Let me give you a story about priorities. My girlfriend’s little nephew was always clap happy when we showed up and I turned into bit of a big brother / uncle to him.

(In fact, he used to call her on the phone to check up on her whether she’d be hanging out with other guys, reminding her to be truthful to me!)

I started to teach him English, just a little bit. When you’re positioned as the “big brother” it’s very easy to teach and have a good influence on a kid if you just take the time.

Now, I not nearly as often spend time with him as he’d have liked it, cause I did not have enough time. I’d do that later, when my situation would be better (mainly work & money).

You can probably already see where this is heading… in January he got a cold, at least that was what his parents thought. It didn’t get better and he swoll up, so they went to the doctor. The doctor quickly send him to hospital and they found that he had metastases all through his body, did all they could, but he got weaker and weaker and they hooked him up to the machinery, but finally turned off the switch and he died.

Now, I often catch myself putting things off, not taking the time to meet a friend, have a conversation with someone… and I think of Dream (that was his name) and pick up the phone and call them up.

So the little guy ended up teaching me.

Thanks Dream.

It’s nice that you’re a fan of Peter Rowan and Tony Rice along with your arena rock bands. Tony’s guitar playing is awesome, especially with Grisman’s dawg jazz.

I first heard Rowan on KFAT down in Gilroy - they had “Free Mexican Air Force” on heavy rotation. That’s still the best ode to smuggling I’ve ever heard. Course ya have to be an old fart like me to remember it.

Your bonding observation is pure gold. I’m not sure if the prelude was an intentional message or not but I got something out of it worth pointing to.

You said “Our brains work that way — always looking for a reason to be lazy.”

It seems to work that way in direct response too. Something we always need to be aware of.

Any elaboration on how to get around this tendency would be appreciated.

Andy

The greatest marketing breakthrough I created was based on that exact concept. The first letter I wrote did so-so, it broke even and thanks to a high-margin back-end my client was able to make some money.

I wasn’t satisfied so I re-wrote the letter AS IF I really WAS writing to just one person and that I really DID care about that person, was excited about what I was sharing and asking them to call…

Carlton is right-on (as usual). Boy did those phones light up!

– Jason Bedunah
http://www.jasonbedunah.com

Tammy Lesueur