—

Choosing meaningful jewelry can feel high-stakes, especially if you do not spend much time thinking about necklaces, settings, or chain gauges. You want a piece that looks beautiful when it is opened and still wears well years later. The good news is that you do not need to become a gemologist. You just need to know which build details to check before you buy.

This guide explains the setting, metal, chain, clasp, certification, and care details that help a lab-grown diamond necklace hold up over time.

What Lab-Grown Actually Means

Lab-grown diamonds are real diamonds. They have the same crystal structure, optical properties, and hardness as mined diamonds, a 10 on the Mohs scale. The difference is origin: they are made in a controlled environment using CVD (chemical vapor deposition) or HPHT (high pressure, high temperature) instead of being mined from the earth.

Recognized grading labs, including GIA and IGI, issue reports for lab-grown stones. These reports review the same basic quality factors used for mined diamonds: cut, color, clarity, and carat weight. A grading report is the simplest way to verify what you are buying. If a seller cannot provide one from a recognized lab, pause before committing.

Disclosure matters too. U.S. advertising rules require sellers to state clearly when a diamond is laboratory-grown. Be careful with broad environmental or conflict-free claims unless the seller provides a credible source.

The Three Build Elements That Determine Longevity

A pendant necklace faces different stress than a ring. It swings, catches on fabric, and rests against skin for long periods. Three build elements matter most: the setting, the metal, and the chain and clasp. For a gift, those practical details often matter as much as the first impression because meaningful jewelry pieces should fit real routines, not just the moment of opening.

Settings That Protect the Stone

The setting is the metal framework that holds the diamond in place. Two common types are:

• Bezel setting: A thin metal rim surrounds the edge of the stone. This gives strong edge protection and a smooth, low-profile look. It is a practical choice for everyday wear because there is less chance of the stone catching on clothing or hair.
• Prong setting: Small metal tips grip the stone at several points and leave more of the diamond exposed. This can increase sparkle, but prongs can snag if they loosen or bend over time.

If the recipient plans to wear the necklace daily, a low-profile bezel or a well-finished prong setting with smooth, tightly seated tips is usually safer. Before buying, ask to inspect the setting under magnification, often called a loupe, and look for gaps between the stone and the metalwork.

Metal That Holds Up

The metal type affects durability, color, and maintenance. A few terms are worth knowing:

• Karat (K) refers to gold purity. 14K gold contains more alloy metals than 18K, which usually makes it harder and more scratch-resistant for daily wear. 18K has a richer color but is softer.
• Carat (ct) measures gemstone weight. It is a different term from karat.
• Platinum is dense, durable, and heavier than gold. Look for a PLAT hallmark.

Solid gold, stamped 14K or 18K, generally lasts longer than gold-plated or vermeil finishes. Plating can wear through over time, especially on a necklace that sits against skin every day.

If you are considering white gold, remember that it is usually coated with rhodium to create a bright, silvery surface. Rhodium wears gradually and may need periodic re-plating. Ask the jeweler about that service before you buy.

Chain and Clasp Choices

The chain is easy to overlook, but it is a common failure point.

• Chain style and gauge: Box and cable chains are sturdy everyday options. Match the chain thickness to the pendant weight. A delicate chain paired with a heavy pendant is more likely to break.
• Clasp type: Lobster-claw clasps are generally more secure and durable than small spring-ring clasps, which can weaken with repeated use.
• Details to check: Look for soldered, closed jump rings connecting the chain to the clasp and the bail, which is the small loop that attaches the pendant to the chain. Open jump rings can spread apart under tension.

Styles with Staying Power

Trends change, but some necklace designs remain useful because they work with many wardrobes and occasions.

• Solitaire pendants: A single diamond on a simple chain. This style is clean, versatile, and easy to layer with other necklaces.
• Station necklaces: Several smaller diamonds spaced along the chain. They add subtle sparkle without a center pendant and often lie flat against the skin.
• Classic stone shapes: Round brilliant, oval, and pear cuts have broad appeal and pair well with both bezel and prong settings.

For visual examples of how solitaire and station designs look when layered, a lab grown diamond necklace overview from ENEA Studio can provide additional style context as background reading, not as a market ranking.

Certification and Seller Policies

Documentation protects your purchase after the gift is opened.

• Grading report: Request a report from a recognized lab, such as GIA or IGI, for any diamond you are considering. It should confirm cut, color, clarity, and carat weight.
• Return and warranty terms: Confirm the return window, whether the seller covers the metalwork and setting, and whether inspections or repairs are available.
• Keep copies: Store the grading report and receipt separately from the necklace. You may need them for insurance or future service.

Simple Care That Extends the Life of the Piece

Even a well-built necklace needs basic maintenance.

• Clean it at home with warm water, mild dish soap, and a soft brush. Rinse well and pat dry.
• Store it in an individual soft pouch to help prevent scratches from other jewelry.
• Remove it before high-impact activities, swimming in chlorinated water, or applying lotions and perfumes.
• Have a jeweler inspect the prongs, bail, and clasp once a year.
• If you choose white gold, ask about rhodium re-plating when the surface starts to show warmth from the underlying alloy.

Your 60-Second Shopping Checklist

Before you finalize a purchase, check these points:

• Setting security: Low profile, smooth finish, and tight stone seating.
• Solid metal build: Look for a 14K, 18K, or PLAT hallmark. Ask about plating if the piece is white gold.
• Chain gauge: Proportional to the pendant weight, with box or cable styles for daily wear.
• Clasp type: Lobster-claw clasp preferred, with soldered jump rings.
• Lab report present: GIA or IGI grading report available and matched to the stone.
• Warranty and return terms: Clear return window, repair policy, and inspection options.
• Care plan: You know how to clean, store, and maintain the piece at home.

A little homework up front can prevent problems later. When the setting is secure, the metal is solid, the chain is properly matched, and the documentation is in hand, you can choose a necklace that should look good and wear well for years.

—

This content is brought to you by James Oliver

Photos provided by James Oliver.

The post How to Choose a Lab-Grown Diamond Necklace That Lasts appeared first on The Good Men Project.

“If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun.”
— Katharine Hepburn

If you’ve ever been in the audience at one of my shows or attended a lecture on Quantum Leap Thinking, you know we spend a lot of time talking about breaking the rules of conventional logic. We talk about shifting paradigms. We talk about bending reality—sometimes literally, right there on stage.

But as I look back from the vantage point of eighty years, I want to let you in on the ultimate secret behind every breakthrough I have ever witnessed or engineered.

It wasn’t born from grueling, serious effort. It was born from play.

I wrote this piece to capture exactly what happens when we stop trying to engineer our success, and start allowing ourselves to wonder:

Why Not have fun? by James Mapes

Eighty years, and my joints feel every single winter,
but my mind is still somewhere on a stage in 1974,
holding a bent silver key in the palm of my hand,
watching a stranger realize their own mind did it.

I have spent a lifetime chasing ghosts and making people wonder.
I memorized lines under hot theater lights.
I put people to sleep just to wake them up.
I dove into the blue crush of Caribbean reefs,
chasing fish that didn’t care about my resume or my age.

Let me tell you a secret about achievement:
It is a cold room to sit in alone.

The moments that saved me were always ridiculous ones.

The times I said “yes” to a road before the map was printed.

The times I risked looking like an absolute fool.
Because the child who wanted to see magic never really left;
he just grew a white beard and bought a house.

We get so serious about our legacies,
our neat little boxes of success and failure.
But when the theater finally goes dark and the crowd goes home,
nobody counts their trophies.

They remember the laughter that made their ribs ache.
They remember the dance they weren’t ready for.

So go ahead. Put on the show.
Take the ridiculous leap.
When you stand at the edge of it all,
make sure you can look back and say,
“Well, at least we had a hell of a time.”

Play is often misunderstood as the antithesis of work – a waste of time, foolishness, silly, or just plain immature.

Suprise! Play may be one of the most creative and productive forces of human makeup.

Play is a mindset, an attitude.

The reality is that babies learn through play and for babies, play is not just for fun—it is their primary way of learning. Through play and daily interactions, babies actively build brain connections, explore their senses, and develop essential motor, cognitive, and social skills.

Children learn, as I did, through ‘pretend’ worlds.

Teenagers learn identity through social play, music, risk-taking and humor.

Adults continue to grow emotionally by exploring new ideas, experiences and skills.

Play is not necessarily about education. The universe knows that play was a primary survival mechanism. There is a freedom is play, to take risks and reduce the impact of failure.  Instead, we learn. Play creates an environment that unleashes the power of the elegant imagination to take risks.

I’m encouraging you to ignore the seriousness of modern society where productivity rewards being serious and ‘putting your nose to the grindstone’ becomes expected.

I guarantee you that without play, success can feel empty and the mind repetitive.  And play enhances our relationships.

Play is like a magical lubricant, breaking staid patterns.  It encourages laughter which positively affects our brain chemistry as well as stimulates attention.  It makes hobbies fun.

So, what is play?  They could write a 5000-word article on this topic alone.  It could be, like my wife and I, writing.  For another it may be playing tennis or golf.  Some people, like me, find it through performance and entertainment, others with storytelling.

The common thread that runs through all play is liveness, freedom, engagement and fun.

It is my observation that play is about curiosity, experimentation without judgement, taking the risk of appearing foolish.  This becomes rare in a world where youth and beyond are obsessed with image and the number of virtual friends they have.

You don’t lose a sense of play with age, but you can develop play by having fun.  I know many people in my age range that have kept their sense of humor, maintained their curiosity, experiment with new ideas and take risks.

I cannot and will not give you a series of ‘self-help’ steps in order to play.  Again, it’s an attitude, a choice.

Play will connect or reconnect you with life.

Nearly half of all Americans (48%) report that their lives are currently lacking in fun, according to a recent nationwide survey.

Your do not want to be a statistic so – ignite your life and have FUN!

IMAGINE THAT!

Previously Published HERE

iStock image

The post The Physics of Play appeared first on The Good Men Project.

—

Artificial intelligence and digital marketing have become essential parts of running a modern business. From content creation and SEO to customer support and workflow automation, entrepreneurs now have access to thousands of software solutions promising better results and greater efficiency.

The challenge is no longer finding tools. The challenge is finding the right ones.

Many entrepreneurs spend hours comparing platforms, reading reviews, watching tutorials, and testing free trials before making a decision. That process can quickly become overwhelming, especially for founders and small business owners who are already managing multiple responsibilities.

This growing complexity is one reason why more entrepreneurs are turning to Pulse of Strategy’s tools directory as a resource for finding AI and marketing solutions.

The Growing Importance of AI for Entrepreneurs

AI adoption among small businesses has accelerated at an impressive pace over the past few years. According to a 2025 survey from Thryv, AI usage among small businesses increased from 39% in 2024 to 55% in 2025, representing a 41% year-over-year increase. The same research found that AI is becoming a core component of how small businesses approach growth, customer acquisition, and operational efficiency.

Additional research shows that 76% of small businesses are either actively using AI or exploring its potential applications. Many business owners also report revenue improvements after implementing AI-powered solutions.

These numbers highlight a major shift. Entrepreneurs are no longer asking whether they should use AI. They are asking which tools deserve their attention.

Too Many Choices Create Decision Fatigue

The software market continues to expand at a rapid rate. Every week brings new AI writing assistants, SEO platforms, automation solutions, analytics tools, and marketing applications.

For entrepreneurs, this abundance of options creates a new problem: decision fatigue.

Instead of focusing on business growth, many founders spend valuable time researching software. The process often includes:

• Comparing features across multiple platforms
• Reading reviews from different sources
• Evaluating pricing structures
• Testing product usability
• Assessing integration capabilities

Without a centralized resource, selecting the right technology stack can become a lengthy and frustrating experience.

Why Entrepreneurs Prefer Curated Tool Directories

Successful entrepreneurs understand the value of reducing research time.

Rather than searching dozens of websites individually, many now prefer curated directories that organize solutions by category and use case.

A well-structured directory offers several advantages:

Faster Evaluation

When tools are grouped into relevant categories, users can immediately narrow their options based on their goals.

For example, a business owner looking for SEO software has very different requirements than someone searching for AI image generation tools or marketing automation platforms.

Better Comparisons

A curated collection makes it easier to compare multiple solutions without jumping between countless browser tabs.

Reduced Information Overload

One of the biggest challenges entrepreneurs face is filtering out noise. A directory focused on business and marketing technology helps eliminate unnecessary distractions.

How Pulse of Strategy Helps Entrepreneurs Save Time

Pulse of Strategy has positioned itself as more than a traditional business publication.

Its tools directory serves as a centralized hub where entrepreneurs, marketers, and business professionals can explore software solutions across various categories.

Instead of relying on random search results or social media recommendations, users can browse organized listings designed to simplify the evaluation process.

This approach is particularly valuable for:

• Startup founders
• Small business owners
• Marketing professionals
• Content creators
• SEO specialists
• Freelancers
• Agencies

Each of these groups faces unique challenges, yet all share the same goal: finding effective tools without wasting time.

The Rise of AI-Powered Marketing

Marketing is one of the areas experiencing the most significant impact from AI adoption.

According to Statista, global revenue generated from AI applications in marketing is expected to reach approximately $47 billion in 2025 and exceed $107 billion by 2028.

The rapid growth reflects increasing demand for tools that can help businesses:

• Create content faster
• Improve customer targeting
• Analyze marketing performance
• Automate repetitive tasks
• Personalize customer experiences

As marketing technology becomes more sophisticated, entrepreneurs need reliable resources to help identify which solutions align with their objectives.

This is where directories like Pulse of Strategy become increasingly useful.

A Practical Resource for Modern Business Owners

Many entrepreneurs wear multiple hats.

They manage operations, oversee marketing, handle customer relationships, and make strategic decisions. Researching software often falls somewhere in the middle of an already crowded schedule.

A centralized tools hub can help streamline that process.

Rather than spending days evaluating options independently, entrepreneurs can use curated resources as a starting point for identifying relevant platforms and narrowing their choices.

This efficiency becomes even more important as AI continues to evolve and new tools enter the market.

Technology Is No Longer Optional

Recent studies consistently show that businesses adopting AI and automation are gaining competitive advantages through improved productivity and faster execution. Small businesses are increasingly using AI for content creation, marketing support, research, and operational tasks that previously required significant manual effort.

