold weather trend.

Interestingly, from boys to young men in the US today … well ladies, we have you outnumbered.

Of the 61,960,544 kids in our country under the age of 20, boys outnumber girls 31,664,617 to 30,295,927. That is a 51.1% male majority.

Extend that to Men under the age of 34 and the population total tilts ever so slightly towards men (50.9%). 35, however, is where the crossover begins as women outnumber men by nearly 105,000 between the age of 35 – 39.

Within the key marketing demographic segments (A25 -54, A35 -54) there is largely parity between the sexes:

DEMOGRAPHIC TOTAL MALE FEMALE MALE FEMALE
0yo – 34 147,658,275 75,128,266 72,560,009 50.9% 49.1%
15yo – 34yo 85,727,731 43,463,649 42,264,082 50.7% 49.3%
25yo – 54 yo 128,604,937 63,905,727 64,699,210 49.7% 50.3%
35yo – 44yo 41,554,134 20,666,921 20,887,213 49.7% 50.3%
35yo – 54yo 87,048,657 43,035,350 44,013,307 49.4% 50.6%
55yo – 70yo 49,535,087 23,736,225 25,798,862 47.9% 52.1%

Time however is not the friend of America’s male population. From 60+, women become a significantly larger piece of the demographic puzzle.

There are 143,905,602 Americans 60+ years of age. Men represent only 43.8% of that age group. Of Adults 75+ men represent 39.1% of population. I found it particularly troubling to learn that there are only 523,953 men over the age of 90 in the United States today.

Or at least, there are only 523,953 guys who admit they are over ninety. The other 15,000,000 or so claim to be in their 50’s and between Rogaine, Cryogenics, Grecian Formula and that fabulous little blue pill who would know the difference?