INTELLECTUAL TAUNTS AND INSULTS

Dear Friends:

My dear friend Gabriel Siegel (to serve as a reminder, this is the same smart aleck who said, "When Douglas Castle dies, they'll have to have two funerals -- one for him, and another for his ego.") has sent me a wonderful collection of Intellectual Taunts and Insults which I am, by virtue of my obsessive need to rattle cages and to wake the drooling sleepers among us, duty-bound [please avoid the obvious but inappropriate laxative jokes] to share with one and all:

INTELLECTUAL TAUNTS AND INSULTS

“I feel so miserable without you; it's almost like having you here.”
Stephen Bishop

“He is a self-made man & worships his creator.”
John Bright

“He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.”-
Winston Churchill

“A modest little person, with much to be modest about.”
Winston Churchill

“I've just learned about his illness. Let's hope it's nothing trivial.”
Irvin S. Cobb

“I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with great pleasure.”
Clarence Darrow

“He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary.”
William Faulkner (about Ernest Hemingway)

“Poor Faulkner. Does he really think big emotions come from big words?”
Ernest Hemingway (about William Faulkner)

“Thank you for sending me a copy of your book; I'll waste no time reading it.”
Moses Hadas

“His ears made him look like a taxicab with both doors open.”
Howard Hughes
(about Clark Gable)

“He is not only dull himself; he is the cause of dullness in others.”
Samuel Johnson

“He is simply a shiver looking for a spine to run up.”
Paul Keating

“He had delusions of adequacy.”
Walter Kerr

“There's nothing wrong with you that reincarnation won't cure.”
Jack E. Leonard

“He can compress the most words into the smallest idea of any man I know.”
Abraham Lincoln

“I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it.”
Groucho Marx

“He has the attention span of a lightning bolt.”
Robert Redford

“They never open their mouths without subtracting from the sum of human knowledge.”
Thomas Brackett Reed

“He inherited some good instincts from his Quaker forebears, but by diligent hard work, he overcame them.”
James Reston (about Richard Nixon)

“In order to avoid being called a flirt, she always yielded easily.”
Charles, Count Talleyrand

“He loves nature in spite of what it did to him.”
Forrest Tucker

“Why do you sit there looking like an envelope without any address on it?”
Mark Twain

“I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.”
Mark Twain

“His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork.”
Mae West

“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.”
Oscar Wilde

“He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.”
Oscar Wilde

“He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts - for support rather than illumination.”
Andrew Lang
(1844-1912)

“He has Van Gogh's ear for music.”
Billy Wilder
_________________________________________
Once again, Gabe, thank you, and my compliments (none of which is actually applicable to you).


Faithfully,


Douglas Castle

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A BRIEF DEPARTURE: The "One Percent" Rule

The 1% Rule
Note: This brief article was originally published in the author's own blog at DOUGLAS CASTLE, http://aboutdouglascastle.blogspot.com on 25 June 2009.

Dear Friends:

People (most of them self-professed pundits) are always citing the anecdotal wisdom of the "80 -20 Rule," which refers to the typical business situation where a mere 20% of your customers provide you with 80% of your business volume. It follows that a prudent business person should allocate 80% of his or her time on that critical 20%. Walking ahead just one more step, it would seem to me that it might truly be clever to focus more effort on segregating the 20% from the 80%, downsizing (I apologize for the dismal term) the 80% and building the 20% -- the ultimate result, if Murphy's Law and the Heisenberg Principle do not tamper with us too much, would be that the 20% would become our new 100%. Operating at optimal efficiency (which requires dispensing with the unfruitful investment of time in the 80%), we would then spend 100% of our time on the 100% of our customers who truly matter.

The inference in the 80-20 Rule is that the minority produces the majority of our wealth, and that they are of greater significance to us.

There is also a "Two Percent Rule," which refers to the belief that approximately 2% of the world's population (a very small, very powerful group, apparently) controls 98% of its wealth. The implications are obvious...as are the results.

Without making any value judgment, and just making an observation, I believe that both of the above rules are basically sound, albeit somewhat imprecise statistically.

But those rules are not the drivers in the limo of my current life: No, I would have to say that the Rule that affects me the most is the "1% Rule" [which will be referred to as "THE ONE PERCENT RULE" by both my detractors and by my twelfth-grade Creative Writing Teacher immediately after the release of this article].

