I used to want to be someone special until I met someone special. Now I know, all I want is to be special to my someone special. I spent so much of my life only caring about myself.
Happy Valentine's Day. Never take the one you love for granted...
As a child, I was raised Christian. My denomination was never determined as Catholic, Protestant, Baptist, or Lutheran; just Christian. Religion was, obviously, taught as good and important in life. I went to a couple of churches but I remember Cornerstone church the most. I never had any bad experiences with church but I never had any good experiences either. At times, I was forced to go and that left a bad taste in my mouth. Even as a child, I was always one to question the beliefs we're spoon fed at church. So, I'm going to put my thoughts, and opinions, out and see what other experiences and thoughts I receive.
I'm skeptical of religion, church, and the Bible for several reasons. The foundation and principles of all three are good but the problem is somewhere along the way those principles get misconstrued. Good comes from religion, the Bible, and church but I see bad too. It seems to me that, a lot of religious figures are hypocrites, corrupt, in it for themselves, or all of the above. As a result, many of their followers are led the wrong way. I think religion can cause as much harm as it does good. Wars have been started over religion (the Middle East) and genocide of an entire race because of their religious beliefs (Hitler with the Jews). On the other hand, there are the Mother Theresa's of the world that devote their entire life to God, good, and helping people all because of religion. It seems religion is a double-edged sword.
You see most religious people are hypocrites. It's easy to be hypocritical when you're religious because it's hard to follow God's law to the t and because of this we're taught, at a young age, that it's in our nature to mess up. In order make that okay we call it sinning.
Now, the Bible is a great book, the best selling of all time. It contains great stories, life lessons, and is a guide to how life should be lived. Yet, I can't bring myself to believe that God spoke to the disciples and, as a result, the Bible came to fruition. In psychology, I was taught that a person that hears voices is a schizophrenic, but a couple thousand years ago a person that hears God's voice in their head is a disciple. That's hard for me to believe and extremely easy for me to question.
Look, I don't have a problem with anyone that is religious and goes to church. I think it's great that people have a good foundation to believe in, that's exactly what religion and it all was made up for. I only hope that you aren't, and don't, fall into the bad side of religion. Another thing, I don't understand judging people that don't believe what you believe or aren't your denomination. As for me, I'm going to be the best person I can. I rarely go to church but I don't think that matters as long as you're a good person.
Please share your thoughts with me.
As a person that works in a tip oriented industry, I have come to the conclusion that good (generous) tippers are hard to come by. I've been very frustrated with I'm not sure what the reason is that most people tend to be bad tippers but I believe, and co-workers agree, that it's one of the following reasons:
1. Ignorance - People were not taught how to properly tip.
2. Greed - People are tight with their money and don't believe they should tip.
3. Inability - They can't afford to tip.
I've decided to address all three of these issues one at a time and offer a solution to the problem.
First, I know that some people are ignorant to tipping in general. I've heard from a couple of people that they didn't know they were supposed to tip. These individuals simply weren't taught by their parents, or anyone else, during their life to tip or how much.
The Solution - spend time in school, that's supposed to prepare you for life, teaching kids the art of tipping.
Next, are are greedy people. These are the people that didn't share their toys as kids. It's their money and they're going to do with their money as they please.
The Solution - Pay these greedy people in tips based on their job performance, so that they'll learn what it's like to work really hard and get little or nothing for it.
Finally, people with the inability to tip. These people don't make a lot of money, and that's fine neither do people in the tip industry, but that's the point!
The Solution - If you're going to go out for dinner, or order a pizza to be delivered, you know a tip is involved as part of the process. Enjoy dinner out, or staying in and having your food delivered, but allow for the tip within whatever budget you have.
The main reason I decided to talk about tipping is because I'm a pizza delivery guy. I enjoy the job because I get to be out of the store for periods of time during the day, or night. The problem is whenever you drive 15 minutes to a persons home and they tip $1.79 on a $24.21 order, it happens more often than not. It's a slap in the face as well as highly offensive. Anyone that delivers RISKS THEIR LIVES so that they can bring you food to stuff your face with. We could have a car wreck and die en route to your home. None of us do the job for the joy of meeting you and your dogs.
Now you may be asking yourself, what should I tip? Well, the answer is easy to follow. 15% used to be the standard for someone that does an adequate job. The amount you tip fluctuates up, or down, based on the persons (server, delivery person, bartender) performance. The standard is now 18-20% and follows the same guideline as before. Thus, the $1.79 tip I received was a 7.39% tip, which is horrible. I failed to mention she lives 7 miles from my store. Even if she was across the street that's a horrible tip.
The moral of the story is! Anytime you deal with a person in the service industry please take good care of them. We're all there for your benefit and, as long as you're taken care of, you should take care of them by tipping appropriately!
Just so you know, I won't be talking about taxes in this post. I've been thinking about death today for a couple of reasons.
First, I was browsing mydeathspace. If you haven't heard of it, it's a website that lists people with myspace that have died, and the cause. Many of the people are my age or younger and it just goes to show how quickly you can leave this world at any time. I found it sad, this time, because all their friends and family were leaving them messages telling them they love them and how much they miss them.
Second, I read a blog by a 93 year old man, named Donald Crowdis, entitled It Bothers Me I Have To Go. It really made me think about time I've already wasted and focusing on seizing every moment I have remaining.
Finally, this evening I'm talking to my mom and I tell her about his blog. She then tells me that she had a thought she's never had before just the other day. It was raining when she woke up and she thought, "I wonder how many more times I'm going to get to hear the rain?". Mind you she just turned fifty in October but her thought is very poignant, I think.
Life, definitely, is what we make it. It can be taken from us in an instance no matter who we are, how old we are, or who we "know". Today reaffirmed what I already know about myself. I want to do something important with my life to help people.
I also want to to be true to myself and the people around me. I want to love someone with all my heart, again, and I want them to love me the same way.
I leave you with this...
Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.
~ Aristotle