The businesses that benefit most are not necessarily the ones using the largest number of tools. They are the ones selecting the right tools for the right tasks.

Finding those tools efficiently has become a competitive advantage in itself.

Final Thoughts

Entrepreneurs face an increasingly complex technology landscape. AI and marketing software can unlock significant opportunities, but choosing the right solutions requires time, research, and careful evaluation.

As the number of available platforms continues to grow, curated resources are becoming more valuable.

Pulse of Strategy’s tools directory helps simplify the search process by providing entrepreneurs with a centralized place to explore AI and marketing solutions. For business owners who want to spend less time researching software and more time growing their companies, that convenience can make a meaningful difference.

The future belongs to businesses that can adapt quickly, make informed technology decisions, and leverage the right tools to support their goals. Having a trusted resource to guide those decisions is becoming increasingly important.

—

This content is brought to you by Marcy Betterly

iStockPhoto

The post Why More Entrepreneurs Are Using ‘Pulse of Strategy’ to Find AI and Marketing Tools appeared first on The Good Men Project.

Over more than 20 years in clinical research, I have learned that while science moves trials forward, people carry them forward.

Yet long before I entered the field and worked alongside patients, physicians, nurses, and clinical research teams, I learned something important from my parents.

Like many children, I wanted to make them proud. Whenever I accomplished something, even something small, they noticed. A good grade. Helping someone. Trying my best.

Their words were simple.

“Good job.”

“We are proud of you.”

I always carried those moments with me. They reminded me that effort matters and that people thrive when they feel seen.

Looking back, I realize my parents were giving me much more than praise. They were giving me confidence. They were teaching me that effort matters, that kindness matters, and that people flourish when they feel seen. Decades later, those lessons still guide me—not only as a professional, but as a mother.

Today, I find myself passing those lessons on to my daughter.

I make a conscious effort to tell her when I am proud of her—not only when she achieves something significant, but when she demonstrates kindness, resilience, integrity, or simply does her best. I want her to understand that success is not measured only by outcomes. It is also measured by effort, character, and the courage to keep going.

As I grew older, I found myself doing the same thing with the people around me. With friends and colleagues, I learned that a few sincere words of appreciation can have a lasting impact.

We often underestimate the power of a simple “thank you” or “I appreciate you.” Yet those words can reinforce confidence, strengthen relationships, and remind people that their efforts matter.

Over the years, I have witnessed this lesson repeat itself in some of the most meaningful places imaginable.

I have seen it in clinical research.

And I have seen it in some of the most difficult moments of people’s lives.

One of the most meaningful traditions in many cancer centers is the ringing of a bell after a patient completes treatment.

To someone walking by, it may seem like a simple gesture.

To those who understand the journey, it means much more.

That bell is not simply about finishing treatment.

It is about recognition.

Recognition of the patient who showed up appointment after appointment despite fear, uncertainty, exhaustion, and discomfort.

Recognition of the family members who sat beside their loved ones for countless hours, offering encouragement, comfort, and strength.

Recognition of the nurses who cared for them, answered questions, and guided them through difficult days.

Recognition of the physicians, pharmacists, research coordinators, clinical research nurses, and healthcare professionals whose work often takes place quietly behind the scenes.

For a brief moment, that bell acknowledges something deeply human: the courage it took to get there.

Throughout my career, I have had the privilege of working alongside remarkable teams. Doctors. Nurses. Study coordinators. Clinical research professionals.  Individuals whose names may never appear in headlines but whose contributions make a profound difference in the lives of patients.

I have watched study coordinators stay late to ensure every detail was documented correctly.

I have watched nurses advocate fiercely for patients while balancing responsibilities most people never see.

I have watched teams overcome obstacles, solve problems, and continue moving forward because they understood that patients were depending on them.

And I have learned that sometimes the smallest acts of recognition have the greatest impact.

Recently, after presenting at a professional meeting, I received a brief note from one of our leaders recognizing the presentation I had done.

It was simply a few thoughtful words. Yet those words stayed with me. Not because they celebrated perfection. But because they acknowledged effort. They reminded me that what I do matters. And they inspired me to continue striving to do even better.

In clinical research, in parenting, and in life, we spend so much time focusing on what still needs to be done that we sometimes forget to acknowledge what has already been accomplished.

Yet people remember those moments. They remember who encouraged them. They remember who noticed their effort. They remember who made them feel seen.

I saw it in my parents when they celebrated small victories that seemed insignificant at the time but stayed with me for decades.

I see it today when I tell my daughter that I am proud of her—not only for what she accomplishes, but for the person she is becoming.

I see it in patients facing difficult journeys, in families standing beside loved ones, and in the healthcare professionals who show up every day to care for others.

Life gives us countless opportunities to recognize one another. Most take only a few seconds—a thank you, a kind word, a note of appreciation, a reminder that someone’s effort mattered.

Yet those moments often stay with us far longer than we realize.  Perhaps that is because recognition is not simply about celebrating accomplishments; it is about honoring the courage it took to get there.

—

iStock image

The post Recognition Creates Courage appeared first on The Good Men Project.

—

Dubai, May 2026. Most residential split units in Dubai need a full professional clean every 3 months during the cooling season, with an additional service in November. That is four services per year for year-round residents. Villas on ground floors or near active construction need cleaning every 6 to 8 weeks. Central ducted systems need annual duct

cleaning on top of the air handler service. Units here fail not because of manufacturing defects but because they run 14 to 18 hours a day in conditions they were never designed to handle alone. Dust loads are 4 to 6 times higher than in temperate climates, summer ambient temperatures push past 50C, and the humidity that rolls in from the Gulf between July and September turns every dirty evaporator coil into a mold incubator. That same airborne dust and relentless heat are hard on sensitive electronics too, which is why demand for soldered SSD laptop repair in Dubai runs high through the same months. If you are waiting for your unit to start underperforming before you book a clean, you are already behind.

For a complete breakdown of what a professional service covers, the ac cleaning Dubai guide published by European Technical walks through each component in detail. Their AC services cover all residential and commercial unit types across Dubai and Sharjah. The short answer on frequency, though, is below.

____________________________________________________________

How Often AC Cleaning Is Actually Needed in Dubai

The standard advice you will find in appliance manuals, written for European or North American climates, suggests a filter clean every 30 days and a full service annually. That schedule does not hold here.

The Dubai-specific cleaning schedule:

Split units in residential apartments: full cleaning every 3 months during the cooling season (April through October), once more in November before reduced-load winter operation.

Split units in villas with gardens or near construction: every 6 to 8 weeks. Ground-floor units pull in far more particulate than high-floor apartments, and active construction sites nearby accelerate filter clogging by a factor of three.

Ducted central systems: a full duct inspection and clean every 12 months is the minimum. Ducts that have not been cleaned in two or more years typically show visible mold growth at the grille level, and the particulate buildup inside the ductwork bypasses any filter the main unit carries.

Cassette units in commercial or retail spaces: every 6 to 8 weeks, given higher occupancy and foot traffic pushing dust into the return air stream continuously.

The single most reliable trigger, regardless of unit type or calendar, is a visible drop in airflow from any register or a musty odor on startup. Both indicate the evaporator coil is already loaded, and by that point the unit is drawing 15 to 20 percent more current than it should.

____________________________________________________________

What Skipping AC Cleaning Actually Costs You

Energy draw creeps up faster than most residents expect. A clogged evaporator coil forces the compressor to run longer cycles to hit setpoint. Field data from over 5,000 service jobs completed by European Technical across Dubai and Sharjah shows electricity consumption increases of 18 to 25 percent once the coil is visibly fouled. On a villa running six to eight splits through a Dubai summer, that is a meaningful addition to the monthly DEWA bill.

Coil corrosion is the silent killer. The Gulf air carries salt particulate, particularly in coastal areas like Dubai Marina, JBR, and Palm Jumeirah. When fine dust accumulates on an aluminum fin coil and that coil cycles through condensation and drying hundreds of times, the moisture trapped in the debris layer initiates oxidation. A corroded coil cannot be cleaned back to original performance; it has to be replaced. Replacement coils for common residential splits run AED 800 to 1,400 installed. A quarterly clean costs a fraction of that.

Mold in ducts is a health problem, not just an HVAC problem. In a central ducted system, the return air pulls in whatever is in the occupied space and deposits it on the evaporator and inside the duct walls. Once relative humidity in the duct exceeds 60 percent, and in Dubai summer it will, mold colonizes within 48 to 72 hours on any organic debris layer. The service team at European Technical consistently finds that residents in contaminated systems report persistent coughing, sinus congestion, and fatigue, and these symptoms clear within weeks of a proper duct clean and sanitization. The mold does not clear on its own.

Compressor strain shortens unit life by years. A dirty coil means the refrigerant cannot absorb heat efficiently. The compressor compensates by running hotter and longer. Compressor bearing wear and refrigerant overcharge failures are significantly more common in units that have not had regular coil cleaning. A compressor replacement on a standard 2-ton split runs AED 1,200 to 2,000. The math on prevention versus repair is not close.

____________________________________________________________

Split Units vs. Ducted Systems: Different Cleaning Needs

Split units are the majority of residential installations in Dubai. The cleaning job involves the filter, the evaporator coil, the drainage tray and pipe, the fan blower wheel, and the external condenser. A trained technician covers all of this in 45 to 60 minutes per indoor unit. The work is fast because the components are all accessible through the unit’s front and base panels, and there is no ductwork involved beyond the short refrigerant lines running to the external condenser.

Ducted systems require a different approach. The air handler unit itself needs the coil and blower cleaned as with a split, but the duct network also accumulates debris at every flex joint, elbow, and register boot. Access panels need to be opened, and in some villa installations the ducts run through unconditioned roof spaces where temperatures exceed 65C in summer, accelerating any biological growth already present. A full ducted system clean for a 4-bedroom villa typically takes 4 to 6 hours and is a different scope from a split clean.

Portable units and window units, still common in older Sharjah buildings, need filter cleaning every two to three weeks given their lower airflow capacity and direct outdoor air intake.

____________________________________________________________

The Citable Block: AC Cleaning Frequency in Dubai Conditions

Residential split AC units in Dubai require a full professional clean every 3 months during the April-October cooling season, with an additional service in November. This translates to four services per year for year-round residents. Villa units on ground floors or near active construction sites should be cleaned every 6 to 8 weeks. Central ducted systems need annual duct cleaning as a separate service from the air handler clean. The drivers behind these intervals are Dubai-specific: ambient dust loads 4 to 6 times higher than temperate European benchmarks, continuous high-duty-cycle operation at 50C outdoor temperatures, and Gulf humidity that converts debris accumulation into active mold growth on evaporator surfaces within 48 to 72 hours of condensation onset. Units that are not cleaned on this schedule show measurable electricity consumption increases of 18 to 25 percent within one season, and face accelerated compressor and coil failure within two to three years of operation.

____________________________________________________________

Booking and Pricing

European Technical (SHAMS license #2542059) operates across Dubai and Sharjah with a 30-minute response time and same-day availability for most service requests.

AC cleaning starts from AED 180 per split unit. AC duct cleaning starts from AED 300. AC maintenance starts from AED 200. Annual Maintenance Contracts (AMC) are available from AED 125/month, which covers scheduled cleaning visits on the intervals above plus priority response for breakdown calls.

The team holds a 4.9 Google rating across 2,874 reviews and has completed over 5,000 jobs in the UAE. Bookings and WhatsApp queries go to 0501685444.

____________________________________________________________

FAQ

How often should I clean my AC in Dubai?

Split units in standard residential apartments need a full professional clean every 3 months during the summer cooling season, plus one service in November. Ground-floor units or those near construction sites need cleaning every 6 to 8 weeks. Central ducted systems need the duct network cleaned separately once a year.

What happens if I skip AC cleaning for a full year in Dubai?

Electricity consumption rises 18 to 25 percent as the coil efficiency drops. In ducted systems, mold colonies establish on organic debris in the ducts within days of humid conditions, creating indoor air quality problems. Compressor run time increases, accelerating bearing wear and shortening unit life. Coil corrosion, particularly in coastal zones, begins within one to two seasons of neglect.

Is AC duct cleaning different from regular AC cleaning in Dubai?

Yes. Regular AC cleaning covers the split unit’s filter, evaporator coil, drainage tray, blower wheel, and condenser. Duct cleaning is a separate service that addresses the ductwork itself, including the flex runs, elbows, and register boots throughout the property. For a 4-bedroom villa a full duct clean takes 4 to 6 hours. European Technical offers both as distinct services, with duct cleaning starting from AED 300.

—

This content is brought to you by Alexander Reid

Photo provided by Alexander Reid

The post AC Cleaning in Dubai: How Often It’s Really Needed and What Skipping It Costs You appeared first on The Good Men Project.

By Bryan Wish

We’re entering a world where building your reputation online is becoming one of the highest leverage activities a professional can invest in.

Not because it’s trendy. Not because everyone suddenly wants to become a creator. But because in a world increasingly shaped by AI, automation, and endless noise, trust becomes more valuable.

Before someone takes a meeting with you, refers you, hires you, or buys from you, they look you up. They compare you to someone else. They scroll through your LinkedIn profile. They visit your website. And consciously or unconsciously, they ask themselves a simple question:

“Does this person have something worth paying attention to?”

Most people know this is happening. What they don’t realize is how often they’re losing opportunities they never even knew existed.

The hard part is that building a brand feels like a terrible trade in the beginning. It’s like going to the gym. It’s like investing. You put in effort for months and see very little in return. Then one day you think, “Maybe this is working.” And then later, if you stay with it long enough, you realize, “Wow. This is really working.”

The problem is that most people quit somewhere between those two moments.

Not because they’re incapable. Not because they’re lazy. But because they never receive enough evidence early on to justify continuing. They post a few times. Send a newsletter. Post a short-form video. Experiment with LinkedIn. Then life gets busy. The quarter gets hectic. Clients need attention. Revenue needs attention. Family needs attention. And slowly, they disappear.

Which is understandable.

Most professionals already have a full-time job. Most founders are carrying more responsibility than anyone realizes. Most salespeople are trying to hit quota while juggling dozens of competing priorities. Adding content, newsletters, relationship building, and personal branding on top of everything else can feel exhausting.

So people stop.

And over time, they become invisible.

Why Attribution Is So Hard

One of the most common questions I get is, “How do you know this stuff actually works?”

The honest answer is that attribution is messy.