My friend and business partner, Adam J. Kovitz, and I were discussing many wonderful upgrades to THE NATIONAL NETWORKER, and my role in mapping out and orchestrating many of these substantial changes. Adam's compliment to me was that I was a "One Percenter." He had used this expression on numerous occasions. I now understand it well enough to give it a definition. Following is the Rule, which I attribute jointly to Adam and myself...

THE ONE PERCENT RULE: Approximately One Percent of all Human Beings create and construct, while the remaining Ninety Nine Percent criticize and destroy. In sum, it is so much easier to be a critic and a complainer than it is to be a problem-solver, that most among us are virtually programmed (by our propensity toward inertia and indolence) to be critics and complainers, while only a few among us defy our baser instincts and actually create, build and problem-solve. To make matters worse, the special 1% is generally acknowledged and praised posthumously, i.e., following a crucifixion, burning at the stake, suicide, and the like. To be a One Percenter may be a thankless job, but it is necessary to every step that Humankind advances. This tenacious 1% fights against Humankind's collective drive toward either stagnation or self-annihilation. And we spend so much of our time and resources trying to discourage or eliminate this pivotal component.

Are you a One Percenter? Take the matter up with your own conscience. The sooner, the better. Time is fleeting.

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle

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LYNN PATNER: To Grumble or Not to Grumble, That is the Question...

The article which follows was originally published on the SrMeetUp! Blog (http://SrMeetUp.blogspot.com), and has been reprinted with the permission of SrMeetUp!
####

To Grumble or Not To Grumble , That is the Question…
By SrMeetUp! Featured Columnist Lynn Patner

All around me I am hearing grumbling. I hear grumbles from my students, from my clients, while I am standing in a grocery store and at dinners with friends. There are the economic grumbles, the physical grumbles and of course the relationship grumbles. I cannot go anywhere anymore without hearing someone grumble. All this grumbling is affecting me, and even at the dog park, the dogs are getting into the grumbling mood. Fights are breaking out right and left.

Now granted, the world situation is less than perfect. The collapse of the economy, the housing debacle and the loss of jobs, et cetera, only brings around more grumbling, nothing else. It goes like this: one starts to grumble, then another adds their grumbles and soon there are many grumbles. Now grumbling would be fine if it solved something or was of good use, but grumbling does nothing. It’s like sitting in a rocking chair and expecting to go somewhere. It doesn’t even make one feel better.

Do you remember the cartoon character in the Charlie Brown series, Pigpen? Wherever he walked little clouds of dust followed. That is exactly what happens with grumbles; they are like little clouds of dust that follow behind you collecting more grumbles as they go forward. The problem is they keep attracting only negativity.

In 1994 I stepped onto a path and began an amazing journey. I learned that our thoughts, either verbalized or not, create our experiences. That new information took a very long time to penetrate my mind. But then I saw what thoughts and beliefs produced, and it opened an entirely different world of reality. The reality is, I am the producer, the director and the star of my own life. This revelation did not make me happy because I could no longer be the victim in my own life drama. I couldn’t blame my parents, nor the environment and worse yet I couldn’t grumble about any of it anymore. If I was not a victim, then I must be the creator. Creator is definitely a better option.

What I have learned about my thoughts and the power of them, my emotions, and my beliefs is they literally create my reality. And it is now being proven by scientific methods no less. Wow! All you doubting Thomas out there read on.

In 2005 Bruce Lipton Ph.D., a cellular biologist, published “The Biology of Belief.” This book was awarded 2006’s Best Science Book of the Year. In the book he presents scientific evidence showing that genes and DNA do not control our biology. Instead, our genes are turned on and off by signals from outside the cells in our bodies, including the energetic messages emanating from our positive and negative thoughts. The significance of this shift in belief is vast, in that the original view held for a long time was that we were victims of our own biology. The ‘new’ sciences show that we are actually masters of our biology.

An earlier book, “Timeless Healing: The Power and Biology of Beliefs,” published in 1997 by Dr. Herbert Benson, M.D. tells about a study conducted in 1957 at Cook County Hospital in Chicago. This study found, according to Dr. Benson, that 30 percent of the patients with rheumatoid arthritis benefited from placebos. Their placebo relief lasted at least three months. In 1995 more research was conducted confirming this study. The results were published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, where 40 percent of individuals suffering with rheumatoid arthritis had a 50 percent reduction in both swelling and tenderness in their joints by simply taking a placebo. These effects lasted for six months or more.

