Timothy Leary was probably a kook – but we probably won’t know for sure until history plays itself out over the next several hundred years. However, I want to point out one of his ideas that I thought was interesting.

Are we living at “the end of time”? I think we all sort of believe that we are living towards the end of human existence. We have it, somewhere in the back of our minds, that we’re living in the last chapter of the world. We’re all kind of waiting for Jesus Christ to come back or World War III to blow us all away. And in that sense, it almost feels as though we’ve giving up trying to move forward or improve. We’re exhausted, out of ideas, and just waiting it out until the end.

However, Timothy Leary’s thought was that we are not at the end of times… we are in the very infancy of human existence. I think this is a unique thought. He thinks we have much more potential than what we’ve accomplished so far. We need to stop fighting wars and start cooperating. Lets use the tools like space travel, the internet, and drugs to take human existence to the next level.

Now, let me clarify my stance – I’m not into taking illegal drugs of any kind. However, I don’t think this idea is lost because of the mention of drugs.

Let’s stop living like we’re the tail-end of existence. Let’s live like we’re the pioneers – because we might be. We might be written about in history books a thousand years in the future… of course they won’t be books anymore. Let’s move forward.

I was reading about how President Obama declared June national LGBT month. What is LGBT? Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transexual. I guess my only question is, what's the point? I've been noticing a lot of things like this that really, have no point.

Another example is on the local scene, here in Omaha… people have been holding rallies to stop the violence. I just don't understand what is actually being done to stop the violence. But back to Obama, part of his official statement was this….

…we renew our commitment to the struggle for equal rights for LGBT Americans and to ending prejudice and injustice wherever it exists.

That is nice and I agree we should do that. But what is the point of declaring June the national month of LGBT? I'm sure all of the LGBT Americans we'll be happy to know they also share June with these events…

• Adopt A Shelter Cat Month
• Audiobook Month Cancer From The Sun Month
• Celibacy Awareness Month
• Child Vision Awareness Month
• Children’s Awareness Month Dairy Alternative Month
• Dairy Month
• Effective Communications Month
• Entrepreneurs Do It Yourself Marketing Month
• Fireworks Safety Month
• Great Outdoors Month
• International Childhood Cancer Campaign Month
• International Men's Month
• Lane Courtesy Month
• National Accordion Awareness Month
• National Aphasia Awareness Month
• National Bathroom Reading Month
• National Candy Month
• National Dairy Month
• National Flag Month
• National Fresh Fruit and Vegetables Month
• National Hunger Awareness Month
• National Iced Tea Month
• National Papaya Month (also, again in September)
• National Rivers Month
• National Rose Month
• National Safety Month
• National Seafood Month
• National Smile Month (From May 18 to June 17)
• National Soul Food Month
• National Steakhouse Month
• Perennial Gardening Month
• Pharmacists Declare War on Alcoholism Month
• Potty Training Awareness Month
• Professional Wellness Month
• Rebuild Your Life Month
• Sports America Kids Month
• Student Safety Month
• Turkey Lover's Month
• Vision Research Month
• World Infertility Month

You didn't know June was national potty training month? That's because it's meaningless and a waste of time. I could put a carpool together, with myself and some co-workers, and declare our commute the commute against child abuse - but, at the end of the day, we haven't really done anything to prevent child abuse. Do your part.

This is a song lyric that has been stuck in my head…

Get your mind and your money right, right now
- Lil Boosie (Bankroll)

It's taken out of context, of course - but I like it better that way. I think this is something everyone should strive to do - and this is definitely one of my big life goals right now. I think these two things are intermingle a lot in your life. I also like the immediacy of the quote - don't wait - do it right now.

This quote kind of goes along with one of my previous posts where I question all the people complaining about our government and I wonder if the U.S. government is really that bad.

What in the world does getting your mind and money right have to do with how good of a job government is doing? Well, after I had written that post, I was reading a post over at The Simple Dollar. I won't go into what the post was about too much, but I want to quote Trent on a couple of items…

The most profound change you can make on the world as a whole is to get your own house in order. Railing about politics can be fun and it can also be cathartic. But, in the morning, you’re going to wake up to the same life you had yesterday, except possibly worse because you spent all your energy raging about a law or a corrupt official.
- Trent Hamm (The Simple Dollar)

That quote is how I link this post to my post about the government. At the end of the day, the government is doing a decent job - are you? Get your mind and your money right, right now.

As I was walking into Wal-Mart the other day to pick up a few items, I noticed someone walking out with a 24-pack of Pepsi. On the box of the 24-pack, in big, bold letters, it just said “Do Good”. As I made my way into the store I noticed the big display of Pepsi, all of them saying “Do Good”. Simple. To the point.

