The awesomeness of social networks

Perhaps the best way for me to answer our latest social media question assignment is to inform of how I am currently using social networks, how I have used them, and how I plan to use them in the not so distant future.

In my project that I am doing in a couple of weeks on micro lending, I have opened an account with perhaps the largest Internet social media micro lending service provider in the world, Kiva. I have given two small business loans of $25.00 each. Typically, each $25.00 loan goes to a pool of loans from different people for various purposes of the groups or individuals involved. I will explain this charitable service more in depth when I give my presentation to the class, but with Kiva, I am able to invite other friends and family to join in through LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube (with your own channel), Friendster, MySpace, and Squidoo. You can almost launch your own marketing campaign within these social networking sites just to get the word out there on the impact that Kiva is making. If interested, please click here for the Kiva homepage (http://www.kiva.org/?_redirect=true&page=home).

For my volunteer work this past summer in South America, I used Facebook myself to raise awareness and attain donations for mission work I did. I had a link for Creative Corners, the organization I was working with, so that people could give donations to me directly through the form of an electronic check or through the use of a credit card. I created a Facebook group for my personal trip and also for Creative Corners to invite all my friends to join. I posted videos and regular updates. I used this source of communication primarily for people to pray for me…for safe traveling and the work I was doing. If interested Creative Corners, please click here for homepage (http://www.creative-corners.com/our_work/).

I have recently joined a club at Auburn known as Mocha Club where you donate $7.00 dollars a month (literally perhaps the price of two coffees from Starbucks or another coffee shop). This has been very successful at college campuses across the country because most college students can afford such a small sum to help other people. Mocha Club permits its members to choose different causes for what you would like to contribute to, such as clean water, education, HIV awareness, and so on. On Mocha Club’s website, you literally have a social network right there that works similarly to Kiva. I can create a team of people I have invited to join this cause for $7.00 a month. You can literally send invitations through all the major existent social networking sites, including Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Friendster, and about ten other online social or service organizations. If interested, please click here for the Mocha Club homepage (https://www.mochaclub.org/).

When I graduate, I will be writing a book this summer, and I am seeking to become an inspirational speaker so that I may travel around the world to speak on various topics in relation to my life and the adversity I have faced and overcome. I seek to use social marketing to promote my new book and my name in efforts to attain an agent and a book contract. I am not really sure how all this is going to work, but my hope is to build an Internet audience of followers so that my reputation is spread in the unique message I am hoping to send and talk about.

As you can notice in my entry, social networks are a very powerful tool to raise money for any worthy cause. Social networks are a powerful marketing tool to spread the word about anything for any purpose. The extent to which you use social marketing is really up to the person who seeks to attain a specific goal. If you are looking to inform, promote, or spread the word, the ability to do so is really limitless with new technology through social media.

Friendship: What it means to me?

This past year (2009) I have really had one of the most interesting plotlines of my relational career in terms of friendship and pursuit…perhaps some sob stories and also some hysterical moments. I am smiling right now, but in the midst of some storms, there are not always smiles to be had, just prayer and even perhaps sulky tears.

My attitude towards any friendship has always been simple: serve the other person with 100% effort. I have come to find and believe that I do that pretty well, despite what other people may think or say. In any relationship, it becomes extremely difficult when you give and give and give, especially for long periods of time only for the other person to take and take and take. For me personally, this more or less pertains to past dating relationships I have had in the last couple of years. You give all you have to serve the other person…to make his or her life easier…to truly make things better for them; sometimes I think people just forget what friendship is. I do not believe friendship is meant to be a scratch my back, and I will scratch your back kind of thing. That sounds too political like a barter system. Remember that if we truly serve others we will not keep count or tallies of what we are doing for them, but I must admit that I think it is our human tendency to do just that…to keep count. I did this for you, and you should do this for me. It is very discouraging when other people perhaps take and take and take and perhaps do nothing for another person because they are so “busy” or whatever the excuse they come up with. Maybe one of the main points I am getting it is that you can only give in and give up so much before you are exhausted and you no longer want to give anymore. If the other person is not even trying, then I am not even entirely sure that is true friendship in the Biblical sense. Eventually you might come to the conclusion that enough is enough, and you refuse to give anymore. If you find yourself in this predicament, maybe you should be asking if the other person was a genuine friend in the first place. My definition of friendship is doing hard work, real hard work. If another person is standing around and doing nothing for a friendship to grow, then perhaps acquaintance or casual friend would be a better word to describe the person. We know each other’s name, and occasionally we will see each other around.