There continues to be scientific evidence that states that we are powerful creators in our lives and the world in which we live. So, less grumbling is important as our beliefs about ourselves and the world, regardless if they are true or false, positive or negative affect us on a multitude of levels. So, I say, " just say no to grumbling."

A few tools to assist you any time you are in a grumbling space…

• Listen to uplifting music
• Think positive thoughts
• Walk in nature
• Relax in water
• Read an inspirational book
• Play with a child
• Laugh often
• Go shopping

What is important to remember is that our thoughts are creating our reality all the time. Most of the time we are creating these thoughts with our unconscious mind. As a matter of fact, I just recently heard that we are creating our lives around 95 percent from the unconscious mind. That is important information to notice. So you ask, what is the answer. The answer is: become aware of your thoughts and redirect them when you start to grumble.

Do anything that opens your heart and fills you with joy and you are on the path to bring about a life transformation.

-- Lynn

BRIEF COMMENTARY By ELAINE INGIS:

It is amazing how much we accomplish out of sheer vision and the will to make things happen. Lynn Patner offers both a tremendous opportunity and a challenge to every Boomer -- since we have the ability to transform our state of physiological health by out thoughts about life, why do we waste time dwelling on negative possibilities? There may be more to the Law of Attraction (the force behind those "self-fulfilling prophesies" many of us learned about in Psychology 101) than many of us have ever realized. We are blessed and burdened by the obligation to create our own reality by our thinking processes.

Being aware of this, we owe it to ourselves, each of us, to surround ourselves with positive influences and to avoid energy vampires who seem to thrive on complaining, suffering and misery. Carrying this one step further, we can enrich and improve our lives by becoming vitally involved in a social group or community that has a courageous, problem-solving orientation, instead of by sitting alone and talking to some well-intentioned friend on the telephone who reaffirms and prolongs our misery by fueling our outrage or by encouraging us to retreat from what life has brought us. We each have great personal power; this power is multiplied when we combine forces with other positive people.

At the risk of sounding like a shameless self-promoter, SrMeetUp! was created to bring about a positive, supportive and strengthening community environment for our Members. Positive thoughts are contagious -- why not share them? - E.I.

[Douglas Castle, a Director of SrMeetUp! and the Developer of both the Braintenance and Links 4 Life Blogs contributed to this Commentary]

***You can Follow SrMeetUp! on Twitter at http://twitter.com/SrMeetUp .

FEARLESSNESS + AMBITION + LEARNED SKILLS = POWER

Dear Friends:

My question to my colleagues is a simple one: Are you motivated more by FEAR, or by the OPPORTUNITY FOR GAIN? Be fully honest. Christine West's Seminar: http://ping.fm/SH3ov . My personal commentary follows.

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle


PREAMBLE SPECIFICALLY FOR INTERNAL ENERGY PLUS

In our study of INTERNAL ENERGY PLUS , we have come to understand that our deeply-rooted subconscious feelings, which tend to be childish, defensive and negative, constrain us from reaching out and growing to the extend that we would like. We sometimes rationalize this by labeling it "caution," "humility," or, ironically, "maturity!" Through the course of life, this program and its rationalization are both reinforced by the people around us, who are similarly constrained. We find that many of our friends are only too happy to offer us comfort when we fail, but they become resentful and distant when we begin to succeed. This is a passive-aggressive reaction to feelings of envy -- oftimes others feel somehow lessened by our achievements; especially when we surpass them in accomplishments that are deemed socially significant.

As a boy, I remember hearing several things, both said by seemingly well-intentioned parents to children who were being obstreperous or "uppity," both of which terms are used all too frequently by adults who have accepted defeat as destiny:

1. "You mind your place, son."

2. "Don't get your hopes up."

3. "Get real!"

4. "Folks like us never get into places like that. You have to really be somebody to be be accepted there."

5. And, of course, my favorite: "Just who do you think you are, anyway?"

Picture in your mind what it would be like to be so supremely confident that you were able to try anything without even thinking of the possibility of failure, or of humiliation. Imagine feeling expectant of victory. Imagine feeling entitled to wealth, abundance, success and unconstrained happiness. Imagine hearing only encouraging voices, urging you forward, telling you that you were born for glory...born to do great things.

