I recently saw what I thought was a pretty stinking amazing movie. Not that the acting was particularly great (though I do find something weirdly fun about Ben Stiller - might have been him in another epic movie that set the tone for me). Have a watch, I'll still be here when you get back...

In this movie a guy has to go find something that has been lost - for the most part he is chasing after something tangible but "us" artistic movie types (keep in mind I thought Galaxy Quest was throughly epic) know that the undertone was really him seeking that which could not be held - passion, excitement enthusiasm a genuine love for life and a love for what he does. It made me fully realize something that I have been told for years: {"When you aim for nothing you'll hit it."}

I watched as he fought against being more than he perceived himself to be and I reveled at the idea that I simply don't struggle with that, at all, never ever (for those of you with sarcasm detectors - they should have just gone off). I AM MY OWN ROADBLOCK.

I strongly believe we are all made for things so much greater than any of us can comprehend. We are made to do things that are seemingly impossible. We are on life's greatest adventure and often settle for the bleachers - you might not but I do.

When I write code I believe God smiles. It's one thing I do where I can make an impact, where I can change things. The things I get to do manifest in to so much more than 1's and 0's but sometimes I cannot see past that and I flop around on one of the things I love doing and teaching to my kids.

As developers we know that programming is often not as it is portrayed in TRON, The Matrix or Hackers; we even giggle at the excitement demonstrated by the actors on the silver screen. There is an ironic humor in that though - I geek out over getting a few LEDs to flash on a breadboard or solving a really hard problem so are we so different? Maybe deep down inside the actors and actresses want to be be 1337 Hax0rs, or not.

So here comes the wet blanket: We only have so long to become and do what we have a passion to do. Assuming the average human will live to 80 years that means we only have 4160 weeks to live and share our passion with the world!

Here's the dryer for said "wet blanket" : We can start now.

I love sharing my excitement over hardware and making things with my kids and wife (turns out the like it quite a bit too). If you are anything like me you are you're own roadblock when it comes to living a really amazing life so I have some advise, from one roadblock to another:

PLAN AWESOME.

You might've missed it because you were looking for 7 steps to leading a super cool life, while being a parent, a super hero and all around coder (sidebar: that would be a great title for a book if it didn't imply that this thing had to be complex). Let me share the secret again:

PLAN AWESOME.

Try it this weekend. I'll even give you the first plan:

You: "Hey kids"

Them: "Yeah {Mom || Dad}"

You: "Let's make a {insert your passion, excitement filled adventure here*}"

Them: "Wow! you are the best planner of awesome! You win the parent of the year award!"

And there was much rejoicing. But be prepared for absolute flops but the point is that you are sharing what you love with others. Remove roadblocks, get out of your own way, be amazing and live out every bit of who you should be!

*Excitenment filled adventure could include but is not limited to: Soldering something for the first time, building a railgun, geocaching, hunting (but not touching) a bunch of different types of local nature, building a fort out of anything but pillows and furniture, building a game from scratch, etc...