The other harder part was to always tell the truth. I did have a major setback in feeling confident about the experiment when, due to a combination of multiple factors, my marriage ended. While it hurt immensely, I eventually decided to resume work on the experiment. I hinted at the experiment in the weeks before it started and discussed it with a couple of my close friends before deciding that come hell or high water on Dec 21st, 2009 I would begin. My twitter account was now ground zero for a whole new type of experiment (years and years ago I lived as a homeless person in Portland, Oregon for 6 weeks because I wanted to see what the actual effects on my own personality would be).

A few people including Pete Grillo, Steven Mcdade and Thomas Brenneke came perilously close to making me ‘out’ the experiment throughout 2010. My one rule to maintain telling the truth while taking an extremist tack was the same as used by Project Alpha: If asked why I was required to tell the person asking. Thanks to a few of you for keeping it secret by the way!

Unsurprisingly the end of the year conclusions came out fairly staid:

• People under the age of 25 are vastly more likely to positively respond to reactionary statements.
• People identifying as monotheists are more likely to unfollow when their ideologies are questioned or insulted than polytheists or atheists.
• People who use their faces as avatars are less likely to deviate from a moderate tone in their tweet stream.
• The amount of unengaged accounts went up at approximately the same ratio as my daily number of tweets. While many of these accounts aren’t necessarily spam it does indicate that neophyte users frequently just follow anyone in the stream who says things that they relate to. Nothing out of the ordinary there really.
• The number of spam accounts did spike rather heavily (up 23% the first week no less) as I began using more hashtags and keyworded phrases.
• One fact I’m quite proud of is that my fellow Portlanders were the group least likely to unfollow me based on my statements. When I looked at the data closer the numbers of “loyal” followers were split fairly evenly between liberal and conservative users. Which led me to conclude that Portland is more about speaking up than it is about partisanship. Not everyone in Portland may agree but they won’t necessarily unfollow you for it.
• At the 6 month mark I ramped up to following a large number of adult performers, strippers and cam girls throughout the world, again surprisingly Portland accounts took offense at a much lower rate than other cities.
• At the 9 month mark I began cycling on a 48 hours rude and 24 hours polite rate which resulted in very little differences to the statistics over time but did cause some upheaval during the switch from one state to the other.

The few really interesting realizations occurred in the way many of my long term friends and some quiet acquaintances changed the way they saw me over that year. Especially interesting was the group of people who publicly said one thing but privately said another. It speaks volumes about how even though we’re told to tell the truth as children, between the age of being a child and being a fully fledged grownup we lose those abilities to always be honest.
Of my personal favorite responses and results were:

• An active social media using tech executive from California regularly sent me a DM whenever I took certain topics to task thanking me for “saying what he would get fired for”.
• A VP of Marketing from a NYC based company sent me an email that read in part “Some of what you say is obviously calculated to get a response but nicely doesn’t come off as blind trolling. It would be nice if honesty of the level you approach was something marketers could capitalize on”.
• A former student from my drumline teaching days called me to ask if I was really that angry at the world and if there was anything they could do to help.

After going through the data and realizing that a lot of what our parents taught us is true, that how you speak affects how well you’re listened to I realize that the greatest lesson wasn’t the specifics of the data. My experiment was never about collating the many into a grand unified theory of sociology, it was about how the circle of friends and acquaintances I have change and adapt over time. Everyday our personalities go through varying degrees of flux. It’s a natural part of being human, what we must all learn to do is be honest to ourselves and to everyone else without remorse. It’s not a real decision if you’re not invested in it.

While I’ve got much of the data aggregated now I’m not able to share the full report at this time. When you blindly involve people in an experiment you don’t have a right to arbitrarily decide how to use their public identity. I’ll try to figure out a way to sanitize it enough to not force many people to have their information shared as part of this. I should add that I also am under an NDA which prevents me from releasing anymore data at this time. I will say thanks to the very cool company that liked the idea and paid me for the researchas well as provided me excellent resources for getting the missing data restored as much as possible. Thanks guys!

I feel enriched and also deeply humbled by the gamut of emotional responses to my words, my deeds and especially the number of new friends I made during the experiment.
To those of you who helped voluntarily or as subjects I say thank you very much.

