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I am very exited.

Most of the architecture community are healthy, resolved, and they are the smartest people around.  Thinking back to when I started having problems in Architecture school, made me realize that most people in the architecture profession need a sort of support group, one that they could make there own.

I have heard people say that architecture life is one where architecture becomes your wife. You must devote endless hours to it, and it becomes your life. While being in the “Architecture Life”, I have heard complaints about how we were misled; the profession is not what we thought it was going to be.  Too much work and not enough pay.  Too much stress to be wasted for our clients to easily shut us down.  At my previous job our client’s destroyed our design, by only requiring us to use well known design, and not develop new innovative design.

I am here to change that, I want to lead the way, to create a new way of looking at architecture.  Architecture is not something that is old and dead.  It was not just great in the past, this thought makes it easy for people to just reuse the same ideas.

I will not stand for the status quo of our profession.  I am tired of being a depressed and angry young architect.  I want people in architecture school to have hope and certainty that they will be part of a new way of life. They will fight for good design, and quality.   No more complaining of the struggle to have good design on the top of our bosses and clients priority list.

I want to create documentaries OR SOMETHING that teaches how the corporation way of thinking (the bottom line) has made our profession a miserable and uncreative field.

This is where I come in. If you read my essay, Survival Through Design (I stole the title from Richard Nuetra’s book), you see that I have had a long hard struggle in this profession.  I have continually blocked myself from the successful accomplishment of my degree and in turn, my ascension into this great career. It started from the beginning, when I excelled at design and learned to love the abstract conceptual artistry of the early Architectural Process.  When I came to the realization that most people in the profession rarely get to experience the conceptual beginning –designing-, I convinced myself that, that, was unattainable to me.  I was not good enough to stand out from the rest and work in that small percentile of people that actually get to design.  That was the main source of angst that I had throughout my years at Cal Poly Pomona. I unconsciously thought, what is the point of being here, if I won’t get to do what I love?

As they say, hind sight is 20/20.  I now see the error of my ways. I don’t regret all those years that I went through my depression.  I was able to learn so much and experience a different kind of education.  I always knew like most people say “you really have to love architecture to make it through till the end.” I somehow knew that I would one day learn to appreciate every aspect of my chosen profession.  And here I am, all these years later writing about this.

I am blogging about this, so that I may help someone that might be going through similar struggles.

I just recently realized that this is exactly what I want and I am done getting in my own way!  I love the early conceptual stages, but I also know that being a designer is not all that makes a well rounded Architect.  I have now learned to appreciate all aspects of my profession even the dreaded drafting and red lines, without which, we might never perfect our immense task of planning buildings.

http://www.ted.com/talks/bjarke_ingels_3_warp_speed_architecture_tales.html

I have been on a weight loss rampage in the past month.  Due to my Gout problem, I had to stop eating bad foods and had to stop working out crazy, like I was all year.  I cant take my protein shakes anymore, that is for sure!

I began last year, when I started my crazy life reinvention.  July 4, 2008.  That was when I was standing facing the pacific ocean at Newport Beach and asked myself: why have i let myself go?  What is the difference between me and some beach bod guy?  This has got to change! enough is enough!

I think I wrote about it in an older blog. The thing I really haven’t said is that I went on a high protein – low simple carb diet and lost tons of weight fast, but because of the change of diet -amongst other things- I got Gout! (look it up)

After my first episode last year with Gout, I balanced out my diet, but I could not go back to the gym regularly. I thought, what is up? I really want to do this! What is it that is stopping me from going to the gym? I would get home from work and eat then watch TV and forget gym time! Couldn’t think of why, so i went for the self help stuff.  Tony Robbins, Stephen Covey, and eventually David Allen.

First, it was only Tony Robbins, after listening to Awake the Giant Within, I was off and running.  I was going to the gym regularly eating right and staying away from the TV!

This worked all year and I was Gout free. I even had free days and drank beer occasionally.   I thought I was doing real good. I was looking better than ever with new muscles popping out everywhere and getting lower pant sizes. I thought, what else can I do to loose more weight faster and reach my goal faster?

