I like the way the unification of the Common song is balanced against the warrior’s cry of the Wu-Tang song.

I’m currently taking medications to stabilize my mood (1500mg’s of a generic Depakote, 30mgs of Zyprexa at night and something for high blood pressure).

I also wanted to share with the world something I formally called a “Bipolar Protocol Sheet.” I’m now changing the name to “Mental Illness Recovery System” (M.I.R.S. for short). I think more than just people suffering from bipolar could benefit from it.

Here’s the rough draft that I just emailed to some friends and family.

Mental Illness Recovery System

Outline

This document is meant to be a guide for people close to me in the event of me “wigging out.” This will probably go through multiple versions and rewrites before a “final” version is released. I’d also like it to be a template that could be used for other people with similar problems.

How to Use This Guide?

Read it in its entirety, then refer back to it when you notice a “warning sign”

Warning Signs

First I should explain what a warning sign is (in the context of this document.) A warning sign is basically anything that you may notice that could be a sign of me moving towards losing it/wigging out. Historically speaking there seems to be approximately a two-week window where I start acting out of my element before the eventual crash that leads me to a mental hospital. During this two week window there should be warning signs present. The tricky part about seeing them is that there is probably at least one present every day to one level or another so it’s sometimes hard to tell if it’s a noteworthy warning sign or not. After reading the list I ask you to use your best judgment. When in doubt, ask me, or ask someone listed as a contact within the document (if you feel uncomfortable asking me yourself.) There will be a section of the document titled “Protocol for Alerting Me of a Warning Sign”

The list:

• 5 or less hours of sleep for 4 or more days
• Talking/thinking fast
• Acting “Scatterbrained”
• Too much talk about things of a “esoteric” nature
• Getting too focused (or obsessive) about any one thing for “too long” (this could be too many hours in a day, too many days in a week, use your best judgment.) Examples of things from the past are (computers/technology, Taichi, Meditation, video games, etc.) This one is a little tricky to call though…

[If you have more things to add email me/leave a comment]

Protocol for Alerting Me of a Warning Sign

What do you do if you believe I am on a path to the mental institution? This can be tricky, but I hope the following text helps you figure out the best course of action to prevent what could be a potentially unpleasant experience for you and me both. You should be aware of the fact that because of my previous experiences I have become VERY conscious of the fact that I must function in society in a way that is different from the general public. This has led me to become very careful about exposing myself to situations that could possibly lead to a domino effect leading to hospitalization. I’m saying all of this to let you know that I pretty much ALWAYS think I’m on top of things. For anyone to come into my world and tell me I am off could be seen as… “negative” thinking or something and I may disregard it (depending on my mood at the time, although I try my best to be in a receptive mood about such things.) Also be warned that approaching me too often about “warning signs” in a manner that “bugs” me may result in me consciously and unconsciously covering up evidence for you to see as to reduce the frequency of being bothered.

I personally believe the best approach is to ask me questions as opposed to making statements. For example:

Instead of “Casey, I don’t think you’ve been getting enough sleep. I think you might be [some statement referring to me being on the road to hospitalization].”

Start a dialog with a question first. Example:

“Casey, have you been feeling rested lately?”

or even more directly

“How many hours of sleep did you get last night?”

I respond with a low figure like 3 or 4.

“How many hours did you get the night before?”

I respond with another low figure like 4.

“Do you think you have been getting enough sleep lately?”

I should respond with a no. And you will have probably brought the issue to light if it had somehow been clouded from me because of a recent stressful situation.

Also, you can be very direct about a concern, ie.

“Casey, I think you’re starting to [lose it, or however you wish to phrase it]“

The only problem with statements like this is that they need to be used very sparingly, as I have a low tolerance for them and if used too frequently means I will consciously and unconsciously shut you out from status updates that you would use to formulate an opinion like this.

One option available will be to contact one of the contacts not listed in this first version of the document. My Mom will probably always be the best choice as she will always have the most up-to-date information on who to contact and how.

In Closing

This is just the first draft of this document. The final version will be a hard copy and will include my medical history and doctor contact information for those of you close enough where information like that could be potentially useful. In the event of me needing to go to a hospital or see a doctor, a doctor and hospital (with proper contact information) will be listed. These locations should already have copies of my medical history (as I will provide them with it) but it is always good to have back up (in the event that they can’t find it, or I need to go to another location.)

Questions/Comments/Feedback can be emailed to me or left below as comments.

