Behind the Scenes at ActiveRain

I woke up this morning groggy, with many fewer clothes on than what I went to bed wearing, and the face of my tuxedo cat inches from my own.

"Meow," she told me, her pitch whiney and pathetic.  She blinked at me while I stood, used the little girls' room, and wobbled into the kitchen, rubbing the bruise I got on my shoulder from running into the doorhandle at the gas station after a mad dash to FedEx and then to the bank last night.   Since there was food in her bowl, I can only imagine that she was reporting on what I already knew:

It's hot in Seattle.

Wait, no, let me rephrase: It's FREAKIN' hot in Seattle.

Sigh.  For a city that's used to muggy days and rain falling on our heads in droves, this summer's heatwave has been murderous to our way of life, our work, and naturally, our moods.  Most of the houses and apartments here are built without air conditioning, mostly because our "summer" usually lasts all of two weeks at some point at the end of July or early August.

The ActiveRain offices have been affected, too.  Today will be our hottest day ever in the history of Seattle, and yesterday's build-up to that point was evidenced by the hollow, shadowed eyes that our workers came in with, indicating that the heat had made their sleep restless and unfulfilling.  Joel stated that he was just going to sleep in his pool from now on, while Kerrie railed against the heat -- admitting that she'd left the windows open all day the day before.

It's interesting to be detached from the bulk of the office, as shut up as I am in my own little square of space in the corner.  They laugh about me having bionic ears because I can hear every detail of every conversation out there, but as the heat ratchets higher and people get less sleep, their moods are changing, tempers are flaring faster, some are more ADD than usual.

I guess it's fair to say that the AR Staff is just as human as the rest of the world.  Most of us are aware that we're tired or feeling stressed or just unfocused, but it's so hard to keep on the straight and pleasant narrow when you just can't seem to get enough shut-eye or when you walk outside and Washington's turned into Texas for some ungodly reason.

We've been under an excessive heat watch and a non-precipitation warning for the better part of the week (I have a plug-in on my firefox that shows me these lovely things), and fires are cropping up around the state caused by lightning storms and other threats to the environment.  People are toting two or three bottles of water at once to stave off heat exhaustion. 

My vet even recommended that I shave my short- and medium-hair cats.

I'm fully convinced that my hometown has gone more and more insane as the mercury rises; honestly, for the sake of the office and my coworkers, I can only hope that it cools down soon so that we can all get some rest and stay hydrated.  I think I speak for everyone when I say, "Give us some rain, already!"

 

Think about it.  The lemons that Life hands you are disappointments - a big bushel of dispair - especially when you were expecting a bushel of some real beauties like apples or oranges.  Expectations sometimes get us in trouble, but unlike many psychiatrists that I know (it's weird, but three or four of my childhood friends became shrinks), I don't advocate lowering those expectations.

Take the realm of dating or marriage, for instance: My auntie says, "Claire... your expectations are too high for these men.  Lower them a little, give a little, and you'll be happy."  Then, she pours me a cup of tea, and, without adding any sugar, hands it over to me.

How can I possibly be expected to drink unsweetened tea?!  I've told my auntie that, time and time again, that I'm very picky about my men and that I like sugar in my tea -- honey, at very least!  Still, my auntie's one for making lemonade out of lemons, instead of simply pitching the entire bushel and moving on as I am. And so, as she drinks her unsweetened tea and prattles on about my lack of a husband at my overripe age of 25, I eventually come to the same point during each of these conversations:  "Auntie," I say, "I love you, and I would never change you, even though you're wrong."

As she sputters into her teacup, I smile pleasantly and tell her, "I'm picky about my men because I want what's right for me, not what you or anyone else think should be right for me."

That note is especially important: Disappointments are often the expectations of others foisted on your shoulders that you can't, in your heart, live up to and carry on under the weight.  Often, we take others' expectations into ourselves and depression lays in when they simply don't fit what is right for us.

Jon is a big fan of pushing people, of grasping higher, of reaching out into the ether to pull amazing things from the sky. His expectations aren't too low, and even though sometimes we, as his employees, don't quite make the grade, we've never asked him to lower them.  You see, Gentle Readers, having high expectations is giving yourself a personal push of motivation, wanting -- nigh, NEEDING -- more than what you have.

