I’ve worked through a lot of stuff in the last year. This TED talk covers some of the stuff I’m still working through.

“Stories are data with a soul.” -Brene Brown

In January, I wanted to die so bad I stayed in bed the whole month taking Benadryl every time I woke up. It was bad.

While waiting for the Benadryl to kick in, I studied suicide and learned the most peaceful method involves an oven bag and helium. Beyond my religious baggage, the thing that kept me hanging on was a belief that I might be able to work on something that matters more than GeekBrief.TV did.

I want to be doing GeekBrief.TV. Since it was my idea and I wrote all the shows, I can’t come to terms with losing it. It should be mine. I invented my dream job and I don’t want to do anything else. Life says, I don’t get the option I want.

Luria and I agreed before mediation, I would get GeekBrief.TV and she would get Cali Lewis. To me that would be the best, bad end of our marriage and business relationship. When we got to mediation last November, she changed her mind. She was suing Mevio for reasons I can’t even begin to comprehend. Mevio’s lawyer, Bobby and mine said let her have GeekBrief.TV. Mevio told me that they would win and give GeekBrief.TV to me to control. The mediation process is HELL. Mevio told me I would earn back equity based on performance of the show. Having my baby (GeekBrief.TV) messed with by outside forces wasn’t okay, but I trusted Mevio at that point more than I trusted Luria. Right now, I barely trust even best friends. I made a huge mistake trusting Bobby at Mevio, but I don’t think it was the biggest business blunder I made.

In February, the depression burned off like fog does in San Francisco. I went from feeling doomed to feeling excited about my future. It happened over night.

I was taking care of my grandmother and her sister until the family could get them in a better, safer place. I started reading my home town paper and creating a vision for something I could do there. There was an article about Let’s Think Productions shooting a short film there. That gave me huge hope. I made a list of people in my home town that were making a difference, and I worked on getting to know them.

All that, and I still haven’t gotten to my biggest business blunder! When depression went away, I was open to any opportunity. The opportunity to produce the “Making of The Bloodstone Diaries: Thief of All Things” happened and it was one of the most fun things I’ve ever done in my life. I got to work with talented and nice people who produced very cool things for me to shoot and edit. From that, I made this …

My best friend from growing up has a daughter who is an amazing ballet dancer. She asked me to shoot photos and film the annual recitals. Intrigued by the opportunity to produce something I haven’t produced before and looking for ways to make money, I thought it would be cool to shoot the three recitals like a film and offer DVDs for sale to parents. The ballet school has around 500 students, so on the surface the idea seemed solid. It’s easy to shoot. It’s easy to edit. It’s easy to make DVDs. If I sold DVDs for $20 each, I figured it could be a nice bridge between GeekBrief.TV and what I wanted to do next.

There were three recitals. There was a gymnastics show, a dance show and a ballet show that took place over the course of a weekend. I heard from parents the event was torture, but for me it wasn’t. Okay, some of the gymnastics recital was torture, but the dance recital was an amazingly entertaining show that I would have paid to see and the ballet recital was beautiful.

After shooting the first show, I had to go to Office Depot and get an external hard drive because I realized I was capturing a LOT of data. I shot with two Canon 5D Mark IIs and rented a $5000 lens for tight shots. When we finished, I had over 20 hours of footage to edit down to half that. My promise to finish in a month was not even close to possible.

After syncing the two shots, I started cutting. I made a huge mistake. One camera shot 30 fps and the other 24 fps. The result of that mistake cost me a huge amount of time rendering to verify my cuts. In theory, it should have taken me about a month to edit what I shot. In reality, it took the whole Summer. Stumbling blocks continued to arise and it wasn’t until Monday that I got to get that haunting Steve Jobs quote out of my head: “Real artists ship.” I shipped.

I spent $30,000 to make $2,000, but beyond the cash, I put a massive amount of effort into the project. I hope some kind of karma is involved. I wanted to make recital films that are better than any other recital films ever made. When I see what I made, I think I failed. I don’t like the end result because my wide lens wasn’t good enough and I had to compress for standard definition. In HD, it looks better, but that’s too complicated for average moms and dads to grok.

Producing these DVDs was my biggest business blunder because it was a one off opportunity to make survival cash when I could have been working on something that would have provided on-going revenue. Caring about friends is a great way to be happy, but it isn’t the best basis for making business decisions.

Starting today, I’m looking for an opportunity to pour myself into someone else’s dream for Internet TV. I want to continue to be a pioneer in Web TV, but I’d like to take a break from being the primary dreamer (unless the dream is funded).

