An excerpt from C.S. Lewis Screwtape Letters. 

Letter 15. 

The humans live in time but our Enemy (i.e., God) destines them to eternity. He therefore, I believe, wants them to attend chiefly to two things, to eternity itself, and to that point of time which they call the Present. For the Present is the point at which time touches eternity.  Of the present moment, and of it only, humans have an experience analogous to the experience which our Enemy has of reality as a whole; in it alone freedom and actuality are offered them. He would therefore have them continually concerned either with eternity (which means being concerned with Him) or with the Present—either meditating on their eternal union with, or separation from, Himself, or else obeying the present voice of conscience, bearing the present cross, receiving the present grace, giving thanks for the present pleasure. 

(2) Our business is to get them away from the eternal, and from the Present. With this in view, we sometimes tempt a human (say a widow or a scholar) to live in the Past. But this is of limited value, for they have some real knowledge of the past and it has a determinate nature and, to that extent, resembles eternity.  It is far better to make them live in the Future. Biological necessity makes all their passions point in that direction already, so that thought about the Future inflames hope and fear. Also, it is unknown to them, so that in making them think about it we make them think of unrealities. In a word, the Future is, of all things, the thing least like eternity. It is the most completely temporal part of time—for the Past is frozen and no longer flows, and the Present is all lit up with eternal rays. Hence the encouragement we have given to all those schemes of thought such as Creative Evolution, Scientific Humanism, or Communism, which fix men’s affections on the Future, on the very core of temporality. Hence nearly all vices are rooted in the future.  Gratitude looks to the past and love to the present; fear, avarice, lust, and ambition look ahead.

by McBride/ Warren/Warren

You can spend your whole life building 
Something from nothing
One storm can come and blow it all away
Build it anyway

You can chase a dream
That seems so out of reach
And you know it might not ever come your way
Dream it anyway

God is great, but sometimes life ain’t good
When I pray it doesn’t  always turn out like I think it should
But I do it anyway
I do it anyway

This world’s gone crazy and it’s hard to believe
That tomorrow will be better than today
Believe it anyway
You can love someone with all your heart
For all the right reasons
And in a moment they can choose to walk away 
Love ‘em anyway

You can our your soul out singing
A song you believe in
That tomorrow they’ll forget you ever sang
Sing it anyway. Yeah, sign it anyway
I sing, I dream, I love
Anyway 

The last year of my life has been quite a ride.  I left my wall street job, tried my hand at starting a travel startup, put that on hold.  I joined as co-founder of another startup, I got kicked out.  I traveled to Italy for almost a month, spent a month with my family in Mexico.  Fell in love.  Mentored kids who want to be on wall street.  Met incredible people with so much passion for what they do.   

I am not sure that I had clear goals for the last year, I just wanted to try new things, build new things and learn new things— that I did.  What happens next, I am not sure.  

But what I do know is that if I had not left, I would still be sitting at my desk wishing I had the courage to go and fail and get back up.  

I am up, and ready for more.  What more is, I am not sure.  But I am so optimistic about the future (do I really have another choice?).  

For a while I thought that if I went back to wall street, I would be making a 360.  But how can it be a 360, when I have gotten so much more perspective!  I did not start and end in the same spot. I am actually excited about the possibility! I count myself lucky for the opportunities that I have been afforded.  

Onwards and upwards with no regrets.  After all, someone very smart did say:

’ Experience is what you get when you don’t get what you want’.  

There is a time for everything.  A time to sow, a time to reap.   A time to listen, a time to talk. A time to sit still and a time to take action.

I have the hardest time staying still.  I always want to be doing something.  But there is a difference between being busy and being a busybody.  I don’t want to be a busybody, but I want to be busy doing productive things. 

I have found there is a beauty that can only be found in stillness.  I am discovering that there is productivity in being still.  I haven’t mastered it yet, and it’s a struggle.

But I am learning to listen, to be still and find “Beauty in the dessert”. 

I am a firm believer that things work out only when we are ready for them.  An opportunity comes and if you don’t have the right experience, or the right education, or if you are not in a place in your life when you can take advantage of it; Or if you are not willing to take the risk— then it will pass you by. 

I am sure it sucks when you let an opportunity pass by and only later you realize that you should have readied yourself for it.   Because there are some opportunities that do really only come once in a lifetime. 