Here in the Real Estate Industry, you probably all know well how hard it is to hope for more, especially since this industry was so deeply plunged into the recession.  I'm sure many of you are still carrying around that bushel of lemons, trying to figure out where you can find the sugar my Auntie stole from me in order to make some lemonade. 

Let me ask you this: Are your disappointments and expectations by others truly worth the weight you're carrying?  The answer is quite simple and very, very succinct: Are you nuts? Of course not.

That weight will be lifted the moment that you recognize that having higher expectations and hoping for more is okay, even valued, over living under the depressive and soul-collapsing crush of what other people think is best for you. 

Learning to be good at what you do is not a matter of how many facts you know or where you place a chair (under the window?  In the corner?), but how adaptive, agile, and attentive you are.  By setting your expectations high and working in favor of highering them every step of the way, by pitching those lemons to the roadside and demanding sugar in your tea, by always feeding that craving for more, not only will you evolve and adapt as a professional, but you will come to realize that it's those who make lemonade who probably need people like you the most.

I did the Snoopy dance in the middle of the office today. In fact, I did the rubber chicken, then the Snoopy dance, and then I sprinted the all of ten feet between my office and the conference room where Jon sat and practically blew out his eardrums as I skidded to a stop in the doorway and announced that I had, in fact, accepted a final document that I've been working to obtain for darn well near forever.

There's something momentus about accomplishing every goal set in front of you at your initial hiring on a job. Whether it's to sell eighteen houses by your third month or stuff four hundred and fifty pillows for a major manufacturer or landing a huge legal contract with the government, that laundry list that we all get at the outset of our new position is something that niggles in the back of the brain, whispering, "You still have to get me done... I'm still here... Your performance eval is going to be awful if I'm still on it..."

It's easy to lose steam on that corporate to-do list, especially when you don't know why or how those goals were set for you. If you don't care, they're not going to get done, and that's really the bottom line.

Let's face it: We all deal with these awful personal deadlines that weigh so heavily on our souls, and when they finally come through, we smile serenely, nod if acknowledged, and go about our day without making so much as a ripple in the pond of our occupations. But inside... Inside, we're having a grand ol' hoe down in the middle of the cube farm, standing on the desk and kicking our heels up! Inside, we're doing the rubber chicken dance in the touchdown zone. Inside, as each of these items are pecked from the list, we're so happy we can hardly breathe.

Am I right?

You know I'm right.

And when that laundry list is completed, ready to be crumpled up and three-pointed into the circular filing cabinet, suddenly, the future seems so much easier to face, the stresses of running around and trying to get that LAST phonecall in are gone, the boss is happy, and you can enjoy your weekend.

I finally hit that point here at AR. I took this job because I KNEW that I was going to love working here (as said in yesterday's post about staying positive); I knew this job was mine. A little over a year later, that stupid list is all crumpled up and binned, and I feel about twenty pounds lighter. However much as I'm in a celebratory mood, I have to say that this isn't a pat-on-the-back sort of article, so I'll get to the point:

Just as being happy is a mindset, setting personal accomplishments is the perfect way to gauge yourself in your position, to measure your growth and development, to motivate and focus you toward that light at the end of your laundry list tunnel. We're often faced with huge tasks when taking on any job, whether it's being hired somewhere or taking on the burden of extra work, and sometimes, they may seem insurmountable as we bang up against brick walls time and time again.

Tireless doggedness and absolute resilience against accepting the word "no" is the best and only way to push through; though a hoe-down on the desktop may not be the best way to express yourself at work, celebration is just as much a part of the process as determination. Allow yourself to have that celebration inwardly and more importantly, outwardly. I suppose I'm lucky that I work for somewhere awesome like ActiveRain, that allows me to run and skip and laugh and jump (and yes, even do a few Hammer-esque side to side shuffles), but I have to tell you.... Celebration is the sweetest bite of that Last-Item pie.

The world would be a better place if we could all moonwalk when we "done good", so take the time to reward yourself with a little celebration now and again, regardless of what wide-eyed stares you may receive for your Betty Davis eyes.

