The John Shinnick Web Site
Last Update: September 5, 2026
John Shinnick 3.0: It's All About Me
~ Quote of the Month ~
I’m groaning today, I’ll be telling it tomorrow. – John Shinnick
How do you respond when your boss tells you a joke that is so bad that you can't bring yourself to laugh and you've heard it before anyway? Well, this worked in such a situation and I've used it ever since. This is my second entry into my favorite quotes, which may be egotistical, but I figure if you can't quote yourself, who can you quote?
The Next Big Thing
Late-breaking news! I just received notification from the Library of Congress that my copyright application (covering 10 songs in all) was accepted on September 1, 2026, and effective April 21, 2026 (the Copyrights are back-dated to the time of application). This has nothing to do with the following essay.
Or perhaps everything.
I occasionally visit a graphic-based role-play website. The character I chose is pretty much who I am in real life. One of the add-ons I use is one which displays a short line of text above my character. The text I’ve chosen to display is “Forever Searching”. When people ask me what I’m searching for, I tell them “The next big thing.”
To me, a Big Thing is a pursuit with three properties: Frequency (I have to do it a lot), Duration (I have to do it for years), and Passion (I have to throw myself into it, heart and soul). Like my careers in human resources, then in information technology? Well, for a time. While training for them I was passionate about them, but the realities of actually doing them took the luster off both. Both had stopped being, a big thing far sooner than I’d anticipated.
What have my big things been? The first that I recognized as such came about after breaking up with a lady-friend. I consciously wondered what was next for me. I settled on martial arts (tae kwon do) which I pursued for about five years. It was a big thing for me during that period. But it came to an end when I got my black belt. That had been my main goal and my motivation. Mr. Spock of Star Trek fame once summed it up nicely: “…having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but is often true.” I got the belt and tried to go on, but I was done.
Other big things? Baseball and softball were huge for me until I could no longer find teams to play on. Golf was a big thing from the time I retired until my body (specifically my back and shoulders) told me it wasn’t. The game of go was a surprisingly big thing for years, from my undergraduate days until I got into my 30s and it somehow stopped seeming relevant. Writing? I’m doing that now! My writing group seems to have disbanded, but four essays a month on this site isn’t too bad; still a big thing. I still make sure to allocate time to reading, generally an hour to an hour-and-a-half in the morning at breakfast. Still a big thing.
Music is still a big thing overall, but of late perplexing. if I subdivide it, it’s been hit and miss, more misses than usual over the last year. I abandoned sax and banjo feeling I was spread too thin. I sold them to move on. I went through a phase recently where I both wrote and recorded, then it suddenly stopped I really want to get that impetus back. I had a bit of an epiphany at the local Neighborhood Night Out and I’m no longer looking for musical collaborations. And I’m still working with the church, both with the band and with other musical projects.
Forever Searching
So once again, I find myself searching for my Next Big Thing to fill the perceived vacancy as I stumble through my days. Perhaps I never stopped and am just more conscious of it. As a psychology major half-century ago (yikes!) I ran across Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. You know, physiological, safety, love and belonging, esteem and self-actualization. That psycho-babble, yeah. Well, I’m thinking that I’m pretty well set on the first two and as set on the third and fourth as I’m going to get. So it’s on to self-actualization to fill my perceived void. At the age of 75, my options are somewhat limited but that may actually facilitate the search.
The Certificate of Registration I received this morning actually sent a visceral charge through me. That charge gives me a sense of great optimism that my search for the Next Big Thing may yet bear fruit.
A bit of good ol' psychobabble from my days as a psychology major, compliments of Abraham Maslow. The idea is that you take care of the basic lower level needs first, then move up the pyramid. Easy enough. As I look for the Next Big Thing to occupy my time, I hope it moves me into the self-actualization realm.
Dates indicate the most recent update.
11/06/24 09/05/26 09/05/26 04/01/23
09/05/26 09/05/26 03/02/21 n/a
