Keyword: hippopotomous

  • Hippoposterous

    “Hippoposterous” by Jason Kotecki. 20 x 20. Oil on canvas.
    Original is SOLD 🔴 Shop this art!

    This is a tiny hippo in a bowl of Froot Loops. Or is it a normal-sized hippo in a giant bowl of Froot Loops?

    I don’t remember.

    Either way, it’s preposterous.

    Most serious people don’t have time for the preposterous. They have much more important things to concern themselves with. Of course, there’s a good chance that these people are also riddled with Adultitis, make terrible leaders, and will never change the world.

    Consider the smartphone. It is a device on which you can look up any fact in the world or talk to your friend on the other side of the planet via video. And you can use it to order a hundred melon ballers that will arrive at your door by tomorrow. Just think of all the elements at play that make this thing work: microchips. The internet. Wi-Fi. Facial recognition. Speech recognition. Rechargeable battery. Unbreakable glass. (Oh, wait…)

    Now, imagine having to explain all this stuff to your great-grandparents.

    Preposterous!

    For those of you old enough to remember TV shows from the twentieth century, it’s something out of The Jetsons or Star Trek. But now it’s just an ordinary, normal thing.

    Okay, now let’s compare this to a pocket calculator. The calculator seems simple by comparison, right?

    What if I told you that the first handheld pocket calculator would not be invented until five years AFTER President John F. Kennedy declared, in 1961, that America would send a man to the moon by the end of the decade?

    Preposterous!

    Now let’s look at some of the challenges you might be dealing with.

    • Finding a better job.
    • Paying off that credit card.
    • Landing that account.
    • Finishing your degree.
    • Potty-training your kid.

    Do any of these issues seem all that hard by contrast?

    Will success require creativity? Hard work? Sacrifice? Teamwork? Of course. But let’s not label it as preposterous. It’s amazing how many things that started out as preposterous eventually become rather obvious.

    Remember, there once was a time when a stapler was a fancy piece of office equipment.

  • Like a Boss

    “Like a Boss” by Jason Kotecki. 16 x 20. Oil on canvas.
    Original is SOLD 🔴 Shop this art!

    Life can feel like a high-wire act. You’re doing your best to juggle everything on your plate: your job, your family, your finances, and just when you think everything is going pretty well, you glance down and see someone whose yard looks way better than yours. How do they get those flowers to flourish like that?

    Or someone’s kids who are in way more activities than yours. Will my kids be less attractive to colleges? 

    Or someone who just drove up in their new car. Should I be thinking about getting a better job?

    For instance, my neighbor cuts his grass every six minutes. Okay, maybe it only seems like that. It’s probably more like sixteen. The point is, a perfect lawn is apparently important to him. I’m not here to judge, except I often do judge…myself. 

    Our lawn usually looks pretty shaggy compared to his, especially if it’s been more than a week since we cut our grass. And the fact that we hire that out makes me self-conscious. Does he think I’m less of a man because I don’t cut my own grass? Does he think we think we’re better than him because we hire someone to do it for us? Do the neighbors see our weak landscaping game and think our house is bringing down the home values in the neighborhood? It’s kind of embarrassing to say all this out loud, because I have no reason at all to think anyone is thinking any of this, but it does pop into my head when I lose focus on what matters to me.

    I appreciate a nice lawn, but I value the extra time to spend with my family. One of the reasons I work so hard on my business is so I can spend more time doing what I love and pay someone else to do the things I hate.

    Please understand that I’m not saying my way is the best one. After all, my neighbor friend is retired with kids who are grown. He has a lot more time to spend on keeping up his lawn. For all I know, it might be a therapeutic escape for him. It’s like comparing apples and mangosteens. Which is completely my point.

    Television and magazines are filled with examples of people who seem to have it all together. They gracefully glide through life as the perfect mom, perfect wife, and perfect employee.

    It’s all a facade. We don’t ever know the whole story, whether it’s the celebrity with the flawless teeth or the neighbor right next door. We all have different priorities and are fighting different battles (which often stay hidden from the camera’s lens or our surface-level observations).

    I’m not here to tell you what’s important to you. I’m just here to remind you that it can’t ALL be. 

    The people who are running around like chickens with their heads cut off, trying to keep up with an impossible standard of balancing everything perfectly, are making a huge mistake. Not only is such a standard impossible to attain, but they’re also allowing the busyness to distract them from what’s most important. 

    The people who are doing life right are the ones who are mindful of what kind of life they want to live and are focused on that.

    How do you tackle life like a boss? 

    Stay focused on what’s most important to you. Ignore the rest.