Author Archives: Guus

Inspiring post

Lately I’m a bit lost and confused. And when I am I often kind of stop doing things. And to get out of that often I write down things, make some schedule or to-do list. Or since I know about segment intending, I write down the next segments. Or segments for the day. And I even consider making monthly or yearly or lifetime segments. And doing that today, trying to make my day a bit more useful, feel a bit better, I created a segment IFS. And in this segment I am writing the English post for IFS. And I want to accomplish to write an inspiring post. And i want to feel that I wrote something useful.

So that’s why I titled this post “Inspiring post”. And so this is what the segment looks like:

Segment IFS.

In this segment I am writing the English post for IFS.

I want to accomplish to write an inspiring post.

I want to feel that I wrote something useful.

And the weird thing with this segment intending is that mostly, or maybe even always, I find afterwards that I indeed accomplished what I wanted to accomplish and feel like I wanted to feel. But writing it down so plainly now doesn’t make it easier, although maybe it is just inspiring what I am writing down here as this is really something that works and gives you some grip on your life, on your feelings when you are lost or don’t know what to do or are overwhelmed or so.

And I’m not sure about you, but I find myself often wanting to do too many things in a day. Like right now I would love to continue with the tools side of inspiration for Success, of this site, but I already planned quite a lot of things and one of the main things I planned for today is also some relaxation time. Some time tonight I want to just stop and feel free, feeling like I did the things I wanted to do, did the things that I am supposed to do from a spiritual point of view. As often I beat myself up so hard for where i stand, for who I am, for what I did or didn’t do.

And that just doesn’t make sense, as i’m just a human being doing his best, just like you. And somehow human beings have limitations they can’t bypass, even if they feel the want or need to. And somehow they are built to want that, act like that, bypassing their own limits.

And yes, that’s how humans are built, that probably even the purpose of human beings, passing limits and boundaries that realistically cannot be bypassed. But they did, and indeed prove day after day that something like impossible doesn’t exist.

Which makes me think of the quote “They didn’t know it was impossible, so they did it.”, a quote.attributed to Mark Twain.

Sort this from that

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So here I found myself, after a visit from the local installer from Smart who were able to get my Smart internet connection going again. And it seems the main problem with our Smart connection right now is a weak signal, possibly caused by trees growing or something like that.

And i felt a bit embarrassed because it seems Smart as an organization and the people within Smart have been doing their best to help me, even when I got more and more confused and annoyed and even angry inside, the last i didn’t show. And I still feel a bit embarrassed, but I don’t think I should be, because the problem with the Fair Usage Policy is still there. And the choice of implementing that policy, as a policy and technically, has made everything around problems with our internet connection very confusing and annoying, for me as I guess for the staff within Smart. And I don’t need to be embarrassed about that and everything around it and my complaints and cause around it. But being me I still am, and if I’m a bit like you, like other humans, I guess you can understand that.

And I guess another presumption is still somehow valid. And that is that a company like Smart, with increasing internet demand and improving technology, should still be able to serve me as a customer on a certain plan, no matter whether there are trees growing or not. And the same applies with Globe, who just disconnected me because, as far as I know, technically they can’t serve me properly at the moment. But to me disconnection a business account from an internet company this way is just ‘not done’, from a business as well as a human perspective.

But actually I am kind of happy with all that happened, as it made me think that what I want for humanity is not as simple as i thought. And that organizations like Smart and Globe still work and that there are indeed humans within those organizations trying to help customers, people. And that indeed there were people visiting me today trying to give me back internet access, even though our connection is kind of beyond what the system is capable, of is designed for. And they did and I am writing this from home and I was able to connect our computers to the internet, so all the things that i need updated and such did happen and is happening right now.

So this whole thing around being fully without internet while having two connections because of our location and expected problems with that, brought about a lot of thoughts. And it also brought me back to one of the ideas of Kim Cooper: “Sort this from that”. As there are many things going on.