"You look like you need an ice cream cone, little girl," I told my sister as the corners of her lips drooped toward the floor after eating out last night.

"I shouldn't feel guilty about spending money," she told me, obviously unhappy. "I'm okay." Like many people, myself included, the Recession we live in today has impacted my sister's way of thinking about money. She's just switched jobs, just finished her college education, and lives in a gorgeous apartment in the heart of Ballard right across from the park. And yet, still, she worries about every penny she spends because she doesn't know when she might need that penny to survive the economy.

Like many of us, my sister works hard to support herself. I'm very grateful that she inherited the 'motivated' gene in our family and fights now for everything she has. That gene has served me well in the past, and like me, my sister has learned the value of the respect and experience that busting your butt to get the job done gives you. She's started displaying Claire-like symptoms of putting your heart and soul into the job at hand without asking for anything more than a simple 'thank you' or 'job well done'. Sometimes unfortunately, the seriousness of the situation gets to us both.

My sister is very serious; she didn't used to be.  She used to be this vibrant social butterfly who simply enjoyed everything she came across, but now, after finding herself so unhappy after earning her BA, after discovering some of the trials and tribulations that we muddle through as adults, she's lost that little spark she once had.  To bring it back, she's decided that she's going to be happy.

I've made that same decision countless times. Growing up, I had a rough childhood; we never had enough - enough food, enough clothing, enough heat in the winter.  My mom sacrificed everything she could to make sure that we never went to bed hungry and that our shoes didn't have holes in them.  Our family situation was undesirable, especially on top of our money issues.  My father had dependency issues and my stepfather was abusive.  At the age of 16, I was a very, very angry child.  I faced my problems with determination and temper, where my sister faced them by keeping her head down and looking for social support of others outside of the family.

One morning somewhere around my 17th birthday, I woke up, and I decided to be happy.  I decided not to let my situation impact my mood. 

Years later, I worked in Maryland for a woman who had morality issues; I can't speak in particular length about her as she's involved in litigation, but I feel that she mismanaged her business, that she misappropriated funds from that business, and she treated her employees like dirt.  I worked there because I needed to pay my bills, and I felt that I was doing a service to the clients.  Irregardless, toward the end, I started feeling like I was carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders, like I had to slog through the day just so I could go home, tuck myself under the blankets, and sleep away the miserable feeling I had in my gut.

One afternoon, I called and cried while on the phone with my mother.  It was then that I decided to be happy: I was moving home.  My mother was having spinal surgery, and so the circumstances lined up well for me.  I could be home while she was recovering, and I could be happy once again.  I found a job across the country, packed my car and my kitties, and followed my happiness home.

I lost my job twice the following year to a pair of layoffs.  It was at the beginning of the Recession, and having moved across the country and exhausted my savings account, I was in a bad spot financially to lose my job...twice.  I worried about bills everyday; I made myself sick over them.  How would unemployment cover my medical costs, my housing costs?  I set my head on the edge of my kitchen counter and breathed out until I was calm some days, worried I'd give myself a panic attack.  While doing the job search that led me to ActiveRain, I had given myself a panic attack just before that particular interview, and so as I drove into Bellevue, I was still shaky.

Jon and Bob (the two who interviewed me here) don't know this, but I sat in my car for a full ten minutes pulling myself together, updating my mascara, and deciding that this was going to go well, that I was the happiest person on earth, and that this job was mine.  A year and some months later, I'm still here, I'm still kicking, and I consider having landed the position one of my best personal triumphs.

I give you these examples because these were all very serious situations, all based on hardship, all centered around the bad and miserable in life.  They're very personal examples - trust me, I try not to speak out of my rear for things of which I know nothing - but the point I am trying to make is that even when times are hard and everything going on around you seems too dire, you have to make the concious decision that you are going to pull through, that you are going to be happy, and that, like my sister, you'll be okay. 

Your mood affects so much of your daily life, your interactions with the world at large, and the quality of the work you do.  It affects the people around you, and in turn, when their moods go south, their moods impact your mood, and soon, you have this whirling vortex of depression that's being fed in a turnstile manner by those closest to you. 