Applying the Law Of Attraction, just think of the type of life that you would have. Think of the heady, godlike power. Going further, imagine that these feelings were bred into you, generation after winning generation...


ORDER OUT OF CHAOS - A SOCIO-ECONOMIC AND BEHAVIORAL COMMENTARY

Throughout the United States and the rest of the world that surrounds us (I sound a bit paranoic, don't I?), people are frightened. The economy is in a contractionary state; many formidable and once-credible "bedrock" institutions have failed amid allegations of major misjudgments and corruption -- and the distinctions between the public and private sectors are becoming increasingly unclear. People tend to be frightened by rapid change and general uncertainty.

Panic makes for some terrible decisionmaking, while maintaining a calm and analytic state of mind while those about us are in a state of irrationality can reveal some contrarian investment bargains. While fear has locked many investors and businesses into a paralytic holding pattern, a distinct minority, virtually a special social class, is quietly buying up controlling stakes and future monopolistic positions in a variety of industries, companies and commodities. This minority, for the most part, is comprised of very wealthy, privileged families...families who have prospered through generation after generation, almost regardless of the political or economic environment. We will refer to them (for the purposes or simplicity) as dynastic families. Their blueblooded names are familiar to many of the rest of us, and they have held tremendous power for quite some time -- centuries, in fact.

I am betting that amongst the pedestrian, "common" population, fear is a far superior motivating force than the promise of an opportunity for gain. I believe that we travel long, circuitous routes in order to avoid confrontation, pain and loss, while we seldom leave the living room couch for an opportunity, which might require effort on our part. Inertia, indolence and a lack of ambition combine to work against the potential efficacy of positive reinforcement, while fear actually creates a physiological reaction (i.e., the secretion of adrenalin, cortisol, etcetera) which actually produces the means for rapid movement in a "fight or flight" response.

The endorphin "rush" produced by the mind's complex neurochemical apparatus is, in contrast, usually much slower to gain a foothold and much weaker in terms of its sway over our responses to the environment and circumstances. It is interesting to note that fear is regarded by many as a visceral reflex, while ambition, and the excitement that accompanies it, is seen to be more of a cerebral, learned action.

Is it possible that the actual physiology of the members of these dynastic families has changed, through some sort of evolutionary genetic mechanism, over the generations? Is it possible that the progenitors who spawned these imperial families started out with an anomalous physiological/ psychological makeup which permitted them to seize ever-increasing stakes of wealth and power while others panicked and fled? Is there a "contrarian gene" that makes these people different, or is it a function of a learned response which is handed down from each generation to its successor?

These few have triumphed through virtually every tragic chapter in the course of Humanity's erratic, ungainly evolution. I am fascinated by the fact that such a small group of persons can continually control the bulk of the world's resources.

These dynastic families all have one thing in common -- they are not motivated by fear.

I am equally fascinated by my almost dull, ho-hum, all-too-calm expectation, in my dual roles as a Strategic Planner and a Futurist, that these dynastic families will become even wealthier and more powerful as a result of the severe economic recession that has befallen us; and that they will emerge, as they always have, with an even greater percentage of the world's wealth when the current crisis has ended. The irony is that these families always benefit by their uncanny ability to maintain their cool in the midst of the confusion -- to make order (and money) out of chaos. This observation has made conspiracy theorists out of many of us. We are indeed, by and large, a fearful group of primitives running from the lightning, while these others are out flying their kites.
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Fear vs Opportunity: Which is the more powerful motivator?

My question for my colleagues is a simple one: Are you motivated more by FEAR, or by the OPPORTUNITY FOR GAIN? Be fully honest. Christine West's Seminar: http://ping.fm/SH3ov .

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle

p.s. I am betting that fear is a far superior motivating force than the promise of an opportunity for gain. I believe that we travel long, circuitous routes in order to avoid confrontation, pain and loss, while we seldom leave the living room couch for an opportunity, which might require effort on our part. Inertia, indolence and a lack of ambition work against the potential efficacy of positive reinforcement, while fear creates a physiological reaction (i.e., the secretion of adrenalin, cortisol, etcetera) which actually produces the means for rapid movement.

