chris culbertson [dot] com

Driving to Change the World

// July 7th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // life

I really like the idea of changing the world. In some way, big or small, I want to have a positive impact on the world. I think charities are great and there are many more organizations that do wonderful things. I don’t like all the beuracracy and overhead that many of the organizations have to deal with. Besides all that, I don’t have a whole lot of disposable income or time to volounteer. So, I want to share with you the small things I try to do on a day to day…nay…an hour by hour basis. It is easy to look at the big picture and pick out the beautiful parts. It is harder to make choices consistantly when people are not looking and may never know. This is what I challenge you to do.

So here is the first thing that I try to do. It is not going to change the world to some crazy extent and most people won’t even have a clue that I make this effort, but I know that if just a few more people take this approach it will help the greater good.

When I drive my car, or any car for that matter, I pretend like every other driver on the road could potentially be my mom in a rental car. Feel free to substitute mom for mother-in-law, bosses wife, teen age daughter, you get the picture. Everytime I get mad or pissed off, I take a step back (figuratively), and think what if that is my mom. I would not want to drive up next to someone and flip them off or cut them off and slam on the breaks or something; only to find out it is my mom. I am however, a big fan of the horn. My horn does my talking for me. I make sure that it is a honk that represents what I would say, given the chance. Sometimes people just need to know that they did something wrong so they don’t do it again (ideally). If we could get everyone to take this approach I think we would have a lot more people happy and fewer accidents that cause even more frustration, anger, and stress than the often times very small thing it stemmed from. So let’s all choose our attitude when we are driving. You can still be in a hurry and drive fast, just don’t get all frustrated and do silly things when some car is left lane cruising.

This is something that is not easy for me, but I truly feel that small things like this lead to better self control, awareness of others, and eventually a better place to exist.

Feel free to comment and share on twitter. I am going to be using a new hashtag #ideasthatchangetheworld I know it is long, but sometimes small effects take big efforts.

Life…A New Chapter

// June 30th, 2009 // No Comments » // family, life, work

Riding the Wave of Life

The past couple of weeks have been a very busy time in my life. So many things are happening and I could not help but to really take a step back and look at my life from afar. These types of moments, for me at least, do not happen too often. When they do, I really get into it and analyze who I am and where I am. I challenge myself daily and hold myself to a very high standard. Sometimes this is a good thing and sometimes it is a bad thing. I feel that times like this are important for an individual so one can see where they are compared to where they have been. This sounds very simple, but it is not. When we get going in life it is easy to see the next step, but often times you lose focus on the big picture. I always compare it to the difference of someone you see everyday and someone you see once a year. It is easy to see the changes in the person you only see once a year because you have a snapshot of where they were and over a given period of time you were unable to see their progression (or digression) and then you see another snap shot. So anyway, I feel like a lot is going on and I took the time to take a step back and look at my life from a different perspective and I really feel that this part of my life is the start of a new chapter.

I encourage everyone to do the same every once in a while. Life get’s fast and sometimes overwhelming. Don’t let it get the best of you. Even if things are going well, it is always good to take a step back and look at it from a fresh standpoint. Look at how great the economy was doing and how quickly that went south, right.

So I am looking at work and what I want to do and how I can make money doing it. I am looking at getting married in October, which is great, but a weird feeling. Between all of this and just trying to be more active and healthy has me in a whirlwind of emotion. Excitement seems to be the one seeping through most often and I am exactly that when I look at the future with the opportunities that lie in front of me and my two girls (Megan and Olivia) always behind me 100%.

Zappn.com Launch Party

// June 23rd, 2009 // 1 Comment » // life, videos

A few friends, the Swindlr crew, launched their first product Zappn.com a few weeks ago. May 29th, 2009 they threw a launch party at the Arts Incubator in downtown Kansas City. They have been working on the product for quite sometime and actually met their newest teammate/programmer at Highlight Midwest last year.

Be sure to check out Zappn.com where “it’s not who you are, it’s what you do” and sign up for an account. Be sure to give them feedback as the product is pretty new and they are updating it like crazy.

Here is a video from the launch party.

Zappn.com World Premier Launch Party from chrisculbertson on Vimeo.

Thanks Guys. Be sure to follow them on Twitter: Chase, Brock, Darby, Christopher, and Zappn of course!!!

Starting a WP blog

// April 18th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // life

I have started this WP blog for a number of reasons. One being to learn how to do it. I continue to be surprised just how easy it is. I have just updated the theme and am beginning to experiment with the widgets and plug ins.

Here is what to expect from my new personal blog:

• General thoughts and intrests
• Business ideas and communications
• Royals talk
• Mizzou talk
• Videos from things in my life (so I can learn more about video editing)
• Experiments in rich media and content in general
• You will probably learn more about my friends and family because I talk a lot about them
• Hopefully fun and light reads to help get your brains a movin’

I love to connect with new people and just share information and knowledge. I am thirsty for knowledge and don’t plan to be quenched anytime soon, so give me some to drink down.