So... why so serious?  Make the concious decision to be happy, and no matter what happens, to keep your chin up.  Even when things look bleak, understand that there is more to this life than money and a job, that the economy will bounce back eventually, and that you are in control of your life, your situation, and your own happiness.

(The movie embedded here is something that I found utterly charming - usually, weddings are so serious, but this particular one is fun and memorable. They'll have lasting memories of more than just the cake and garter because they made the decision to insert happiness.)

I was braving the 520 bridge yesterday, thanks to the I-90 construction where they shut down the ENTIRE WESTBOUND BRIDGE (sigh - I'm still a little bitter), and just as I got past the cop sitting at the last exit onto the highway, my phone beeped.  Naturally.  Yey for cops and the no-handheld-phones law; luckily, my trusty Bluetooth earpiece was right there and I popped it on, flipped open my phone and answered a call from...

...my sister.  "I really want to go see a movie tonight," she said, but had no preference on which movie she wanted to see.  Long story short, I picked her up downtown and we shot back into Ballard to check movie times.  Believe it or not, Harry Potter was sold out (darn).  Everywhere.  But a movie I wanted to see several weeks ago was still playing...for only two more days.

Food, Inc. is one of those movies that makes you want to stop eating.  No, seriously, if you need to go on a diet, go watch that movie, because I walked out of the theater with my stomach turning and a new awareness of where the food I do eat comes from.  Luckily for me, I don't eat a lot of processed or snack foods - I mostly choose local fruits and veggies.  I think my downfall comes in my meat selection.

But I digress...  this isn't an article about the movie, but what happened after.  On our way back to Ballard, Paige (that's my sister) and I got into a debate about illegal immigration.  It was a large theme in the movie and so it was an easy jump from that to the debate.  Slowly, our discussion grew from illegal immigration to collapsing multi-national corporations to, finally, how innovation is the product of necessity.

So, with my mind too on the run after that conversation to really lay down and sleep, I laid and stared at the ceiling and pondered...  What need do we fill?  We're in real estate, so the automatic knee-jerk reaction is to say "I get people into homes".  Which is great! Don't get me wrong: I'm not bashing that mentality at all.  But...

...that's not a necessity.  What I'm offering up as a question is a much wider look at the industry and what we do in it.  Are you  a pioneer?  Using Jon as an example, he's created this magnificent engine that, even for it's faults, has helped push real estate marketing to a whole new level - a personal level.  Another example: My job here is part assistant/part office manager.  Is that the need I'm filling?  No.  I'm the fixer, the coordinator, and the organizer - the need I fill is keeping everyone together so that the business functions.  Am I a pioneer?  Perhaps, on some level, due to my association with AR, the tools I try to get people to use in the office, and so on.

My sister's point was simply that "no one" would want to work certain jobs for what these large, multi-national corporations were paying illegal immigrants, in example: clean toilets, gut pigs, shovel manure, and so on.  With the jobless rate in the country being nearly 10%, I was of the opinion that were those jobs available, necessity would dictate what those "no ones" would do to provide for their families, and innovation would be born from that necessity - new, better ways to do the job, better wages, better living standards...  perhaps, even, a better product.

Now, before I get on my high politics horse (which, as you all know, I try to avoid whenever possible - my blog's not a battleground, and even -I- need to respect that), I circle back to the thought of filling needs.  In this society, in these economic times, it's interesting to see how many people seem born with a natural tunnel-vision that inhibits them from thinking of anyone other than their own household bottom line.  This, unfortunately, leads to holes in the community that need to be filled but are ignored until those holes cannot go on anymore: businesses move out of the neighborhood, certain products are shipped out of state to be assembled, workers who are no longer "necessary" get cut, families have to raise their budget to pay for commodities, utility bills go up, etc., etc.

But we are not powerless.  I know it seems a dim, dire situation when you're watching your personal or community's bottom line, seeing things changing, but understand me clearly: those changes are opening up opportunities and NEEDS that must be filled to stabilize the community.  You all know the term "Build it and they will come"...

