19
February
2008
After numerous criticisms from my family about this blog, it looks like I am ending all new posts.
Greg, you are wrong here, Greg, you are wrong there.
Greg, I don’t understand what you wrote here.
Greg, you disappoint me, etc., etc., etc.
It does me no good to try to justify and/or explain who I am to those that do not have an open mind, especially my family members. I am who I am, take it or leave it. My point of view on life is 180 degrees from the norm. This makes me cold, or evil, or mean in many people’s eyes that don’t get it. I understand my family thinks they are losing me, just like when I was in the hospital with a brain tumor many years ago. Well, I lived then, and I will live on now. But I will not subject myself to this negativity and passive aggressive behavior. It does not serve me, it pains me and sucks me down.
Originally I started this blog to vent or to enlighten myself. And it was awesome how many others enjoy my posts and the dialogs we had. But my family doesn’t get me, and they are prowling this blog looking for the kill. Maybe if they type enough contradictory things I will forget who I am and become part of the herd again? And in a recent email to my wife from a family member, she was told that she was crazy or mentally ill. These are attacks on me, attacks on my wife who is my family. I will not stand for this crap. I suppose I should have made this blog anonymous and I wouldn’t have had this problem. But that seemed like hiding. I don’t expect an unenlightened person to agree with anything on this blog because it contradicts what we are told by society. I appreciate what my family is trying to do, in their eyes they are saving me or fixing me or whatever. But it is time for that to stop.
Thank you to all who contributed on this blog. I really enjoyed the times we had.
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Greg Hankerson 
Happiness, Enlightenment 
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29
January
2008
I would much rather have regrets about not doing what people said, than regretting not doing what my heart led me to and wondering what life had been like if I’d just been myself. - Brittany Renée
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Greg Hankerson Happiness, Relationships, Enlightenment 2 Comments »
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22
January
2008
One thing I tend to do is justify people’s actions. I can see why they did what they did. People are trained to do things as they grow up. I was trained to justify. For instance, if somebody commits a crime, I imagine how they got to the place that they are and build an understanding of it. A computer does what it does because it was programmed by somebody. People are programmed by people like parents, friends, teachers, the media, etc. So the man that beats his wife, well he saw daddy do that and is just imitating behavior. And I don’t see this as right or wrong, it’s just what is. It’s the cycle of life. Some call me crazy for thinking this way, but it serves me.
But my justifying behavior has caused some friction in my relationships. Somebody tells me what somebody did or said to them and how it hurts them. And I tend to justify what happened by saying that they’d done the same thing in another situation and how can you be upset when they’d done it too? Isn’t that hypocritical? Well yes, but it doesn’t help the situation to bring it up. Some people can handle that info, but most can’t. One reason is it makes them think I am siding with the other person they are feuding with, I am taking their side. I am not really being supportive in a critical situation either. Over time people will end up resenting me if I continue to do this.
So this is the beginning of a new rule for me. When somebody close to me is having a tough time with somebody else, the best thing I can do is listen and not judge. And to give them comfort and be there for them. When the moment is heated, just listen and give comfort. This is going to be difficult for me because I am used to doing this all the time. But I am committed to change, and it’ll happen.
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Greg Hankerson Happiness 4 Comments »
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27
November
2007
Progress is a nice word, but change is its motivator and change has enemies. - Robert F. Kennedy
I’ve made a lot of changes in my life over the past few years. And it seems I’ve upset a lot of people.
“What happened to the old you?”
“Remember you used to do this all the time?”
“I miss that”, they say.
Well there are a lot of things I used to do that I don’t do anymore. I’ve made many Life Changes. And what I must have is respect for the way I live my life, that is if you want to have a relationship with me.
I used to be the person that was trying to change everybody, or save them. Things that worked for me in my life, well those close to me needed to do that because I thought it would make them happier. Well I don’t do that anymore because I realized I cannot control people. They are far, far, far, far out of my control. I cannot tell people how to live their life. The only exception to that rule is if they ask for advice or if they are children.
So several people in my life are continuously telling me how to live my life. So I ask them nicely to stop doing that. They do it again. I tell them that they are not Respecting my wishes. If I want advice I will ask for it. But everytime I speak to them, it’s the same thing over and over.
“You should do this, you should do that.”
“The old you used to do this and that, remember?”
Yes I do remember. And the old me used to be an alcoholic. Should I go back to that? The old me used wet his diapers, should I go back to that? I have changed, and I continually change from day to day. That is my right as an American, as a human being. I have stopped telling you how to live your life, now please respect Me and do the same. I’m 36 now and I have people telling me not to be friends with certain people. Can’t I decide that? I am not 12 anymore. I can make adult decisions now, can you?