Some Thoughts About “Epic Planning”

Before last week I didn’t have a plan for what I was going to do during the month of August for “Social Activism” (the mission theme this month for the FiestaMovement – Ford’s social media marketing campaign). All I knew is that I wanted to do something EPIC and something for DonorsChoose (a nonprofit that helps teachers raise money for projects in the classroom).

Then I thought to myself “What would be epic?” and that’s when I came up with the idea to fully fund every project located in the Milwaukee area. Once I had my “epic idea” I had to figure out a way to make this idea come to life. My original (and perhaps better) plan was to find some people/companies to take on the responsibility of getting one (or more) projects fully funded. Done this way, one group of individuals would be focused on a smaller chunk of the pie. Raising $300 in a month to fund one project is pretty easy for almost anyone to do (especially with some guidance). Raising $36,627 in a month to fund 68 projects sounds… epic? lol

Instead I decided to focus on creating a page that encourages people to donate $1 and spread the idea. The reason I decided to focus on “plan B” instead of what I thought to be a better “plan A” is because, based on previous attempts to do epic fund raising, I realized the importance of leveraging my strengths. To begin with, I pretty much only had one resource… me. I’m not so good at organizing and managing things and I realized that splitting up 68 projects would call for a fair amount of organizing and managing. Also, I thought recruiting others would be easier AFTER I had something that was up and functional.

Zero To EPIC In One Week Is Really Zero To EPIC In Two Years

Even though I JUST decided to do all of this last week the plan that came together is based on a lot of things I’ve been studying and trying over the past couple years. For example, the website asking you to donate $1 is based on a “squeeze page” template used in internet marketing. The original template was designed to get your email address. I changed it to get you to donate (so DonorsChoose.org can get your email address ). The style of the sales video is based on what I’ve learned from studying under Jason Moffatt and watching pretty much every Frank Kern sales video I can.

Failure helped a TON as well (it always does ). I just looked at (and edited) my blog post from two years ago when I tried to raise $16,000 in one month. There is a quote from that post that’s worth posting again here for anyone considering doing some EPIC FUND RAISING:

I’ve never tried anything like this and don’t really know what I’m suppose to do to raise the funds, but that seems like 90% of the fun!

So I guess what I’m saying is that even though I’m pulling this off in a week, it’s taken me 2 years of reading and trying stuff to get me to the point where I can pull something like this off in a week.

Phase 1, Collect Underpants. Phase 2…

If you’ve never seen the South Park episode with the underpants gnomes, then you probably didn’t catch the reference of this heading. It’s one of my favorite episodes. Here’s the clip on YouTube and you can watch the full episode (Season 2-17) [here]. Basically, the South Park kids need to create a business plan and the Underpants Gnomes tell the kids they know all about business. After the kids make their trip to the underpants cave, here’s the business plan they show the kids:

Phase 1: Collect Underpants
Phase 2: ???
Phase 3: PROFIT!!

I kind of went off on a tangent, but the point I was going to bring up is that a lot of my “plans” look really similar to the underpants gnomes plan. I think I did a little better this time.

This week was “phase 1.” All I wanted to get done this week was create the “DonorsChoose Squeeze Page” (go there and donate if you haven’t!) With that out of the way, I can take a couple days to chillax and regroup. Beginning Monday next week, I’ll be going on a HARASSING PEOPLE FOR $1 campaign both on and offline. I think I’ll also put elements of the original plan in motion and see if I can get anyone else to take ownership of some projects on their own project page.

GOT TO GET TOUGH, YO JOE!

Thanks to years of watching the TV show and playing with the toys, I grew up hardcore! I think I’m going to take my Little to go see the G.I. Joe movie today. That would be nice.

The Dream In Action (dot com )

Now here are some of my “dreams in action.”

Become A Taich Master

This started started after seeing Karate Kid for the first time. Originally I wanted to be a Karate Master like Mr. Miyagi. When I was in grade school my mom enrolled me into some Karate classes at the downtown YMCA and I LOVED them. In high school, after being exposed to various “kung fu flicks”, I signed up kung fu classes at the… Chinese Kung Fu Center. A few years after that I was introduced to Taichi and made the decision to be a Taichi Master. That decision was about 10 years ago…

Since making that decision I’ve found a Taichi Master of my own to study under and even competed in a Taichi Push Hands tournament in Taiwan. What I’m doing presently to put the dream in action is holding a Taichi class once a week on Sundays. It’s been a somewhat long and bumpy road getting the class off it’s feet, but now I have some regular students, one who has even took the initiative to start a YouTube channel and upload videos on my behalf! He even calls me Master Payne!