Labels: Christine West, fear, The Castle Consultancy, reinforcement, behavioral psychology, blogs by Douglas Castle, THE NATIONAL NETWORKER (TNNW), Humanitas Maximus, The Global Futurist, The Internationalist Page, Links 4 Life, Internal Energy Plus, relationships, Twitter, Linked In, social media, Facebook, INTERNAL ENERGY PLUS, Buzzworks, TNNW_BUZZWORKS, SrMeetUp!, Braintenance, Taking Command!, Strategic Planning, Stress, SEO, Procrastinertia, Omnigadget, Douglas Castle, Wikipedia, Google Alerts, Better Blogs, Yahoo! Alerts, Artificial Intelligence (AI),

Mixed Messages = Sneaky Behavior

From the moment of birth, most of us are indoctrinated with the edict that we should aspire to "goodness" (pursuant to some high moral and social standard which we seldom see in this life), and that we should avoid the "temptation" (or perhaps "instinct") to do evil. Yet evil seems at many times to be darkly instinctual -- an atavistic propensity toward some kind of kill or be killed behavior lodged deepedly within our genetic wiring.

The lure of evil and seeing how so many people are either forgiven, unpunished or even rewarded for certain "special" evils at special times or in special circumstances is indeed powerful and pervasive -- the Hollywood star who is caught abusing drugs is "treated for his problem" and is commended on his overcoming his "ongoing battle with addiction," while the poverty-stricken ghetto teen caught with drugs is locked up for ten years for "drug trafficking," -- a judge is merely reprimanded for reversing a legitimately rendered jury-rendered court decision in order to give favor to a major campaign backer (giving the lucky contributor the best justice that money can buy) while the chap who forges a signature on a check gets to spend several years in "Club Fed" -- the Politician (perhaps even the Secretary of the Treasury, for the sake of illustration) fails to pay several million in income taxes, says "Oops! I forgot!" and pays the delinquent tab while the tax preparer who deducts $1,000.00 in unsubstantiated expenses from his client's taxable income (in order to reduce his client's tax bill by $120.00) gets railed at by some prosecutor (who is then promoted...perhaps even becomes a governor), and sent off to set a spell in the federal pokey -- you've heard many of such tales.

Why do we nod our heads so disdainfully when one of our children is caught cheating on a Regents Examination, or shoplifting $12.50 worth of merchandise, or using phony ID to buy beer?

Haven't we learned that mixed messages and hypocrisy breed sneaky behavior?

With such conflicting signals, this sneakiness eventually blossoms into full-blown social schizoprenia.

My questions: Are these the exceptional cases or merely the frightening truth about Human Nature? Are we setting our standards for acceptable conduct too high for a species with inherent behavioral limitations?

Please let me know. In the meantime, I'll be watching American Idol, or Dancing with the Stars.

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle

*Follow DOUGLAS CASTLE on TWITTER - http://twitter.com/douglascastle
*Follow DOUGLAS CASTLE on THE NATIONAL NETWORKER - http://twitter.com/TNNW_BUZZWORKS

PLS --> -->

PLS --> -->

Dear Friends:

If you do not already have a free Twitter account, you can get one at http://twitter.com.

Twitter affords you a unique opportunity to refine your brevity skills -- you have exactly 140 characters within which to express your thoughts. Every character counts!

To follow us on INTERNAL ENERGY PLUS, log into your Twitter account and head for http://twitter.com/IEP_VOICE.

To follow us on THE NATIONAL NETWORKER, log into your Twitter account (what's that? you're already logged in? Great!) and head for http://twitter.com/TNNW_BUZZWORKS.

I'll look forward to our Tweeting each other (with wespect). See you there.

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle (http://aboutDouglasCastle.blogspot.com)


THE NATIONAL NETWORKER- We Are Networking
BRAINTENANCE - Stay Razor Sharp
INTERNAL ENERGY PLUS - Human Potential
THE INTERNATIONALIST PAGE
THE GLOBAL FUTURIST

PLS --> --> Dear Fri

PLS --> --> Dear Friends: If you do not already have a free Twitter account, you can get one at http://twitter.com. Twitter affords you a unique opportunity to refine your brevity skills -- you have exactly 140 characters within which to express your thoughts. Every character counts! To follow us on INTERNAL ENERGY PLUS, log into your Twitter account and head for http://htxt.it/MIy9 To follow us on THE NATIONAL NETWORKER, log into your Twitter account (what's that? you're already logged in? Great!) and head for http://htxt.it/5vac I'll look forward to our Tweeting each other (with wespect). See you there. Faithfully, Douglas Castle (http://htxt.it/6dHO THE NATIONAL NETWORKER- We Are Networking BRAINTENANCE - Stay Razor Sharp INTERNAL ENERGY PLUS - Human Potential THE INTERNATIONALIST PAGE THE GLOBAL FUTURIST