So some facts or thoughts:

the wireless signal for our Smart internet connection is very weak;
the environment, like growing trees or something, probably makes the signal even go weaker over time;
I don’t trust Smart anymore, as before my complaints in my experience improved the connection;
many or most people within large organizations do want to help people, but are often just limited, either by knowledge or by being limited by their management;
(large) organizations are (still) driven by money, by greed, as that’s just how we built our world;
I and you are part of the system. I often see myself switch roles from demanding customer to helpless human to not willing or not being able to pay business man or consumer;
there is a lot of complicated technology involved in making things, making the internet work and that technology is progressing, changing fast;
we are all part of driving the changes, even though it has consequences like not being able to serve existing customers, people anymore;
I am not sure if my case, my experiences with large organizations are common or not;
I would love to pay more for my internet, but as of the moment business wise and private that’s not really an option. And this whole thing goes back to the fact that the money flow in the world is not working properly as of the moment;
etc.

Well, enough for now, but one of my last thoughts was that there must be better ways to make companies more human again, but that the whole thing is a system, where we as customers are part of the system as well as the organizations and the people within our organizations. So we help keep the system into place with our demands, which may just be wrong based on wrong presumptions or may just be unreasonable.

Looking forward to your thoughts on this whole thing, either from within those organizations or as a customer, a human with needs an organization could deliver.

Robot or human?

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Well, just got a good sample about organization to human communication. This was an e-mail of me to Smart and I was hoping for a little bit more than the reply I got: But nobody said it would be easy.

Attn. Ms. Rome

Dear Ms. Rome,

This morning, without any internet, I was thinking what to do next
related to the problems with my internet connectivity. And that large
organizations like Smart are not always easy to deal with when things go
really wrong.

Often you end up talking to different people where no one has the full
picture of what is going on.

Then I realized that related to this feedback reference number you have
been replying to my e-mails, so I do have a contact person. Then I
realized that I haven’t made life easier for the people within Smart
either as I have sent quite some complaints, recently not even giving
proper reference numbers and such.

So here I found myself this morning, without internet. And then I
realized that you have been trying to help me very well, probably
talking to your boss or other people within Smart to find solutions for
me. And that I had been e-mailing with one person, so I do have a
contact person, a human being, within Smart. And then I realized that
wanting to make organizations like Smart more human again, serve people
again, my behavior has not served that cause very well, that I have not
been a good example as I partly have just behaved like a complaining
customer instead of a human being needing help.

And then I realized that if I want large organizations to be more human
again, serve humans in a human way, that I would need to change the
customer side as well, meaning I also would have act as a human and
introduce myself properly for example. And while writing this just maybe
tell you that I am desperate as I don”t know where to go or what to do
to have proper internet again, as I depend so heavily upon it. And that
it wouldn’t be easy to move my computers as I have setup quite some
stuff like e-mail accounts and ftp accounts that I can”t just move to
another computer without an awful lot of hassle and time. And that I now
have to go down to the city to do my work and some private things in an
internet cafe. And that yesterday I forgot to put some important files
to my USB so I couldn’t finish my work, my promises to people while
using the internet in an internet cafe.

So well, what I actually wanted to do with this e-mail is to tell you
that I am Guus Ellenkamp, fifty years old, of Dutch origin, that I moved
around ten years ago to The Philippines as my partner is from here. So
that I am a human being and not only, not just just a customer. And
maybe tell you that I am kind of a computer and internet person and
depend very much on the internet. And that many Filipinos tell me that I
am complaining a lot and that that may be true, but that my intentions,
just as the intentions of every human being, are good. And that I seem
to talk a lot and write a lot, as this e-mail is now much longer than I
intended. And much more to tell, but I guess this is not the right time
and place.

Maybe you can tell me a bit about you, about your side?

And yes, of course it would be nice if Smart or actually the people
within Smart, can provide me proper internet again. But that’s not my
point with this e-mail right now.

Looking forward to your reply,

Guus

And some information related to my account which will hopefully make
your life easier:
Account number: 0124554160
Service Reference Number: 1010128432
Address: “The Malasag House”, Malasag, Cugman, 9000 Cagayan de Oro City
Phone: 0917 596 14 55
FeedbackReferenceNo. 000041306

And this was the reply:

Dear Guus,

We appreciate you for taking the time to let us know of your situation.

Please be assured that we are continuously coordinating with our support
group to expedite handling of your concern.

Thank you for your kind understanding.

Sincerely,

Rome/llp
Customer Care

Sounds like an organizational reply, not a human reply. This means that Ms. Rome didn’t get my point or can’t bypass the procedures and policies of Smart. Or maybe this is just how she thinks, but I doubt it.

