Apomo

Put the lights up on the house on Friday. On Saturday half of them stopped working. On Sunday the large star over the entryway fell down. I suck at Christmas light installation I guess.

Sunday we had a collaboration meeting to figure out the Christmas service. It’s going to be pretty cool.

Watched a couple of VH1 specials the other night. One on “Guns N Roses” and the other on “Metallica”. It was interesting to see how the two groups work/worked so differently as a creative team. Metallica sits around a conference table and hammers stuff out like album names, songs selection, business deals, auditions, etc…in  a teamwork oriented fashion with a good deal of give and take. Their focus is on the group. GNR on the other hand had a meltdown partly because they were all a bunch of dopers, but also because Axel asserted himself on the group and it became about Axel and not about the group. Eventually the group walked out and now Axel is nothing even though he has the rights to the GNR name. The rest of the group got a new frontman and they’re the Velvet Revolvers now. Axel tried to put together a new GNR but they flopped. And Metallica is still rocking. Lesson: The group is more important than any individual no matter how talented, creative, or popular a particular member happens to be.

Got some more music in the mail today: Two U2 albums (Rattle & Hum and Under a Blood Red Sky), Joss Stone (Mind, Body, Soul) and Coldplay (Parachutes).

Had an awesome day at work today. My best day ever. If X is a good day, I did X times 3. Kind of makes up for me taking Friday and Saturday off. My boss came in today and did an evaluation…it was good. A good day today.]]>

All I got out of my shopping hell this morning was a new pair of black suede Dickies skate shoes and three CD’s. Bob Marley, Stevie Wonder, and Nirvana. Gave the Wonder one to Russ. I had about five more CD’s picked out but the line was way too long at Best Buy so I hid them behind a box with the intention of coming back before the sale ended at noon. But Russ and I spent about 5 hours at Starbucks brainstorming the Christmas event. It was 2:00 before I knew it. Damn it! Now I remember why I love half.com so much.]]>

Watched the AMA’s last night. It was ok. Keith Urban was really good. Rascal Flatts was pretty good. The Stones were good. I thought the thing with Sara McClachlan and Cyndi Lauper was cool; especially how they did the lighting to make it look like they and the band were in black and white. Way cool. I wonder how they did that.]]>

Just on the first DVD there is u2, Paul McCartney, Coldplay, Richard Ashcroft, Elton John, Pete Doherty, Dido, Youssou N’Dour, Sterophonics, REM, Ms. Dynamite, Keane, Black Eyed Peas, Rita & Stephen Marley, Duran Duran, Bob Geldof, Muse, Travis, Kaiser Chiefs, UB40, Hunterz & The Dhol Blasters, Green Day, Snoop Dogg, Bon Jovi (currently playing on my screen “Livin’ ON a Prayer” ) and Annie Lennox. They have lots of combos with various artists performing together.  Good stuff!

Pretty much liked everybody on the first DVD. Thought Snoop was a little stupid because he sang “Who am I (What’s my Name?)” and had everybody chant his name over and over. Kind of pretentious. I thought it was about the Africans, not Snoopy. But I guess that’s Snoop. Full of himself, even at a charity thing. 

It’s kind of amusing at times when they pan the crowd because it’s such a diverse crowd. You’ll have a young little hottie gyrating to Snoop standing next to a gray haired guy listening to Snoop with this “What the hell is this shit?” look on his face. He came to hear Paul McCartney and Snoop doesn’t track with him. haha. It’s also kind of interesting to see that alot of these singers don’t have perfect white teeth. Never noticed that before. The guy from Coldplays are about as yellow as mine. haha

Go buy it. I need the money. Bono told me he’d give me a bird dog spiff for every set I can sell. Oh, sorry. I forgot. It’s not about me.

{insert my best Snoop voiceover imitation} “Yo! Yo! Yo! Check it out! Everybody say A! A! A! Everbody say Po-mo! Po-mo! Po-mo! Everybody say A! Say Pomo! Hey! Hey! Hey! Put it together now! A PoMo! A PoMo! A Pomo! What’s my name? Apomo! What’s my name? A Pomo! Yeah! Yeah! That’s what I’m talkin’ about biyatch!  Peace out!”  {exit stage left giving sideways peace sign near my left nipple and managing to not fall down when I trip over a mic cable} ]]>

Good book, btw. I recommend it. Bought the Vertigo Tour video Sat night after work. Good video. My son watched it for awhile. He said, “The CD’s better.” haha. The stage and the backdrops were incredible. I envy anyone who has seen the show live, including (as much as I hate to admit it) N. haha. I noticed the Live8 DVD boxed set is out too. I think I’ll get those and watch them here at work.

