The annoyance of Joy.

  So I'm making some major changes in my life and I feel great though sometimes that un-certainty likes to creep on in and keep me safe. Thanks but no thanks Doubt Monster, I'm going with the joyous vibe, it's better there. And.....it's a choice so why not?

  I had a great conversation the other night with a bartender who is going through a similar time as well. Progress, decision to expand her life and it has it's repercussions. We talked about the annoyance of joy. Sometimes when you decide to expand, you get excited, you want to share it. And heck, why not? Moving out is a great if not crazy feeling. Will this world support me? Will I fail? But some folks around you get annoyed at your joy. It's a tough one to navigate cause many of those folks are people you love. They like the depressed version of you, or the (barf!) "humble" version of you. That's what they are comfortable with. What they may not understand is getting sane feels as uncomfortable and crazy as going insane and you need a tremendous amount of support to go sane. If they aren't supportive.....

 When I moved to the west coast and started playing saxophone in a wierd band called "Jackie O MotherF$@cker" some of my east coast peers didn't know what to do with this information. They made attempts to be polite and hide it, but I could see right through that. I couldn't for the life of me see what the threat was. Really, who cares about my choice? It's my choice after all! And I no longer needed to play the role of the dreadlock Strat and Marshall stack playing loud cute boy who got the girls with no effort dude any more, thank God. I chose to figure out who I really am and explore why I even make music in the first place. Lord knows, I wasn't happy then, but I was changing.

  At one point in my life I was resentful of happy looking couples and I was surrounded by people that behaved the same as me. You attract what you act. Today, I'm happily single and I love seeing love too. I don't have much interest in the moment at being in a relationship but it's a relief to be able to smile at other people who are. I think it's awesome.

  So how does one overcome this? The changes I'm making, well, I feel high but not drug high. I just feel, high, like high frequency high. I keep dancing in the street and smiling at people. I get a lot of smiles back. I think it's just that. Insisting on loving yourself and others no matter what. That willingness to love moves me into expansion mode and out of contraction. And for those who speak up and say such things as "don't let your head get too big" or "just remember where you came from", love em' and leave em. Get away from that energy. If they choose to grow in a happy way or stay the same that is their choice, you can't do a thing about it.

  And that's my favorite one: "Just remember where you came from!" What if where you came from sucked? What if it was full of misery and violence? (I find when I hear that phrase it usually is from misery and violenceville!) What if you don't like where you came from? Why should you remember it? Why not keep on keeping on to the promised land? That phrase "you can't take it with you" I love right now cause, it's true. I can't take a bummer with me to Joyville. Too much weight! Best to leave that behind.

xoj

Debt!

  When I closed my business in 2010 I was $28,000 in the red, my life seemed to be going nowhere and I would have about 10 seconds of bliss every morning before my mind screamed 'debt! debt! debt!' over and aver again. I had spent the last decade not so differently than many Americans feasting on an orgy of credit cards and loans, burying my head in the sand when the bills got too high.

  That was 4 years ago.

  I now live in New York, my life is expanding, I'm saving money for the first time and I'm earning more doing what I love to do, heck, what I came to planet Earth to do, more than I've ever earned. Things have never been better. I'll be writing the next few post about what I have learned from this whole experience, how I've gone from nightmare to dream in not too long of a time and what I'm struggling with today.

  First: Debt. What is this thing called debt? Well, debt is money and money is debt. Money is a lending system. If all debts were paid today there would be no money left. Bizarre right? Well, we humans invent strange things. Money is easier to carry than goats so I'm all for it. I consider myself a social capitalist, I love making dough and I love being able to contribute to the land I live on helping others realize their dream. When I pay my rent I say thank you for choosing me as a tenant, I am contributing to my landlords vision. If I choose to resent that action, well, I'll only slide back to where I was: freaking out daily.