Another essential aspect to friendship is just having fun. Sometimes we take things so seriously we do not even have fun with each other. I believe God meant for us to enjoy and glorify Him forever. Well, if you are serious all the time, it is probably too hard to enjoy anything.

Please also realize I have different levels of friends. I have best friends, good friends, and average friends, but overall, the other person gives to some extent. It may be as simple as sending me a message through Facebook, text, or calling me to talk for three or four minutes. When I mention giving to someone, you do not need to sale your house and give them everything, including the shirt on your back. What I am referring to is just giving your time. Sometimes it is that simple…give someone your time, even if you think you are the “busiest” person on the planet, which by the way you probably are not.

I am often surprised how Americans so casually consider what friendship is. “Friendships come and go, but I am here to stay.” First of all, people are not going to stay here forever on this planet; unfortunately, a day comes when all will end. Sometimes we treat friendships like they are baseball cards in some trading contest. A friendship involves a person with feelings, with hardships, and with other dimensions most people do not even take time to know. I think sometimes that people deserve to be treated better than we treat them. We, including myself, dispose of friendships often without much thought because of convenience or really dumb fights. Sometimes I am shocked at why people just give up friendships over really silly things. It is easy to forget what other people have done for us when we are caught up the emotions of a moment, such as being angry. The only point of view we seek to understand is our own, instead of the other person in why they acted the way they do. I think there will come times where all you can do is let go because the price to hold on is simply too much. In intentionality, you may have to cut someone off, even if it hurts, because in the long run it will hurt more to try and hold on. Like I said, I can only give so much before the spiral of violence turns into dangerous grounds.

One last thing I would like to touch upon is gossip. Gossip will destroy a multitude of friendships quicker than a forest fire in dry conditions. What is unusual about gossip is that it will destroy a friendship without the knowledge of the two people that are even in the friendship. One person will say, “Do you know what so and so said about you?” The same question may be presented to the other friend in the situation encountered. Before you know, each person in the friendship believes the word of someone else without even consulting the other person. This is a very dangerous position to be in because you start to believe other people, instead of the original person in the friendship. The friendship becomes ruined based on what other people say. First of all, if you are tempted to gossip about anyone, my advice for you is to be quiet! Some people have so much trouble doing this when it is really not that hard; it kills me when people speak without ever even thinking about what they are saying. Secondly, if you have heard someone say something about you or someone else and you feel compelled to communicate with the person who is being mentioned, go to the source you have this sudden conflict or emotional splurge with. I would also encourage you to wait a few days. If you say something out of emotion, you may indeed say something you regret.

Friendship is a gift, and I am often surprised how we dispose of it so easily and take it so for granted.

Again, I want to reiterate these are lessons I have learned over the past few years and not necessarily in just a few months. I work on blog entries, poems, and any other type of writing for several days if not weeks before I post it. That is the nature of a serious writer aspiring to be an author. Unlike some blogs, I do not instantaneously post whatever comes to mind in the second of a minute, even as awesome and educated that action might be.

The Country Version of RSS Long Songs

So if you do not like country music, I might venture to seriously ask if you are indeed a true born Yankee because you probably are. When Valentine’s Day comes around, many of us are reminded to be grateful for singles’ awareness, especially when someone cancels Valentine’s Day plans at the last minute for the best excuses heard round the world. Fortunately, a last minute cancellation has only happened once on Valentine's Day astonishingly in undue fashion a long time ago.