TNNW TWITTER AND CASTLE COMMENTARY

TNNW TWITTER AND CASTLE COMMENTARY

Following, ladies and gentlemen, are three of the blurbs which I blurted on Twitter today in my spare moments. Read them aloud please:

1) ~tagged.com -- A "Social Network" that behaves more like a virus - warning! http://twitlik.com/LINKS4LIFE #TNNW

2) THE NATIONAL NETWORKER (TNNW). Interactive business community. Join http://www.thenationalnetworker.com/. Free Newsletter. Member services.

3) Networking is more than broadcasting and name collecting. It is a route to relationships. Join us: http://www.thenationalnetworker.com/.

Thank you. Brilliant job. Appreciate it.

Inevitable Commentary:

I have always been a long-winded sort of fellow. Coming from the Ancient School of Management Consulting (founded by R. Fenwick Stanton III during the latter part of the Bronze Age), I was told at the beginning of my career that a good consultant takes off his clients watch and tells the client what time it is…and then bills him for it. I was also told that there was a true advantage to being excruciatingly verbose (with a large side order of redundancy): When selling fresh manure, you were paid by the steaming pound – unless, of course, you were a major distributor, in which case you were paid by the steaming metric ton (or by the tonne, as we Anglophiles tend to favour); as a consultant, you were paid by the word or by the page. That was what I was taught.

Now I know better. People are neither as patient nor as polite as they used to be. They actually look at their watches, send text messages or hail cabs when I speak. They frequently start tapping their feet and gesticulating with broad, waving arm gestures when I am in mid-sentence. In today’s Contemporary School of Consultancy (which many prefer to call “coaching”), less is more. The key is to limit your word usage to the absolute minimum number of characters needed to convey the thought. It is more about efficiency than about eloquence. Douglas Castle (a name that I am currently using to disguise my true identity, in the event that I discover it) is a scribe with a chisel in a world gone to Skype. I sit home at night and inventory my lava lamps, beanbag chairs, and leisure suits. On rare occasion, I will even eat red meat in an out-of-town restaurant where no one will recognize me. One of those places where the waitress calls me “Hon”.

Now that you’re getting ready to leave for an evening of speed-dating, I’ll say what I had originally wanted to say before I sidetracked myself.

LESS IS SOMETIMES LESS. Quicker, briefer, smaller is (are?) not necessarily better. In our pursuit of brevity, we are leaving out nuances, expressions, tangents (those great stories that are so interesting that we forget what we were talking about in the first place – but the ones that tell people a little about who we truly are) and helpful repetition. We are broadcasting in short bursts…but we are no longer truly connecting.

Human Nature is largely unchanged. We still prefer to give our business to the people we know and like. We still go through some trial and error to learn new things. We sometimes need to have a question repeated. We crave relationships, despite our stated desire to be independent and uncommitted.

Social media is not an inherently evil concept. Brevity is not necessarily impolite, especially if you are trying to evacuate a burning building, telling another hiker that he is being followed by a bear or about to step into a nest of yellow jackets, or when your car is being surrounded by a horde of drooling, grunting cannibalistic mutants from the future who are banging on your windshield with halberds and clubs (this last example is, admittedly extreme). Speed is sometimes necessary for the sake of survival, or to get designer clothing on sale immediately after a holiday.

But (and one should never begin a sentence with “but”) social media is not (are not?) a substitute for quality time invested in developing a rapport. Some processes (like making a fine wine) simply require more time. In our networking activities, if we fail to invest the time to gain understanding, to earn respect, to facilitate genuine bonding, to feel the extra element of warmth that can only comes from familiarity.

I will continue to tweet on Twitter.

But I am not out to advertise my professional services as a strategic planner or organizational engineer (which are described in some detail at http://aboutdouglascastle.blogspot.com/), or to say positive things about The National Networker – incidentally, you can get a free subscription to their terrific newsletter and see some past issues at http://www.thenationalnetworker.com/ - I am out to get to know you, and to have you get to know me.