Growing it out wasn’t too big of an issue until it hit that irritating in-between state where it literally couldn’t be anything than a mass of curly nonsense.

Prepping to get my hair cut.

Other things I’d forgotten about having long hair:

1. My hair is REALLY curly when long. This means tangles.
2. It’s REALLY big when long anytime it gets humid. I live in Portland, Oregon. It rains heavily here, which means “Poof!”
3. People treat you differently if you haven’t shaved on Saturday AND you have long hair.
4. The winter time is nice for keeping your neck warm.
5. I used much more shampoo and conditioner which got expensive.

The bag containing my hair ready to ship to Locks of Love

All in all while a few people gave me grief about it (including one recruiter who hounded me weekly until they saw a picture of me and said “charity shmarity, long hair is unprofessional”) I got many congratulations and compliments for daring to buck the short hair on men business trend.

Going to give it another try in a year or two and hopefully will convince 2-3 others to do it with me. Hell you even get a free haircut at the end if you have Great Clips cut your hair when you go to donate.

There is so much more that can be done but with the excellent Locks of Love organization you can literally just do your normal routine and then after it grows enough; you can help make a small difference in a child’s life!

Instant clean-cut, just simply remove hair

Granted many of you can’t grow your hair for a variety of reasons, there are literally hundreds of

different ways that you can make a difference in the life of someone. Donating blood, old clothes, your time, your expertise all are ways you can do good in your own community!

Happy birthday son! It’s been 3 years since I first got to hold you and all of those beautiful moments in between as you’ve grown, learned and developed into one of the most awesome people I know.

I’m so proud of you and of how big you’ve gotten. I’ll be coming up to see you next week and am so excited to give you your birthday gifts and take you shopping for cool stuff! I can’t wait to see you!

I’m sorry I’m not able to be there with you this birthday but I hope you enjoyed the cupcakes I sent you. You are a little champ and I miss seeing your face and experiencing that side scoot lap sneak attack you learned shortly after you first learned to walk. There are so many moments and incredibly cool things you do and I love all of them. You’re my son and I love you very much!

You’re 3 now and I love you and am always thinking about you and your brother too!

Love you son,

Daddy

What’s really interesting is realizing more and more that in order for me to be truly happy I need to embrace the person I was from age 19-22 much, much more.  I lived life in many ways like a hippy or beatnik. I worked when I needed money, I slept if I needed to but above all I never compromised my own values or ethics while at the same time keeping to my promise to always be equally mutually beneficial to any interactions I had. I forgot that along the way and that imbalance contributed to a lot of hurt to a lot of people who didn’t deserve it including myself. The adage “be true to yourself” means accepting the flaws inherent to who you are too.

I’m by no means glossing over my own immaturities throughout my life but there is a certain raw natural instinct that guides us at that age before the outside world forces us to change to be a better fit in society. The real question then is how useful is society if it requires that we not be ourselves (obvious nonharmful to others qualifier). So much of our society is about making a better you with stuff and lesser so on excelling on being ourselves.Why can’t we instead work towards promoting a better species instead of just being a vast network of interdependent snake oil salesmen.

So who is this new me? Or rather what is the “me” that has returned? That’s really an observational thing so find me somewhere at any of my favorite Portland haunts and see for yourself :D

Mine are currently:

1. All Along the Watchtower by Jimi Hendrix: That song originally a tune by Bob Dylan is completely and totally owned by Hendrix (he plays almost every guitar part in the song). Great taken to the level of perfection. This coupled with the fact the lyrics always really resonated with me (and slightly reminds me of Stephen King’s Dark Tower somehow).

2. White Rabbit by Jefferson Airplane: A fantastic melodic & percussive rhythm perfectly crafted to hit you like a one, two punch of awesome in perfect compliment to Grace Slick’s perfect delivery and the impact her amazing voice has.

3. If I ever leave this world alive by Flogging Molly: This song didn’t make much sense to me personally until I fell in love and became a parent. So melancholy yet at the same time so hopeful and optimistic, the song has become even more something I find myself humming or singing in the shower or while puttering around handling errands.