By not respecting my wishes, they are pushing me farther and farther away from them. It’s like in 6th grade. Would I want to hang around a bully that beats me up everyday? Well that is what it feels like emotionally everytime I am not respected. So I make a change in my life and choose to limit my relationship with them. And that is difficult, but it is progress.
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Greg Hankerson Happiness, Relationships, Enlightenment 9 Comments »
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20
November
2007
Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of. - Benjamin Franklin
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Greg Hankerson Happiness, Enlightenment 3 Comments »
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19
November
2007
Happiness is a way of traveling, not a destination. I have been so consumed with reaching my goals and checking off one more item off of my to do list that I have forgotten that the process is the reward. I have been finding myself in that place where I guess in some way I have been wishing my life away. I keep saying I will be so happy when I get my book published, I will be so happy when we build our dream home, or I will be so happy this or that. This list just goes on and on. I have realized what this does is limit my happiness. It limits when I can be happy. It is not that it’s not good to use emotional forecasting, ( the use of combining visualization of your goals and how you will feel). This combination is absolutely paramount in helping you achieve your dreams. This way of traveling is more of a reminder to be in the moment. I needed to remember that joy or happiness is found in loving what you do, not the outcome.
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Corey Happiness 3 Comments »
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13
November
2007
You may of heard the term “Thinking Outside The Box” before, maybe you haven’t. Well today that term is stuck in my head for some reason. Maybe it’s because I realized I’ve been stuck inside the box for a while and it’s been getting smaller. I know in the past I have gone on autopilot. I have tasks, I do them and the next day I repeat, rinse, repeat, rinse and repeat. What this means is my world has stopped growing because I am experiencing nothing new. So today I went for a walk to the shop and talked with some friends. I watched an old lady back into my friends car and dent the tailgate. Then to my surprise he said not to worry about it as he could fix it. I also bought tickets to the Endurocross for this weekend in Vegas. That is going to be some serious fun! All of this broke my routine of staying at home and working or playing games on the computer.
Now with my business I am struggling with making it gigantic. Right now money is tight. But I want to hire a team of writers for my websites. They cost money, but their writings will bring people to my sites which will in turn make lots of money. But it will take time. So do I have them work slowly so I don’t have to pay much? Or do I borrow money to pay a big team of them? This is risky for me. I know, well I believe it will take off and prosper over time. But do I believe in myself enough to take the leap? Well I have a writer from Muldova who is doing a great job. Starting Friday I will probably hire him fulltime and look for more people to write as I have 10,000 articles that need writing (yah that is a lot) and I am adding more everyday.
I think the traditional, safe thing to do is only spend what you have. Play it safe so you can retire and live a comfortable and secure life in your retirement home. Well, millionaires didn’t play it safe, they were aggressive and took risks. Most failed many times before finding the one thing that succeeded.
With my new website model, my goal is to have 1,000,000 articles written with over a billion webpages. In the past I’ve created websites that had over a million pages. But they were filled with junk and didn’t really offer the reader something of value. But now that’s changed. With a little luck, maybe it’ll be the new MySpace, who knows.
Below is a great puzzle that can get you thinking outside of the box. The goal is to connect all 9 dots with 4 straight lines without lifting your pen off the sheet of paper. See if you can solve it.
And the answer is here:
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Greg Hankerson Happiness, Enlightenment, Goals No Comments »
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1
November
2007
The past week has been horrifically bad, but from all bad seems to come more good, at least in my life. I had a death in the family followed by a funeral, a fire at family’s house, a near breakup from the wife, and a lawsuit filed. Wow, the apocolypse is here. Just need some hordes of locust! But with all of this stuff going on, my mind has been running beyond max capacity to make sense of it all and to just survive it. I can logically explain why the things happened, by I still feel this giant pain in my heart. My wife has been going through her own trials and tribulations so I didn’t really get the support I wanted. In fact, I got the opposite of what I’d call support. But I guess if my wife and I were on fire, my first reaction would be to put me out.
So she was dealing with her own living hell, and I had mine. Now when we talked about her problems, I’d try to make them seem smaller than they actually were because I tend to think more logically. I always see the issues different than my wife does. I explain how everybody has their own perspective because they were raised that way. They are entitled to act however they want. We get upset when they tell us how to act, so why should we want them to change? I also inevitably find the hypocrisy in the situation. You are mad because they did this, well remember when you did the same thing here? All of what I am doing makes the other person seem that I am justifying what happened, or that it’s ok. My wife is mad, or angry, or sad, and I am doing that? To an emotional person, this is throwing gas on the flames.
So I need to learn to control my logical side and just listen, and feel compassion for their plight. Not figure how they caused it and explain it to them. Listen, feel compassion and sympathy, say I am sorry that happened and leave it at that for now. Maybe ask if there is anything I can do to help. When the emotional rollercoaster stops, then I can ask if the other person would like some input on the situation and approach it delicately, like I am walking on thin ice. Because the wound is fresh and I don’t want to cause it to start bleeding again. But until then, button my lip.
