I have been out of school for almost two years now but as May gets under way I still get an itch for summer break. There are numerous drivers, including the heat, the lives of my friends still in academia; even the aesthetic sensation of simply wearing shorts a t-shirt and flip-flops. However, there is one aspect of summer that trumps them all…

It’s the longer days! Once sunset creeps past seven o’clock everyday has a recreational feel to it. I can work until six and still climb camelback, leave at 6:45 and still make happy hour golf! I’m not eating until 8:30 or 9 at night; making me nostalgic for the days my dad would have to whistle me home for dinner with the sun still up and my afternoon adventures far from over.

I salute you, long days, as my favorite part of May and until it gets unbearably hot you make summers in the valley down right pleasant.

This is a big week for the Pursue the Passion Program.  Starting on Monday the first blogs from students at Gateway Early College High School started posting.  This marks an important change in the type and breadth of content we hope to offer on the PTP website and the audience for whom it’s created.

Working to promote a dialogue among students about their future is the most important aspect of our project.  The submissions we are receiving are valuable not because of the revolutionary questions but the sincerity with which they’re asked.  High school graduates understand that they are about to make a big step, however they have been faced with it intensely, for months even years, and the genuine importance of their questions have become diluted overtime in the absence of guidance or quality answers.

Our goal is to reaffirm in students the importance of addressing theses questions and create a forum for them to find answers.  The students posting on our site will have gone out and administered their own PTP interviews.  It is my challenge to anyone who reads this, that they help promote this dialogue online. 

Take the time to read a student submission and if you have answers, anecdotes’ or advice take the time to post a response.  At the very least let them know someone is reading and hears their concerns.  Questions that continue to go unanswered often cease to be asked.

Earlier this week our two other Pursue the Passion trip mates, Noah Pollock and Jay Whiting, flew in to help create some PTP media.  Both are now living in L.A. pursuing their music career.  This weekend will be one of their biggest shows, opening for Pigeon John at The Knitting Factory.This should be a fantastic opportunity for their group “Class Project” and speaks to the potential those in the industry see in their music.  Furthermore these types of opportunities do not present themselves without a tremendous amount of hard work and risk exhibited by the artists.

For many new artists the opportunity to play shows is accompanied by a required draw.  In the case that the artist can’t achieve the draw, they are responsible for the seats that went unsold.  This means that you often may not only be performing for free, but have to pay to for the chance to be heard. 

This is a profound representation of the type of sacrifices those who love something make in pursuit of a dream.  Many of us sacrifice the opportunity to do something that interests us because it doesn’t pay as much as another less personally rewarding option. 

The level of competition associated with the most desirable industries requires monetary sacrifice.  It is for these reasons that internships, part times jobs and volunteer opportunities are so important.  That little bit of experience can separate you from the pack and allow you to get your foot in the door, helping you land the dream job that makes you rich in more ways than one.

When you’re young take the experience over money.  It’s an investment in yourself and your future with greater dividend potential than any 401k.

A big part of the Pursue the Passion’s mission is to improve the quality of student’s lives, both as professionals and individuals.  While we have a multitude of theories and messages that we try to utilize for articulating our message there is still the question of how to facilitate actual change. 

It requires more than consciousness and simple acknowledgement of a goal or problem but an action that can be quantified, tested and benchmarked.  This is what I would consider the lifestyle change at the root of any self improvement process and, for me, the most important part.  I need something that I can practice on a daily basis that will help me stay motivated and see actual results.

These lifestyle changes can be as simple as changing what we eat, reading more or even self affirmations.  The power of these small changes is not in the act itself but rather their cumulative effect on our ability to maintain focus and effect our attitudes. After our weekend of “Leading You” training with Jobing I committed myself to making 1 lifestyle change that would, ideally, enhance my productivity and focus at work.I decided to switch my workouts from the late evening to before work.  It means getting up at 5:00, but it also gives me incentive to go to bed early, lets me wind down in the evenings and energizes me before heading into the office.  My point isn’t that anybody else should follow suit, only that it is something I’d been meaning to do for a long time and had put off with nothing but my own apathy as an excuse.  Every one of us has at least one thing that we know we should be doing, but have justified putting off until another day.  I recommend we all just get started, because after all tomorrow’s another day.