And if we should come to respect each other, to enjoy each other and to trust each other…we can have a relationship. Hopefully, it will be a mutually productive and profitable one – but I will insist, unconditionally, that it be a friendly one. An investment in friendship can yield tremendously profitable returns. But be advised that an investment in friendship requires time, and often more than 140 characters’ worth of conversation. It also requires some listening, as well as broadcasting.

Always,

Douglas Castle

p.s. Adam J. Kovitz enjoys seeing his name in print. Here it is, Adam.

Two Articles About You

Dear Readers and Friends:

There are two brief articles which I believe that you will find of considerable interest.

When I first wrote them, I thought that I was self-indulgently journaling about my personal biases and proclivities, and about my battle to better myself. I was only partly correct.

They are about you, too. I know that you will find something in each of them which resonates within you. As a writer (or, at very least, as a person who writes), one of my objectives is to touch souls, to draw forth feelings from deep within the darkest corridors of my small but very important audience. My influence upon others is my immortality. Writing is my means of connection and my communion.

Whatever you learn from reading and acting upon what I've written is my offering of myself to you. What you should know in any case is that as Human Beings, we are all participants in the struggle for survival and betterment...the challenge of focused evolution through self-discipline.

As Humans, we are all born with a two major challenges -- the first is our limited time here, and the second is the burdensome responsibility of deciding how best to use that limited time. We are, each and every one of us, terminal cases. The trick is what to do with whatever uncertain time we have left.

PROCRASTINERTIA at http://twitlik.com/994 and FREE VS PRICELESS at http://twitlik.com/995 .

Faithfully, and with Great Respect,

Douglas Castle

DCastleFT.GlobalEcon

DCastleFT.GlobalEcon Merkel mauls central banks : Unconventional monetary policies being pu.. http://tinyurl.com/pmkd8k

DouglasCastle.Digg R

DouglasCastle.Digg Rwandan to face genocide charges in Finland: Finnish prosecutors will file.. http://tinyurl.com/ofbpkd

DouglasCastle_FTnews

DouglasCastle_FTnews Anti-Castro politicians fight thawing of relations : Cuban-American po.. http://tinyurl.com/q4ng52

DouglasCastle_APNews

DouglasCastle_APNews Clinton details conditions for Cuba entry to OAS: SAN PEDRO SULA, Hond.. http://bit.ly/16fd9E

DCastleFT.GlobalEcon

DCastleFT.GlobalEcon Berlin breaks the unwritten rule : The chancellor's strong and clear c.. http://bit.ly/dthI1

DouglasCasle.digg Ai

DouglasCasle.digg Air France plane: wreckage found 400 miles off coast: Brazilian military air.. http://bit.ly/NNxv0

DouglasCastle_FTnews

DouglasCastle_FTnews Geithner says China backs US stimulus: China has expressed confidence .. http://bit.ly/qPrdT

Douglas Castle Apologizes for Loitering and Littering.

Douglas Castle Apologizes for Loitering and Littering.

Dear Friends:

As a man born with an irresistible propensity for apologies (I have actually apologized to neighbors about the weather), I had to take this moment to apologize to all of my readers. Please read on.

I spend a great deal of time railing and carrying on about being heard and being noticed in this noise-filled, e-media world. It is nothing short of magic to hear, and to be heard amidst the constant full-sensorial assault on the senses imposed upon on us in a promotion-obsessed high-technology society. It seems, too much of the time, that everyone is promoting and no one is producing...that everyone is selling, even if no one is buying. Ironically, if you truly want to purchase something, it's almost unimaginally difficult to get service -- "All of our representatives are currently assisting other callers..."

Two days ago, I tried to contact a domain registration service by telephone. I called the number for "Immediate Customer Assistance." The first time I phoned, I held for 15 minutes. The second time, 20 minutes. The third time, I started yelling into the telephone (at no one) after hearing a musical tape loop of Dave Brubeck's immortal "Take Five," which was, until very recently, one of my favorite songs. While I waited on the telephone, I went through in excess of one hundred emails which had accumulated in my computer inbox in the space of two hours.