Promote Technical Literacy

It’s odd writing down these dreams… Here I thought I was going to say something about “Build a consultancy to make me MILLIONS!” but… I guess it has nothing to do with that. Yesterday I posted about making Milwaukee the most social connected city in the world. That goal has nothing to do with being a “social media guru”, building a consultancy or even making money (although that will be a part of it ).

It’s almost as if I’ve forgotten about this dream… It’s hard to not get sucked into the “glitz and glamor” of building a consultancy that charges big corporations a bunch of money to tell them how to not suck. What I really want to do is promote and spread technical literacy among schools, not-for-profits, community centers, volunteer organizations, churches, etc. The dream in action is creating an organization whose primary goal will be education and consulting in the social media space (Social Milwaukee). I also want to hold regular events where people learn how to use these various tools (while drinking beer and playing board games). The first event will be this coming Monday.

Never Stop Pwning Life And Help Others Do The Same

About a year and a half ago I had this idea for a movement called “Pwning Life.” I made a video about it the next day to mark the event. People from the gamer generation understand “pwning life” immediately. To pwn a game or pwn n00bs in a game, you have to practice a lot, compete a lot, research, etc. To pwning life (the ULTIMATE game) you have to continually practice, compete and research. The process is non-stop because to rules of the game continually change. What you need to pwn life in high school is different than what you’ll need in college. What you needed in college will be different than what you need when you start your career (or business). It’s about PWNING LIFE! (Non-stop)

The dream in action is the YouTube account that I try my best to update semi-regularly and the community I’m slowly building. Now Ryan has inspired me to take things to the next level and try my hand at a “real” blog (this blog isn’t a real blog ).

What’s Your Story About Putting Life Dreams Into Action?

I encourage you to share what you’re doing to put your dream in action as a comment on Ryan’s blog post. You’ll have a chance to win $25 gift card which could use to further put your dream into action by purchasing a book. If you don’t feel like your doing anything to put your dream in action, START NOW by sharing your dream in the comments!

Today was nice because I made some serious headway into getting my apartment set back up so I can live and work in it again (getting internet hooked up being a big part of this). For the last… more than a month, I’ve been living at my girlfriends house at night and hanging out in coffee shops during the day. This hasn’t been very good for productivity. I just uploaded a video on YouTube showing off the new setup a little bit:

Tomorrow’s Trip In The Fiesta

If you haven’t heard I won a contest to test drive a 2011 Ford Fiesta for 6 months. Here’s my “Agent Profile” on Ford’s website. One of the things I need to do is go on a “secret mission” once a month and make a video about it. My mission for this month is to drive 100 miles straight on Historic Route 66. The plan is to make an early trip to Gameworks to eat pizza and play video games. Then venture into downtown Chicago to find the official start of Historic Route 66. After that we’ll see how far we feel like going (either Springfield, IL or St. Louis, MO) and spend the night there.

One of my daily posts will have to be about the sexiness that is the Ford Fiesta.

Blogging 101

It’s funny. I’ve been blogging for a long time and I’m far from being a novice, but I think I’m going to do a little reading on blogging basics. I’ve never gotten very good at sorting things with categories, I haven’t been using many pictures lately, I don’t use any tools that I’m sure would make doing this blogging thing a lot easier. Hmmm… I should take a picture of myself and add it below for good measure.

I wonder how twitter could change k-12 education? Meeting with educators last Friday–only kids use social media. Schools block it. Ideas? – [JHTaylor (link to Tweet)]

@JHTaylor RE: Education I have a ton. Most centered around the use of these tools after school. – [SocialMilwaukee (link to Tweet)]

@SocialMilwaukee Would like to hear more. [JHTaylor (link to Tweet)]

Here’s the more…

Why You Should Listen To My Rambling

I’m probably going to swear a little bit while writing this post and [not pull punches when expressing my feelings about MPS] ([Milwaukee Public Schools]). I thought it would be a good idea to share WHY it’s worth paying attention to what I say ([besides my genius] ).