Something in the book I learned from Bono. He doesn’t have much time for self-loathing and self-flaggelation. He says this several times. He’s not really much into introspection. I find this enlightening to a degree because it seems he has a practical understanding of grace that I need to learn. Perhaps my legalistic background still influences me as I tend to constantly look inward and decry myself. I’m not saying that all of this is bad, and I don’t Bono is saying this either. But there comes a point that you have to accept yourself, accept your faults, accept your sins, and learn to live and move within these parameters and not beat yourself up or expect any less success in the spirit because of your faults. Bono freely admits his faults, yet he doesn’t let them stop him from having complete confidence in his ability to fulfill the mission God has given him. Too many times I tend to doubt my ability to do God’s will because I feel so unworthy. I still feel the weight of legalism.

In so many words he says “Yeah, I’m a lousy example of Christian living. I suck at alot of things. I drink too much. I’ve done alot of stuff I’m not proud of and I won’t even talk about them here. But so what? What does it matter? I’m loved by God and I love Him back and that’s what matters. Let’s stop beating ourselves up and save Africa instead. Next question?”  Really cool. He’s kind of like King David in that regard.

(I’m watching the video right now. He’s leading the crowd in a chorus of “Hallelujah!”. It’s totally cool when he does Yahweh and everybody sings along).

The only disappointment in the book is he didn’t talk all that much about the teamwork dynamics that go on in the band. I would be interested to know how they work things out between them, how the creative process evolves, how they view each other’s role and gifts, etc….
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Here’s the deal. When I care about something I get so into it I live it, think it, breathe it, dream it, just totally immerse myself in it. I totally get all in it and it becomes my obssession. As a result I get overly analytical about it, I get impatient with slow progress which gets me depressed sometimes, I get overly critical of other people who don’t understand what I understand and/or lag behind my pace, and then I get frustrated with my life because I can’t devote my life to what I’m passionate about. I’m “stuck” in a great paying job. See the irony there? Sometimes I overdo it and I get burned out of it for awhile.

I’ve been feeling lately that I need to manage my passion. Somehow I need to reign it in and control it. Don’t let it consume me. I can’t let myself get wound up like a three day clock because it’s just not healthy and it drives other people insane.

For me this is easier said than done. I just am not one of those people that can just cruise through life with hardly a care in the world. You know the type. The ones that get stuff done, but they’re not all that ambitious. Or the kind of people that don’t care about important stuff, like spirituality or maybe they’re a believer but really don’t think much about their spirituality. They’re just happy to go through life the way it is and don’t really care much about finding anything more or deeper meaning out of life. I just can’t be that kind of person. I envy them sometimes, but I’m just wired more intensely than that.

So if this is unhealthy, and I think it is, then I have to find a balance. For me this begins with analysis. Why am I this way?

Partly I got it from my Dad. As a kid he was a slave to his job as a minister. He came from the old school that you had to give 4000% to the ministry or you weren’t worthy to be called a minister. He drove himself beyond reason, and it cost him physically. He’s toned it down somewhat the last few years, but I caught the disease.

Partly it’s insecurity. I still base alot of my self-worth on what I do, what I accomplish. I remember when I was contemplating leaving the ministry when I first left the UPC. It about killed me emotionally because my worth was so tied up in what I did for the Lord. To have a regular life was failure in my eyes. It was humiliating and degrading. Yeah, I was that arrogant. I’m not quite as far gone as all the now but I still connect some of my value and worth to what I do.

That’s a big reason I hate and feel guilty about my job. Who in his right mind wouldn’t like to make good money and only have to really work about half a day? But, I hate it. Partly because I feel guilty about it, partly because I’m so passionate about advancing the kingdom that I feel like I’m wasting valuable time sitting behind a desk and merely getting wealthy.

I just get so wound up about church work. I think part of what I have to do is put it in perspective against the larger issues in my life and remind myself that there are other things in life that I need to be a part of, namely my family and friends.