Is this kind of communication really what we want?

Bread and circuses

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One of my biggest questions is still what people really want, especially what younger people want, what youth wants. And as I have visited quite some internet cafes recently it seems that young people, students just want to play games, computer games, internet games, as most of the people around me in this internet cafe seem to play computer games or internet games.

And I have thought about that quite a lot recenlty, as I remember that when I was a student there was I time that I was also addicted to a computer game. And that in later periods in my life I also played games quite a lot, although in the end, mostly after months, I will get bored with it, so right now, recently, I didn’t really play that much.

But looking at my goals, my desires, in the end I also just want to ‘play’, want to relax. And recently also realized that many things people do business wise is to entertain people, serve people in their spare time. And that indeed virtually anything that is being produced or sold is mainly focused on entertainment, of course next to things for daily needs like food and household items.

And this brought me back to the old Roman quote “Bread and circuses” (or “bread and games”). And I just read in Wikipedia that that is mainly related to politics, like keep the people happy in a simple way.

But going back to the subject of what people want I am indeed really wondering what people really want. And maybe I should just see if I can find some statistics about that as for now I basically have my own reference and some feedback I got from some of my friends. But that feedback is often very limited and confirms what Napoleon Hill states, that most people don’t have a definite purpose or a goal in life. Mostly I hear people say if I ask them what they want, what they want in life very simple common things like ‘a family’ or ‘enough money to support me and my family’ or ‘a happy life’. So indeed hardly any of the people I asked have clear definite goals they want to achieve, let alone dates and plans related to them.

And also looking at myself I am slowly starting to realize why most people are where they are. They are where they are because they are not very specific about what they want, where they want to be. So they are indeed where they intend to be: nowhere.

And that makes me often think about the quote from Alice in Wonderland who is at a crossroad and asks someone whether she should go left or right. And the other person or creature asks where she wants to go. And she says something like “I don’t know” and then (of course) the answer is “then it doesn’t matter whether you go, left or right”. And the more I think about it, this is so true. And this is where most of us I guess end up, including me at the moment, although I think I am a little bit further than the majority of people.

But all that I know about goals and timing and plans makes life much easier for me, as right now I don’t have any clear short term timescale or plans. So often I don’t really move so much, don’t take much action. And before I would mostly kind of blame myself for not doing anything. But right now, when I am in a place where I think I don’t want to be, I often realize how I got there. Just by doing the things I did, making the choices I made. And indeed, I am starting to believe that uninspired action, action without a specific goal, is quite useless, maybe indeed harmful to get us where we want to go, where we want to be. As uninspired action may indeed just get us further away from our goals than we think.

so yes, be happy where you are right now. Because you are where you are because of the things you did and the choices you made. And you may have quite some hidden desires that stop you from reaching goals that you think you have. Like in my case one of my implicit goals is to stay in The Malasag House in Cagayan de Oro City. And that limits my options and defines my choices. But it’s a very important, even though quite hidden and unspecified goal. As The Malasag House is my home and I don’t want to leave my home anymore as I did before, and realized I lost my home only afterwards.

So what are your goals? And what are your hidden goals? You may be closer to where you want to be or may just be where you want to be if you look at all of this closely.

So be happy where you are and start from there if you want more or something else.

Dealing with big powerful companies

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Well, I’m trying to see my internet connection problems as opportunity, because what is happening to me now with my internet is exactly what Inspiration for Success is partly about: big companies not being human or customer friendly anymore.

But not easy again and no success in sight, sitting in an internet cafe as both my service providers can’t deliver internet at my house at the moment. And I tend to be sarcastic about it, like “Is this progress” and maybe it is as I guess they are trying to serve the (growing) mobile internet market. But for me it is very inconvenient and costly and annoying.

So let’s see where this goes, and remember, it’s not about Smart and Globe, but more about Philippine culture and large companies not being able to serve customers as humans anymore.

And I want to share one link now where I will share more of my story with Smart, as of the moment not even having understood my letter it seems: https://www.facebook.com/fairusagepolicypldtsmartbro/.

Enough for now as I am very short on time and have also some business issues to settle as running an internet business without internet is not easy. And that’s also why we have two connections, but that doesn’t seem to be enough, but fortunately there is still a third and more solutions, like now an internet cafe with a good connection.