• I attended MPS schools from kindergarten to graduation of high school (K-12).
• My mother has taught at MPS practically my entire conscious life, first as a substitute, then as a full-time teacher (she retired in 2007).
• I really am a genius (to one extent or another). [The New School for Community Service] arranged for me to take Calculus and Physics at UWM my junior year of high school. I mention this not to flex my mental “bling”, but to show that I represent a population of students that are TOTALLY neglected by MPS. The super-fucking-smart-ones-that-know-how-fucking-BULLSHIT-the-system-is-thus-refrain-from-doing-any-homework-yet-get-called-”bad”-or-”lazy” variety.
• I spent one year at [Marquette University High School] and can compare my experience there to my experience at the two other high schools I attended.
• I spent 5 years teaching ESL/EFL (English as a Second/Foreign Language) in Taiwan so I know how to teach. (Note: I also know how little having a 4 year degree goes towards ones ability to be an awesome teacher.)
• I have the experience of being a young Black male that is fluent in Mandarin Chinese but unable to easily acquire a job at the MPS run school the [Milwaukee Academy of Chinese Language]. (Note: The principal called this past Friday and offered me a job for this coming fall. I still want to do it but (un)fortunately I’ll be getting A LOT more than $20-30/hour for my time by then. I still might do it anyway. .)
• I worked for about a month at LaBrew Troopers and… *sigh*

I’m sure there are more reasons, but I’ll stop there. If you’re not convinced that you should continue reading by now then I don’t think I’ll be able to convince you.

Milwaukee Public Schools Suck

MPS, in my humble opinion, doesn’t even deserve the S to stand for school. Suck is much more appropriate. MPS is a fucking embarrassment to the city and should be destroyed. I’m appalled at what gets to carry the title school here… *grits teeth* OK. I think I’ve gotten that out of my system. Allow me to get to the subject at hand.

Social Media and Education

You specifically asked how Twitter could change K-12 education, I’m going to talk about Twitter and social media in general. Also, I’m not 100% sure if your “any ideas” was in reference to “how twitter could change” or “Schools block it.” My response to schools blocking it is to reach kids with these tools after school and eventually starting my own school. Now lets look at how these tools could change K-12 education.

Twitter

Imagine the school of the (very near) future where the teachers and students are on Twitter (or a service like it) and are all following each other. Imagine a student at home with a question about an assignment. Imagine that student hitting Twitter and getting answers first from classmates and then from the teacher confirming what the classmates told him. Imagine an enthusiastic classmate creating a YouTube video answering the question in detail.

YouTube

I suppose I’ll just segue into YouTube from there. What’s AWESOME about online video is that someone can do an OUTSTANDING presentation of something once and it would be available to everyone FOREVER. Boom, finished. I’m not super impressed with the video as I threw it together from what I call “manic inspiration” but [my video explaining the supply and demand curve] SUCCEEDS (for some people) where hours in class FAIL. This is important. Why? Because the students are the teachers as well (when given the opportunity).

OK… I’m starting to lose steam. lol I’m going to wrap up with some closing thoughts and links and whatnot.

In Closing

We are failing our city’s (nation’s?) youth and need to correct this IMMEDIATELY. There are solutions to the problems that won’t cost billions of dollars either. Right now “Social Media Based Education” is happening EVERYWHERE naturally WITHOUT “TEACHERS”. Take for example what happened on [a video I recently uploaded teaching people how to sign up for Twitter]:

I decided to chime in as well, but do you see what happened there? Collective learning. I think the work of Sugata Mitra is phenomenal. If you’ve ignored every link up to this point, find 20 minutes in your day to watch [the TEDTalks video about his hole in the wall project (Can Kids Teach Themselves?]).

There is SO MUCH out there… Why isn’t there a school (or at least a class) in Milwaukee testing the [$100 laptops]? Has any MPS teacher applied to be a Google Certified Teacher via [Google for Educators]? Is there an MPS school that has tried using [Moodle], [Blackboard] or a program like it ([here's a nice little comparison of the two I found])? How many teachers are doing something as simple as recording “cliff notes” from class and posting them to YouTube for review from home? Is there any at MPS follows blogs like [Open Education]? The list goes on and on…

Sorry, I’m getting angry again, but FUCK MPS. It’s bloated piece of shit as are most things that get touched by the government…

I’m SERIOUSLY fucking pissed at what we do to (inner city) kids. We pack them in bullshit schools. We give them NO fucking skills that are worth a shit… *grrrrrr*

I’m fucking done with this post.

OK Durango516, if you like my advice go get started at [Wordpress.com]

Oh! and I enjoyed this video about it.

My “resolutions” post coming up next!