workinrhythm.com Blog

The gigs used to come from places like Miami and Vegas.  Now they are in places like Hoboken and Fresno.

Oh well, I’ll take them where I can get them.

No kidding

Happy Drumming

Well, the recession must be over.  I booked more drum circles in the last three days then I did in the last six months.

I’m (we are) guilty.  Guilty of holding onto our money and not spending.  We have put off our annual Spring Vacation or as it has become ‘the naycation” and have virtually stopped using our credit cards.  We are limiting our dinners out and cooking at home much more often.  Thats okay, we like to cook.  I just don’t like to clean.

I realize we are part of the problem. But I also think that if we spend to help the economy.  It would not be enough so here is my simple plan that I believe in some form has some merit.

Its easy.  Lets spend in mass.  Designate a day and a time where everyone spends twenty dollars per person in the household. In my case it would be sixty bucks for the three of us.  Infuse the economy and the market with cash.  Then lets do it again next week and the week after.  I believe that simple spending will help generate cash and channel it in all directions.  Twenty bucks is not to much to ask to help ourselves.

Lets stop watching the news too.  Boy, can they perpetuate a situation?   I am a little tired of the media telling us how bad things are.   They are beating us into the ground with all the gloom-and-doom and naysaying.  Its really out of control.

I just think the Twenty Buck Plan would work.

Have a great day today!

When I find something I like, I want to share it with my friends. A few years back a new pizza place opened in our town. The pizza was the best I had in a long time (in South Jersey). I told everyone I knew to check out the pizza. They apparently did as when I went in the owner refused to take my money and thanked me for talking up his product.  Unfortunately for the owner, his pizza maker, who brought with him is own recipe for sauce and the best anchovies left.  Taking his sauce recipe with him.  The pizza went downhill fast.  Of course, I had to let everyone know this too.

Well, this post is not about pizza but Bikram Yoga.  I started doing yoga nine years ago. For six years I would do two to four Ashtanga classes a week.  Then one day I tried Bikram Yoga.  Its ideally done in a mirrored studio on a carpet (with a mat) and the room temperature should be 105 degress and 47 % humidity.  I remember the first time I did it I said to myself   “I could never do that more then once a week”  but soon enough I found myself going to two classes a week then three classes a week then four….

Almost three years after doing my first Bikram class, I now do five to seven classes a week.  I rise at four thirty every morning, some days more reluctantly then others but I do get up. By five O’clock Iam out the door, get to the studio (about 14 minutes away) and crank up the heat .  In the studio there are two ventless gas heaters and four electric heaters. At 5:30 I am at the top of my mat for the hour and a half session in front of me.

Now why do I do this? The answer gets more apparent and clear to me every time I leave the studio.  I feel great! Its not just stretching, its a lot more. Its a cardio workout, it strengthens the mind and power to concentrate, it puts me in touch with every muscle group in my body and its incredibly challenging if you let it.  It keeps me going back for more.

Physically I am have built up great core strength.  I am more flexible then I was when I was a teenager ( I avoided stretching back then because it hurt) and I feel the aging process has slowed down considerably.  Its obvious to me when I look around at other people over fifty, they seem to be aging quicker then I and I really feel that I am in reverse. Its a great feeling.

But absolutely none of this has come without determination and hard work.  During the three years of Bikram I have seen hundreds of people come to class and never return (its not for everyone) or I have seen people come for months or longer then leave and not come back. I realize that sometimes life gets in the way, but what is life if yo cant live it to its fullest?  I dont mind getting old. I just dont want to feel old.

Check it out. I highly recommend  it!   Have a great day today!

Freddie Mac was my very first corporate gig back in 1997.  I was brought into their corporate headquarters somewhere in Northern Virginia.  I remember being impressed by the executives who rolled up their very white and starched shirt sleeves and got down to the business at hand.  Learning to play the beautiful music of Brazil called Samba.  It went over quite well and I remember impressing myself and leaving their headquarters full of ego and a double latte I picked up at the Starbucks in their lobby.

Over the next twelve years the hot industry of the moment would supply about fifty percent of my corporate gigs.  First it was the dot.coms. then it was the technology industry, followed by the pharmaceutical companies and then the defense consulting firms.  But always, spread thorughout those years were the very impressive bank meetings.  Of all the companies that were represented by their ceo’s in front of congress this last week, I had been to at least one meeting  of each of those banks.  As well as most of the big national mortgage companies.   Did them all.  A lot of big extravagant meetings in Vegas or Miami or at posh training facilities north of New York City in Westchester County where trainees were greeted with five star accomodations, the best wines supplied to the room, the finest in diining and the lure of power and wealth exhibited through stately English type estates complete with neatly manicured lawns and perfectly stacked stone walls.

It was more then a unique situation to be in.   Peering into the inner workings of the companies that are or were,  the backbone of America.  It would be hard to imagine that companies like Lehman Brothers would be non-existant in just a short time.  That it would all come crashing down.  That the meetings and the spending and the drumming would stop.

But it did. And rightfully so, the drumming.

I was at the beach yesterday watching my son surf. It was a beautiful day at The Cove in Cape May NJ and the waves were long and clean. A great day for the longboarders to enjoy one of the last real ‘nice’ days of the year.

There were probably fifteen to twenty surfers spread between the breaks and all were wearing
wet suit shoes or ‘booties as they are called, all except my son, Christian,

“I dont know how he’s doing it” I heard from more then one of the surfers who emerged from the water onto the beach to walk back to the jetty. “Is the water really cold?” I asked
It was repeatedly a profound “Yes”.

Now I would gladly buy my son a new pair of booties if he asked. He hasnt asked nor does he seem to care. “Aren’t your feet cold” I ask over again “Im fine” he exclaims.

As I sat on the beach feeling sort of like a ‘bad dad’ because my son is in the surf with no booties and I keep having to explain to people “he says he’s fine” when they notice he has’nt any boots on. I wondered and corrolated this phenomenon to life in general.

He is so passionate about his surfing and is willing to tolerate the pain to the point of not even knowing it exists. Passion, is human nature at its greatest potential