I think I have taken every good opportunity given to me, and I’ve made the best of it, and have very little regrets about that.  So if it hasn’t worked out, I am at least happy I tried.  And if they haven’t worked out, it’s because as good as it was, it wasn’t right.  

The right one is still out there, waiting to be taken advantage of.  In a good way of course. 

I have long been a fan of Airbnb, the not so little startup, which connects people who have extra space with those that need a place to stay.  But now I more than a fan, I have become an avid supporter of the site.  Airbnb helped me to keep the apartment I so love.  It’s surprising how many people don’t know about the site or are still afraid to use it. 

I had a little dilemma a few months ago- a two bedroom apartment and no roommate.  I didn’t want to move when my lease was up because I love my apartment- the space, the big windows, the nice doorman, the great neighborhood.  And to be honest, I had no energy to move.  So I renewed my lease with the believe that I could find an awesome roommate.  Major fail.  

My Craigslist roommate turned out to be the combination of everything I feared.  She left after only 4 months, and even that was too long to live with her, so I was back to having no roommate and still a two bedroom apartment. 

Airbnb to rescue!  I had signed up for an account last summer, and as a concept I loved it.  But I had never actually used the site.  A bit out of necessity I decided to give it a try as a host.  Best decision ever.  

I posted a few pictures of my apartment, described the place, posted some house rules and like magic the requests starting coming in.  The quicker I respond, the more request I accept, the more requests I receive.  It’s fun to manage all the request, to figure out which ones make more sense.  For example, if I have a request for May 3-6, but I also have a request from May 5-15— it makes sense to decline the May 3-6.  This only works if the request come in at the same time, otherwise I never cancel on my guest. 

Every single one of my Airbnb guest have been tremendous!  I have hosted 5 different couples so far, not a lot yet.  But the rest of March is booked, April too, and May is filling up quickly. 

I am getting more cash than what I could rent my room out on a monthly basis.  If any of the guest did suck, they would only be here for a few days, and I there are consequences— a bad review, so guest want to be good!

Most of my guests have been European, I think this is because they are so used to hostels and Airbnb is most definitely a few steps up from a hostel.  So I think Europeans are first adopters.  It has been so nice meeting people from all over the world.  I love to travel and this makes me feel like I am helping my fellow travelers. I give them tips on where to eat, what to see, and they bring me swiss chocolate, and tell me about their countries.  They are the best kind of roommate, they are out and about all day, and when they come home, they are fun and happy. 

There are a few things that I would improve at Airbnb, some as simple as a big link on top of the dashboard for My Reservations— they are hard to find.  Others like creating a meetup group for hosts in the same city, and a way to share tips with each other— like a FB group where people can post, or better yet, a Quora type interface.  It would also be awesome to swap spaces— So If I want to go to D.C., for a weekend and someone wants to come to NYC, let’s just do a house swap (Airbnb can still charges a fee).  And it would also help, a lot, if we could post videos introducing ourselves.  I think more people would be comfortable if every posting had a video. 

Overall, I am a huge fan of the site, I’d love to work for them in fact.  But in lieu of that, I’ll just continue to be an avid supporter and fan, and host of course. 

If you have not tried Airbnb, save yourself some money and stay at a home instead of a hotel.  And if you have a crazy roommate, ask them to leave and rent out your space on Airbnb! 

I haven’t been writing much lately, I hadn’t been inspired and nothing interesting had happened in a few weeks.  I’d been waiting on some news for a few weeks and the anticipation was killing me.  While it wasn’t the outcome I wanted to hear, I am glad to know the answer and move on.

The best part about not getting the outcome I was hoping for, is that it energized me even more.  I forgot that defeat (if this can be called that) can be invigorating.  

I often learn lessons from my little brother.  He’s had a rough patch the last few weeks and he feels like nothing ever turns out the way he wants.  He’s 18 and going through the stressful process of applying to college.  

But talking to him yesterday about his latest defeat (breaking a door after getting locked out), I remembered that it is the tough times that define us, the tough times that make us.

And I reminded him that mom and dad never gave up.  They always did whatever they had to do to make it happen.  My mom at her age always tells me about her plans for her jewelry store, the plans she has to make it bigger and better.  If there is one lesson I l learned from mom & dad is that it’s not over until it’s over.  My dad was still working a week before he passed.  

I needed to be inspired, I was feeling like I was on cruise control.  Now I am ready to take the wheel and stop living on the passenger seat.