Don Hall 6/13/17 Don Hall 6/13/17

Discerning the Dominant Chimp

It's all in the attitude. We're all just a huge collection of stereotypes and cliches. Admit it to yourself and you'll feel better. I promise.

Don Hall 6/11/17 Don Hall 6/11/17

Outta Sight, Outta Mind

In our daily walk through the paths we choose, we all want to feel important. This is as universal as breathing oxygen to live in the human condition. It is the reason behind our rage and sense of victimhood. It is the driving factor within our desire for connection with others.

To somehow find people in our lives who see us as being worth sacrifice and loyalty, commitment and love.

To be seen and treated as if we are of import.

Don Hall 6/7/17 Don Hall 6/7/17

Between Generations and Happy to Steal from Both

"When I ask older people,* they say it's the smart thing to get a stable job with benefits and a secure salary even if I don't like the job. When I ask younger people,** they tell me to take time off, that it's completely fine to jump from job to job until I find something that, I don't know, fulfills me."

* Older than 33.
** Younger than 33.

My friend is leaving her job. It seems things are getting fairly dismal over at my former place of employ and that, perhaps, I got out while the getting was good. Unlike me, she's leaving without any kind of severance package and is a bit lost in her Next Step on the Journey sort of deal. She wanted to grab lunch and see how I'm doing as a gauge for what comes next for her.

"You don't seem to fit either category. What's that all about?"

Don Hall 6/6/17 Don Hall 6/6/17

I Believe... [Bill Maher Needs to Channel Lenny Bruce]

...that if Bill Maher wants to say the word, he should take Lenny Bruce's cue and say it so many times it becomes meaningless or makes a point. The casual dropping of an intense racial epithet is exponentially worse in its flip and careless use.

Don Hall 6/5/17 Don Hall 6/5/17

Diversifying Your Identity Portfolio to Become a Real Live Person

Identity is that which we find our own self worth. It is the moniker we decide is most representative of our essential I—being professionally successful, being highly educated, making a lot of money, being an excellent parent, being pious and faithful in a chosen religion, being socially and/or sexually popular and desired, being physically attractive or beautiful. It includes areas that we have no control over but decide to embrace—our skin color, our gender, our sexual preferences, our physicality.

Race and gender and physicality are born-in traits but the choice is not to erase them but to either embrace the stereotypes laid upon skin color, sexuality and disability or buck those stereotypes. Culture, hair style, language—the trappings of the outward display of identity—are all conscious choices.

What you choose indicates what you value in life.

Don Hall 6/4/17 Don Hall 6/4/17

Do You Have a Personal Relationship with Joe Janes?

"Do you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ?"

Ordinarily, I just avoid the spiraling pit of nonsense discussion that entering into this question/trap opens up. I know that the fact that I do not have a personal relationship with a long dead carpenter who, in legend, resembles Paul Bunyan crossed with Smokey the Bear is going to start a pseudo-psychological debate about my life and the void that I have in it.

Not this time. Just not in the mood.

Don Hall 6/2/17 Don Hall 6/2/17

Living Two Lives is Like Walking on a Razor's Edge

It points out that I live two lives every day: the one that engages in face-to-face conversations and takes walks in my neighborhood and has a beer (or two) with people, and the other that is immersed in the screens in front of my face.

Don Hall 6/1/17 Don Hall 6/1/17

Move with Purpose (or The Removal of Unnecessary Motion)

One of my personal favorite shorthand directions when working on a staged play I stole from my second ex-wife.

"Move with purpose."

So simple.

Translated it means that if you are going to cross from point A to point B, have a reason to do so that connects with the character's life in the play. It funnels down to mean that all movement, down to scratching your face or tying your shoe needs to connect with your purpose. As an actor, it's an extremely helpful tool as I have a tendency to move around a lot with no function other than I just have lots of freakin' energy.

Don Hall 5/30/17 Don Hall 5/30/17

The Rhetoric of Separatism

The fecundity of division is easy. Is someone black? They go in the Black Category. Wearing a blue uniform? Racist Thug Category. White? White Supremacist Category. That rhetoric, however, is only good for inciting division. And division is the opposite of the solutions to create and maintain a fair and just society for every single one of us.

Don Hall 5/29/17 Don Hall 5/29/17

I Believe... [Snake Plissken vs Johnny Castle]

Don Hall 5/28/17 Don Hall 5/28/17

Is Emotional Labor the Same as Working Construction in Your Dreams?