On a happier note, my friends and I once cooked dinner for about thirty single girls at Clemson University. We decorated a large banquet hall at a local church and performed various love-related skits, songs, recitations. As you have seen on my blog, I am a rather large fan and writer of poetry. So I quoted a few of my favorite works for my performance piece. I think that Valentine’s can be like Christmas for some people. When you are alone, it can be just a simple reminder of the pain one might feel by the fact that you are alone without friends or family physically around for often unknown reasons. For any holiday, it hurts even more when you go out of your way for someone, and he or she simple seems to have this “I do not really care attitude.” I believe that Valentine’s Day is supposed to be about genuine, sincere, servant-like love. Even though I was a crazy Freshman boy trying to make my friends feel better on Single’s Awareness Day, the thought was simply to make the girls feel special…to make them feel noticed…to remind them they are indeed beautiful in God’s eyes. Although not the norm, sometimes one might go out of his or her way to simply acknowledge a friendship in encouragement letting someone know how special they truly are. This is the agape love of an approach I hope to one day find myself in so that Valentine’s Day is not so much of a dreaded day on my calendar, becoming a distant memory of past fun times . We sometimes take things so seriously we take the fun out of cupid’s wings in the gesture of a simple thought.

Sometimes we listen to our favorite country love songs without even applying the words and lyrics to our own lives. The following are some RSS feeds regarding this topic of country love. If you would like to explore this topic in its truest First Corinthians 13 form, I would suggest listening to and/or reading some of the lyrics of this wonderfully written music. Helium lists nineteen top country love songs each with a story or article for each song that has been chosen. There is an available RSS feed icon to select so you may join the relevant feed. There is another top twenty country love song list as determined by Blake Shelton on The Great American Country Television website. There is even a live stream video of the show he did in dedication to Valentine’s Day. You may again subscribe to the RSS feeds on the nature of the topic in terms of what you are specifically interested in. Here is another blog with an entry including the music videos of love songs this particular writer has a found a unique taste for. I found his comments personally entertaining. You can subscribe to the RSS feed of RMcrayne’s country-relevant messages and topics in connection to his personal blog. Lisa L. Rollins, a predominant journalist for The Nashville Country Music Examiner, also lists through an RSS feed her “Cupid’s country countdown” ….14 of the greatest classic-country love songs of all time. If you indeed appreciate music, I believe you find some of these RSS feeds and top country love song countdown lists perhaps inspirational and invigorating to go out and find that special someone, even if you have not had much success as of recently.

The following are some recent love songs I have come across that certainly touch my inner hopeless romantic personality.

Brad Paisley sings an awesome song entitled, “We Danced.” I must say it is very euphoric in the dreamiest of senses. Here are some of the basic lyrics that tell a little bit of the story in this Strutting Duck closing type of environment.

And from that moment
There was never any doubt
I had found the one
That I had always dreamed about
And then one evenin'
When she stopped by after work
I pulled a diamond ring out of the pocket of my shirt
And as her eyes filled up with tears
She said, "This is the last thing I expected"
And then she took me by the hand
And said, "I'll only marry you on one condition"

And we danced
Out there on that empty hardwood floor
The chairs up and the lights turned way down low
The music played, we held each other close
And we danced.

Not many people especially like Vince Gill, but I find his voice soothing when I am trying to take a long nap on a rainy day. One of my favorite songs by him is called “Whenever You Come Around.” Some of the lyrics are as follows:

The face of an angel; pretty eyes that shine
I lie awake at night wishing you were mine
I'm standing here holding the biggest heartache in town
Whenever you come around

I get weak in the knees; and I lose my breath
Oh I try to speak but the words won't come
I'm so scared to death
And when you smile the world turns upside down
Whenever you come around

I feel so helpless; I feel just like a kid
What is it about you that makes me keep my feelings hid
I wish I could tell you, but the words can't be found
Whenever you come around.