An even larger issue that those is that, contrary to popular opinion, I’m not God. I don’t have to manage the kingdom of God and feel the weight of it’s success or failure on my actions. I’m not responsible for the kingdom of God, God is. It’s his kingdom, not mine. I have to take some of that burden off my shoulders and give it to God. I have to limit how much I care about it. Otherwise it drives me to distraction. I can’t worry too much about the future. I’m not Atlas or Olympia or whoever the hell it was that had the world on his shoulders. I’m just a guy. As much as my meglamaniacal side doesn’t want to admit it, when I die hardly anybody will notice. I’m not as important as I’d like to hope.

Be that as it may though, I still want to do less of what I’m doing and more of what I want to do in the kingdom. I’d love to just have my whole day to do charity work and to be involved in emerging church stuff. Maybe I’m just not ready yet. If I was full-time again, I’d probably end up being consumed by it again. Maybe this is part of my desert experience. Learning to have balance in my passion.]]>

2) Don’t trust MSN Maps for accurate directions. Their directions forgot to tell me I had to first turn left onto Sunrise Blvd before I could expect to turn right onto Trade Center Way. I ended up somewhere in the foothills 30 miles out of the way and 30 minutes late to the meeting. On second thought, maybe that wasn’t so bad…being late to the meeting.

3) Am I a cheap ass bastard because I gave my assistant two free carwash codes from the Shell station for “doing such a good job”? I got them free. You get a free car wash if you get 8 gallons. The last two people that used the pump accidentally left them in the pumps printer. I was just trying to do what they told us in the meeting, show appreciation to your employees for their hard work. Do you think I missed the point?

After I gave him the receipts I told him I wasn’t comfortable with the way he looks at my man boobs when I walk by his desk. He just gave me this really dumb look and said “Huh?”. Maybe he’s the one that should have gone to the classes.  ]]>

gal on myspace. She’s pretty cool. Check it out.]]>

It was pretty cool. Very Catholic in style. Lots of chanting, organ music, and stuff like that. Their facility was pretty cool. It looked alot like a mountain resort from the outside with exposed beams and dark red and dark green and stone. You entered from the side. Not a very good room acoustically but very pleasant to sit in. Nice stain glass up high and the walls on both sides were picture windows so you could everything outside. High, open vaulted ceiling, and the fllor was a tan colored aggregate concrete material. The platform was accessible from all four side, and all wood, not carpeted. The priests sat off the platform to the side, facing the audience. They used Bose sound equipment (Provoked ought to like that).

There weren’t that many people there and they were almost all elderly. It was the early service, maybe the 10:30 crowd was a little younger. They do a “fellowship time” during the service where you’re supposed to shake everybody’s hand around you and say “Peace to you” and smile. But nobody said anything to me afterwards even though I hung around a little. Walked right by the priest and smiled as I headed out the door and he didn’t say anything to me either.

The sermon was good. One of the younger priests, in his 50’s, spoke for about 20 minutes. The sermon was at the beginning of the service too, about 15 minutes in, which I thought was pretty cool. He spoke about all the stuff I’m passionate about. Being incarnational, loving God and loving your neighbor. I liked his term “soul gazer”. He said we need to let the Holy Spirit help us to be soul gazers when we meet people. Not to see them as a resource to meet our need but to see them as fellow children of God that He loves. We’re to see them for their soul value, not their wordly value. It was good stuff. I’d buy the tape if they had them available.

I like the way they have a special reading of scripture as an integral part of the service. I think it’d be cool to use this in our worship service somehow. They had a person hold a large crucifix lead a priest and a helper to the middle aisle where the helper held the scriptures while the priest read a passage from the Gospels. Similar to the Catholic mass I went to last year.

Unlike the Catholic mass I attended, there were no surprises here. Everything was printed out in a 10 page bulletin and you could follow along. That’s nice for me because otherwise I would have been lost like I was when I went to the Catholic mass. This time I knew when to sing, when to respond, when to sit, stand, kneel. At the Catholic thing I was kneeling while they were standind, standing while they were sitting. It was pretty comical.

The bulletin said it was ok for baptized Christians to take communion. So I went up to the front with them and took communion. The priest broke a real loaf of bread and gave it to you while quoting scripture. Another one came by and gave you the wine from a chalice and quoted scripture too. Then you would genuflect and go back to your seat. I noticed the bread was fresh, not stale. Yes, it was real wine. Yes, I genuflected. I didn’t want to be rude. ]]>

UPDATE: Just had a client that said he heard about the Labyrinth from his pastor. Said he wanted to come but couldn’t. His pastor went and said it was really good.

Twice in a single day. Wow.]]>