Tonight’s chat with a dear friend of mine reminded me of a lesson I learned a few years ago, when I went ape nuts clicking every blue link I could find at iWon.com in a bid to become independently wealthy and attract me some hot gold digging babes. I was on a mission to win something, ANYTHING from iWon’s site, so I could pay my bills, quit my job, and at long last tell my boss to go blow it out his own arse.

I also signed up for these gaming sites too in the hopes that I would become some kind of gaming master and win hundreds of dollars in cash prizes. Instead, I would win $1.50… then lose $2.00, win $4.00, then lose $5.00, and on and on.

For three weeks I was at it, playing games, click click clicking, playing some more games, then click click clicking, then play iWon’s slot machine, then click click clickity click click clicking, until my fingers started to sprain. By the end of the third week I was a few dollars in the hole and my fingers looked liked they belonged to the Elephant Man. I wasn’t getting anywhere. As usual, luck was never a lady with me, and in the end I finally gave up.

The next day I went to work, and as I was signing in, somebody handed me an envelope.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“That’s your raffle prize.”

“My…. what??”

“Every year we raffle off the profits from the soda machines, and everyone is automatically entered. You were one of the winners, so that’s your share. 25 bucks.”

I just stood there, blown away by having finally won something, and especially at the timing of it all. I had spent the last three weeks trying to win every prize imaginable at iWon, and failing miserably at that, and now came this, a $25 prize for a raffle I never even knew existed. I still have that envelope by the way, with the money still inside.

There’s an old joke where a man prays to God to win the lottery and the Lord tells him to go buy a lottery ticket first. In my case even that part had already been taken care of. It was a sobering lesson straight from heaven, and one I had sadly forgotten over the years. As much as I’d like to believe God to rain His blessings on my life without requiring any effort on my part except to receive it, I still strive in my own strength to create my own success, and no matter how many times I fail, that lesson never seems to fully sink in for me. It’s been especially true these past few weeks, as I try to cram as much knowledge as I can find into my poor little brain so I can utilize it all to make money off the Internet, whether through my blog or elsewhere. There’s so much information to sift through, so little time to digest it all, and not enough brainpower on my part to take what I know and transform myself into the self sufficient man that I’ve always longed to be.

And yet I seem to leave no room for God in any of this. I’m trying to do it all on my own strength, relying on the world’s wisdom and philosophies, when instead I should be casting these burdens on Him, and trusting Him to once again provide that envelope of blessings when I truly need it. That’s something no professional blogger or Internet mogul will ever tell you either. But it’s the secret to real success, real peace and freedom from worry, learning that it really is all under His control. If I succeed in this new mission I’ve made for myself, it will not be because of my talents or skills or luck, but only, and ONLY, because God is gracious in His blessings towards me.

By the way, I do intend to use the prize money I won someday… specifically for when I finally meet the girl of my dreams.

Tags: babes, blessing, blessings, blown away, cash, dear friend, elephant, elephant man, failure, financially independent, fingers, gambling, get rich, God, grace, iwon, lord, loser, losing, lottery ticket, love, money, nuts, playing games, prize, prizes, profits, schemes, self sufficient, slot machine, success, win 4, winner, winning, wisdom, world, worldly
Categories: Lincoln's Personal Log
 
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Some time ago my folks and I decided to celebrate my last birthday by taking a trip to the casinos. We had a coupon for an all you can eat buffet, so I was immediately sold on the idea.

I had never been to a casino before, being the kind of guy who didn’t see the logic in having my money so quickly liberated by a gang of mob-like casino runners, but this time my curiosity won out. The place we were going to was a huge complex consisting of a mall, an indoor stadium, a luxury hotel, and of course, the casino itself. When we walked in I was visually assaulted by bright lights everywhere, in all different shades of shiny colors that thrilled me.

“Wow, the colors, the colors! I gotta take a pic of this!” *Click*

Next thing I knew I was surrounded by three security guards.

“uh….”

“Excuse me sir, you’re not allowed to take pictures here.”

I managed to stutter out an apology, thinking for sure I was now going to get my head bounced off the cement, but they were pretty nice about it, checking my camera to make sure I wasn’t scoping the territory, then finally letting me go with just a warning. I quickly put my camera away and briskly walked to a different section (just in case they were having second thoughts), where I tried my hand at a few slot machines. 5 minutes in I was beginning to realize how much I really hated gambling. I had two coupons worth 20 dollars that I could use to gamble and promptly lost it all in under 45 seconds. After that I was pretty much tapped out, refusing to spend another dime on this accursed place.

It occurred to me though that when you’re not willing to spend money at a casino, there isn’t much else you can do, except maybe stare at the pretty lights some more. I finally gave up and hit the restaurant, where the food was simply excellent, much to my relief. I sampled foods with weird sounding names and polished it all off with a HUGE waffle cone of creamy chocolate ice cream. Yeah yeah, I may be getting up there in years, but I still refuse to grow up.

Despite the vast size of the casino complex, once the eating was done, there really wasn’t much else to do, so not surprisingly I quickly got bored out of my mind. I decided to call it a day and went back to the terminal to wait for my bus to arrive, where I ran into a thick wall of cigarette smoke coming from chain smokers who were also waiting for their buses. I swear, I’ve never seen so many cigars and cigarettes in my life. EVERYBODY was smoking up a storm. I guess for them it was a way of taking their minds off the thousands of dollars they just blew by saying “hit me” one time too many in Blackjack.

Honestly, these gamblers creeped me out. The zombie looks on their faces as they continued to pour coins into slot machines, their horrific reaction to seeing the wheel go just a few numbers past the one they bet on, the wringing of hands for being dealt awful cards in Texas Hold ‘Em, and so on. Maybe I’m weird, but I don’t consider this my idea of fun.

The bus finally came, and I leapt up the stairs with a nod to the driver and a short request:

“Get us the hell outta here.”

The complex soon shrank into the background, almost sinking into the earth as I glanced back one last time and thought to myself: “Never again.”

Tags: all you can eat, apology, birthday, bright lights, buffet, casino, casino complex, casinos, cement, chocolate ice cream, coupons, curiosity, gamble, gambling, logic, luxury hotel, mall, mob, restaurant, runners, second thoughts, security guards, slot machines, stutter
Categories: Lincoln's Personal Log
 
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