On last song I cannot forget to mention by a guy by the name of Jason Aldean. He sings a famous song entitled, “She’s Country,” which may indeed drive any country boy insane. This song, on a more serious tone, touches more into the reality that a girl presents in respect to a boy’s and/or man’s heart. The song is “Truth,” and these are some of its lyrics:

Tell em all I'm on vacation,
Say I went to visit friends,
That you ain't heard or seen from me in quite a while,
When they ask you where I've been,
Tell em I'm out on the west coast where it don't ever rain,
And that I'm probably doing fine,

(Chorus)
Just don't tell em I've gone crazy,
That I'm still strung out over you,
Tell em anything you want to,
Just don't tell em all the truth,
Yeah don't tell em all the truth,

Tell em all I'm out in Vegas,
Blowin' every dollar I ever made,
Tell em that I must be into something bad for me cause,
I sure lost a lot of weight,
Tell em I'm out on the road with some old rock and roll band,
Living like a gypsy can,

(Chorus)

The truth is that I'm asking you to lie,
And we both know that it ain't right,
But if you ever loved me please,
Have some mercy on me,
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

Tell em anything you want to,
Just don't tell em all the truth,
Yeah don't tell em all the truth,
I still need you,
Yeah that's the truth,
I still love you,
Baby that's the truth.

A song entitled “Then” by Brad Paisley has become one of my recent favorites. Check out the music video below.

Click here to read Helium’s article on the nineteen top country love songs of all time (http://www.helium.com/knowledge/118377-unforgettable-country-love-songs).

Click here to see Blake Shelton’s take on his top twenty favorite country love songs (http://www.gactv.com/gac/shows_spl/episode/0,,GAC_26200_61732,00.html).

Click here to read RMcrayne’s blog with his thoughts on love country music among other country aspirations (http://hubpages.com/hub/Romantic-Songs-Favorite-Country-Music-Love-Songs).

Click here to read Lisa Rollin’s piece on “Cupid country countdown” (http://www.examiner.com/x-2851-Nashville-Country-Music-Examiner~y2009m2d14-Cupids-country-countdown-14-of-the-greatest-classiccountry-love-songs-of-all-time). I think you will be enlightened by her personal selection if you are into this sort of thing.

RSS in simple English...

People appear to use RSS (Really Simple Syndication) for several reasons for expressing opinions about random topics, whether they relate to everyday atypical life or not. Whatisrss.com informs: “RSS solves a problem for people who regularly use the web. It allows you to easily stay informed by retrieving the latest content from the sites you are interested in. You save time by not needing to visit each site individually. You ensure your privacy, by not needing to join each site's email newsletter” (par. 2).

Click here to see some of the most popular RSS feeds at CNN (http://www.cnn.com/services/rss/).

The following YouTube video explains that RSS allows people to bring information to them without have to waste time in going out on the web to look for it. RSS is a movement toward users puling information instead of organizations just pushing it on us as consumers to go out there and find it. If you wish to use this method of information gathering through really simple syndication, Google Reader and News Gator are two services among several that will assist you in doing so. You can scroll through all of the information in a single area instead of going to all these sites individually. Many sites offer the chance to subscribe through an RSS feeder so that you can link it to a private reader account.





RSS Primer: One Page Quick Introduction to RSS. Retrieved February 18, 2010, from What Is RSS? RSS Explained Website: http://www.whatisrss.com/

The miscommunication of miscommunication…What love language are you?

I think often times we, as Christians, think we can do whatever we what without His Presence acting as an all-encompassing power behind us, but let’s be honest…nothing could be farther from the truth. Whether it is pursuing that girl you have been crazy about ever since when or buying the new Transformers Bumble-Bee Camero look-alike, some dreams and aspirations are only possible because a loving God decides to assist you in carrying out his Will. Powerfully, this morning I was awoken with a reminder of my love language through my relationship with Christ; the two of five love languages that my life and spiritual relationship successfully revolve around are affirmation and quality time. In some regards, while this is no excuse, if these two things are not being poured into, I have recently found that I can be in the worst of moods, often taking out my anger and frustration out on other people that are far from deserving such negligent treatment. Click to see Dr. Gary Chapman’s website for his world-changing philosophy on this phenomenon (http://www.5lovelanguages.com/).