I think, in essence, that's the need that real estate agents must fill - you are community builders.  Not like AR's Community Builders, of course ;) but more of finding the right fit for the right people, bettering neighborhoods, building up, and rounding out the rough edges.  So now, my wonderful and lovely real estate agents, I must ask: What need do you think you fill?  What gap have you closed?  What wider-world hole have you patched up?  What innovation are you working to see progress?

It's been a tumultuous week in Claire-land, and as it's finally July, I've sat down to review my yearly budget, my tax withholdings, my goals (both personal and professional), and my savings accounts.  I also took the time to consider what obligations that I give my time to when I'm not at work and whether I could still sincerely uphold those obligations without killing myself or diminishing my standard of living.

So, to start, I pulled my last six months of bank records and uploaded them into a spreadsheet, sorted by category, and made a graph.  It made me wince -- we'll just say that -- in how much I had spent on gas and car maintenance in the first half of the year.  I also pulled up the IRS's calculator for withholding taxes and plugged in the withholding to date off my paystub.  The good news is that I need to make no adjustments to my withholding and I probably won't have a huge return in April.  I closed a couple of my sub-savings accounts, now that the goals had long passed and I was no longer putting money into them, then considered what I wanted to do over the course of the next year.  I opened three new sub accounts to drop cash into: one for a vacation in December sometime, one for my credit card payoff, and one for a new, pretty, comfy convertible couch for my uber-small living room.

Sure, all sensible things - I'm sure you all are nodding your heads in agreement.  Well, except, perhaps, the couch - I want a red couch, which is not sensible at all, and it mustn't have any of those stupid bars that bite into your back when you fold the mattress out. 

But the true experiment of this last weekend was figuring out what I'm really worth per hour; it helps put my goals and motivations into perspective to be able to say, "I work X amount of hours to pay my rent" or "My couch means I have to work X number of days."

Here's how to figure out YOUR hourly worth (using an example of my bestest friend Jamie, who earns salary of $100,000/yr.  I think it would be slightly unethical for me to post my actual salary on any blog, let alone my professional one):

1. Jamie earns $100,000/yr gross on a commission basis doing photography for weddings.
2. Jamie's tax bracket is 25%, meaning her net salary is actually $75,000/yr.
3. Considering that Jamie works eight hours a day with a one hour lunch and a 45-min commute and an hour of prep for work each morning, Jamie spends 11.5 hours everyday in relation to work.  Thankfully, she doesn't take work home, or this number would be higher!
4. There are, on average, 260 working days a year.  Multiplying 260 by Jamie's 11.5 hours/day, Jamie works 2990 hours a year.
5. Taking into account that Jamie spends about $100/month on clothing for work, $150/mo on gas for her car, $100/mo on maintenance for her car, $100/mo on various expenses for work to include supplies, and rents a studio for $300/mo for portrait taking, Jamie spends, on average, $760/mo or $9120/yr on expenses relating to work.
6. Finally, taking Jamie's net salary ($75000/yr), subtracting her expenses ($9120/yr), then dividing by hours worked (2990/yr), Jamie's actual hourly wage is $22.03/hr.  

This is a pretty big change, considering that her job was advertised at approximately $48/hr when she took it; Jamie's actually working for less than half what the sticker price said.

This particular exercise is something I do every six months or so to determine whether my time is well-spent at work, at home, volunteering or otherwise, because considering how much you make an hour helps put into perspective what you spend time and money on, especially when you start comparing it to bills:

• Jamie pays $1400 in rent ($1400/$22.03/24hrs) and must work eight standard eight-hour days to pay for it.
• Jamie's car payment is about $400/mo.  She must work two and a half eight-hour days to pay for it.
• Jamie's commute is worth $250 worth of gas and maintenance on that car.  She has to work at least a day and a half to pay for that.

A day, you say, well that's nothing!  But if you compare it to how happy you are, it's actually quite a bit of something.  As Jamie's 45-minute commute is spent seething in frustration at the other idiots in East Coast traffic, she's really spending $250/mo to learn new cusswords and flip radio stations in an effort to stay calm.  How is that for perspective?  How about this:  Jamie is wasting eighteen days every year and spending $3000 to learn new cusswords and flip radio stations.  Eighteen 24-hour days! $3000! 