4. Someone by Ascension: One of the best dance tracks ever recorded and brilliantly mixed by Paul Oakenfold this song has great music but above all the simple statements in the lyrics (very simple) have tremendous impact. When writing my marriage vows this song, this simple little song inspired me because it was one of “our” songs and the lyrics were and still to my heart are exactly true of how I feel about her.

5. Baker Street by Gerry Rafferty: One of the earliest songs I remember hearing and also responsible for the huge popularity of the saxophone throughout the early ’80s. The bittersweet quality of the lyrics always tend to really hit me the most right when I need them to.

So that’s my list and as always to participate all you need to do is comment. The let me know and I’ll post a link back to your blog the same way I did for the first experiment.

The good news is once you’ve found the knowledge it does get easier, not instantly but every moment it eases fractionally. The situations (yes plural) I’m in right now all seem to be at root the same issue, ultimately that doesn’t matter. What does matter is that each situation has a lesson to be learned. Some of them are painful lessons, some are sad lessons but really they’re all good lessons so long as I take something away from the situation. What’s even better is the very act of trying to dig yourself out of a hole the right way means you get more lessons and even better a greater understanding of how to be a good person. All you need to do is hold onto that inner strength and your faith in yourselfand there’s pretty much no hole you can’t escape. It’ll just take time, belief and above all the strength to fall back from time to time. Throughout all of this I’ve discovered far deeper reserves of strength then I knew I had, now I know that I can withstand far more pain & hurt than I even thought possible. That strength has stripped away most of the fear, anger and depression that had been clouding my mind and leading me  into far more holes than needed.

Namaste :D

And when the broken hearted people living in the world agree,
there will be an answer, let it be.
For though they may be parted there is still a chance that they will see,
there will be an answer. let it be.

We all await the answers to our hearts, to the questions in our souls. I used to think that the fear that the answer wouldn’t be what you want was the worst thing of all. Not at all I know now, quite to the contrary. The hardest part is waiting with baited breath, every cell anticipating, needing to know, needing that sense of resolution and knowing that no matter what there is no way to hurry it along, no way to have the solution, no way to resolve things without patience. Now that I know that it’s a lot easier to find the strength to just wait and focus on what it is that’s important: health, humility and above all being comfortable with lack of control :D

Thank you Beatles for pointing that stuff out to me :D

This weekend was a cathartic kismet roller coaster leading me to and fro inside and outside of my heart. Almost like an acid trip only of sobriety and understanding. If I didn’t know better I’d guess I dreamed all or most of it. all in all it keeps leading me back to what I somehow always knew to be true but even more bizarrely somehow forgot for awhile, I love my wife, my lady, my best friend, my confidant, my lover. I love you Zoe and I’ve been giving some thought to what you said to me the last time we spoke.

You’re absolutely right, there is no way we can go back to the early days of our relationship, our marriage….I don’t want that. It wasn’t stable or all that healthy. I want something more and you deserve something more. I want an incredible loving, passionate, respectful marriage with you. I love you with all my heart and am doing my best to leave you alone right now even though all of me wants to fight for your heart. I understand now that talking isn’t the way to fix us. Me fixing our finances, budget, my attitude and my anger is what it will take to do so. I am fixing all of that as well as I can and just hope it is enough for you.

Namaste!

To all of the new friends I made this week and to those friends that have been my guides through the wilderness I’ve travelled heart and soul through the last 30 days I thank you from the bottom of my heart and appreciate the clarity, growth, acceptance and above all understanding you’ve given me.

I am not entirely blameless in the situation, an ugly disease called depression struck a silent sneaking blow to who I am, who I had been to my family and how I wanted to be. I can’t take that back, I can’t undo the mistakes I’ve made or ignore them. While I may not have noticed the depths of despair and fear in my heart over the last 15 months due to the illness, I am still responsible. I hurt my family in subtle yet massively painful ways.