You see…I am a person who thrives on open communication. When someone rejects or ignores me, it is like a dagger to my heart because it rejects this inner need of affirmation. I need people to affirm that I exist in reality by verbal acknowledgment so I myself may feel fulfilled in a relationship, friendship, or possibly more. Now where I have struggled with this recently is that I have not come to Christ for this fulfillment, and this is where some may say I have personally failed. I have been seeking affirmation fulfillments in people who may or may not understand exactly how my personality functions, or at least they may be still trying to figure all that out. I definitely owe some very dear people in my life a sincere apology for my own misunderstanding in even how my own love language and communication style work. You will continue to have miscommunications of miscommunication if you yourself do not understand how your own love languages work.

Click here to read the 5 love languages blog (http://www.5lovelanguages.com/blog/). There is also a five love languages quiz on the website if you would like to start exploring what your love language is and how your communication styles can improve with perhaps new found insight.

What does it take to be noticed? Prayer for another person….

My sister recently started a blog about her baby (http://www.whattoblogwhenyouareblogging.blogspot.com/). She is about seven months along I believe. Anyway, my sister’s baby has a unique heart condition where the two upper valve chambers of the baby’s heart are not functioning correctly. I may be describing the medical complications completely incorrectly, and quite honestly, I cannot even remember the medical diagnosis because Pig Latin has never been one of my strengths as a foreign language.

Back to a more serious note, the baby has a deathly diagnosis that could lead to potentially adverse health consequences. I have been told the survival rate to live is 65% for babies with this condition.

I have a simple point to make in relation to my previous entry. In my sister’s case, her blog is meant to inform of the struggles not just with child birth but also with this profound trial of adversity. Several couples have encountered similar challenges, and perhaps her story and her boldness to write and cope will assist others with comfort and courage to face what has yet to come.

My point is that people are facing tragedies and overcoming things such as this everyday. People are encountering near-death experiences, and yet we act as if every day, one after the other, is going to be granted to us for free by Aladdin in a magic genie bottle. First of all, you need to wake and face reality if you believe this is the case. The other thing is that you should not spend your life wasting moments to “get things done,” “to be busy,” and “to take care of business.” Yes, I might agree to an extent that our lives are a never ending checklist of crap to do, but I also think there is a unique purpose to serve others while we are here. Can you imagine what my sister might think if I never thought about her, if I never prayed for her, and if I never checked in with her? In fact, I can do better than what I am currently doing. So, perhaps even in this entry, I am realizing my own inner conflict and convictions. People are dying, and you might be worried about how your hair looks today. Give me a break! Smile. Realize every breath of air is a rare gift that many people in the ground no longer get to partake in. You have one chance at this thing we call life. Perhaps say a prayer for someone who really needs it and I mean really needs it. If you are a college student, stop complaining about your class work and simply be thankful that you have class work to do. My sister’s spiritual heart and baby are turning summersaults in her internal parts. The last thing I have time to do is think about myself but rather to plead with my Knight in Shining Armor that Grace will be given and my dear little nephew’s life will be spared so that he may breath and experience the miracle of life that I personally plan on not taking for granted.

He is a good-looking little guy. Take a look these artistic black and white photos. He probably gets his amazing good-looks from his soon-to-be-uncle.






Click here for Allison’s blog, What to Blog When You are Blogging?

What does it take to be noticed?

Have you ever encountered someone you perhaps wanted to reach? In other words, you simply wanted that person’s attention. I am not talking about undivided attention like a puppy or small child tugging at your pant leg but perhaps less of a thought: like a phone call, an email, or even a simple, genuine “How are you today?” When do people, including myself, become so busy that we forget that other people just exist? We look over our fellow human beings as if we are better than them? I think homeless people are a classic example. In a downtown area, you might walk past a homeless person without even making eye contact. Sometimes I feel that homeless people do not make eye contact because society perpetuates this idea that being homeless is something shameful. I guarantee that any homeless person would prefer to be in a different position than on the streets, but sometimes because of reasons unknown to surface level judgments, people are homeless because it is unavoidable. It is the cards that were dealt. I do not think anyone actively chooses to be homeless; they may just have no other choice because a run of bad luck has been encountered, or perhaps adversity in overwhelming forms exists in fashions beyond what you or I can understand.