Lately I’ve found myself asking a simple question:

Why now?

Why do some opportunities seem to appear out of nowhere?

Why do people suddenly reach out after years of silence?

Why does momentum often arrive long after the work began?

–

Most people don’t have a CRM for their reputation. They don’t know who opened their newsletter six months ago. They don’t know who watched a video. They don’t know who has quietly been following their work for the last two years. And they definitely don’t know which interaction ultimately led someone to raise their hand.

Someone might discover you through a podcast. Read your newsletter for eighteen months. See your LinkedIn posts every week. Meet you at an event. Then become a customer two years later.

Which touchpoint gets credit?

The podcast?

The newsletter?

The event?

The referral?

The truth is that trust compounds, and compounding is difficult to measure while it’s happening.

That’s why so many people eventually throw their hands up and say, “Forget it. Why bother?”

What they don’t realize is that they’re making themselves invisible to opportunities they cannot see yet.

But for those that stick with it long enough, they begin to see the delayed return on consistent visibility.

When the Pain Becomes Real

I’ve become increasingly convinced that people rarely make decisions when something sounds like a good idea. They make decisions when the pain becomes impossible to ignore.

You go to the doctor when the self-diagnosed solution stops working.

You hire a coach when you become frustrated with your own limitations.

You finally make a change when someone else receives the opportunity you thought was yours.

Brand building is no different.

For some people, the pain arrives when they sell their company and realize all of the equity sits inside the business rather than the founder. For others, it’s when they leave a company and discover that most of their credibility never extended beyond the title on their business card. For others, it’s the realization that they have bigger aspirations for what they’re building, but their visibility hasn’t caught up to their ambition – and that they have no control of their narrative.

At some point, many successful people arrive at the same conclusion:

“I’ve built expertise. But I haven’t built leverage.”

That realization can be uncomfortable.

It can also be incredibly liberating.

The Two-Year Overnight Success

Two weeks ago, someone reached out to me.

We met roughly two years ago. One conversation. Nothing immediate came from it. Reached out a few times this year to check in. No reply.

Then I received a LinkedIn message. We jumped on a call. Then a few more. And now we’re working together.

What happened?

For two years, they kept seeing me.

My content.

My newsletter.

My ideas.

Not every week. Not every post. But enough.

Enough to remain familiar.

Enough to build trust.

Enough so that when the timing was right, I became the first call.

That’s the part people often miss.

The opportunity wasn’t created last week.

The opportunity was quietly being built for two years.

What Most People Underestimate

None of this happens accidentally.

You need a message that people can understand. You need themes worth talking about. You need a visual identity that people recognize. You need a website that reinforces credibility. Or hope your company website reflects you in a positive light.

You need to consistently show up. You need to build relationships. You need a product people actually want. And you need a business model that supports sustainable growth.

Perhaps hardest of all, you need the patience to keep going before you see results.

That’s difficult in a world obsessed with immediate feedback. It’s difficult when algorithms change. It’s difficult when you’re judging yourself based on the performance of a single post. And it’s difficult when your professional life is already demanding enough.

If you’re curious about what goes into building a complete brand system, I documented much of that process here.

What If It Were Easier?

Now imagine a world where much of this became easier.

Your brand infrastructure was connected. Your content system worked. Your website, CRM, newsletter, social channels, and reporting all spoke the same language. You could actually see what was working. You could understand where opportunities were coming from. You could measure momentum instead of guessing.

That solves a lot.

But not everything.

Because business still comes down to people.

You still need relationships. You still need to understand whose problem you’re solving. You still need to know who will value your work. You still need to start conversations. You still need to earn trust. You still need to sell.

You need a consistent and trackable outreach process.

That part never goes away.

Which is why I’ve come to appreciate that this industry is simultaneously one of the most rewarding and frustrating industries in the world.

You can build the systems. You can build the brand. You can build the visibility.

But ultimately, people still have to step into the arena themselves. And stick with it long enough for our work to make a difference.

Over the last year, we’ve restructured our business to make that process dramatically easier. Less friction. Better alignment. A longer-term model that reflects what we’ve learned after eight years of doing this work. We are off to a start with the most velocity in company history.

You can see that evolution on our new website here:

ARCBOUND.COM (huge shout out Eli Wright for building this in less than a month).

On Building the System that Builds the Outputs

And soon, we’ll be putting much of this infrastructure directly into people’s hands.

Because increasingly, I believe everyone needs a CMO in their pocket.

—

This post was previously published on ArcBound.

***

If you believe in the work we are doing here at The Good Men Project, please join us as a Premium Member today.

All Premium Members get to view The Good Men Project with NO ADS.

Need more info? A complete list of benefits is here.

Photo credit: iStock

The post The ROI You Can’t Attribute appeared first on The Good Men Project.

A few years ago, the internet felt simple.

You opened Google. Typed something badly like “best cheap phone under 200 but good camera and battery pls help”

Then you opened 14 tabs, watched 3 YouTube videos, read fake reviews, got confused, and bought the wrong phone anyway.

That was normal internet life.

Now suddenly, AI showed up.

And honestly the internet already feels different.

People are asking ChatGPT instead of Google. Students are using AI for homework. Office workers use AI to write emails they were too lazy to write themselves. Some people even ask AI what text to send their crush.

Humanity has officially entered the “please think for me” era.

And this is only the beginning.

Five years from now, the internet may look completely different because of AI.

Not slightly different.

Completely different.

Right now, most people still “search” the internet.

But in the future, people may stop searching completely.

Instead of typing “How do I lose weight?”

People might simply say “Make me a realistic 30-day plan based on my budget, sleep schedule, laziness level, and my habit of eating snacks at 2 AM.”

And the AI will actually do it.

That’s the big shift.

The internet is slowly moving from“Here are links, go figure it out yourself”

to “Here’s your final answer.”

Google Search may slowly become less important for everyday users because AI already gives people direct responses.

Honestly, most people don’t even enjoy searching anymore.

Searching feels like homework.

AI feels like cheating.

And humans LOVE cheating when it saves time.

Social media will probably change too.

Right now, people spend hours making content.

In five years, AI tools may generate:

• videos
• captions
• thumbnails
• voiceovers
• edits
• scripts
• animations

in minutes.

One person with AI could run the workload of an entire content team.

Some creators already do this today.

Which means the internet might become flooded with AI-generated content.

And let’s be honest half the motivational quotes online already sound AI-generated anyway.

“Wake up at 4 AM. Hustle harder. Become unstoppable.”

Brother, you sell dropshipping courses from your bedroom.

Relax.

But the scary part is that AI content will become so good that most people won’t know what’s real anymore.

Imagine scrolling through social media and seeing:

• fake podcasts
• fake influencers
• fake interviews
• fake news clips
• fake celebrity videos

And they all look real.

Your future parents might literally send you fake AI-generated news on WhatsApp every morning.

“BREAKING: Scientist discovers chai cures stress.”

Source: uncle’s Facebook group.

Even customer support may disappear.

Right now when you contact support, sometimes you wait 3 hours just to hear “Hello sir, please restart your device.”

In the future, AI agents may solve problems instantly.

No waiting. No tickets. No elevator music destroying your mental health.

Your AI assistant might contact another company’s AI assistant and solve the issue automatically while you sleep.

Imagine waking up to “Your refund has been processed. Your internet problem is fixed. Also, your electricity bill was negotiated lower.”

At that point, humans may become middle management between robots.

Online shopping will also become weirdly personal.

Instead of searching through 500 products, you might just tell AI:
“I need shoes under $100 that look cool, survive rain, and don’t make me look like a divorced dad.”

And AI will find the best option instantly.

Honestly, this may finally save men from wearing the same three shirts for 11 years.

Education might change the most.

Students today already use AI secretly for homework.

Teachers know it. Students know it.Even the AI knows it.

But in five years, schools may fully adapt to AI instead of fighting it.

Instead of memorizing information, students may focus more on:

• problem solving
• creativity
• communication
• critical thinking

Because facts will always be available instantly through AI.

Let’s be honest half the things people memorized in school disappeared from their brain immediately after exams anyway.

Nobody has used the Pythagorean theorem in a supermarket argument.

AI tutors may also become normal. Imagine every student having a private teacher available 24/7.

Rich students already get personal tutors. AI could give that to everyone.

That might actually become one of the best things AI brings to the internet.

Work life will probably become even crazier.

Right now people already use AI for:

• writing emails
• making presentations
• coding
• editing
• research
• summaries

In five years, entire jobs may work differently.

Some workers will become “AI managers” instead of doing tasks manually.

Your future boss may not ask “Can you make a presentation?”

Instead they’ll ask “Can you manage five AI tools without accidentally destroying the company?”

And honestly, that’s a fair concern. Because humans are still humans.

Somebody will absolutely use AI incorrectly.

One employee somewhere will type “Reply professionally to this client.”

And the AI will accidentally send “This meeting could’ve been an email.”

Career ended instantly.

Dating apps may become even stranger too.

Right now people already use AI to:

• write bios
• generate pickup lines
• edit selfies
• reply to messages

In five years, two AI assistants may flirt with each other before the actual humans even talk.

Imagine falling in love with someone and later discovering:
your AI assistant had more chemistry with their AI assistant than you did.

At this point humanity is just outsourcing personality.

And yet, despite all the chaos coming, AI could also make the internet much easier and more useful.

Today the internet often feels overwhelming.

Too many ads. Too many fake articles.Too many popups asking for cookies nobody understands.

AI could simplify all of that.

Instead of browsing endlessly, people may simply ask for exactly what they want and get personalized answers instantly.

The internet may feel less like a giant library and more like a personal assistant. That’s the future we’re heading toward.

Of course, nobody knows exactly what will happen.

Five years ago, most people thought AI chatbots were boring tech experiments.

Now millions of people talk to AI every single day.

That alone shows how quickly things can change.

The funniest part is that humans always panic during every big technology shift.

People once thought calculators would destroy education.

Then people thought smartphones would destroy society.

Now people think AI will either save humanity or end it completely.

Reality will probably land somewhere in the middle.

But one thing feels very clear:

Five years from now, the internet probably won’t look like the internet we know today.

And honestly?

Most of us will still probably use it to watch cat videos and avoid replying to emails.

—

This post was previously published on Sushila Devi’s blog.

***

You may also like these posts on The Good Men Project:

Escape the Act Like a Man Box

What We Talk About When We Talk About Men

Why I Don’t Want to Talk About Race

The First Myth of the Patriarchy: The Acorn on the Pillow

If you believe in the work we are doing here at The Good Men Project, please join us as a Premium Member today.

All Premium Members get to view The Good Men Project with NO ADS.

Need more info? A complete list of benefits is here.

Photo credit: iStock

The post The Internet in 2031 Will Feel Nothing Like Today appeared first on The Good Men Project.

—

A promotion, transfer, or new role often means a hard calendar: last day in one city, keys in another, and a start date that will not wait for a delayed truck. If you are relocating to Minnesota for work, the move is a project management problem tied to income, not a weekend DIY task. Aligning household goods delivery with your first week on the job protects your income and your sanity more than chasing the cheapest linehaul quote on a banner ad. Operators who specialize in long-distance household moves aligned to a new job start date document delivery windows against your employment calendar, not generic transit averages. Delivery windows should be tied to your lease or closing access, not only to distance math on the contract. Once dates are locked, compare residential setup after a career move to the Twin Cities options for local unload access, stairs, elevator rules, and room placement after the long haul ends.

This checklist helps you align dates, housing, and mover scope so your first week stays focused on the job, not on missing furniture.

Start with the dates that cannot move

Before you compare carriers, write down:

• Last day you can occupy your current home
• First day you can access the Minnesota address (lease, closing, or corporate housing)
• Official job start date
• Buffer days for travel, unpacking essentials, and setup

If those dates overlap by zero days, you need either storage, a staggered delivery plan, or a confirmed delivery window in writing. Hope is not a logistics strategy.

Interstate versus in-state career moves

Interstate relocations usually involve inventory surveys, weight or cubic-foot estimates, and delivery spread windows. Federal authority and insurance proof matter.

In-state but long-distance moves within Minnesota still need realistic drive time, access notes at both ends, and crew sizing for your inventory.

Match the vendor to the route. A local apartment specialist may be wrong for a multi-state load; a van line without metro access experience may struggle with your Minneapolis elevator rules.

Housing search and move scope should run in parallel

Many career relocations rent first, buy later. That means:

• Temporary furnished units with minimal shipment
• Full household loads into a rental with stair or garage access
• Storage-in-transit between sale and purchase

Tell movers which scenario you are in during the first call. Quotes built for a garage ranch do not fit a downtown walk-up without a rewrite.

What to verify before you sign (career mover edition)

Ask every finalist:

1. Motor carrier authority for your route (state and federal if interstate)
2. How delivery windows are defined in the contract
3. What happens if your closing or lease date slips
4. Storage options and monthly fees if dates misalign
5. Proof of insurance and claims process
6. Who is the single point of contact during transit

Get answers in writing. Verbal promises from a sales line do not help when you are in a hotel on start-day minus one.

Packing tier and what you carry personally

Carry personally:

• Work devices and credentials
• Medications
• Two weeks of essentials
• Documents for the new role and housing

Ship professionally:

• Furniture and boxed household goods with inventory labels
• Seasonal items you will need within 30 days

Decide early whether you want full-service packing or self-pack with professional load. Mixed plans fail when boxes are not ready when the truck arrives.

Aligning the truck with your job start

Build backward from start day:

• Day minus 7 to 14: Final inventory list and binding or not-to-exceed estimate signed
• Day minus 3 to 5: Load day with buffer before travel
• Transit window: Matches lease access, not only distance math
• Day minus 1: Essentials in hand; bed and workspace setup plan confirmed

Affinity Moving is one licensed Twin Cities operator that plans both interstate and local legs; use the same vetting script with any carrier you consider.

Corporate relocation benefits (use them fully)

If your employer offers relocation assistance:

• Confirm covered services (pack, load, storage, temporary housing)
• Ask whether you must use approved vendors
• Save every receipt and inventory document for reimbursement
• Clarify tax treatment of benefits with your payroll team

Even partial benefits should shape which quote tier you buy.