If you’d like to work with me, even though I made a huge mistake, I’m neal at neal.tv.

Tonight on PBS, a documentary series launched called America in Primetime. There are four episodes that you can catch on your local PBS affiliate for the next few weeks.

The first episode is called Independent Woman and I LOVED IT! My psychology goes all weird because I’m a very feminist straight man, which means I love strong women and yet I want to have sex with women … very complicated.

With GeekBrief.TV, I worked with every fiber of my soul to create a strong independent female character called Cali Lewis. To build this business with my ex-wife, I did a smart / stupid thing. I off-set everything I contributed so that people would believe the Cali character was a strong and true … geek woman. Now I struggle with the authenticity of the most successful thing I ever did.

If Luria hadn’t been pulled in other directions, my mission would have been all good … I guess … maybe not! I wanted to create this strong female character in the mold of Lucille Ball, Mary Tyler Moore and Roseanne Barr. I didn’t really do that. I created a picture of what I thought was right. I made a character that said the right things about geek culture and gadgets, but ultimately it was my little pretend world. Cali Lewis, during my tenure was me. But didn’t those men who wrote those shows I love do the same thing?

Luria got seduced by the Beaker guy. Based on what she told my attorneys during the divorce process, he wasn’t paying her. That makes me hurt for her.

That’s my past. I don’t want to let her go. I think she’s the most amazing woman I’ve ever known. I think she made a huge mistake to trust that Beaker guy more than me … and screw me, but I still hope one day she’ll come home.

People tell me to let go and move on. No thanks, but I’m choosing to move forward without letting go of my past. I really care about what this PBS documentary was about. I want to live in a world where strong women make a difference, because quite frankly … men haven’t impressed me much (except for Steve Jobs).

What I do next in life and tech will matter. I hope it matters to you.

I’ve seen this graphic posted online at least once a day for the last few weeks. Comments are usually about the same. People write things like, “This is so true,” and, “Wow!”

Now, I’m no Einstein, so it’s very possible that I’m missing something key here. I don’t read this and find inspiration. I read it wonder what everyone is smoking in order to be so moved by this quote?

Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.

If you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, YOU might live YOUR whole life believing the fish is stupid, but I’m pretty certain the fish isn’t going to be bothered by your judgement. The fish will not care. The fish will not be aware of your existence in any likelihood unless you try to interact with it on a personal level. If you try to feed the fish or swim with the fish or catch the fish, it might be curious about you and your bate or it might flee you, but the fish isn’t going to develop self-esteem issues just because you look down on it for it’s inability to climb a tree. The fish just isn’t going to care what you think. It’s a fish.

If you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, I think YOU have the problem. Maybe you have a learning disability. Maybe you’re delusional. There may be some schizophrenia. It’s not my place to diagnose you, but my point is this: Don’t spend much too much energy judging fish.

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DISCLAIMER: This was an attempt at writing some comedy. My apologies if you find inspiration in the quote.

I call them mean people because I think it works better than if I found an equivalent adult word. In the last year, I’ve dealt with people being as mean as they can be to me because they had financial gain in taking my business from me. I’ve learned a hard, cold lesson that people are mean when they want money or attention. They’re also mean when they don’t get money or attention.

Today, I got a crash course in a whole different kind of Internet meanness.

A girl named Rebecca Black has a dream to be a pop star. She got her mom to finance a single and a video. I heard the story, but didn’t pay much attention. In the version I heard, the mom said she funded the thing in order to discourage her daughter from a music career. The video blew up on YouTube and the folks involved think a music career might be viable, so mom’s plan didn’t work.

I had forgotten all about that story, and today when I saw several people tweeting in excitement that Rebecca Black was realeasing a new song, I thought this was some cool new singer that I missed discovering during my depression. As the day progressed, I figured out that people were just looking forward to making fun of her. I didn’t have a problem with that in a huge way until I found out she was 14-years-old.

I spent the night interacting with adults making fun of a 14-year-old girl who has a dream to be a pop star. There is no way any adult can justify being mean to a 14-year-old girl with a dream. It’s completely wrong. Her music is bubble gum, but the message in the song she released tonight is optimistic and full of hope.

Rather than making fun of her dream, I wish the Internet would cheer her on. I can’t find one thing in her story to ridicule. She had a dream and parents who love her enough to help. I wish we were all so blessed.