Shane Claiborne is an advocate and Christian philanthropist in the streets of Philadelphia. The name of his organization is known as the The Simple Way (http://www.thesimpleway.org/shane/). He wrote an incredible book entitled Irresistible Revolution. If you are looking for a good read, I would highly recommend it. He is also often a guest writer on a blog entitled God’s Politics (http://blog.sojo.net/author/shane_claiborne/). His entries deal with what some may consider radical ideas concerning Christianity and modern day politics and controversy. While you may consider some of his thoughts to be out there in space, you may also find some unique truth to the injustices that he so frequently points out. Mr. Claiborne’s intentions through his blog might be to get your attention, to make you think, to make you uncomfortable with sitting on the couch for a weekly weekend leisure activity, to possibly get out and make a difference, and ultimately to become something more than your self-inclined natures would lure you to be.

I have been keeping up with a friend from Auburn who joined Grace Campus Ministries to implement and drive forward a ministry in China. His blog, College Rambling, (http://collegerambling.blogspot.com/) has always certainly been one of my favorites while attending Auburn. His latest entry on January 24, 2010 speaks of an encounter with a homeless person in Hong Kong. If you read it, tears may well up at the reaction of the women to his kindness in his giving nature. In fact, he not only has a miraculous story to tell us. He has a small treasure to take home as a result. When you do something for other people, the clear lesson is that you may very well be pleasantly surprised at what you get in return. It may not always be a sense of just self-gratification for thinking of someone besides yourself. It may be an unlikely reaction that touches your heart for the rest of your life.

Another blog by one of my favorite people is Life as We Know It by Matt Dean (http://mattdean.blogspot.com/). Matt Dean is the director of Grace Campus Ministries, the largest ministry that recently held the praise and worship gathering each week in Auburn known as Encounter. He was called to China; so he and his team left to go there. I highly respect this man, and I believe he is making an amazing impact on a global scale. While his blog also has the potential to touch lives in a different capacity than Micah’s, Matt often uses his blog to update the external world on how a family such as his is doing in new life encountered in Hong Kong. He likes to let us know how he is doing and that he is alive and well.

So my professor’s question is this: What are blogs used for? I hope that some blogs are meant to make us laugh. Others are meant to make us think and analyze relevant issues, but I believe the blogs I have included are meant to do much more. They are meant to spread the Word in a message of Hope. They are meant to inspire through simple words and simple pictures. Words become more than just a blog. They become alive in the stories they tell. In the progress that I make with each new blog entry, I also hope to do the same as I seek to become an author and professional speaker. I seek to inspire and become selflessly more so that I may give to others when I have been given so much in relation to my own blessings. My goal is to reject my own selfishness so that I may become more like Someone I will follow for all of my days.

For me, I use my blog to process, write, and express modern, contemporary thoughts with relevant issues in everyday life. One might also say that I witness through my blog with those who may be seeking spiritual direction. Of course, like almost every blog, I use my blog to illustrate a journal’s worth of ideas on real experiences. I write. I create. I vent. I cry. I sweat. I blog to express what makes me human, the fact that I am an ordinary person who feels ordinary things. So, perhaps next time someone seems like they need to talk, give them a minute to talk. Next time someone goes out of their way to help you, acknowledge the fact they helped you with true gratefulness. Maybe even do something in return; that might be a novel concept for self-indulgence….to do something for other people. If someone allows you to edge in so you can merge into traffic on a road, wave to acknowledge a simple thank you. Open your eyes. Reject tunnel vision focusing on you and only your own problems, and realize the world is a beautiful place to live in and to inhabit with thousands of opportunities to give in more ways than you yourself can imagine.

Click here for Shane's blog, God's Politics.

Click here for Micah's blog, College Rambling.

Click here for Matt Dean's blog, Life as We Know It