  So borrowing money isn't evil in itself. Interest, biblically speaking, is. Fees, fees and more fees, to me that is criminal. The system we use is designed to enslave us. No, this isn't an overstatement. It's a mere fact. See for yourself. I feel for the student with those nasty loans. Debt creates fear, debt=doubt. When I moved to Los Angeles after I closed my business I was ready to take on any minimum wage job just to deal. That is insane. My skills are worth $75-$100 an hour if not more. But this is what debt can do: warp our minds and twist our sanity. It is no wonder we as a nation are in such a mess.

  If I take a monkey and stick it in a room with a red button they can press that always rewards them, you shall have one fat monkey and soon a sick monkey. To someone such as myself who abused Visa, Mastercard, Discover, this means the pursuit of pleasure leads right to pain. I had to learn that for myself. I never got suicidal though it's not uncommon. If I had gotten deeper into debt I may have.

  Which is the bizarre thing: it's only a number. If I owe someone $500 the same shame and guilt presents itself as if I owe an institution $25,000. I create a life of hiding and ducking out. I've seen the other side of it: friends owing me $40 and ducking around the corner when they see me for years. That hiding is brutal. I often wonder why a friend wouldn't just pay me $5 a week for 8 weeks then I realized that maybe they just actually need love and this is a way to stay attached, unfinished business is a way to have resentment thrown their way and a way to throw resentment back at me. Yup, I know this pattern all too well myself. The same reality I created with Visa.

  Oh, most of my debt was business related but after a while it was rent, groceries, gas, saxophones....

  We are on a path, this is just a part of that path. You'll live and prosper.

  Fortunately for me I believe there are no accidents. When I moved I had the pleasure of learning about debt from the best: my new scrabble partner. In a former life he was a used car salesman and a debt collector. We talked for hours about money, prosperity, sanity and debt. I learned a lot.

  First thing I learned: Credit card debt? You don't actually have to pay them. It's pretty fucking weird but that is the law. No, that's not for me, I wanted to pay and did not care to duck out the debt collectors, so I chose another route other than the recommended statute of limitations. But, as he told me, in the debt collecting business there are 2 kinds of people they call. The first are nice, church going, God fearing folks who set up payment plans and default on them, almost asking to be punished. "Oh I'll pay my $200 a month if you stop calling me....". The second are folks that know the truth about the debt collecting racket, and it is a racket. They get that call and say "Aw hell no I'm not paying you, CEASE AND DESIST MOTHERFUCKER!" And when the collector calls again you can sue them if you sent a certified cease and desist letter. You can sue them, yes, that is what I just said. They have no right to harass you or your family or friends. In the debt collecting business they call the first category "suckers".

  Now, I felt horrible. I felt guilty, shameful, but you know, guilt is a great way to remain in a state of shame and inaction. "See, I already feel bad" yadda yadda, I don't have to do anything cause I feel bad. Yeah, I passed through that too. But the fact was there was little I could actually do. My life had become deprivation. I lost my apartment in LA and moved back to Columbia, Maryland and took the lowest paying job I had ever taken since high school: Guitar Center. My life felt like a toilet. I felt like a complete loser. I'm a winner, that was just a state of mind. I decided I would save whatever I could and rebuild my life in one of the most expensive cities in the world......

  But first, about those debt collectors. Here is how it works. You default, your debt goes on a debt auction site, much like Ebay for debt collectors. It is in their best interest to buy your debt for as little as possible, maybe pennies on the dollar. Then they try to collect all of it to support their own needs. They say they are collecting for the bank, this is not true. The bank got a tax write off and your debt is sold. Yes, the burden is on the taxpayers like you and I, more guilt if you want it. So basically my debt to US Bank was $14,800 and the first collector paid probably less than $2k for it then tried to collect all of it. More on why this is significant later.

  I went to a state run consumer credit agency for help after the calls started happening at my parents house. They said "bankruptcy". I said "hell no". I figure when there is a storm this is where you learn to sail your ship. I needed to ride this out. I needed to grow up.