UPDATE: A friend on Facebook said, “The public spotlight is heavily risk/reward. If you want the glam, glory, and paychecks that come along with stardom and are willing to truly risk it, a thick skin is necessary. Been that way since the days of Shakespeare, regardless of age.”

My response is, “That’s bullshit! That’s an artificial paradigm that need not be true. Criticism is largely based on jealousy. There is a better way and it’s love. Let’s love when people do well and hate when they hurt others. There is no reason on earth to tear someone down who aims at success, just because you don’t like how they’re doing it. The only reason I can find to criticize someone is because they are hurting someone. There is no other justification.”

I can’t imagine a more fundamental psychological need we all have stronger than the need to feel like we matter. We need to feel like we matter to friends and family, to ourselves and (some of us) to God. When we’re uncertain about mattering, depression happens. You can really see the relationship between mattering and depression when you visit a nursing home. When our older people get moved to a nursing home, they often give up. Some of them thrive, but the ones who feel like they have nothing more to offer that anyone wants, they don’t survive very long.

We all have different ways of validating whether we matter or not. A wife may feel like she matters when her husband and children are considerate of her needs. A public figure may feel like he or she matters based on positive press coverage. Religious folks get a strong sense of mattering from faith, belief and community. I tend to feel like I matter when there is financial reward or through crazy, cool things that happens as a result of my work (having something I created become a question on Jeopardy or meeting notable people I admire). Being married to someone thousands of people agreed with me was special was a big part of feeling like I mattered up until a couple years ago.

16 E Noob was accidentally typed when my phone was in my pocket!!!

As I continue to struggle to break out of depression for good, I go up and down, up and down, up and down. The ups are great and the downs are horrendous.

Last year, going through the divorce process, I was emotionally far better off than I’ve been this year because belief (either spiritually true or psychologically self-created) gave me a strong sense that I mattered to God. I also felt like I mattered to myself and to friends and to family in the off-line world. My biggest sense of doubt throughout 2010 came from wondering if I matter professionally because nobody with any power seemed interested in helping me get back to work.

In January, I really stopped mattering to myself. Once a person stops mattering to themselves, it really doesn’t seem to make a difference if we matter to anyone else.

As an only child, raised without very much money and with a conservative ideology, the belief in rugged individualism was fundamentally programmed into my thought system. There is nothing wrong with the ideas of conservative, rugged individualism. Well … maybe there is one HUGE thing when it comes me. There’s nothing rugged about me! I’m a cushy, mushy, sentimental, heart-on-my-sleeve kind of a guy.

I left the place where I grew up after high school, moved to Dallas, and I really struggled to figure out life because my nature is NEVER, EVER to ask for anything. Luria inspired me to want to accomplish something big, and now I’ve got that in my blood. I want to do something bigger that what I’ve ever done. The main lesson I’ve learned in the last year is that I can’t do it by myself. I have to ask for help even though I can’t stand asking for anything. There will be more about that in a future post.

What I want to build seems both overwhelming and simple at the same time. The business I’ve spent the last several years imagining seems totally doable, but I can only start by myself. Ultimately, I have to attract a team that buys into my vision and helps me make it happen. That’s where we get back to the idea of mattering. I have to matter enough that people will want to join in on my dream.

A couple weeks ago, I shot two shows with a talented host who wants to work with me. It was a joy to create something that will make people smile. That was always my favorite part of doing GeekBrief.TV. It made me feel like I mattered because so many thousands of people seemed to enjoy what I was making everyday. It’s a great reason to get out of bed every morning.

There is no guarantee that what I want to do will happen, but I have lots of hope, some faith, at least the size of a mustard seed, and a passion for making Internet TV that makes people smile.

Last night the Tony Awards were on TV. I love live tweeting during award shows, but it’s inconsistant with the personal brand I need to build on Twitter. At the same time, it’s part of who I am, and I’ve gotten to interact with some really fun people, especially during the Oscars.

I was having a conversation with one of the coolest people on the planet and I had a thought I liked so much I tweeted it: “Broken people look for kindness wherever it’s available and share it whenever it’s possible.” @talasyn on twitter replied with two tweets: “I’ll have to disagree. Some broken people do. Other broken people only see the ugly in people. Those are the self-absorbed bkn” and “..cont… And pride is the wedge between broken and surrendered… Stupid pride. I hate you.”