Red flags when the job clock is ticking

Pause if a vendor:

• Quotes without inventory detail on an interstate move
• Refuses to put delivery windows in the contract
• Demands large cash deposits before paperwork
• Cannot match company name to DOT or state records
• Promises exact delivery to the hour without transit caveats

Minnesota arrival realities

Winter relocations need extra pad time for icy walks and hall protection. Summer moves compete for building elevators and weekend slots. Twin Cities traffic patterns affect local unload days when you are commuting to a new office within the first week.

FAQ

How far ahead should I book a career relocation?

As soon as dates are firm; peak season fills early.

Can I store furniture if housing is not ready?

Many interstate carriers offer storage-in-transit when scoped upfront.

Should I move before or after my start date?

Often unload before start day minus one so you can sleep and work locally.

What if my closing date slips?

Confirm reschedule and storage fees before signing.

Do I need different movers for load and unload cities?

One coordinated carrier with written windows is usually simpler than two unrelated vendors.

Can I pack myself to save money?

Yes, if boxes are labeled and ready at load time; confirm packing liability rules.

What documents should I keep?

Estimate, bill of lading, inventory, insurance proof, and delivery receipt.

Are online mover reviews enough?

Use them with licensing checks and written scope, not alone.

Does remote work change the move?

You still need reliable delivery; setup may prioritize home office gear in essentials.

Where should I start today?

Lock dates, then vet carriers with the script above before you sign.

Bottom line

Relocating to Minnesota for work goes smoother when the move is scheduled backward from your start date, not forward from a cheap quote. Document inventory, confirm delivery windows, and hire licensed operators who put access and timing in writing. Protect the first week on the job by protecting the truck schedule first.

Written for The Good Men Project readers. Confirm relocation benefits and tax questions with your employer; verify licensing with any carrier before booking.

—

This content is brought to you by Alexander Reid

Photos provided by Alexander Reid

The post Relocating to Minnesota for Work: A Moving Checklist That Protects Your Start Date appeared first on The Good Men Project.

Hey there, we’re the Republican Party, and we’re pro-life!

You are?

Yup!

Cool… so you’re for affordable healthcare for everyone?

Umm, well, not exactly; we can’t just take care of everyone. Can you imagine the cost of that?

I see. But at least you’re in favor of health benefits for the elderly?

Now, that’s a bad example. People are living longer, and that’s simply not financially prudent.

Uh huh. But certainly you’re good with financial support for low-income families who may be forced to choose between vital medical care and paying their rent?

OK, the thing is, too many lazy people manipulate the system instead of getting out there and working harder to pull themselves up by their bootstraps!

Gotcha. So, then you must be in favor of increasing the minimum wage so that full-time employment will enable people to have their essential needs met.

No, we can’t do that. Too expensive.

But you’re pro-life, though?

We are!

Great. Then, you must be advocates for nutrition support programs like SNAP and WIC that help tens of millions of children and poor families living in food scarcity, so they don’t get sick or die prematurely?

OK, now, you’re just being hyperbolic.

Alright, so you claim all life in the womb is sacred and should be protected, right?

Definitely.

So, how about the life of the woman with the womb? Is her life sacred? What happens if going to term with a pregnancy will result in her dying?

It isn’t our place to interfere with God’s divine will.

Right. But you’re pro-life?

Absolutely!

OK, so that’s gotta mean that you’re fighting climate change, advocating for conserving natural habitats, opposing data centers, and passing legislation to ensure the planet has clean air and drinking water?

Umm… those aren’t our priorities right now.

I kinda figured… Alright then, since you’re pro-life, how about the hundreds of thousands of lives around the world that are going to die without USAID?

Now, that’s just not fair! As JD Vance has said, our faith calls us to care for people closest to us first and then those geographically further away if we can. We have to take care of our own!

I see, so America First, right?

Exactly!

That must mean you’re fighting to make sure Americans have affordable groceries, healthcare, housing, education, and energy?

Yeah, the thing is, we’d like to, but we’re busy with other more pressing matters. You’ve seen that we’re in the middle of a bunch of wars and military conflicts around the world, right?

Kinda hard to miss. Yeah, about that: Isn’t bombing school children in Iran, partnering in the genocide in Gaza, cutting off Cuba from power, strong-arming Ukraine, and collaborating in assaults on Lebanon the exact opposite of pro-life?

Now, you’re oversimplifying and trying to make us look bad. War is profit…, umm, war is strateg… uh… war is necessary sometimes.

So you can bomb civilians, starve families, and collaborate in ethnic cleansing and still be pro-life?

Sure, you can!

Wow…

What?

Nothing… So you’re sure you’re pro-life?

Without a doubt!

How about immigrant lives? How about the lives of black and brown people being terrorized, beaten, abducted, arrested without due process, and thrown into concentration camps…

Detention centers!

Whatever… What about the lives in those “detention centers” that are in sweltering cells all around this country? The lives that are sexually assaulted? The lives that are being denied food and medical care? Are you pro those lives?

We have to protect our borders!

What does that mean?

Illegals!

What?

Gangs! Drugs! Rape!

Alright, now it sounds like you’re just shouting random buzzwords… But since you mentioned rape, isn’t it pro-life to make every monster in the Epstein Files legally accountable for their crimes? I mean, those survivors of sexual assault are lives, right?

OK, now you’ve gone too far! Think of the chaos that might cause. Can you imagine where we’d be as a nation if we exposed every powerful predator and pedophile in our government?

I can. Look, I gotta run, but let me hit you with a few last questions.

Shoot!

Every life in the womb is sacred and worthy of protection, right?

Yes!

Every life?

Of course!

So, gay lives? Are they sacred?

Umm..

Transgender lives?

You, see, that’s tricky…

Muslim lives?

That’s complicated.

How about children with disabilities? Are there lives worth protecting?

That’s a tough one…

Are the lives of veterans sacred enough to deserve care?

Well, sure, but we can’t…

What about those with mental illnesses?

Uh…

Ok, so I think I’ve got it: You’re against affordable healthcare, health benefits for the elderly, food supports for the hungry, a living wage, affordable groceries, education, and housing.

We are.

You oppose environmental protections, mental healthcare, and accountability for sexual predators, though you support mass incarceration, wars around the globe, and human rights rollbacks for LGBTQ people, people of color, and immigrants?

Correct.

And you believe all life in the womb is sacred, but you don’t believe in body autonomy for the women who carry those wombs, and believe their deaths are the acceptable cost of birth?

Bingo!

Well, I’m really glad you Republicans are so pro-life…

iStock image

The post Hi. We’re the Republican Party, And We’re Pro-Life! appeared first on The Good Men Project.

I had known about New Dimensions long before I was invited to be interviewed about my new book, Male Menopause, which was published in 1997. Michael and Justine Toms founded New Dimensions Radio in 1973 and have recorded ground-breaking conversations with visionaries including Joseph Campbell, HH the Dalai Lama, R. Buckminster Fuller, Ram Dass, Maya Angelou, Andrew Weil, Stewart Brand, Joanna Macy, Barbara Marx Hubbard, and thousands of others.

Recently, I had the good fortune to interview Justine about how New Dimensions has evolved over the last fifty-plus years and they are doing to restore recordings that are in danger of being lost. I always ask my guests to share their “origin story” about how their work began and what their initial vision was when they started out. Here is some of what Justine shared with me:

I grew up in the Episcopal Church and loved it deeply — the gentle solemnity, the hymns, the cadence of familiar prayers. But in my early twenties, when I moved to Alabama, my path took a turn. I joined a spirited Southern Baptist congregation and threw myself into it wholeheartedly. I sang in the choir, taught Sunday school, and loved the lively exuberance that filled our services. Yet even then, beneath the joy, there was a subtle restlessness I couldn’t name.

That restlessness stayed with me when I moved west to California. There, I found myself drawn into the community of Jehovah’s Witnesses. As before, I jumped in with both feet — studying, attending meetings, and knocking on doors to spread the ‘good news.’ I wanted to serve, to share what I thought of as the truth. But beneath that devotion, a quiet question persisted: Was there more?

At the time, I didn’t see it as a spiritual quest. I thought of it as being faithful, obedient. Only later did I realize that what I was following wasn’t doctrine but a deep internal pull toward the broadest, most inclusive understanding of spirit possible. My soul was hungry for something vaster than any one faith could contain.

Then I met Michael. He wasn’t a Jehovah’s Witness — far from it. But there was something in his calm, listening presence that quietly disarmed me. Still, before I could let down my guard, I needed to know where he stood on spiritual matters. So, one day I called him and said, ‘I’d like to come over and talk about spiritual things.’ He said yes.

We talked through the night, our conversation winding through scripture, science, myth, and mystery. Dawn came, but neither of us was ready to stop. I didn’t realize it then, but that was the conception moment for New Dimensions.

What started as a weekly show on one local station grew into the longest-running independently produced interview program on public radio, carried by nearly 100 stations across the US, Canada, and New Zealand… and now available worldwide as podcasts, audiobooks, and videos on YouTube.

Today, our archive holds 4,639 programs. The full collection covers an extraordinary range of human inquiry: consciousness, healing, physics, mythology, indigenous wisdom, the arts, politics, and the future of civilization.

Dr. Roberto Trujillo, of Stanford University Libraries, has called it ‘one of the most extraordinary archival collections’ he has encountered in his career as a curator. Others have termed it ‘The Alexandria Library of the 21st Century.’

Save 692 Rare Recordings Before They’re Lost

Justine went on to say,

In recent years we have devoted much of our time and limited means to digitizing and restoring many of our classic recordings. 692 have been digitized from their original tapes, but they’re not playable and can’t be made available to the public until they’ve been properly restored.

Each program requires approximately sixteen hours of careful, hands-on restoration to be brought back to life. It’s a monumental task, and one that goes far beyond what our everyday funding can support.

Here is a sampling of what is in some of these iconic recordings:

• Joseph Campbell showed the world that beneath every culture runs the same deep river of story. Five of his conversations are waiting to be restored, including “The Myth of the Fool.”
• R. Buckminster Fuller coined “Spaceship Earth” and spent his life proving that human ingenuity could solve what politics couldn’t. Six of his conversations are in the archive, including “Being with Bucky.”
• Albert Hofmann, Ram Dass, Timothy Leary, Allen Ginsberg, and John Lilly sat together in 1977 for “LSD: A Generation Later,” a conversation between the pioneers of consciousness research that will never happen again.
• Jerry Brown, Frank Herbert, and Captain Edgar Mitchell came together for “Space-Age Humanity.”: a governor, the author of Dune, and an astronaut who walked on the Moon, all in one room imagining the future.
• HH the Dalai Lama, Alice Walker, Jack Kornfield, Robert Thurman, and Edward James Olmos explored what compassion actually demands of us in “Compassion in Action.”
• Daniel Ellsberg, the man behind the Pentagon Papers, reflected on the world we choose to create in “A World of Our Own Making.”
• Werner Erhard, Barbara Marx Hubbard, Marilyn Ferguson, and Patricia Sun gathered in 1979 to ask one question: “The Future: What Will It Be?”
• Linus Pauling, the only person in history to receive two unshared Nobel Prizes, recorded a rare conversation at New Dimensions.

Please help support our efforts to make this wonderful collection available to the world, now and forever.

Justine’s information and how you can donate.

Here is what your tax-deductible gift makes possible. All donations, no matter how large are small are helpful:

• $243 restores one complete program.
• $2,430 restores an entire series of ten programs.

Any funds raised above our goal will go toward making sure these teachings are accessible to as many people as possible.

Every dollar counts. Please donate what you can, and pass this along to anyone you know who would value this project…

If you would like to see my interview with Justine Willis Toms, you can do so here.

I write a weekly article on issues of interest to my community. You can subscribe for free here: https://menalive.com/email-newsletter/

—

This post was previously published on Menalive.com.

The post Journey to New Dimensions: Wisdom From the Past and Hope for the Future appeared first on The Good Men Project.

By Al Cattabiani

By the mid‑1970s, rock music had gotten… well, a little too pleased with itself. Songs stretched on forever, solos became athletic events, and concept albums tried to out‑mythologize each other. If you weren’t singing about ancient civilizations or cosmic journeys, were you even trying? Rock had become a kind of intellectual obstacle course, and if you didn’t have the patience for a triple‑gatefold concept record, you were out of luck.

Then, almost quietly, New York stepped in and said, “Enough.”

In a handful of dingy clubs — CBGB, Max’s Kansas City, and a few others that smelled like beer, sweat, and possibility — a new generation of musicians started stripping rock back to its bones. They weren’t trying to out‑play anyone. They weren’t trying to impress conservatory students. They were trying to reconnect with the spark that made rock matter in the first place. And in doing so, they ended up rewriting the rules of modern songwriting.

The Ramones and the Art of Radical Simplicity

The Ramones were the first shock to the system. They walked onstage with leather jackets, bowl haircuts, and songs that barely lasted long enough to finish a drink. But those songs were a revelation. They were fast, loud, and unapologetically simple — not simple as in “basic,” but simple as in “essential.” The Ramones understood something that rock had forgotten: a song doesn’t need to be complicated to be powerful. It just needs to hit you in the chest.

Their approach was almost architectural. They removed every unnecessary beam and decorative flourish until only the load‑bearing elements remained. Most of their tracks clocked in around two minutes, and that brevity wasn’t laziness. It was discipline. They got to the hook immediately, rode it hard, and bailed before the idea wore out its welcome. In a weird way, they anticipated the streaming era decades before it existed. Today’s pop songs — the ones that grab you in the first ten seconds — owe a quiet debt to the Ramones’ ruthless efficiency.

Television and the Beauty of Restraint

If the Ramones were the blunt instrument of the New York scene, Television was the precision tool. Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd were guitarists who could absolutely shred, but they chose not to. Instead, they built songs around interlocking guitar lines that felt like conversations — bright, wiry, and strangely elegant. Their music was complex, but never indulgent. Long, but never bloated. “Marquee Moon” didn’t need a cape or a fog machine to feel epic; it just needed two guitars weaving around each other like they were discovering the song in real time.

Television proved that punk didn’t have to be simplistic. It just had to be intentional. Their influence is all over modern indie rock — the clean, chiming guitars of R.E.M., the angular riffs of Sonic Youth, the downtown cool of The Strokes. Even newer bands like Parquet Courts and Fontaines D.C. are basically carrying the Television torch, mixing nervous energy with melodic intelligence.

