Playing Not to Lose

At a recent family gathering, something was said to me that opened my eyes.

My family is a great bunch of people, with characters ranging the gamut – including a three-year-old cousin who already knows the hot names in politics! We generally eat, talk, pick on each other, and play cards when we get the opportunity, and holidays are always a good excuse to do so…

This particular gathering, we were playing Hearts – our old fallback – somewhat in memory of my grandmother who passed away last fall. If you are unfamiliar with Hearts, the goal is to have the LEAST points at the end of the game, which is reached when the person with the MOST points reaches 100 of them. Each heart is worth one point, and the queen of spades is worth 13 points, for a total of 26 points given per hand. If someone “takes them all,” meaning that one player gets all the hearts AND the “bitch” (queen of spades), that player gets NO points for the hand, and ALL OTHER players get 26 points added to their total.

During this game, I happened to be dealt a pretty good hand, and decided that I would try to “Take them all.” Usually, the other players catch on to what you are doing before the hand is over and “feed” a heart to someone else or even take one themselves to stop you from succeeding. When it was obvious that I was attempting to take them all, one of my cousins made a comment that that is far out of character for me… I usually let the game go on around me and take as few hearts as possible. I believe the statement was something along the lines of “balls dropping” or “growing a set” – leave it to my family to be so eloquent – but it struck a chord with me for some reason.

What I realized is that it’s not just cards with me – life is going on around me all the time and I don’t participate to my potential. Hearts was just one example of me “playing not to lose.” What I realized that day was that I need to start “playing to win!” And so I made a decision that day to do so.

What does this have to do with the environment, you ask? EVERYTHING. And nothing. It means I want you as my readers to know what my goals are with environmentastic! and my life as it relates to environmentastic! It means I want to announce to the world my expectations and my goals and my dreams, and I want you – my readers – to help hold me to them! Not to say that they may not change a little goal-for-goal, but that the end-point will probably be pretty static.

So here goes (stated in present tense in case the universe is listening – for you Secret fans!):

environmentastic! sets the standard for environmental blogs. It is the highest trafficked and most successful eco-site in the history of the internet.

environmentastic! boasts the world’s largest eco-directory, direct competition to DMOZ, except specifically for the environmental community.

environmentastic! is the first stop for consumers looking for eco-friendly alternatives to their conventional products; it is the internet’s most comprehensive vertical search portal for eco-friendly products, services, and ideas worldwide.

environmentastic! has the largest and most active eco-forum community on the web.

environmentastic! has grown and expanded into brick and mortar stores, offering a range of eco-friendly products using the Wal-Mart / Target / Meijer retail model – bringing eco-friendly products directly to consumers so consumers don’t have to seek and search to find what they need and want to be as green as possible.

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So there you have it. I’m putting it out for all the world to see and judge me by. I’ll be taking you along for the ride, readers, so I hope you’re ready. While environmentastic! will never be a “make-money-online” blog, don’t be surprised to see some reviews of what I’m doing or have done and how successful it was / is. Whether or not I reach any or all of the above goals, the real, true, and major underlying theme is that I want to be running my own business – one that makes a difference for people and the Earth in the long run.

I want the freedom to work on my own schedule and from wherever I would like. I’m already tired of working on someone else’s schedule – and I’ve had jobs that have been pretty flexible in that manner – but I’m still tired of it. And with the success that Raconteur Theatre is seeing, I’m excited to keep moving and make something larger and better out of the fine foundation that I feel environmentastic! has become!

Namaste,
A. Caleb Hartley

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