Given my sensitivity, I assumed I had offended this guy. Since I’m leaning into pain, I DM’d him and asked him to email me. I told him I think I can learn from him, and if he hates me, I want to understand why. He did email me and explained that he wasn’t saying he hated me. He was saying he hated his “stupid pride.” He also said some very nice things about me being open about my struggle.

I could have assumed I made this guy mad for whatever reason, and now he hates me. I could have unfollowed him. Instead I asked him, and as a result, I found someone I’ll probably end up having a great meal with one day where we talk about life and God and who knows what else.

140 characters can get us in trouble online, but we don’t have to stay there. People are deep, and I’m learning to explore the depths rather than running away in offense. I can’t always do it. I won’t always do it, but I want to try.

When we share bits and pieces of our lives 140 characters at a time on Twitter, people read what we write, take what they know about us and fill in the blanks.

One day earlier this month something facinating happend on Twitter. Anyone following @calilewis and @nealcampbell might have seen two tweets about Oscar Wilde, one from each of us. The easy assumption was that the two tweets were related. I tweeted, “@2degreesofalie Oscar Wilde.” One hour later Cali tweeted, “One can always be kind to people about whom one cares nothing. - Oscar Wilde”

Oscar Wilde is way off topic for both Cali and me. Anyone paying close attention to both of us would assume the two tweets were related. Since my tweet came first, it would be easy to assume Cali saw me tweet Oscar Wilde and then tweeted an Oscar Wilde quote. But she didn’t. She hadn’t read my tweets that day and I hadn’t read hers. My tweet was an answer to a trivia question. Cali just happend to tweet that Oscar Wilde quote an hour later by coincidence.

Last night I tweeted:

Someone tweeted:

Sharing our lives with each other in real life and online is a risky proposition. We risk offending each other, hurting each other and even just misunderstanding each other. It’s even riskier when we share our lives 140 characters at a time. It’s also rewarding and well worth the risk. The reward of sharing our lives is that we encourage each other, inspire each other, and when were really lucky, we make each other smile.

1 Corinthians 13:12 says, “Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.” It was written at a time when mirrors weren’t anything like what we have now. I think of  a reflection in water or a stainless steel pan when I read that. The verse is about understanding God, but the idea of seeing things imperfectly, or “in part” like the older translations say, applies to how we understand each other too.

My goal is to assume more good things about people than bad things. I don’t always reach that goal, but it’s still the goal.

I can’t remember how long I’ve known Daniel, but I think it’s been since 2006. Before he really started making waves around Silicon Valley, he and I used to chat about new media, school and how he was connecting to big names in technology. I remember pinging him on iChat sometimes when he was up too late and telling him to go to bed!.

If Daniel did, in fact, ask for/accept a MacBook Air in exchange for a post on TechCrunch, that’s a bad thing. If he didn’t know it was bad before, he knows it now. The best part about being so young is that he has plenty of time to redeem himself.

Daniel is probably the best networker, I’ve ever met. I’ve admired his ambition. I’ve watched him go to school, work at QIK, attend tech events and put off sleep to accomplish as much as he could as quickly as he could. Daniel has tons of potential and this doesn’t change that. If he learns from the mistake and continues to pursue his dreams, I still look forward to watching what he’s going to do.

I hope the adults that Daniel has reached out to in Silicon Valley will reach out to him and be there for him. Let’s give him the chance to redeem himself and shine like those of us who admire him always thought he would.

I’ve been reaching out to a handful of friends, and I started personal counseling this past week. I’ve learned a lot and had some breakthroughs that have allowed me to come outside my head for the first time in a long time.

I grew up listening to gospel music and always liked those songs about laying down burdens and moving on, but never really took them to heart. It turns out, it’s a lot less hard than I thought it would be.

I gave up alcohol at the end of last year and it’s just been amazing how quickly years of missing joy rushed back into my life. I buried all the baggage I carried in drinking at night and obsession about doing a great job with GeekBrief.TV during the day. I can’t exactly give up work, but I am taking a couple of weeks off. Except for helping out with the writing, Cali and Dave Curlee are taking up the slack so I have the opportunity to perform a hard reset on my internal OS.

Last night, I went with social media guru, Giovanni Gallucci to hear a guy I admire so much in the world of new and social media, Chris Brogan. It was my second time to hear him speak. The first time, I walked away inspired to think about what he said. The second time I walked away inspired to do what he said. His message is pretty simple: do things for people without any expectation they’ll do anything in return for you. In two words … BE NICE!

So here’s my question for anyone who reads this. As I take time off work to reset, what can I do for you?