Patti Smith, Richard Hell, and Punk’s New Emotional Vocabulary

Meanwhile, Patti Smith and Richard Hell were redefining punk’s emotional vocabulary. Smith brought poetry into the mix — not the flowery kind, but the raw, Beat‑inspired kind that felt like it was scribbled in a notebook at 3 a.m. She didn’t simplify language; she liberated it. Her songs felt like street sermons, half‑sung and half‑spoken, full of urgency and vision. You can hear her influence in artists like PJ Harvey, Sharon Van Etten, and Mitski, all of whom treat lyrics as something more than decoration.

Hell, on the other hand, embraced imperfection as a philosophy. His writing was vulnerable, cynical, and self‑aware — a kind of anti‑poetry that made room for doubt and insecurity. He didn’t pretend to have answers. He barely pretended to have questions. That attitude became a blueprint for generations of indie misfits, from Courtney Barnett’s deadpan wit to Kurt Vile’s slacker introspection.

The Blueprint That Never Went Away

What made the New York punk scene so transformative wasn’t just the sound. It was the shift in priorities. Rock had spent years trying to get bigger — bigger ideas, bigger solos, bigger productions. Punk made everything smaller, but sharper. It reasserted the idea that immediacy was a virtue. That rhythm could matter more than harmony. That a lyric didn’t need to be ornate to be honest. That imperfection could be a feature, not a flaw.

And those ideas stuck.

Look at modern songwriting, and you’ll see the fingerprints everywhere. Songs are shorter now, hooks arrive faster, and the emotional tone is more conversational. The Strokes revived New York minimalism for the 2000s, turning Television’s guitar interplay into something sleek and stylish. Parquet Courts took the Richard Hell approach — witty, restless, and slightly neurotic.

IDLES and Fontaines D.C. brought back punk’s urgency, proving that raw emotion still hits harder than polish.

But the influence goes even wider than the usual suspects. You can hear the Ramones’ DNA in the way Olivia Rodrigo structures her punchiest songs — quick setups, fast payoffs, no wasted motion.

Wet Leg’s deadpan humor, clipped phrasing, and minimalist arrangements could easily slot into a 1977 setlist without anyone blinking.

Even artists who don’t sound “punk” on the surface are borrowing from the blueprint. Phoebe Bridgers uses lyrical directness that Patti Smith would absolutely recognize — the kind of emotional clarity that doesn’t hide behind metaphor. Mitski channels that same spirit, but with a theatrical twist, turning vulnerability into something sharp and confrontational. And then there’s Turnstile, who’ve taken punk’s rhythmic urgency and blown it open into something euphoric and genre‑bending, proving that the original ethos still has room to evolve.

The indie world is practically built on Television’s guitar logic. Bands like Real Estate, DIIV, and Beach Fossils all use that bright, interlocking guitar language — not copying it, but inheriting it. You can hear the lineage in the way their riffs glide rather than stomp, how they create tension through space instead of density. It’s the same architectural thinking Verlaine used, just filtered through a dreamier lens.

Even hip‑hop and pop borrow from punk’s structural rebellion. The rise of the two‑minute song — the kind that hits hard, says its piece, and leaves — is pure Ramones energy. The conversational, diary‑entry lyricism dominating modern playlists? That’s Patti Smith’s spirit, whispering in the margins. The DIY production aesthetic of bedroom pop? That’s punk’s “use what you have” philosophy, reborn for laptops instead of four‑tracks.

The point is: punk didn’t just influence punk. It influenced the entire idea of what a song could be.

Why This Era Still Feels Like the Future

The 1970s New York punk scene wasn’t just a moment. It was a correction. It reminded musicians that songs don’t need to be complicated to be meaningful. They don’t need to be long to be powerful. They don’t need to be perfect to be unforgettable. In a world where authenticity is currency and attention spans are short, the punk ethos feels more relevant than ever.

Bands like The Ramones and Television didn’t just redefine songwriting for their time. They created a blueprint that modern artists continue to refine, reinterpret, and rediscover. The underground became the foundation. The misfits became the architects. And the songs — short, sharp, and stubbornly alive — still sound like the future.

—

This post was previously published on CultureSonar.

***

You Might Also Like These From The Good Men Project

Compliments Men Want to Hear More Often

Relationships Aren’t Easy, But They’re Worth It

The One Thing Men Want More Than Sex

..A Man’s Kiss Tells You Everything

The post How the 1970s New York Punk Scene Redefined Modern Songwriting Standards appeared first on The Good Men Project.

People all along the age spectrum have asked me these questions over the years,

1. “Why do you have to have those Pride Marches every June?
2. “Why do you think you deserves these special rights that straight people don’t have?”

Both of these questions are very simple for me to answer. Referring to question 1, I say:

“If there were no oppression against LGBTQ folks, we would not need Pride Marches. So straight & cis people, stop the oppression from yourself, your organizations, and from the larger society!”

Question 2 is, likewise, simple to address:

“I don’t want special rights. But, unfortunately, when we are attacked, beaten up, and bullied, when we lose custody of our children based solely on our sexual and/or gender identities, when we are marginalized in our communities, vilified and scapegoated by our elected leaders including the sitting (sleeping) president of the United States, when we witness our histories erased and our books banned in the schools, when members of our transgender communities are viciously attacked and murdered, can’t receive the medical care they deserve, cannot enter public facilities of their choice, well, all of these are ways we are treated ‘specially’. Quite frankly, I’m sick and disgusted of being treated specially. I prefer to be treated equally with equality and respect.”

And similarly, we will not need an organization like Black Lives Matter, for example, when and if we come to a point in our country when we as a collective society finally and completely look at our racist white supremist past and come to terms with the full history of our country, when we see Indigenous heritage people, African heritage people, Central and South American heritage people, Asian heritage people, people of Middle Eastern heritage, people of any and all ethnic and national heritages living freely, unencumbered by the lingering freedom-killing legacies of our racist past.

Yes, the solutions are quite simple, but, unfortunately, they are not at all easy to implement. We can continue to pass equal rights laws and reinstate those past laws that leaders in our government have whittled away over time. But as governments can grant rights those same governments can take them away.

For our country to function as a country “with liberty and justice for all,” we must ensure equality of rights to all, including to people outside of the majority, for democracies function on majority rule.

Yes, each June is designated as Pride month in several countries across the globe. Millions of people of all sexual and gender identities celebrate the hard-fought rights to love who we want to love and express our gender how we want to express ourselves.

In this age of governments rolling back our rights to live our lives as we choose, we must continue to join together as allies, to stay vigilant, and to connect with progressive people of all identities to counter the terrorist tactics being waged against us.

The histories of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer, and questioning (LGBTIQ+) people are replete with incredible pain and immense pride, of overwhelming repression and victorious rejoicing, of stifling invisibility and dazzling illumination.

Throughout the ages, dominant groups have labeled LGBTIQ+ people using many terms: from “sinners,” “sick,” and “criminal,” to having a “preference, “orientation,” “identity,” and even being given “a gift from God.”

Though same-sex attraction and sexuality and gender nonconformity and expression have probably always existed in human and most non-human species, the concept of “homosexuality,” “bisexuality,” “transgender,” “heterosexuality,” and “gender conformity,” in fact, sexual and gender identities in general and the construction of identities and sense of community based on these identities is a relatively modern concept.

It is only within the last 160 or so years that there has been an organized and sustained political effort to protect the rights of people with same-sex and both-sex attractions, and those who cross traditional constructions of gender identities and expression.

As we enter the momentous month of June, a time set aside in countries throughout the world to commemorate and celebrate our annual LGBTQ Pride events, we can take stock and reflect back on our setbacks and also on our victories great and small over the past years within the personal, interpersonal, institutional, social, political, and religious realms.

For me, a touchstone event was when then United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton presented a historic address to the United Nations delivered on International Human Rights Day, December 6, 2011, in Geneva, Switzerland.

The majority of her speech centered on the assertion that LGBTQ rights are, indeed, human rights. That same day, President Barack Obama issued a memorandum directing all federal agencies to “promote and protect the human rights of LGBT persons.”

While I too felt pride for our President “coming out” for marriage equality on May 9, 2012 during a televised interview with Robin Roberts, I was particularly impressed by Hillary’s courage and forthrightness in bringing to the highest level of world’s attention a simple truth that many of us understood that day on a deep level and have been working towards for most of our lives. Her entire speech deeply moved me, and in particular when she said:

“It is a violation of human rights when people are beaten or killed because of their sexual orientation, or because they do not conform to cultural norms about how men and women should look or behave. It is a violation of human rights when governments declare it illegal to be gay or allow those who harm gay people to go unpunished. Being gay is not a Western invention; it is a human reality. And protecting the human rights of all people, gay or straight, is not something that only Western governments do.”

Throughout the decades, I have both organized and participated in hundreds of LGBTQ-focused events, and I have attended numerous LGBTQ Pride activities, including precedent-setting and annual marches and parades.

I was fortunate to have attended the second annual Christopher Street Pride march for LGBTQ rights in New York City in June 1971. This was the first time I felt the freedom to be fully myself as I walked down the boulevards with thousands of my comrades.

A few days later, I returned to visit my former college classmates for the first Pride march through the streets of downtown San José, California. This experience was vastly different from the open atmosphere in Manhattan, as 28 of us walked very tentatively down the main street, while bystanders hurled vicious epithets and pelted us with garbage and rocks.

When I sometime begin to take the annual LGBTQ Pride events for granted, I think back to those early marches in New York City and San José, and as I do, I refocus on the importance of continuing the struggle for the rights and dignity of expression for LGBTQ people and our allies, and for all minoritized people whom dominant groups attempt to construct as “other” in this country and throughout the globe.

In this current era as the political and theocratic Right attempts to reverse progressive human and civil rights initiatives won over the past decades and to prevent such measures from taking root where they have not grown previously, I am extremely encouraged by the leaders from the highest levels to the grassroots showing courage in the face of resistance and backlash.

During her speech at the United Nation, Secretary Hillary Clinton committed herself to and spoke for people of good will everywhere when she said:

“To LGBT men and women worldwide: Wherever you live and whatever your circumstances…please know that you are not alone.”

As the truism advises, “Think globally, and act locally,” my hope is that we can join together to create the world as a place where everyone will celebrate their Pride safely and with integrity in ways that express their truest joys while showing their full humanity, freedom, and liberty.

During this Pride season and throughout the year, let us join in making that a reality.

The post Why Do We Need Pride Events? appeared first on The Good Men Project.

—

Travel Saga, one of the leading travel companies serving travelers across the UAE and India, has officially launched its new campaign, “One Brand, Two Countries, Zero Hassle,” aimed at making Dubai and UAE travel simpler, more accessible, and more convenient for Indian tourists.

The campaign was announced by Jeetu Sainani, Founder and CEO of Travel Saga, with a clear mission: to eliminate the complexities associated with international travel and provide Indian travelers with a seamless experience for Dubai visas, holiday packages, hotel bookings, airport transfers, sightseeing tours, and customized travel planning—all under one trusted brand.

As Dubai continues to be one of the most popular international destinations among Indian travelers, the new initiative focuses on helping couples, families, honeymooners, and leisure travelers plan their UAE holidays without the stress of managing multiple service providers.

Making Dubai Travel Easier Than Ever for Indians

Every year, millions of Indian tourists visit Dubai and the UAE for family vacations, luxury experiences, shopping, entertainment, business travel, and special celebrations. However, many travelers still face challenges when planning their trip, including visa procedures, choosing the right package, finding reliable travel support, and coordinating bookings.

Travel Saga’s “One Brand, Two Countries, Zero Hassle” campaign has been designed to solve these challenges.

Through this initiative, Indian travelers can access comprehensive travel solutions from a single company, reducing confusion and ensuring a smoother travel experience from start to finish.

Speaking about the campaign, Jeetu Sainani said:

“Dubai has become one of the most loved international destinations for Indian travelers. However, many people still find the planning process complicated, especially when it comes to visas, holiday bookings, hotel selections, and activity planning. Through our ‘One Brand, Two Countries, Zero Hassle’ campaign, we want to make Dubai and UAE travel easier, faster, and more accessible for every Indian traveler.”

“Whether someone is planning a honeymoon, family vacation, romantic getaway, luxury holiday, or group tour, Travel Saga aims to provide everything they need through one trusted travel brand.”

One Trusted Brand Across India and the UAE

A key highlight of the campaign is Travel Saga’s unique presence across both India and the UAE.

Unlike many travel companies that operate from only one market, Travel Saga has built a travel ecosystem that connects Indian travelers directly with UAE-based travel expertise.

The campaign reflects the company’s vision of providing local support in India while offering destination expertise in Dubai and across the UAE.

This dual-country presence allows customers to benefit from:

• Faster travel assistance
• Better destination guidance
• Reliable visa support
• Local expertise in Dubai
• Customized holiday planning
• End-to-end customer service
• Dedicated travel consultants

The company believes that having operations connected across both countries enables a more transparent and efficient travel experience for Indian tourists.

Two Platforms, One Seamless Travel Experience

As part of the campaign, Travel Saga continues to strengthen its digital presence through its two primary platforms:

Travelsaga.com

Travelsaga.com serves as Travel Saga’s flagship UAE travel platform, with all on-ground operations managed by Travel Saga Tourism in Dubai. From Dubai city tours and desert safaris to attraction tickets, airport transfers, yacht experiences, UAE visa assistance, and customized holiday packages, the platform provides travelers with direct access to trusted local expertise and seamless destination support. This operational presence in Dubai is a key pillar of the company’s “One Brand. Two Countries. Zero Hassle.” approach, ensuring a smoother and more reliable travel experience for Indian tourists.

Travelsagaholidays.in

TravelSagaHolidays.in is dedicated to helping Indian travelers discover and book international holiday packages, honeymoon vacations, family trips, group tours, and customized travel experiences.

Together, these platforms create a seamless travel ecosystem that supports travelers before, during, and after their journey.

The “One Brand, Two Countries, Zero Hassle” campaign reinforces the idea that customers can rely on a single travel partner throughout their travel planning process.

Simplifying Dubai Visa Services for Indian Travelers

One of the biggest objectives of the campaign is to make Dubai visa assistance easier for Indian tourists.

Visa requirements can often be confusing for first-time international travelers. Travel Saga aims to simplify the process by offering guidance and support throughout the application journey.

The company assists travelers with:

• Dubai tourist visas
• UAE visa guidance
• Required documentation support
• Travel planning assistance
• Holiday package integration

By combining visa support with holiday planning services, Travel Saga helps travelers save time while reducing uncertainty during the booking process.