This idea is still evolving in my head, but I know it will be one of my new Golden Rules to live by so to speak. And this is all harder to do when you too are on an emotional rollercoaster like I just was.
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Greg Hankerson Happiness, Relationships, Enlightenment No Comments »
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23
October
2007
So I saw this infomercial… Sounds like a funny start to a post huh? Well, this infomercial said all the right things to me. I’d been pretty lazy lately and I wanted to get into the best shape of my life. I am pretty educated about fitness and this infomercial spoke to me in a big way. So I ordered the program off of Ebay for $115. I also went out and bought a yoga mat, a yoga block, some free weights, and a pull up bar. I already had the heart rate monitor. So that was all I needed. The P90X program arrived a few days later. I knew from the ad that this was a very tough workout, not for the average person. It includes around 15 workouts on DVD, most around an hour long. The program centers around muscle confusion. Basically when you workout, after a week or two of the same workout, your muscles plateau or get used to it and growth slows greatly. This workout varies everyday so that never happens. You rotate through 6 completely different workouts, then take 1 rest day for 3 weeks repeated. Then you take a rest week with lower impact workouts so the muscles can get stronger. Then you repeat that 1 month sequence, but with different workouts than you did before. So this way you muscles never had a chance to get used to what you are doing and growth is constant. And there are 3 different plans. You can do Classic which will increase size and strength, or Lean which will lean you out and increase strength, or Cardio which is the Classic with some extra Cardio workouts thrown in so you do 2 - 3 workouts per day on some days. The program also includes an eating plan which is toutted as being just as important.
I’d been pretty sedintary lately so I decided to start with the 2 intro workouts, the UML and Cardio. Both kicked my butt. I hadn’t sweat like that in a long time, especially the Cardio one! An hour of intervals is hard as hell. So I did those workouts a couple times a week to get in better shape for the real program. Then I started the program after a few weeks more of laziness. The Chest and Back DVD was day one. I think I did 300 pushups and 150 pullups. It was an hour long and I was toast afterwards. Had my protein shake to revive and the next day I could barely move lol! My upper body was hurting to the touch. Boy this program works the muscles! Who needs a gym membership to workout? So I gave myself a day of rest, could barely sleep that night because I was so sore. Then went on to workout #2, Plyometrics which is jump training. When was the last time you jumped for an hour? Well it was Tuesday for me. They call this the “mother of all workouts”. And it pushed my heart to places it hadn’t been in a long time. Then it was time for Yoga which was 90 minutes long. Sounded easy, but oh my god, this killed me! I mean that in a good way. I stretched and got into impossible poses for sooo long. Some of it I couldn’t do the 1st time around. But I think Yoga was harder on me then Plyo. Next was Legs and Back, then Kenpo Karate, then a break for a day! I was supposed to do an Ab Ripper routine every other day but I was so exhausted I didn’t try. The second week I was really exhausted all the time. Slept like a baby though. In fact I went from sleeping 6-7 hours a day to 8-10 and could go to 12 if I let myself. Why was I so tired all the time? Well my body is going through Boot Camp from hell that’s why! Today is day 6 of week 3. I’ve taken about 5 extra days of needed rest, but I must say my body has changed. I’ve cut a ton of fat off my mid section and more. My arms and chest are way more sculpted, legs too. I would say I’ve seen more results in 3 weeks then I’ve seen in 6 months at the gym.
This is by far, the hardest exercising I have ever done. This program is not for the average person. I can barely do it myself, but I started in better than average shape. It’s for the person who already works out for 3 hours a week and wants to take it to a whole new level. I imagine many people have bought this that don’t workout. I mean who doesn’t want to look like the people in the commercial? But there is no way they could survive this. Well I suppose anything is possible. I know by the end of this program I will have an entirely different body, one I’ve always dreamed of. And I’ll have the coveted 6 pack abs. But it’s going to take some serious, serious dedication on my part. And to think I bought this off an infomercial!
Has anybody else tried this program? I am interested to hear your results and comments.
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Greg Hankerson Happiness, Enlightenment 1 Comment »
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20
September
2007
The “key” is not to be thankful in some things, but rather, to be thankful in all things. Receiving all things with thankfulness means you do not set conditions on experiences in order to be thankful. - T.T. Braun
This was a difficult thing for me to learn. And when I am not thankful of something, I ask myself, what is the lesson in what just happened? And it is always there if I look hard enough. And soon after I learn from the experience and am thankful, something new punches me in the face. Isn’t life awesome?
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Greg Hankerson Happiness, Enlightenment 4 Comments »
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