How often do you receive customer service on a level that compels you to tell people of your consumer fortune. I’m guessing not often enough… Well, last night I had such and experience and can’t wait to sing praises.

Last night Brett and I left the house at 6:30 to play a little pick up basketball. In our hurry to get to the courts we neglected to have dinner, and while our lack of sustenance proved no factor in our on court dominance it did bite at 10:00 o’clock when we left to go home. After urgent deliberation we decided to head to Joe’s NY Pizza at 7321 E. Shoeman Ln. in Old Town Scottsdale.

When we arrived I realized that, despite an assurance to Brett that I could pay for both of us, I had forgotten my wallet. On top of that I managed to lock my keys in the car during my moronic confusion. Luckily Brett had left his window open a crack and after we got my keys we headed in to place an order that we would have to return to pick up.

I don’t know if our apparent helplessness contributed but after looking at us and hearing our plan the manager, Lori, suggested we just take advantage of her offer for free slices. That’s right, derelict neglect of adult responsibility got us free pizza. Such is life for Pursue the Passion.

With complete objectivity I can say the pizza was phenomenal and we will be back many times. All because of this one small act of customer service, or in this case freeloader service.

This weekend myself and two other members of the Pursue the Passion tour will be attending Jobing’s leadership retreat, “Leading You”. I have been able to learn very little about the nature of the training from my coworkers who seem to have been sworn to secrecy. I think it’s pretty clear we’re being taken to Vegas to be taught how to count cards. We will then be sent out to earn the bulk of Jobing’s revenue at the table.

Just in case I’m wrong, I’ve been trying to imagine what leadership training would entail. It initially strikes me as counter intuitive that you can be taught to be a leader. Wouldn’t the nature of that role require you to blaze the trail yourself, choosing the direction and establishing the boundaries based on personal benchmarks and beliefs?

At the same time, on our trip those we interviewed repeatedly stressed the importance of good mentors. It helps to have someone you can look to for advice and example, not just learning the specifics of your job but the dynamics of a broader skill set that will ensure your success.

The conclusion I’ve come to going into my own leadership training is that there is value in teaching leadership skills. The practices and distinctions that allow you to set the standard as opposed to living the standard are part of a broader learned skill set. However there is clearly an innate capacity for leadership that some possess and some don’t. While you can teach individuals to lead, you cannot teach all individuals to lead.

Maybe the most important thing to realize is that each of us has a certain capacity for leadership and achieving that simply requires flawless execution of our role at that level. Not all of us want to, or can, be the star. Some of us are role players exhibiting eccentric strengths. Vitally important, but tilted towards a certain end of the spectrum. The hard part is identifying what those strengths are and playing up to those, rather than far more numerous weaknesses.

Last night my softball team completed a long streak seldom achieved in the annals of sports. It’s the type of result that cannot be realized without a strong team effort and consistency of play. Despite the pressure and palpable expectation, we put on our game faces, played one of our best games of the year and loss for the 15th time in a row. That’s right, we went 0-fer, the perfect season. Apparently the losers don’t get lucky sometimes.

I’ve been thinking about this all day. I’ve never been on a team so arguably competitive yet so proven to be terrible. My new theory is to blame our mental preparation. Halfway through the season we had become so accustomed to losing that we were preconditioned to fail. I watched our best players go the way of our worst and our bad players struggle to remember their mitts. There’s no way to experience defeat that consistently without at least subconscious participation in the destruction. We went to play without expectation and walked away essentially unaffected, tacitly approving of our defeat.

In the future we need to work on our mental prep, poised to take advantage of those points in the game where we can tip the scales and get the W. It’s important to visualize the win, act as if and think positive. We should also learn to hit.

By no means am I an economist.  I am not qualified to write this article.  That’s why this post is merely a paraphrase of an article I read last night in Forbes, written by Rich Karlgaard, which said we don’t need to worry about going into a recession for three reasons.

1)  This is an election year.  Therefore all we hear about in the media are the bad things that candidates will improve upon if elected.  The sub-prime mortgage crisis.  A receding economy.  Mr. Karlgaard made the point that there has been $150 billion already written off in the sub-prime mortgage mess.  Standing alone, this number makes jaws drop at coffee shops nationwide.  But this number, when taken into context, makes up about 1% of the $13.86 trillion that is the GDP of the United States .  In other words, it doesn’t hurt the economy as much as we might be led to believe. 