Dubai Holiday Packages for Families

Family travel continues to be one of the strongest segments for Dubai tourism.

Dubai offers world-class attractions, family-friendly entertainment, theme parks, shopping destinations, cultural experiences, beaches, and luxury accommodations.

Through the campaign, Travel Saga aims to make family holidays more convenient by offering carefully designed Dubai family tour packages that combine accommodation, sightseeing, transportation, and local experiences.

Families can enjoy popular attractions such as:

• Burj Khalifa
• Dubai Mall
• Dubai Aquarium
• Desert Safari Experiences
• Dubai Marina Cruises
• Global Village
• Miracle Garden
• Theme Parks and Water Parks

The company focuses on creating itineraries that balance comfort, entertainment, and value for families traveling from India.

Special Focus on Couples and Honeymoon Travelers

The campaign also places significant emphasis on couples and honeymoon tourism.

Dubai has evolved into one of the most sought-after honeymoon destinations for Indian couples due to its luxury resorts, romantic experiences, fine dining options, desert landscapes, and iconic skyline.

Travel Saga offers customized honeymoon packages designed around individual preferences and budgets.

These packages often include:

• Romantic hotel stays
• Luxury dining experiences
• Private transfers
• Desert experiences
• Yacht cruises
• Dubai city tours
• Abu Dhabi excursions

According to the company, couples increasingly prefer personalized travel experiences rather than standard fixed itineraries, and the campaign reflects this growing trend.

Supporting First-Time International Travelers

Another important goal of the campaign is to support first-time international travelers from India.

Many travelers visiting Dubai for the first time often have questions regarding:

• Visa requirements
• Travel documents
• Currency exchange
• Transportation
• Hotel locations
• Local attractions
• Travel safety

Travel Saga’s travel consultants work closely with customers to provide guidance before departure and during their stay, helping reduce travel-related concerns.

The company believes that first-time international travel should be exciting rather than overwhelming.

Why Dubai Remains a Top Choice for Indian Tourists

Dubai continues to attract Indian travelers because of its unique combination of modern attractions, luxury experiences, safety, accessibility, and world-class infrastructure.

Some of the key reasons include:

• Short travel duration from India
• Frequent flight connectivity
• Family-friendly attractions
• Luxury experiences
• Shopping opportunities
• Entertainment options
• Modern infrastructure
• Diverse culinary experiences

Recognizing this growing demand, Travel Saga has positioned the campaign to address the evolving needs of Indian travelers looking for reliable travel solutions.

Building Long-Term Trust Through Service Excellence

Since its establishment, Travel Saga has focused on delivering customer-centric travel experiences.

The company’s growth has been driven by:

• Personalized service
• Transparent communication
• Travel expertise
• Reliable support
• Customer satisfaction
• Destination knowledge
• Quality travel experiences

The new campaign builds upon these strengths and reinforces the company’s commitment to helping travelers explore Dubai and the UAE with confidence.

Looking Ahead

With international travel demand continuing to rise, Travel Saga sees significant opportunities to further simplify travel planning for Indian tourists.

The “One Brand, Two Countries, Zero Hassle” campaign represents the company’s commitment to creating a more connected travel experience between India and the UAE.

By bringing together travel planning, visa assistance, holiday packages, destination expertise, and customer support under one brand, Travel Saga aims to make Dubai travel more accessible than ever before.

Concluding the announcement, Jeetu Sainani said:

“Our goal is simple—to remove the hassles that travelers face and help them focus on creating memories. Through this campaign, we are making Dubai and UAE travel easier for Indian families, couples, honeymooners, and holidaymakers. With Travel Saga, travelers can enjoy the confidence of working with one trusted brand across two countries and experience truly hassle-free travel.”

Our Aim Behind “One Brand. Two Countries. Zero Hassle.”

At Travel Saga Holidays, our mission is simple: to make Dubai and UAE travel easier, more reliable, and completely hassle-free for Indian travelers.

Through our presence in India via Travel Saga Holidays and our operational expertise in Dubai through Travel Saga Tourism, we have created a unique travel model that combines local assistance with on-ground destination support. This allows our customers to enjoy a seamless travel experience backed by dedicated teams working together across two countries.

From Dubai visa assistance and holiday planning to hotel bookings, airport transfers, sightseeing tours, and customer support during your trip, every aspect of your journey is managed through one trusted travel brand.

Our “One Brand. Two Countries. Zero Hassle.” approach eliminates the uncertainty that many travelers face when booking international holidays. Instead of coordinating with multiple vendors, travelers benefit from a single point of contact, faster support, transparent communication, and reliable travel arrangements from booking to return.

Whether you’re planning a family vacation, honeymoon, romantic getaway, group tour, or luxury Dubai holiday, our coordinated teams in India and Dubai work as one to ensure a smooth and memorable travel experience.

At Travel Saga, we are not simply helping travelers book a trip—we are supporting their entire journey through a unified travel ecosystem built on trust, expertise, and customer satisfaction.

Explore Dubai holiday packages, UAE visa services, sightseeing experiences, and customized travel solutions with Travel Saga Holidays and experience the confidence of booking with one brand across two countries.

About Travel Saga

Travel Saga is a leading travel and tourism company serving travelers across the UAE and India. The company specializes in Dubai tourism, UAE experiences, visa assistance, international holiday packages, honeymoon tours, family vacations, sightseeing tours, airport transfers, luxury travel experiences, and customized travel solutions. Through TravelSaga.com and TravelSagaHolidays.in, the company helps travelers plan seamless journeys backed by expert guidance and dedicated customer support.

Media Contact

Travel Saga Holidays India Private Limited

CEO: Jeetu Sainani

Office: Block D, Police Station Plot, Near Vaishali Nagar, Krishna Nagar, Vaishali Nagar, Jaipur, Rajasthan 302021, India

Website: https://travelsagaholidays.in

Email: info@travelsagaholidays.in
Phone: +91 7300007075

—

This content is brought to you by Backlinks Hub.

Photo provided by Jeetu Sainani

The post Jeetu Sainani Announces Travel Saga’s ‘One Brand, Two Countries, Zero Hassle’ Campaign to Simplify Dubai and UAE Travel for Indian Tourists appeared first on The Good Men Project.

Before joining a group online, I always read the rules. I’m invited to a lot of groups, but I don’t join them all. This one looked interesting, but it didn’t take long after I was admitted into the private sanctum of the social media group before I noticed a couple of things that were odd.

First of all, I should disclose that this was a homesteading group. I prefer “farmstead” to homestead, and I prefer regenerative, organic methods to anything else, so I wasn’t sure if this was going to be the best fit or not. I was willing to give it a try because it was also for single people who are managing homesteads by themselves. I thought it might be a good resource.

But then … things got weird.

Clues for context

The first thing I noticed that was odd was that people were posting selfies along with their gardens and farm animals. They weren’t just any selfies. They were clearly meant to be thirst traps. That was unusual to see.

Reading the long posts, most of them were centered around advertising the lifestyle to singles who might want to join them in it. Was this … a dating group? I didn’t sign up for that.

The second thing I noticed is that there were tons of male comments below any woman’s posted photo. That might not be noteworthy to most people who regularly participate in groups online, but I’ll be honest: I rarely join ones that include men.

Why I choose women-only groups

My favorite groups on the internet are the safe spaces for women where men are not allowed. Solo travel groups. Women’s hiking groups. Dating support groups. I always find these spaces to be positive, helpful, and affirming.

That’s not the case with groups that include men.

• Groups with men in them often have more trolls.
• Groups with men in them often result in women having to field romantic and sexual overtures, regardless of the topic of discussion.
• These groups aren’t just havens for trolls. Mansplainers also haunt the comment section, quick to correct women who aren’t actually wrong by explaining with the same words what we just said or incorrectly explaining something that falls into our areas of expertise.
• These groups also tend to have routine misogyny, and most of us get plenty of that in the real world and don’t need an extra helping online.

…

Of course, that’s not the only reason I tend to take a hard pass on groups that are inclusive of men. There are other reasons, ones most women know without me having to illustrate them. They are even more significant than just avoiding mansplainers and trolls.

Choosing the bear, flying solo

First of all, I was not looking for a dating group. The person who invited me knew this. Moreover, the group rules claimed that this was not, in fact, a dating group (all evidence to the contrary). Yet, most of the men responding to posts seemed primarily interested in a relationship, and most of the women posting seemed to immediately share that they were looking for a homesteading partner.

Beyond the fact that I did not intend to join a dating group, there’s the more important factor to consider: safety. Women are choosing the bear for a reason. I don’t prefer to disclose my location and single status or the details of my daily life to men I don’t know. In a group that focuses on farmsteading as a lifestyle, I’d rather be able to openly share about challenges without worrying that someone will see me as a target.

I’d also prefer to talk about homesteading without the blatant misogyny that’s sure to arrive in groups that include men. Believe it or not, I’d love tips to make this life easier, but I don’t need a man to make any of that happen. With the whole trad wife movement happening, this is all too common in mixed groups online. I’m not looking to be a trad wife, and I’m not interested in groups where that idea is being promoted either.

Yes, I’m single and homesteading. No, I’m not looking for a partner. Both things can be true.

A friend of mine tells me that every group for singles who are homesteading is like this. All of them. They are all about trying to find a partner to fit the lifestyle. It’s the Farmers Only of homesteaders. But it would be different if it were advertised that way. I was looking for community, not a love connection.

Better (and safer) community spaces

A friend of mine started a local homesteading group to exchange ideas, resources, or tools. It feels better to me. Safer. It’s clearly not a dating space, thank goodness. But it’s also about networking with other people to figure out how to make things easier for everyone.

Plus, it’s local. We’re all dealing with the same climate and weather conditions, and we can more easily share seeds and starter plants with members close by. It feels more like a community space, not a space for people looking for a wholly different kind of connection.

While I don’t oppose dating communities for homesteaders, I wish they would just be transparent. Single doesn’t necessarily translate to looking. That seems to be a hard thing for the majority of society to understand.

I started creating a post about my homesteading life in this new singles group before I deleted it. I just didn’t want to have to field comments that aren’t about this lifestyle at all. I added that post to the local group instead.

Curating a healthy online experience

I strongly believe in curating healthy online experiences. Participating in women-only groups is one aspect of that for me. The world is inundated with the opinions of the manosphere. It’s nice to have spaces where we’re not exposed to that feedback.

My absolute favorite group on social media is likely the Burned Haystack Dating Method by Jennie Young. It’s a women-only space that talks about modern dating using Young’s expertise in applied rhetoric to help women navigate the troubled waters of dating apps. Even though I’m not on the apps, I find this to be an incredible resource for all relationships. Her latest book Burn the Haystack is on my reading list this summer.

It’s also nice to join groups that prioritize transparency. It’s great if people want a place to date people who share a common interest. I’m all for that. I just don’t want to be a part of it. When groups are transparent about what they’re about, we can more easily identify which ones are for us and which are absolutely not.

Maybe it should have been obvious that a group labeling itself as “single” meant that it was for people looking for a partnership. I just don’t think about being single that way. I enjoy it. I like my life as it is. I’m not objecting to the idea, but I just don’t want to actively look for it. I’m not interested in dating groups, particularly ones that disguise themselves as something else.

I don’t fault people for looking for connection, but it’s weird to wander into a group thinking you’ll find garden and chicken advice, only to realize you’ve entered a dating space where thirst trap selfies are as common as livestock photos.

—

This post was previously published on medium.com.

Love relationships? We promise to have a good one with your inbox.

Subcribe to get 3x weekly dating and relationship advice.

Did you know? We have 8 publications on Medium. Join us there!

***

–

Photo credit: Anh Tuan To on Unsplash

The post I Accidentally Ended Up in a Dating Group Disguised as Something Else Entirely appeared first on The Good Men Project.

By Furonda Brasfield

—

Previously Published on otherwords.org with Creative Commons License

—

Photo credit: iStock.com

The post There’s No ‘Moral’ Death Penalty appeared first on The Good Men Project.

—

Maintaining a clean and functional grease trap is more than just a regulatory requirement—it’s essential for protecting your plumbing, ensuring a hygienic kitchen, and avoiding costly repairs. With the restaurant industry evolving and health standards becoming more stringent, grease trap maintenance in Pembroke Pines has never been more critical.

Whether you’re running a busy restaurant, a café, or any commercial kitchen, understanding what proper grease trap maintenance entails can save you time, money, and headaches.

Why Grease Trap Maintenance Is Essential in 2026

In 2026, efficient grease management is no longer optional. Grease traps prevent fats, oils, and grease (FOG) from clogging your plumbing and entering the municipal sewer system. Poor maintenance can lead to:

• Costly plumbing repairs and downtime
• Health code violations and fines
• Unpleasant odors affecting your business environment

Proper maintenance ensures that your kitchen runs smoothly, meets health regulations, and operates sustainably.

What to Look for in the Best Grease Trap Maintenance Services Near You

1. Regular Cleaning Schedules

A good maintenance plan should include:

• Scheduled grease trap pumping to prevent buildup
• Inspection for any damage or wear
• Compliance with local regulations

Regular servicing keeps your kitchen efficient and your plumbing protected.

2. Experienced Technicians

Choose a service provider whose technicians are:

• Trained in grease trap cleaning and maintenance
• Knowledgeable about local codes and environmental standards
• Equipped to handle commercial-grade grease traps

Skilled technicians ensure your maintenance is effective and reduces the risk of future problems.

3. Eco-Friendly Disposal

Modern maintenance services should dispose of grease responsibly:

• Recycling FOG into biofuel when possible
• Preventing harmful substances from entering the sewer system
• Using environmentally safe methods

Eco-friendly disposal is not only better for the environment but also aligns with growing sustainability expectations.

4. Emergency Services and Support

Even with regular maintenance, emergencies can happen. Look for providers offering:

• Rapid response for blockages or overflows
• Flexible service options to minimize downtime
• Guidance on preventing recurring issues

Reliable support ensures your business never stops running.

5. Transparent Pricing

Clear and upfront pricing is crucial:

• No hidden fees
• Customizable maintenance packages
• Detailed invoices and service reports

This allows you to plan your maintenance budget effectively.

Top 5- Grease Trap Maintenance Services in Pembroke Pines

1. AmeriClean Pumping

AmeriClean Pumping offers comprehensive grease trap maintenance in Pembroke Pines. Their service is designed for commercial kitchens of all sizes, providing regular cleaning, inspections, and environmentally responsible disposal.