  So the first collector called, a goon from New Jersey. He was drunk. I'm not kidding here. He couldn't form the words or say my name. I told him to cease and desist, sent a letter and poof, gone.... till 8 months later. Debt got sold to another agency and another call, another cease and desist.... well, you see the pattern. I could choose to do this until the statute of limitations runs its course, I could deny it but I'm honest. Or I should say I suck at lying.

  So I was speaking to another friend when the next caller started, a collector in Kentucky. What she said blew my mind: "Jef, you are their customer. They are trying to profit from you and they need to treat you with respect. If they are assholes, tell them you will not speak to them until they get someone reasonable on the phone." That turned the whole energy around. They in fact were trying to earn their living off of my suffering and I was the customer now. If I treated my customers with dickishness, I'd have no customers and be broke and lonely. Why did I not cease and desist? See, I was planning to negotiate. If you are reading this, learn to save money or borrow from friends or family with a re-payment plan. I figured they probably paid $1000-$2000 for this debt so I offered $3,000. They accepted. I admit, I borrowed from pop and I am paying him back this money so while I feel I'm out of the woods, I'm still not clear across the field but I am getting there.

  Yes, you can negotiate. Most sane collectors will accept an offer. Most of those debts never get collected. You are the customer, not a victim. Act like a customer in a nice shoe store. If they are chodes, go to another store until you are treated humanely.

  The following days after they accepted I felt like I had just gotten out of some kind of prison. It was like a psychedelic trip, walking around the village kinda dizzy and a bit paranoid. Was I free? Did that just happen? Am I dreaming? What is reality? You get deep when you step one foot into the promised land......

  Now, what they don't tell you about negotiation. In February I received a 1099 form. The discharged remainder is treated as untaxed income. Don't panic. Most folks don't know this but there is a form you can fill out a simple balance sheet that says you were insolvent, or, broke at the time of the negotiation. You don't need to count this is income though you do need to claim it. Get your tax preparer to deal with it. My guy at H&R Block told me with debt being at such epidemic proportions, they fill that form out so much it's routine. And... if you don't have a tax man (or woman!) get one. Your self sufficiency illusion is part of what got you here in the first place!

  And I'll leave with this. Get into debtors anonymous if you are waking up freaked out every day. I wouldn't be living my life had I not turned this crap over to a higher power. It doesn't matter what your attitude is about god or whatever, a group of people who understand is way more powerful than you are. You need help and help is available for free. I expected to have a place to whine about my debt problem, what I got is a place where the emphasis is on creating a vision for your life and following through on that vision. Life without a vision and goals is no kind of life at all. It's no wonder I got hooked on the card! Visa=heroin=coping to a guy like me. Now I can admit I'm an artist and I'm living in my dream. I couldn't admit or accept that before. it was a life of my backup plan, the safety net. Who the fuck actually wants to live in a safety net? Life is about risk, progress and rewards, joy and fun, not suffering and scraping by on those bills resenting every dollar you spend. Oh, we shall all suffer, that is a part of life, but why chase pain? That is the insanity part for me: I was chasing suffering to appear like a victim. What a lie! I live in the United States. I've been a poverty case since I left my parents middle class home and even with that, we don't have war or famine on US soil right now, so I created my own madness! I'm privileged and I am okay with that! And now, I'm moving up because I want to. And I'm moving up in a healthy, positive manner. I've never felt so much joy. I thank my debt every day for forcing me to see the light!

The main thing I learned? That law of attraction shit is real. When my mind was saying "oh no, debt debt debt debt debt I gotta get outta debt debt debt!" all day what happened? I created situations that caused me to get deeper in debt. It wasn't until I realized I can actually focus on "fun, life, savings, music, love!" that the sinking boat turned around. And once you get a little bit of what you actually do want, you realize you can ask for more. See for yourself.....

xoj