Approximately one in every ten messages was spam. Ironically, in going through my spam filter's collected entries, I have generally found that approximately one in every twenty five spam messages is a miscategorized legitimate email. My computer can no longer effectively differentiate between them - the machine is as overworked and confused as I am (Note: I plan to publish the results of my study in the International Journal Of Useless, Unsponsored Research, August Edition. Adam J. Kovitz, of THE NATIONAL NETWORKER refused to finance this endeavor when I offered him a right of first refusal, citing it as "crap," or some variant thereof). Anyway:

Several days ago I started featuring several different newsfeeds on a number of the blogs which I administer, co-author or write. While International News is very important, the feeds have been posting to these blogs many times each day. Enough is enough. To make matters worse, the hyperlinks to the top news stories are not live [by the way, if you want to bring any of the links on these posts to life so that you can read the entire story, all you need to do is paste them into your browser].

I have been quite a hypocrite...filling my readers' blogs, widgets, RSS feeds and email with this avalanche of sobering and saddening news, instead of heartfelt, informative and stimulating content. I have been loitering and littering, and I am deeply sorry.

Starting tomorrow (because nobody ever starts today, whenever today may be - we Humans are prone to procrastination and indecision, which I should probably write about if and when I can get around to making up my mind about it), I will decrease the frequency of these feeds to once daily for each. The feeds in question are from Associated Press (AP), The Financial Times (FT) and Digg.

Please stay with me. I will make it up to you.

I am deeply in debt to those people who read what I write, and I will not abuse the privilege and honor of your interest and loyalty.

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle

*Follow DOUGLAS CASTLE on TWITTER - http://twitter.com/douglascastle

DCastleFT.GlobalEcon

DCastleFT.GlobalEcon Global recession makes world less safe: Rising fuel and food prices fo.. http://bit.ly/rYWP1

DouglasCasle.digg Th

DouglasCasle.digg The Great Tiananmen Taboo: It is 20 years since students and lecturers fille.. http://bit.ly/1Afn3

DouglasCastle_FTnews

DouglasCastle_FTnews Pakistan court frees Mumbai attack suspect: A notorious Islamist milit.. http://bit.ly/jEJ4D

DouglasCastle_APNews

DouglasCastle_APNews Investigators ponder what happened to Air France: RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) .. http://bit.ly/8TGEY

DouglasCasle.digg Pi

DouglasCasle.digg Picture Gallery: Korea War 1950-53: A short history of the North-South conflict http://bit.ly/LkqNG

DouglasCastle_APNews

DouglasCastle_APNews Vast search of Atlantic Ocean for Air France jet: RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) .. http://bit.ly/wTZ3M

DouglasCasle.digg GM

DouglasCasle.digg GM, Citigroup Replaced in Dow by Cisco, Travelers : General Motors Corp. and.. http://bit.ly/tFu03

DouglasCastle_APNews

DouglasCastle_APNews Susan Boyle fairy tale sours as she enters clinic: LONDON (AP) -- Now .. http://bit.ly/18uWhs

DCastleFT.GlobalEcon

DCastleFT.GlobalEcon Robust output data boost markets : Stock markets round the world surge.. http://bit.ly/rugu9

DouglasCasle.digg Mu

DouglasCasle.digg Muslims want tangible change on Mideast from Obama : Respect for Islam, a pr.. http://bit.ly/xCKaR

DouglasCastle_FTnews

DouglasCastle_FTnews Air France plane missing with 228 aboard: An Air France passenger jet .. http://bit.ly/Be3I1

DouglasCastle_APNews

DouglasCastle_APNews Netanyahu rejects US calls for settlement freeze: HAVAT GILAD, West Ba.. http://bit.ly/RUIO5

DouglasCasle.digg Ne

DouglasCasle.digg New ID rules begin June First for Mexico, Canada trips: New rules requiring .. http://bit.ly/QFRXA

DouglasCastle_FTnews

DouglasCastle_FTnews Output for UK manufacturing improves: The UK purchasing managers' inde.. http://bit.ly/15SEei

DCastleFT.GlobalEcon

DCastleFT.GlobalEcon Shadowy deals exposed to 'sunlight' : Aggressive tax deals by investme.. http://bit.ly/yz7UU

DouglasCasle.digg La

DouglasCasle.digg Last Titanic survivor dies at age 97: Millvina Dean, the last survivor of th.. http://bit.ly/lLzZm

DouglasCastle_FTnews

DouglasCastle_FTnews GM to file for Chapter 11 protection: General Motors will file for Cha.. http://bit.ly/bdywV