The Moustache Years

Today has been a monumental day thus far for Utley. Monumental in the fact, or in hopes of gaining some momentum, some rhythm if you will, in respect to this so called "job hunt." So if the kharmic gods are out there listening, please, take note.

Upon looking at the weather forecast earlier in the week, I noticed that today, Wednesday, was shaping up to be another epic day for skiing. 50 degrees, not a cloud in the sky. Therefore I made plans yesterday to do some skiing, figuring the season is winding down, and also I have other things going on this weekend. However, after thinking about it last night and sleeping on it, I woke up this morning and decided, "I'm gonna pass on skiing today. There is work to be done!" I had a very productive afternoon yesterday, so in hopes of gaining momentum, I said thanks but no thanks to skiing. And you should see the day outside today. Glorious.

So I woke up, had my morning coffee, and headed to the gym, already day #3 this week. After a great workout I got in my car and began the short drive home. The whole way home I was looking at myself in the rear view mirror, something I have begun to do a lot of since I have been growing this 1.5 month old beard. I've been thinking about it over the past couple days, but looking in the mirror today, I decided today's the today...I shaved the beard. Basically a "shout out" to the aforementioned kharmic gods. A shout out saying, "Hey. Beard's gone. I'm ready!" I figure the move is an attempt mentally to put me in the "job hunting" frame of mind, rather than the "clearing of the head" frame of mind. A wise man once said, "How you look is how you feel," and with the beard I felt like a mountain man, a ski bum, someone taking some serious time off. Though not completely over that, I am ready to make some progress towards the next step of "On Sabbatical" or more importantly the next step of my working life. I mean I figure there will eventually be some interviews and of course, there will be no beard for interviews. Not that I have any yet, but I'm trying to practice the theory of Positive Visualization here. It's a theory I picked up from the book, The Secret. It states that if you consistently visualize what you want for your future, sure enough it will come true. So I got that going for me...and now let us see how it unfolds...

And one more thing, I did not shave the beard completely. I left a nice mustache and also a flavor-saver. For those of you unfamiliar with the term, a flavor-saver is the small patch of hair under the bottom lip. I saw Bruce Springsteen, aka The Boss, rocking one on The Daily Show the other day. Quite distinguished. I got the idea for the mustache, or the dont-trust-ache from one of the ski people I have met over the past few weeks. He is mustachioed and has an impossibly hot girlfriend, so hey, the dont-trust-ache, as he calls it, must be working. So I'm going to give it a shot. Probably not for too long, but its not every day one gets to play around with facial hair. Hence, I made the small transition from full beard to mustache, making it 2 moves today that should catapult me into the future...

Another wise man once told me, "Baby steps. It's all about baby steps."