Tell me, folks...what could you do with eighteen more 24-hour days every year?  How about $3000?  What would you do with an extra hour and a half every day?  Those are the questions I ask myself when I have these personal budgeting sessions - not just 'what would I do with', but 'why do I spend money on that'?

Currently, I have three volunteer obligations outside of work and two other extremely low-paying semi-volunteer gigs, taking up a solid five of seven nights a week.  When I consider what my time is worth, it really makes me pause to reflect on whether I'm spending my time well, and whether I'm truly happy running around the city.

This time, I've decided to decrease one of my obligations by a half hour and one of my obligations by a full hour, giving myself a few extra hours each month to write.  Since my passion really is writing, an hour and a half could mean 10000 words on a novel I want to get published.  I think about it as paying myself - I'm worth my time.

So I have to ask, Gentle Readers, when you consider how much your time is worth - however you quantify it - are you spending your time on things that make you happy?  Are you spending your money wisely?  When looking over your goals, are you working toward them, or just placing them on a shiney pedestal to look at?

 

Go to Bob's blog and wish him happy bday!

 

Today is July 4th, 2009, and today, Americans celebrate the Fourth of July with fireworks, barbecues and friends.  We pass bottles of wine and cheer as fire comes to life in firepits on the beach.  We get incessantly drunk (at least, the very young and legal of us do), clanging beer bottles together and singing drunken melodies.  Some of us follow our base urges into the night, while others fall into a sleeping stupor and will wake up tomorrow with a terrible headache and a serious need for hydration.

Yes, I realize that this is a very brusque look at our celebrations, but to bring clarity to how few people actually consider what freedom costs, I decided to give this example before hashing out the facts. Onwards.

The Declaration of Independence, one of our most sacred documents as Americans, was signed by 56 men.  Of those 56, 24 were lawyers and jurors.  11 were merchants.  9 were farmers and plantation owners.  These were all considered the smartest of the smart, but truly, they were the bravest of the brave, knowing full well that they were signing their death warrants and those of their families to fight behind a principle that they so believed in.

Here is the true cost of our freedom:

1. Five were captured and tortured by the British before they died behind bars.
2. Twelve lost their homes when the British soldiers burnt them and everything they owned.
3. Two had sons that were captured and never heard from again.  Two others sacrificed them to the mire of war.
   
4. Nine physically fought in the Revolutionary War and lost their lives.
5. One saw all of his boats sunk by the British and had to sell everything to pay what he lost in those fateful hours, including his home and possessions.  Once a rich merchant sailor, he died penniless.
6. One was so constantly harassed by the British that he put his family in hiding; his property was ransacked and stolen, leaving him, also, penniless.
   
7. Eight had their homes broken into, vandalized, and stolen from.
8. One lost his home to General Cornwalis and Cornwalis used it as an HQ for the British Military.  His home was destroyed when he urged Washington to open fire and take out the occupants within.  This signor died bankrupt at his own hand when his home was lost.
   
9. One lost his properties to the British when they were seized on the England side of the pond.  His wife was also lost when she was captured and tortured, dying only a few months later.
   
10. One had to flee his dying wife's beside; his thirteen children also fled, never to be heard from again.  He lived in the forest for years, returning to find himself without any family at all.

Even in a simpler time, our freedom was never free. These men, the ones who put their name on the document that began the war to give us this glorious country, knew precisely what they were getting into.  Their families knew the risk they were taking alongside these men and accepted it.  They were the epitome of brave, and yet...

yet...

We sit in our backyards and grill instead of taking a moment to remember the fallen, the ones who lost everything, every penny, their homes, even their families, to give us our freedom from the oppression the British empire forced on us so many years ago. 

So please, everyone, as you're pulling out the BBQ and laying down the kabobs, take the time to consider what it really is to be free, to not worry about things like conscription and tariffs.  Remember, even for a second, the real cost of freedom, and enjoy your Fourth in such a way that you celebrate those freedoms and the lives lost that afford us those freedoms.

Oh, say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hail'd at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, thro' the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watch'd, were so gallantly streaming?
And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof thro' the night that our flag was still there.
O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

~Francis Scott Key, "Defense of Fort McHenry"