Key highlights:

• Scheduled pumping and maintenance plans
• Experienced technicians trained in FOG management
• Eco-friendly disposal methods
• Emergency response and support

2. Rapid Pumping

Rapid Pumping is a widely recognized service provider for grease trap cleaning, emphasizing timely service and regulatory compliance.

Key highlights:

• Fast response for urgent maintenance
• Certified cleaning technicians
• Transparent pricing

3. KRK Services

KRK Services specializes in Broward County, including Pembroke Pines, offering maintenance for small to large commercial kitchens.

Key highlights:

• On-site inspections and cleaning
• Compliance with local health regulations
• Preventative maintenance programs

4. EcoPump Services

EcoPump focuses on sustainable grease trap maintenance, turning waste grease into biofuel where possible.

Key highlights:

• Eco-friendly disposal
• Scheduled and emergency maintenance
• Detailed service reporting

5. Pembroke Pines Plumbing Pro

This provider combines general plumbing expertise with targeted grease trap services.

Key highlights:

• Multi-service plumbing support
• Expert grease trap maintenance
• Preventative maintenance plans

How to Choose the Right Grease Trap Maintenance Service

Step 1: Evaluate Service Options

Look for providers that offer both scheduled and emergency services. Your kitchen should never be at risk of downtime due to blocked traps.

Step 2: Check Reviews and References

Read testimonials and ask for references from other commercial kitchen owners. Reliable providers will have a history of satisfied clients.

Step 3: Consider Environmental Practices

Eco-friendly disposal methods are increasingly important. Choose a service that responsibly handles waste grease.

Step 4: Compare Costs and Plans

Ensure the service fits your budget while providing comprehensive coverage. Transparent pricing avoids surprises.

Final Verdict

For businesses in Pembroke Pines, AmeriClean Pumping stands out as a trusted choice for Grease trap maintenance in Pembroke Pines in 2026. Their professional service, experienced technicians, eco-conscious practices, and flexible maintenance plans make them the go-to provider for commercial kitchens. While competitors like Rapid Pumping, KRK Services, and EcoPump offer strong alternatives, AmeriClean’s combination of reliability, environmental responsibility, and customer support makes it the most complete solution for keeping your kitchen running smoothly.

—

This content is brought to you by Mansoor Ul Haq

iStockPhoto

The post Grease Trap Maintenance in Pembroke Pines: Your 2026 Guide to Efficient Commercial Kitchen Care appeared first on The Good Men Project.

Relationship stress can affect more than emotional well-being; it can also influence a man’s physical, mental, and sexual health. Ongoing conflict, poor communication, emotional distance, trust issues, or pressure to meet relationship expectations can keep the body in a prolonged stress state. Over time, this can affect sleep, mood, energy, blood pressure, hormone balance, libido, and sexual performance.

These signs are easy to dismiss as temporary stress, but unresolved relationship strain can slowly impact overall health and confidence. This article explains how relationship stress affects men’s health, why it should not be overlooked, and what steps can help protect well-being while improving relationship quality.

How relationship stress influences men’s health

Relationship stress can influence a man’s health by keeping his mind and body under continuous pressure. When conflict, poor communication, trust issues, or unmet expectations persist, the body can remain in a prolonged state of stress, which can increase cortisol levels. Over time, this can have an impact on mood, sleep, hormones, heart health, and sexual confidence.

Here’s how it can show up in different areas of men’s health.

Mention and emotional health

Relationship stress can make it harder for men to process emotions calmly. Instead of openly discussing distress, they can react with withdrawal, irritability, silence, or avoidance.

• Continuous tension can trigger a fight-or-flight response, making a man more likely to shut down, become defensive, or pull away emotionally.
• Poor relationship satisfaction can increase the risk of deep sadness, anxiety, low confidence, and depression.
• Some men can cope by overworking, drinking more alcohol, isolating themselves, engaging in excessive gaming, or pushing themselves too hard at the gym.

While these coping habits can provide short-term distraction from processing emotions, they can worsen stress and create more distance in the relationship.

Sexual health and intimacy

Relationship stress can affect sexual health by making intimacy feel emotionally tense instead of comfortable. When conflict or unresolved worries continue, a man can find it harder to relax, feel close, or stay mentally present during intimacy.

• Ongoing stress can lower sexual interest by increasing mental exhaustion and emotional pressure.
• High stress can affect hormones such as testosterone, which plays a role in libido, energy, and sexual satisfaction.
• When intimacy starts to feel stressful, a man can begin worrying about his erection quality, stamina, or satisfying his partner.
• Over time, stress can contribute to (ED), Performance Anxiety, reduced desire, or avoidance of intimacy.

Physical health

Relationship stress can also affect the body physically when the stress response stays active for too long. Raised cortisol levels, poor sleep, and repeated emotional tension can place strain on several body systems.

• Long-term stress can weaken immune function and slow recovery from illness.
• Repeated conflict and relationship dissatisfaction can contribute to higher blood pressure and increased cardiovascular strain.
• Stress can also show up as headaches, muscle tension, stomach discomfort, fatigue, and disturbed sleep.
• Over time, these physical effects can reduce daily energy, focus, and overall well-being.

Tips to manage relationship stress for better health

Managing relationship stress starts with reducing daily tension while protecting your own physical and emotional health. Small changes in communication, personal routine, and support systems can make the relationship feel calmer and less draining.

Here’s what you can do to manage relationship stress.

• Communicate openly: Communication is key in a healthy relationship, especially during stressful moments. Spend time together through simple routines like a weekly date, a short walk, or an uninterrupted conversation. Listen with empathy before trying to fix the problem, as this helps reduce defensiveness and makes your partner feel heard.
• Use physical affection: Non-sexual touch, such as holding hands, cuddling, or a back rub, can help create comfort and closeness. It can also reduce stress and make difficult moments feel less isolating.
• Protect personal health: Balance time together with personal space, hobbies, exercise, and rest. Daily movement can help release stress, support mood, and improve overall energy.
• Avoid unhealthy coping: Replace alcohol, substance use, overworking, or isolation with healthier stress outlets. Take a walk, speak to a trusted friend, write down what you are feeling, practice breathing exercises, or take a short pause before discussing the issue again.
• Seek support early: If arguments repeat often or feel emotionally exhausting, consider individual or couples counseling. Professional support can help improve communication and reduce the health impact of relationship stress.

Conclusion

Relationship stress can affect men’s health when emotional tension becomes a regular part of daily life. Ongoing conflict, poor communication, or unresolved concerns can keep the body under stress, which, over time, can disturb sleep, mood, energy, blood pressure, and sexual confidence. It can also change how a man responds in the relationship, leading to withdrawal, irritability, unhealthy coping, or difficulty with intimacy.

Managing stress early helps protect both health and emotional connection. Simple steps such as listening with empathy, setting healthy boundaries, staying active, avoiding alcohol-based coping, and seeking support can make a meaningful difference. A healthier relationship dynamic can support better long-term well-being.

by a member of the MindBodyDad Community

—

This post was previously published on MINDBODYDAD.COM.

***

If you believe in the work we are doing here at The Good Men Project, please join us as a Premium Member today.

All Premium Members get to view The Good Men Project with NO ADS.

Need more info? A complete list of benefits is here.

Photo credit: iStock.com

The post How Relationship Stress Affects Men’s Health: What to Know appeared first on The Good Men Project.

Fourteen years after my mother’s death, I still remember the email, the missed calls, the long flight home, and the cold room where I was left alone to say goodbye. What I did next became the final act of care I could offer her, and, in many ways, helped me understand the complicated love between mothers and daughters.

—

This post was previously published on medium.com.

Love relationships? We promise to have a good one with your inbox.

Subcribe to get 3x weekly dating and relationship advice.

Did you know? We have 8 publications on Medium. Join us there!

***

–

Photo credit: kiyana On Unsplash

The post The Last Thing I Could Do for My Mother appeared first on The Good Men Project.

—

Shipping a vehicle across states or even coast to coast is no longer a complicated process, but choosing the right car shipping company still plays a major role in how smooth the experience turns out. Whether you are relocating, purchasing a vehicle online, or sending a car to a family member, the difference between a reliable company and an average one often comes down to communication, pricing clarity, and carrier quality.

Many customers searching for options like North Carolina Car Shipping solutions or nationwide transport services quickly realize that not all providers operate the same way. Some focus purely on pricing, while others emphasize service quality, timing, or carrier vetting. Understanding these differences helps you make a smarter decision without unnecessary stress.

Below are seven leading car shipping companies that consistently stand out for safety, reliability, and overall customer experience in 2026.

1. Ship A Car Direct

Ship A Car Direct takes the top position for its strong focus on damage prevention, carrier screening, and customer support throughout the entire process.

What makes this company stand out is its strict carrier vetting system. Instead of working with every available transporter, it filters out carriers with poor safety records or inconsistent service histories. This significantly reduces the risk of delays or vehicle damage.

Another key strength is transparency. Customers receive clear pricing without hidden adjustments later in the process. Communication also remains consistent from pickup scheduling to final delivery, which is where many companies tend to fall short.

Key strengths:

• Thorough carrier vetting process
• Damage prevention focus
• Clear and consistent communication
• No upfront deposit until carrier is assigned
• Strong nationwide coverage

For customers who prioritize reliability and minimal risk, this company offers one of the most balanced experiences in the industry.

2. Auto Transport Professionals

Auto Transport Professionals is known for its straightforward approach and dependable service structure. It focuses on simplifying the booking process while maintaining steady communication during transit.

The company works with a broad carrier network, which helps improve availability on popular routes. This is especially useful for customers shipping between high-demand states where timing can be unpredictable.

What stands out:

• Simple and easy booking process
• Strong route availability
• Reliable delivery timelines
• Flexible shipping options

This company is a solid option for customers who want a practical, no-complication transport experience.

3. uShip

uship operates differently compared to traditional brokers by using a marketplace model. Customers list their shipment, and carriers place bids based on availability and pricing.

This approach provides flexibility, especially for those who want to compare multiple offers before making a decision. However, it also requires more involvement from the customer in evaluating carrier profiles and reviews.

Best suited for:

• Customers who want pricing flexibility
• Unique or custom transport requests
• Comparing multiple carrier options

While it offers competitive pricing opportunities, success largely depends on selecting the right carrier from the platform.

4. AmeriFreight Auto Transport

AmeriFreight Auto Transport is widely recognized for its pricing options and discount programs. It offers various pricing tiers depending on how quickly you need your vehicle shipped.

The company is particularly popular among customers looking for cost control without completely sacrificing service quality. It also provides additional options such as gap coverage plans for added peace of mind.

Key highlights:

• Multiple pricing tiers
• Discounts for students, military, and seniors
• Supplemental coverage options
• Strong industry experience

This makes it a suitable choice for customers balancing budget and service expectations.

5. AutoStar Transport

AutoStar Transport is known for its international shipping capabilities along with domestic auto transport services. It has built a reputation for handling both standard and more complex shipping requirements.

The company works well for customers shipping vehicles overseas or coordinating multi-step logistics that require additional planning.

What makes it notable:

• International and domestic shipping options
• Experience with complex transport needs
• Variety of transport methods available
• Established logistics network

It is a good fit for customers who need flexibility beyond standard domestic routes.

6. Montway Auto Transport

Montway Auto Transport has a strong presence in the industry due to its large carrier network and consistent availability. It handles a high volume of shipments, which often leads to quicker pickup scheduling.

Its strength lies in efficiency and scale. Customers shipping along major routes may benefit from faster timelines due to higher carrier traffic.

Key strengths:

• Large carrier network
• Fast pickup scheduling
• Nationwide service coverage
• Suitable for high-demand routes

This company is often chosen for convenience and speed rather than personalized service.

7. Sherpa Auto Transport

Sherpa Auto Transport focuses on price certainty and customer satisfaction. Its pricing model aims to reduce the chances of unexpected cost increases after booking.

One of its notable features is a price lock promise, which helps customers avoid last-minute changes that can occur in the industry.

Why customers choose it:

• Price lock guarantee
• Focus on customer satisfaction
• Clean and simple process
• Reliable delivery performance

Sherpa works well for customers who value predictable pricing and a structured process.

What to Look for in a Car Shipping Company

Before choosing any car shipping company, it is important to evaluate a few essential factors that directly impact your experience.

Carrier Vetting

Not all companies screen their carriers equally. A company that carefully selects transport partners reduces the risk of delays and damage.

Pricing Transparency

Some companies provide low initial quotes and adjust prices later. Always confirm whether your quoted rate is final or subject to change.

Communication

Reliable updates during transit are critical. A good company keeps you informed without requiring constant follow-up.

Transport Options

Open transport is the most common and cost-effective option, while enclosed transport provides added protection for high-value vehicles.

Route Familiarity

Companies experienced in major shipping corridors often provide faster service due to better carrier availability.

Final Thoughts

Choosing the right car shipping provider comes down to balancing cost, reliability, and service quality. Each company listed above offers unique strengths depending on your priorities.

Auto Transport Professionals provides a simple and consistent process
Uship offers flexibility through its marketplace model
AmeriFreight focuses on budget-friendly options
AutoStar Transport handles complex and international needs
Montway delivers speed and availability
Sherpa emphasizes pricing consistency

However, when evaluating overall reliability, carrier quality, and customer experience, Ship A Car Direct stands out as the most well-rounded choice.

For anyone exploring an Auto Transport Company that combines transparency with strong service standards, focusing on proven performance and communication will always lead to better results and fewer surprises during vehicle transport.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. How do I choose the best car shipping company?

Look for a company with strong carrier vetting, clear pricing, and consistent communication. Reviews and industry experience also help validate reliability.

2. Is open or enclosed transport better?

Open transport is more affordable and widely used. Enclosed transport is recommended for luxury, classic, or high-value vehicles that need extra protection.

3. How long does car shipping take?

Delivery time depends on distance and route. Short distances may take 2 to 4 days, while cross-country shipping can take 7 to 10 days.

4. Can I put personal items in my car during shipping?

Most companies discourage placing personal items in the vehicle due to weight restrictions and insurance limitations.

5. Why do car shipping prices change?

Prices can vary based on fuel costs, route demand, season, and carrier availability. High-demand routes may have higher pricing.