I gave up beer for 6 months this started in the last week of May 09.  I lost pounds quick! But I still had my free weekends and instead of beer, I drank liquor.  After a fun weekend in Santa Monica, I got Gout again! It sucked! I thought man not this again! It has been here ever since.  I am currently doing a mainly Raw/Vegan diet to help me get rid of the uric acid but this is a double edge sword.  I am losing weight like an anorexic. And losing weight fast is a no no for Gout sufferers (look it up).

Now I am walking on thin ice, as far as straying from the raw food diet.  Mainly, Fresh vegetable juices, using the Jack Lalanne power juicer. If  I eat, lets say, a chicken soft taco from taco bell and then a bunch of Doritos, then forget it; the Gout is back.

I will reach my fitness goal fast as heck now.  Then I will stop loosing weight and get my Gout under control! That is what is going on with me now.

other than that I am also working my butt off to Get Things Done!

Everyday we have habits that make us fatter, balder, unemployed, unsuccessful, unhealthy…   and yet we continue to follow the same habits and patterns of behavior. Those behaviors lead us to a stagnant existance.

How do we break free?

I know that the first thing is becoming aware. A big wake up call like a serious illness will do that.  Why cant we decide proactively to live healthy? Why cant I just make myself work 8 to 12 hours to make my dreams come true; as opposed to waiting until life passes me by. What keeps me distracted from my results?

Lists:

The Pleasures-

-resting/ relaxing/ Hanging out

-sleep

-t.v./ movies / reading for pleasure/ video games

-computer/ internet (for fun)

-visiting w/ fam and friends….

there is more

The Limiting Beliefs -

-I am not good enough

-Its too hard to learn

-I don’t have time to learn

-I don’t like grunt work

-getting stuck is the worst

Another thing that i do is I say things are easy and fast when they are not.  Everything takes time and effort. I have to learn to give everything its right time and effort.  Especially in a learning curve situation.

I am finally so far along in my fitness, that I am ready to jump over to my career. This is me becoming aware of something wrong and tackling it head on. With you as my leverage.

Wish me luck!

I envision myself working non-stop. (website, portfolio, video podcast, art)

the results are:

a dream job.

successful website with a blog and video podcast about architecture -culture, designs, LEED, education- and much more.

work that i am proud of.

Don’t get me wrong, I have gotten stuck due to lack of knowledge, but the things that has stopped me from following my instinct the most, are my insecurities. I am done with that. I know what I am capable of and I know that if I don’t have a skill and I really need it, or want it, all I have to do is take a class, or read and practice said skill and I will go back to following my heart. It is not that easy to know what to do in every situation, but if you follow your first gut feeling, you will end up in a good spot. If you are wrong then you need to work on analyzing that decision, so that won’t happen again. Usually if your gut leads you down the wrong path, then that usually means that you need to learn something. I go back home and analyze the F— out of it! Then, I research on that stuff and learn what to do if I am ever in a similar situation again.

If you think about your decisions as a natural progression, it might look like a bunch of branches. Eventually you have a tree. I know that the decisions that I have made for certain parts of my life have left me with some pretty ugly looking trees. I am currently in the process of fixing those dudes. Like my eating habits. That tree is literally looking better and better as of late. My architecture tree has now been replanted because it was really dying already. I am happy that I am now fixing all my trees, so that eventually, I could have a full forest of wonderful looking healthy trees.

Do I even have it in me?

What if I do it and it is crap?

I need to learn form Z better so that my stuff could look better.

Never did I just smoothly crank out shit! It was always stopped with a barrage of second guessing myself. Now fast forward to today and listening to the No Reform tracks I thought man these are good, people will like them. I told Maria and she said, they do sound good, but there is a lot of good music that no one ever listens to.
That is true. I am certain that there is tons of art, music, poetry, that is good, but no one ever sees, hears, or reads. That is what I think people must get over in order to create. In order to create one must stop second guessing themselves. I am sure any artist will tell you this. I have heard some musicians say that they write music for themselves. I think that is passion. If no one ever listens to it, it must not matter.

So back to good old Tim Ferris, the truth is, if you don’t believe in yourself as a messenger, then you will never let yourself create anything of value. In turn, no one will believe in you as a messenger!

I am too busy getting stuff done, to even worry about failure.  I am just pushing to make things happen.  I know that all i need is to make everyday count and if I fall, really push to not let myself stay down!! I really recomend that if you are having some kind of mind block, like writers block, or life block, you get into this stuff; it is not bad at all.

I will keep you updated on my accomplishments.