There is a misconception going around that having a conversation about difficult subjects is hard. That the very idea of sitting down with someone who vehemently disagrees with you is so taxing that the potential results of common understanding and forward momentum are simply seen as not worth the effort.

I'm not buying it. And I don't even like Heineken.

Don Hall 5/27/17 Don Hall 5/27/17

I Joined Quora and Now Am Filled with Despair

As a piece of the freelance journey and in a desire to increase my online visibility (online presence and freelance work go hand in hand these days) I was advised to join Quora. Quora is a a social network where people can ask questions and, ideally, receive answers from experts on the subjects.

In principle, it works. In practice, I have been struck that either many of the questions are generated by robot or there are just too many lazy, stupid people in the world for me to be able to grasp.

Don Hall 5/25/17 Don Hall 5/25/17

Worker Bonuses, Fresh Ingredients and No Advertising

My experience has indicated to me that money (and the focus on business over quality) is like red onions. A little bit is a nice addition to your burger but even a bit too much makes the whole sandwich taste like nothing but red onions.

There is a way to make millions without losing your soul to the Greed Virus.

Don Hall 5/23/17 Don Hall 5/23/17

The Rabbit Hole of Sewage and Unrestrained Horror

In the dawn of the New Era of Emotional Primacy, the concept that our emotions are the most intelligent approach to decision making is just as shortsighted and just as completely chuckleheaded. As I've written before, in a world of Kirks, we need a few more Spock's. Spock generally walked the Good Captain through the consequences of his poorly thought-out actions.

Don Hall 5/21/17 Don Hall 5/21/17

Ce n'est pas votre vie (This is not your life)

Perhaps the desire to have an omnipotent god floating above and beyond us is the desire to have some being see and record the objective truth, untainted by human memory or the traps of ego or of believing that which you choose to believe rather than what is true. An idea that somewhere there is an accounting for our mistakes and misdeeds, or silent moments of suffering or failure, the betrayals and disloyalty, the hidden opinions expressed in odd looks or coded phrases by someone or something untouched by our daily grind.

Don Hall 5/20/17 Don Hall 5/20/17

If Trump Is Not Your President, Try Not Acting Like Him

The sudden scorched earth viciousness of doing everything instantly to destroy someone you disagree with is almost comical if it weren't so stunted and counterproductive. But it works for Trump, so why not, right? Or maybe it doesn't work in the long run as we can see four months into his reign.

Don Hall 5/19/17 Don Hall 5/19/17

I Believe... [Trump vs. Harrison]

...that the idea of a male romper is more distressing than the man-bun, the endless facial hair and the fake enthusiasm for kale. I may move to Wyoming and live in a cave to avoid modern fashion trends.

Don Hall 5/18/17 Don Hall 5/18/17

Recalibrating the Daily Grind (Like College but With Higher Stakes)

On more pragmatic levels, it's slightly terrifying. In practice, I still have to do things on task that generate income and no one I know is going to pay me to masturbate and eat bricks of cheese while watching Better Call Saul for eight hours at a stretch. The dawning realization is that there have to be rules that I commit to following just like when chained to a public radio cubicle inches from the little twat I trained and who finally found the backhanded courage to impale me in the spine with Sharpies.

This time, however, the rules are mine to create.

Don Hall 5/16/17 Don Hall 5/16/17

Bay Leaf Game Theory (and Other Lessons from My Mother)

When I was a kid, we weren't exactly flush for a lot of my growing up. Granted, I wouldn't have known it because my mother often worked several jobs to feed my sister and I. My mother would not let us wallow in the bucket of self pity that she saw in others. Whenever we started feeling "poor" she'd grab us up and spend the last of our money to take us out for a big night at Shakey's Pizza. "Poor people don't eat at Shakey's Pizza so we aren't poor," she'd demand.

It's a lesson I've kept with me all my life.

Don Hall 5/12/17 Don Hall 5/12/17

Creation Does Not Guarantee Equality

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness."

Jesus Christ, that's a high bar. I mean, first, the whole "endowed by their Creator" hits the religion thing pretty hard on the nose. For this post, let's just assume that in spite of their vast knowledge of the Magna Carta and the enormously well read nature of our Founding Fathers, they were still sort of a bizarre group of highly superstitious religious types, admit the flaw and move on, OK?

It's that almost comical statement that "all men are created equal." Ignore the fact that they only meant men and only white men and only rich white men. Let's take the phrase as we interpret it today. That WE ARE ALL CREATED EQUAL.

I hate to break it to you but that's complete horseshit.