I like this – even if it is just good marketing. At least it made me stop and think, “how can I do good?”. I think causing people to stop for a split second and think about doing good – is a good thing.

I also like Pepsi’s Refresh Everything Project they have going on. They’re giving away a million dollars each month to fund great ideas in your community. Where did the money come from? Apparently from the money they would’ve spent on a Super Bowl ad. This is a really neat idea.

I like what Pepsi is doing. Do good.

I enjoy computers. I’ve enjoyed them since I was young and I think I’ll always enjoy them. Computers have a power and potential that nothing else has - which also makes them dangerous. I’ve recently been trying to land some more freelance, on-the-side, web design work and have been spending a lot of time on the computer.

An idea will get stuck in my head and I’ll have to immediately go to the computer and start coding it out… and I won’t stop - I won’t stop until it’s done. Whether that’s an hour, a day, a week, or longer. In the meantime - life goes on. Then, I also realize that I need to be active in the web community - so I’m tweeting, I’m reading everything in my Google Reader, I’m commenting, I’m favoriting, I’m saving things in Evernote, I’m working on a client project, I’m invoicing, I’m researching, I’m coding, I’m designing… and in the meantime - life goes on.

On one hand I rationalize it - I’m working towards my dream, I’m working for my family’s finances, etc. And maybe that’s true - but at the same time, I want to be there for my family - I want to be a good dad and a good husband. Am I really helping my family out by having my face in a screen the whole time I’m home? Is that how I want to live my life? Constantly thinking about a clever tweet or something cool to post on Facebook or another blog post or a design that would help promote my services? Am I ever really present if I do that?

So, I was ready to throw it away and take a moratorium from all online activity. I had decided that yesterday. Once I decided a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. But after speaking with my wife last night - I don’t think I should take a moratorium from all online activity. The trick is restriction. In this age of distraction, we need to place restriction on ourselves.

So I am restricting myself from online activities during certain times of the day. I also might restrict what content I allow myself to consume - I certainly don’t need to consume a bunch of crap.

Then, just now, I read this blog post -> I tweet, therefore I am, which kind of sums up some of my thoughts. There are certain times when you just should not be thinking about Twitter or any online activity - you should be enjoying life, here and now.

So, what are my restrictions?

My restrictions that I’m putting in place today are - no online activity between 5:00 and 11:00 in the evening. That’s only 6 hours… but it’s some of the most important 6 hours as far as family goes. That also leaves me 18 hours to do what I need to do.

I was wrong, restriction is not the answer. At a certain point in time you realize that there’s only 24 hours in a day and you have an unknown, finite number of days. One of my favorite song lyrics recently has been the following…

Because after all mans intellect and power, All you get is 650,000 hours if you’re lucky then you’re dead

I was trying to get some more freelance web design work and I was sleeping less, on the computer more - and is it worth it? I’ve been reevaluating - what’s important, what’s not. What do I want to fill those 24 hours up with each day? When I look back 10 years from now, what am I going to be happy I did - and what am I going to regret having done?

So, I decided to close up shop - which wasn’t hard to do, I just have one project that I’m finishing up. You can’t do everything right? And I have a lot of other little mini-projects in my real life that I’m going to be working on. I won’t be vague, here’s what I want to do…

Be a good employee

There’s a lot of fairytale stories about becoming a freelancing and working at home when you want - but the truth is, I’ve got a great job. And even better, I genuinely enjoy it, most of the time. My employer is great, my managers are great, the work is fulfilling… so what am I looking for? So I’m ready to really give 100% at my job - which I think is something that people forget to do.

Be a husband / father

Right now, I’m dieting for a natural bodybuilding contest, so I’m low on energy anyways… what’s left of my energy after work and working out - I want to give to my family. I want to be an energetic dad, I want to help do the dishes.

Give 100% towards my bodybuilding contest

I’m dieting for 29 weeks total and it’s hard. It’s hard mentally and physically. The least I can do is give it my best shot.

Personal finances

It seems like we’re never quite where we want to be. I want to spend some time and focus on our personal finances. Make sure we’re heading in the right direction to meet our goals.

Blog more

I want to blog more. When I first started this blog, I was only blogging about profound thoughts I had… but I want to blog more often and about more relaxed topics. Maybe even throw in a picture or a video now and then.

Enjoy real life

Ha - I said this on my web-site - and this one really isn’t related to web designing or not… but this has become a personal goal of mine lately - just enjoy real life. Get off the computer, get out of the screen… enjoy the little things.