2)  The incompetence of business journalists.  Mr. Karlgaard told the truth about business journalists.  He said they are mostly failed sportswriters.  He went on to make a pathetic pitch about how Forbes writers are great, and then went on to say that it takes a lot to be a business journalist.  You need great communication skills.  The ability to ask CEO’s tough questions.  Great business sense.  An insatiable attitude towards research.  Most of those that possess these skills go into business themselves or get a job consulting.  Very few chose the low pay of a business journalist.  This, Karlgaard argues, thins the pool of talent, which lowers the quality of information reported. 

To support that claim, just on the way to work my carpooling accomplice informed me of how the New York Times, arguably the most respectable publication in the world, ran a front page story on an author who produced a stunning memoir about an impoverished upbringing.  A week later it was realized that the memoir turned out to be fiction after the author’s sister called in to say the stories were untrue, and that author was in fact from a suburb of Los Angeles .  

3)  Statistics. Tying the 70% disapproval rating of our President with the 70% of Americans who believe our economy is heading towards recession, Karlgaard said that it was too much of a coincidence to not take a look at.                

Are we going into a recession?  There are people much more qualified than I am to answer that question.  Even the experts aren’t certain.  But I thought I’d share these points with you because it defies what is now conventional thinking, serving as a reminder that there are always two sides to the coin.    

This week was my first spent entirely in the office and provided me with a much needed opportunity to work on the documentary.  Watching video of our trip for ten hours while intermittently trying to engage myself in real world conversations has left me red eyed, frazzled and unnecessarily brazen.  Our trip promoted a certain sensibility, characteristic of irreverence, spontaneity and indulgent personal analysis. 

One moment I’m inside the RV moving at 80 miles per hour, blitzing up the northwest coastline while eating month old baked goods, listening to Bob Marley and arguing with Noah about the fundamental nature and significance of work.  That’s when Brett taps me on the shoulder and tells me we’ve got a strategy meeting for the PTP Program.  I was about to interview the Director of Shoe Design at Jordan! 

Everyone else is in the present while I’m resurfacing from this fictional world that hardly seemed real while it was happening.  Let’s just say I’m slightly unpredictable at that point.  Brett wants to know who’s driving to lunch and I think we should hitch hike.

But, I have to say I love the creative process and the task of building something from the bottom up.  As I’m watching footage the themes are taking form in my mind and I’m allowed a chance to evaluate a significant time in my life on a level few are permitted.  I get to decide how to tell my own story…  Hopefully someone wants to hear it.

As I waded through hours of PTP video archives yesterday I came across a video Brett shot after our first month on tour.  The clip consists of Brett interviewing me about my impression of the first month and what impressed me most.  The primary issues I focused on were two I had since, nearly forgotten…

First I expressed a genuine sense of surprise and encouragement at people’s candor and need to talk.  I had very few expectations going into the trip.  A primary reason; I couldn’t envision the interview process.  My preconceptions were that many people would not want to speak with us and that those who did were unlikely to volunteer anything truly personal and therefore valuable.  This skepticism was put to bed on the first day and the month that followed was characterized by adventurous activity and conversation unlike any I had previously experienced.

The second idea I expressed was my surprise at how little I had previously asked questions.  I felt that every person, at some point, should travel for an extended period with a question they hope to answer.  The nature of the question is not important.  It could be trivial or profound.  The important part is that it gives you an excuse to speak with strangers’ everyday.  Once I became aware of peoples willingness to talk I began to feel irresponsible in my neglect to ask questions.  The knowledge and experience that a simple conversation can yield are incredible and yet we allow countless conversations to slip by un-had or executed insincerely. 

As we tramped across the country we kept attempting to explain the conflicting feeling that the world was much bigger than we envisioned, but smaller than we imagined.  What we were beginning to understand was that the size of our world and its potential for opportunity far exceeded our prior expectations.  But, our proximity to opportunity and the obstacles that stood in our way were much smaller than we imagined.  The best way to understand our world was to experience it with those we shared it with.