My goal since October 12th 2005 has always been to do right by Zoe, and to truly love her without condition. When Zandr was born I felt the same for him, and the same with Mikey. Sadly due to fear of failing them and an inability to cast away self doubt I let myself spiral ever downward into a place where I could no longer feel anything but anger, sadness and despair turned inward towards myself. A need to push everyone I knew away from me, because I felt..I knew I was a failure. It made me numb.. The worst part is I couldn’t see it even at the end. It took me losing everything important to me to wake me up from the horror I’d become. That whole time is there replaying in my head fuzzily. It’s like I was in the backseat of my own brain wanting desperately to scream but I had no voice, no ability to reason with myself. My heart knew the truth, that Zoe, Zandr & Mikey had captured my heart and soul from the moment I met them, but I could not think it or know it any longer.

Depression is an evil evil disease that can cause good people to do bad things or at the very least make them incapable of making the right choices. Even now that I’m a few weeks into treatment for it and am finally painfully aware of how bad I became, I can still feel it probing at my heart looking for a way to once more take the reins and lead me back down. I’m crawling out of the hole finally. It sadly is something that has to be done alone. Only I can find the path back to unity of my heart and soul, I have guides in the form of therapists, counselors & medication but the act of healing comes from within. I do want to thank the people who have given me advice & have spent time with me to ease the burden weighing me down though. Each moment is different and some are almost unbearable. I disagree with some of the things they’ve said but the feeling of support makes me still listen.

Every day has been a struggle, at night I fight back against the pain of loneliness in my empty house. The feelings of home and happiness now just a memory. I don’t know how to make amends to those three amazing people who inspired me to be a better man. I’m sorry I failed to realize their hopes for me. I took in their love and cast back sullen sadness no matter how much I wanted to rejoice with them in the amazing journey of life. I turned my back on my best friend, lover and wife. I turned my back on our two amazing joyful sons. Instead I let fear, doubt, & distrust rule me. Did they do anything to deserve this? No,  That my friends is what love is. Doing what is required of you for the betterment of each other and sacrificing for happiness. I used to know that and knew it intrinsically with every cell in my body and every facet of my soul. Depression took that knowledge and locked it away for a long terrible dark time.

I will not let myself fall back into the pit of despair, I have found once more that which makes me a good man. I have forgiven myself for I knew not what I did. I can not forget for I will bear the scars for the treatment I gave my loved ones till the end of my days. I will not ever let myself stop being the good person I know I am.

I know you’re too young to understand what’s going on right now. Know that I love you guys with all my heart and soul, that I miss you so much and that this isn’t anything you guys did. All I want right now is to feel your arms hug me and to wrap my arms around you and hold you both close. You two and your mommy are the most important people in all the world to me. Seeing your faces when I first wake up every morning is the best part of my workday other than coming home to you guys.

I’m sorry that I’ve ever yelled at you, I know that must be scary. I’m so sorry Zandr that I’ve been unable to fix the eczema your legs and arms and that due to my own exhaustion haven’t been able to read to you as often as I’d like. Seeing you boys in pain is the most anguishing experiencing in my life with the exception of having you taken away from me.  When you Mikey give me a hug and then scootch back onto my lap to sit down that always warms my heart in ways I never knew I could until after you guys were born.

The last week since I haven’t been able to talk to you guys I’ve listened to the saved voicemails I had of you both and looked through all the pictures I have desiring nothing more than to have you fall asleep cuddled up with me feeling safe, happy and warm.
Know that no matter what happens, that mommy and daddy love you guys so much and that we both just want to do what we feel is best for you. I love you boys so much and being away from all of you is the most painful thing I’ve ever experienced. I miss you both so much and hope that I can see you soon.

I am so thankful to your mom that she felt that I would be a good husband to her and a great father to you boys, she is one of the best things that ever happened in my life as are both of you. It sucks that it took this happening to make me fully realize that. I miss you guys. I love you guys.

When your mommy asked me to give her a baby, I had no idea just how powerfully being a parent would affect me, I knew I’d love you and that you’d be amazing but mere words can’t hold a candle to how totally amazing and beautiful you boys are. Everytime you say “Daddy” or “I love you” boys my heart melts a little bit.