In conclusion - none of these are really about freelancing or not, just reevaluating how I want my life to be. If you don’t like something about your life - change it.

Our family has several goals that we’re shooting for - getting our emergency fund to a certain amount, paying down debt to a certain amount, christmas, license plates, etc. We could pay a small amount towards each of these goals, each paycheck - or we could put it all toward one goal until we get that goal accomplished. This is what we’ve started to do.

Theoretically it’s the same and we’d reach the goals at the same time either way… but doing it this way makes it seem like we’re getting somewhere. For example, if we have 5 goals and each of them is $100 and we have $100 to put towards our goals - it seems to accomplish a lot more to put that $100 all towards one goal and get it squared away and so that now we only have 4 goals left.

Just something we’ve started doing.

If I just grabbed you on the street and said what's the most important thing in your life? You would say something like - your family, or your church group, or maybe your career, maybe your kid or your pet. And the thing is - in some part of your heart that's absolutely true…

…Is the thing that you claim that's important, really important?…

…because if a lot of people actually looked at where their time and attention went - the parts that they do have control over - it would look like the most important thing in their life was Facebook…

…Before you try and fix everybody, it really does help to fix yourself.

• Merlin Mann

This quote from Merlin Mann is something that I found over a year ago, but continue to think about fairly regularly. It's important to realize where your time and attention is being spent because when all those moments are summed up - that's your life. And your time is important but your attention is even more important.

I also think about his first question - what's the most important thing in your life? Of course all of the things he mentions are - family, career, kids, etc. Sometimes we just have to remember to act like it.

Wired put out their controversial post yesterday entitled, The Web is Dead, Long Live the Internet. It was kind of a dumb distinction between “the web” and “the internet”. Basically they were saying that everything we use online is going in the direction of app-based use.

This made me stop and think about the internet a little more. I wonder what the big picture purpose of the internet is… or is there a big picture purpose? In my opinion, it has a lot of potential but also has a big risk of going the way of television and producing garbage that consumes people’s lives. In fact, that was one of the reasons why I wanted to first impose a restriction for myself and then opted instead for choosing what I really want to do.

So I’m wondering how internet will fit in our lives 10 or 15 years from now. I think we’ll connect ourselves to the point where there will eventually be a “real-life” revolution. People will get sick of looking at their 3-inch screens. Eventually we’ll decide we want our real world back and we’ll only keep the web apps in our lives that really add value and we’ll let everything else die. We’ll use the web as a tool for our lives, and nothing more. So even though the internet is close to 20 years old now - I think it will still be evolving quite a bit over the next 20 - it will grow from the adolescent it is today to become a mature adult.

And I guess I do agree with the Wired magazine article - everything will become use based. I use this app for that, and that app for this. We won’t spend hours a day browsing and scanning and tweeting and updating statuses, etc. But whether we call it the web or the internet, really isn’t important.

I’m actually trying to morph my life and internet use in this direction now. I love the internet, but I’m only trying to use for things that add value to my life.

I'm still thinking about the future of the internet. Today I'm thinking about communication. Here's how I see the future of communication on the web.

In the future there won't be any social media services at all. There will be only two ways to communicate - messages and feeds.

Messages

Messages are what used to be e-mails, text messages, twitter direct messages, facebook messages, and any other private message. They are all centralized in one place again, but of course they are all well tagged and color coded and categorized so you can easily go through them. This categorization is done nearly automatically, so it's not a hassle for you every time.

Feeds

Everyone in the future has one or more public feeds based on topic. I, myself, will have a work feed, technology feed, thoughts feed, random feed, and family feed.

Here's some examples of what I'd publish to each feed:

• Work Feed - "I'm working on Section PA09012 of the project and I think I found the answer. I'll be doing some testing this morning and if all goes well, I'll be updating the documentation this afternoon."
• Tech Feed - "The new app Konekt2Phamily is probably going to fail simply because the name sucks."
• Thoughts Feed - A long post on what I think the future of the internet might be.
• Random Feed - My wife and I got tickets to Willie Nelson in October. (I'd also add a clip of 'Always On My Mind')
• Family Feed - A video and a few random photos of my girls.

There is no commenting, liking, reblogging, reposting, retweeting etc. None of that exists any more. If you want to comment on something you can two things, a) send a message to the person with your comment or b) think of something more to add to it and publish your thoughts to one of your feeds.

Final thought

The great thing about this we don't have to wait for any technology to arrive for this to occur. We could all simplify our communication right now if we all decided to go this route.