Personal Crisis – Page 9 – Perpetual Adoration

March 14, 2015

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A Banker Responds to My Novena

During the first three years of my law practice (1983 to 1986), I rented an office from some other attorneys. In addition to the use of an office, I was allowed to use the other attorneys’ receptionist to answer a separate telephone line that I had set up in the reception area. My agreement also included an arrangement in which I was able to use one of the secretaries to prepare legal documents. She kept track of the time she spent doing my work, and I paid an agreed-upon hourly rate to the attorneys for her services.

February 21, 2015

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Trash Compactors and Depression

On a Friday evening in June 1977, while I was in the family room of my parents’ home, the evening news came on the television. The news opened with a teaser announcement about a movie that had recently been released that was surprising all of the critics and was wildly popular among viewers. Of course, if we wanted to know what that movie was, we had to sit through 20 minutes of the news before the newscaster would tell us about the movie.

January 17, 2015

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The Vanishing Pause

If you read my article last week, you know about the May 2013 Internet Trends Report that revealed that the typical smartphone user checks his or her phone 150 times a day. I finished writing the article on a Saturday, and the following Monday I met with “Tim,” a 27-year-old man who was in need of legal assistance. During the first five minutes of our meeting, Tim received four text messages on his iPhone. Since he was holding his phone in his hand, he immediately read the messages. On two occasions, he stopped talking to me so he could respond to the messages.

December 20, 2014

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A Special Christmas Gift

Earlier this month, I had a conversation with a judge who recently retired after serving as a state court judge for more than 20 years. For the purpose of this article, I’m going to call him “John.” John is in his early 60s, and during our conversation he asked me how many grandchildren I have. I told him that after adding three new grandsons last month, my wife and I have 10 grandchildren.

November 9, 2014

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Stretching Your Way To New Capabilities

Last month, a 22-year-old man scheduled an appointment with my office to discuss the possibility of filing a bankruptcy. For the purpose of this article, I’m going to call him “Jim.” When Jim and I met, he explained to me that he had been terminated from his job earlier in the year and was drowning in debt. He told me that he currently lives with his girlfriend in the basement of her parents’ home.

September 27, 2014

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Is Your Life Out of Control?

According to Dorothea Brande, author of the book, Wake Up and Live, the most important success secret she has ever discovered is to “[A]ct as if it were impossible to fail, and it shall be.” From a business perspective, I can tell you that in my 31 years of practicing law and working with numerous business owners, Brande’s “secret” really is one of the true principles of success in the business world.

August 23, 2014

A Different Perspective on the Robin Williams Suicide

After the recent suicide of the famous American actor and comedian Robin Williams, various reasons were given to explain why he killed himself. Some of the reasons included the fact that he had recently been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, suffered from severe depression, and was having money problems. For whatever reason, at the age of 63, Williams ended his life after determining that he was better off dead than alive.

July 26, 2014

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Aggressive Behavior, Anger, and Trust

One evening during the summer of 2005, I called one of my clients and asked him if he would come over to my house to fix a problem with my plumbing. His name was Jim, and at that time he was in his mid-50s. We had done business with each other since the early 1990s. I was originally introduced to Jim by another client who owned several rental properties and had hired Jim to work on his properties.

June 14, 2014

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The Real Enemy

A couple of weeks ago one of my clients started talking about one of his favorite pastimes — reading comic books. My mind immediately flashed back to when I was a boy in the 1960s. Back then, I hated reading assignments from school, but I loved reading comic books. The first product that I ever ordered through the mail was a product that I discovered by reading an advertisement in a comic book.