Your loving dad,

Chris

1. Stop being angered. I’m going to counseling tomorrow and will go everyday if I have to until I can feel good about not yelling at people or making people feel threatened. Intimidating or hurting others is anathema to who I am and how I wish to be. I may never have struck anyone in anger or not but I will not let my temper rule me.
2. I’m going to deal with my depression, my conflict and my overall stress level when it happens instead of waiting for things to get too heavy for me to bear.
3. I’m going to go back to work and accomplish my goals if I cannot do so through my current situation I will find something better and stick with it to provide better security for my life.
4. I’m going to find happiness again, first in myself and then in others. My friends and family used to be my sole source of happiness since deep inside I haven’t really been happy with myself since I was young. I will find happiness in myself.
5. I’m going to prove to myself that I can be who I want by making myself a better person. I am a good person that has let personality flaws, faults and issues cloud my judgment and actions and that is not who I am or who I will allow myself to be perceived as.
6. I’m going to stop smoking by the end of the year. Done. I need to be healthy for myself, my boys and smoking only wastes money and causes health problems.
7. I’m going to stop eating unhealthy food. I eat far too much junk food. I will only be eating real food and not processed junk anymore.
8. I’m going to stop drinking unhealthy beverages. Beer, wine, soda all of it. Done. I need to be healthier and consuming so much soda isn’t good. I don’t drink much but every little bit helps.
9. I’m going to exercise. I keep saying I need to lose weight and get in better shape but keep making excuses about it. That stops now. I’ve spent the last couple mornings doing situps and pushups soon I’ll be doing some jogging. I need to be healthier about myself in every way.
10. I’m going to stop sitting on my ass and start living life. All too often I’ve come home from work exhausted and instead of spending quality time with my family I chose to zone out watching tv. That’s done. I need to return to the days of reading, learning and spending real quality time with those I care about.
11. I’m going to stop talking so damned much. Odds are if I’ve talked with someone I’ve tried to dominate the conversation. I don’t know the reasons why but deep down maybe I just feel that I need verification of my opinions. Or it could be I just crave the attention.
12. I’m going to set myself a budget that allows me to save money every month and pay back and pay off bills in the past. Getting ahead instead of languishing behind.
13. I’m going to stop using the internet as much. I retreat into my vice of using the internet too much. I’m not a gaming addict or porn freak or anything like that. I just love the shear amount of information the internet provides but I turn to it as a distraction too much for it to be healthy.
14. I’m going to start thinking before I speak. All too often my mouth has spoken things I didn’t mean and didn’t ever want to say or have caused me to drone on and on about nothing instead of truly knowing exactly what I wanted to say. That stops now.
15. I’m going to find confidence again, since the birth of my son Mikey I have struggled with depression over affording bills for my family, the stress of a job I didn’t like and by deep feelings of letting my family down. When I lost that job I felt crippled by zero confidence in myself. I need to regain the strength I felt and to feel confident again.
16. I’m going to improve my self esteem. I am a good person and have made mistakes and been misunderstood but I am a good person and have good ethics and morals.
17. I’m going to clean my garage and get rid of things I don’t need. Material items all too easily distract from people. I’m going to be a better neighbor and colleagues. I need to be there for my neighbors & coworkers when they need me.
18. I’m going to take more time for my friends instead of time with my friends.
19. I’m going to listen far more than I speak. I run at the mouth to hide my own insecurities. It only serves to make me look foolish which reinforces my insecurities.
20. I’m going to make sure I understand something before I say I do. All to often I’ve said I understand while leaping instead to wrong conclusions. That’s not fair to other people or myself.
21. I’m going to respect myself, my friends and family more than I do now and show that respect in my interactions with them.
22. I’m going to stand up for myself and be heard truthfully. In the past I’ve had issues with lying but when I met my wife I stopped all that. I didn’t want to do anything like that for her. While that’s a noble intention I don’t want to lie (even white lies) for myself first and foremost and then my family.
23. I’m done giving into the fears and doubts in me. Those parts of me are not healthy and will no longer be allowed to exist. If I sense fears and doubts that only serve to cause me turmoil, they’re gone.

All of this starts now or started September 24th and will be an ongoing effort to align how I am with who I want to be. I’ll likely be updating every day now with a quick note of which ones I feel like I am improving and which I need to work harder on.