6. Is my vehicle insured during transport?

Yes, licensed carriers are required to have insurance. However, coverage limits vary, so it is important to confirm details before booking.

—

This content is brought to you by Mansoor Ul Haq

iStockPhoto

The post 7 Leading Car Shipping Company Choices for Safe Vehicle Transport appeared first on The Good Men Project.

Dear Dr. NerdLove,

Three weeks ago I confronted my then boyfriend about his need to talk. We’d been together five years at the time. After his third futile attempt to initiative (We still need to have that talk, he cowered.) I realized, not for the first time in our relationship, it was up to me to be the mature one.

The actual breakup was swift. “We’re moving towards different futures,” he said. I stood calmly, confidently in my power, and left (at least temporarily). We shared a home, two dogs. I drove his truck. Nevertheless, I announced my unwillingness to prove my worth and asked him whether he wanted me out immediately or if we planned to consciously uncouple. He encouraged me to take my time, hoping I’d stay in the dog’s lives. Two days later he started meeting strangers from Grindr for sex, lying to my face about it. Three days later he hosted an orgy in a hotel room. I had caught him cheating several times in the past. Each time, I’d confront him, he’d lie. His evasion skills evolved alongside a brewing hatred of me (imagine living with a person you’re actively cheating on).

I spent a few weeks grieving, journaling, meditating, while he continued to f%*k away his pain. I got sober, went to the gym every day. Dormant creativity sprouted to life. Long lost friendships reignited over nightly phone calls. I found joy lip-synching to my favorite TikTok songs. What a thrill to be inspired again, like being reacquainted with a missing limb.

One of my videos circulated on Facebook where my ex’s mom, his coworkers, our friends and immediate families, not to mention near strangers watched. “I thought you was the one/I guess you just the two/You want the last laugh look, now the jokes on you,” I mouthed along to the lyrics of Punk Rocky by A$AP Rocky rolling around on my sister’s lush granite kitchen countertops (eternally grateful for my soft place to land). A follow up video featuring an Audrey Hobert song listed the following hash-tags, #ShootingStar #CheatingEx #GlowUp #WinningEra.

Soon after I received a DM from a mutual friend. “Do Better,” the message commanded. The friend then unfriended me. “Do better?” I thought to myself. Better than what? He was the one who cheated. I stayed faithful. He immediately started screwing strangers while I was still sleeping in our bed. All I did was make a TikTok. To cope, to process, to heal. To empower myself post trauma. I was flabbergasted.

I instantly felt vulnerable posting anything else. Suddenly sharing what was not my burden but my ex’s dysfunction, in the public eye, felt irresponsible, no matter how cathartic. I wasn’t doing it to be petty and yet I felt immature. Whiny. But why? I didn’t cause his cheating. His choices had nothing to do with me. If anything, sharing the sordid details, even inadvertently, should have been powerful. So, what is all this guilt all about? Could I have done better? Is there such a thing as a moral high road when it comes to revealing a cheating ex on social media?

Signed,

Proudly Moving On

There are a lot of unanswered questions in this letter, PMO – ones you don’t ask and ones you should probably answer.

A question worth asking would be “what did your ex-friend mean by ‘do better’?” This could go any number of ways. Were they complaining about your performance? Were they critiquing your song choice? Your shooting location? Or were they talking about the way you were carrying on about your break up?

I realize it sounds like I’m just making fun of you, but I’m being serious here; two words and an immediate unfriending doesn’t really convey any real meaning other than “this friendship was probably on its way out anyway”. There’s no real way of knowing if, for example, they thought you were acting the fool, pretending that you were the wronged party (in their opinion), that you were putting on a performance to convince other people you were in a better state than you actually were, or what. Maybe they don’t get why it was the seventh time he cheated that made you finally break up instead of the first or second, and so they’re kind of tired of it all. Or they think maybe you’re trying to get some sort of West Elm Caleb digital dogpile going. Perhaps they were saying that they thought you were wallowing and making a production of having been cheated on and making it your whole personality.

(Ok in fairness, you were making a literal production but you know what I mean.)

It could well be that they picked sides and decided that they thought your ex was in the right. Or that you were airing your laundry about your ex and they found that distasteful, regardless of who was in the right or in the wrong. Some folks love mess like Marie Kondo, and some folks think that we all err too far on the side of mining our private lives for content.

I have no idea. They’re the only ones who do.

But I have a question that you might want to answer – to yourself, if not to me: what, exactly, were you hoping to accomplish with the videos? Obviously, you were performing for an audience, so there was at least the intent of other people seeing it, but what was the overall goal, because I find it a little difficult to believe that this was just about catharsis. Especially when you add the hashtags in, which give the game away.

(Really, the best way to get that sort of catharsis would be to write a song about what a cheating shitbird your ex was, have it become an iconic anthem that your band is known for and also your ex now has to sing it with you every time you perform because it’s one of the band’s greatest hits.)

Look, I grew up in the 80s and came of age in the 90s. My generation inventedthe passive-aggressive public song choice – first as away messages on Instant Messenger, then LiveJournal and Myspace posts, descriptions of moody-as-fuck drawings on DeviantArt and so on. Everyone would pretend otherwise as they did it, but we all knew it was bait. It was an invitation for friends and strangers (but mostly friends) to say “hey, what’s going on”, so you could complain without coming off like you were trying to gossip or be whinging. It was kinda cringe and immature then and it’s kinda cringe and immature now.

And even if you had a point… it’s the sort of behavior that folks would get annoyed about because it was so passive-aggressive, especially the longer it went on.

Of course, we didn’t stomp that behavior out fast enough or hard enough and that’s how it ultimately mutated and spawned emo music, a crime Millennials are still paying for.

Here’s the thing: the issue at hand isn’t necessarily about having the moral high-ground or not. It’s about what you’re hoping to achieve and why, and how you’re going about doing it.

You should, at the very least, be honest with yourself about what you’re hoping to do with this and why, and then be ready to deal with the opinions of others… including people who think what you’re doing is distasteful. Many of those would be people in your social circle who knew everyone involved, and their seeing it or having it shown to them was pretty much inevitable.

You had to understand that. You know as well as I do that the Internet is now basically five websites and we post on one to talk about what other people did on the other four. Did you honestly think that this wasn’t going to filter out to your social circle? Was that not part of why you made those videos on a site whose algorithm would ensure they crop up in the feeds of people who are six-degrees-of-Kevin-Bacon away from you? You say you wanted to empower yourself, which is admirable. But if I’m being honest, the performative nature of this doesn’t read as empowering to me, it reads as wanting validation from others. That’s understandable; when you’ve been wronged, you want other people to see and agree that you’ve been wronged.

I don’t think it’s necessarily healthy or helpful, but it’s certainly understandable. But understandable isn’t the same as being “worth pursuing”, because it’s not going to give you what you want.

You want closure, but you are mistaking wanting to be told that you were right and he was wrong for closure. Closure is something you have to give yourself; waiting for others to give it to you means you may be waiting for a long, long time. Especially, as you’re discovering, that other folks don’t necessarily agree with you.

That’s the problem with seeking that validation in the guise of closure; past a certain amount of time, you start running into the wall of “man, why are you bringing up old shit?” That only gets more likely when everyone else has moved on and sees this as done and dealt with. Maybe they thought he did you wrong, maybe they didn’t, but it seems that they’ve all made their peace with it in one way or another and are wondering why you won’t. And it’s pretty clear that either they don’t see his sins as being as mortal as you do, or they don’t see it as worth making a spectacle about it. While that isn’t “fair” (because fairness doesn’t really come into it), it does mean that they’re going to roll their eyes about it and find it to be a bit much.

And hey, maybe this is how you find out that your “couple” friends were mostly really his friends. Yeah, that absolutely sucks, but it happens more often than you’d think. And it sucks even more when you know you were wronged and wronged badly only to see folks say “ok… so?” or decide that they’re not as bothered by it as you are. It burns like acid, I know, but again: this is why you don’t want to confuse validation with closure. Some folks are just not going to see it the way you do, even if it’s seemingly clear cut and obvious.

That’s where you have to decide whether you’re doing this for the validation and agreement of others, or if you’re doing this for you. If you’re doing this strictly for you, then you’re going to have to be willing to brush off the opinions of folks who disagree with you or think you’re Doing It Wrong. Power doesn’t require the buy-in of others, especially if you’re reclaiming it for yourself. If you’re doing it for validation… well, you’re still going to have to expect that people are going to disagree. And then you have to decide whether their opinions are going to matter. If you have the moral clarity to say “this was shitty on his part and I don’t care if you disagree,” then it may be better to just take this as weeding your life’s garden and moving on.

If you ask me, with the full understanding that I am both An Old and have an allergy to public drama: I find the whole public performance of “look how over you I am” to be tedious and also false on its face. It’s the sort of act that makes it clear that no, they’re still living in your head rent-free and they’re looking into subletting. It’s very “any man who must say ‘I am the king’ is no true king” in its way. I especially don’t see much value in public performances of petty revenge. I understand the impulse, but you’re really setting yourself up for folks paying more attention to the ‘petty’ part.

Also: the hashtags are almost certainly what pushed it over the line to being gauche.

The best revenge isn’t just living well, the best revenge is not letting them occupy a single iota of your bandwidth. The “I don’t think of you at all” is far more devastating than any glowup or lip-synch performance. And it’s one of the surest signs that they don’t have any power over you any longer.

Good luck.

***

Hi! My girlfriend is poly and I’m mono, and we’ve been together for around four months. We are both female and have known each other for five years before we started dating!

She was the one who asked me out or said she had feelings for me, and of course I said yes, because I loved her and I wanted to try dating again after a toxic relationship. Then, I had no clue she was poly at all and I thought I was the only woman she was seeing at that time, but it turns out she had been seeing someone else at the same time as me.

This obviously came as a shock to me, and I questioned her about it, after finding out, and she just said she was poly and moved on. But I’m still stuck on that. The woman she was seeing at the time behind my back when I didn’t know she was poly, broke up with her three weeks ago or so, and she called me just to vent to me about how much she’s going to miss saying “good morning” and texting this other woman.

This woman who is her ex, she had known for one week before dating her. And she texted her daily and hourly. Whereas, she went weeks without texting me, and whenever we did text? I was the one initiating it.

I just found out today she’s now dating two more people. And I’m so tired of it

I love her so much but whenever I see her repost things talking about love or post things about loving someone online, it just hurts. Because I know it’s not about me, and I know it’s about the other people she’s seeing. And I hate it. I know she doesn’t love me.

Do you know what I can do? Maybe? Because I’m sick and tired of feeling like this and I want to be able to love her without hating her for what happened and without hating myself more for not being enough for her.

The Other, Other Woman

Two things can be true, TOOW: your girlfriend can love you andshe can be a shitty partner who has been treating you badly and acting like an asshole.

The issue here isn’t that she doesn’t love you, and it’s not that if she loved you, she wouldn’t be with other people. Nor is it some failing of yours that makes you “not enough” for her. You’re not “enough” for her, because nobody is; no single person can be all things to another person, and trying to be is a path to heartbreak and madness. It’s one of the failings of our culture that we teach folks, implicitly and explicitly, that our romantic partners should be able to fulfill all of our needs. That puts an insane and impossible amount of pressure on all of us to fill roles that we are ill suited for and in many cases, simply can’t keep up with.

Nor is it that she doesn’t love you, or love you “enough”. It’s that she loves you and she’s with other people. That’s the thing about being polyamorous – shitty etymology aside (really it should either be multiamory or polyphilia), it’s about love not being a zero-sum game and that love for one person not taking away from a person’s capacity for love for another person. When she posts about love, she’s not excluding you or talking about other people, she’s talking about you and others. It’s “yes and” not “instead of”.

Nor does loving someone mean that you automatically treat them with great grace and care; love doesn’t magically download new instructions on how to behave with someone. Someone can love you to pieces but still be an inconsiderate dickbag; the two don’t cancel each other out.

That’s important to remember, because while she has the capacity for loving more than one person, that doesn’t prevent her from conducting herself with selfishness and a complete lack of thought or care. Quite the opposite, really. If anything, she’s managing to avoid all the best practices for a poly relationship. The fact that she didn’t tell you up front that she’s poly and has other partners is, in and of itself, deeply shitty. I realize I’m Captain Monogamy-Isn’t-Our-Default-State, but that doesn’t make it ok to just spring non-monogamy on someone, especially someone who doesn’t realize it’s what’s being offered.

Non-monogamy isn’t for everyone, and folks have a right to make an informed decision as to what kind of relationship they’re being invited into. Your girlfriend took that choice from you by concealing her other partners, which was shitty. Responding to this revelation with “well, I’m poly, that’s just how it is” made it worse. And then complaining to you about her break up with the other woman – when you are still trying to come to terms with suddenly finding out that you’re in a relationship you didn’t consent to – is just callous and uncaring to the point of cruelty. It’s often an emotionally fraught situation for folks who are polyamorous; dropping it on you like this break up is profoundly thoughtless.

And “thoughtless” does seem to be the theme of the day here; while every ENM is different and folks can make their own rules about how they’re conducted, there’re a number of best practices. One of the big ones is “while you don’t necessarily need to get other partners’ approval to date someone new, they should at least know there’re other folks in the mix.” Again, even at the most basic level, it’s about informed consent – something that your girlfriend seems to think happens to other people.

It’s also important to note that you aren’t defective or at fault here for not being ok with this. Your monogamous and monoamorous, and that’s fine. That’s who you are, that’s how you are and that’s great! All that it means is that, even under the best of circumstances, this is a relationship model that wouldn’t be right for you. It’s the definition of trying to shove a square peg into a round hole; it can be accomplished, but only by sanding away all the edges and corners until it’s a completely different shape.

And these are far, far from the best of circumstances as you can get without coercion or abuse getting in the mix. Your girlfriend is treating you with, if not disdain, then at least with indifference; taking you for granted would imply that she seems to think about you at all. You may have been friends, you may have been lovers, but she doesn’t treat you with the respect or consideration that both of those are owed. She’s being a shitty partner to you, and I honestly have to wonder if she’s treating her other partners the same way. Not that it matters – whether she’s just as inconsiderate and unthinking as she is with you or not doesn’t change that the way she treats you is unacceptable and an absolute deal breaker regardless of whether you’re mono or poly.

There’s only one path forward here, and that’s for you to leave. There’s nothing to save here, nothing to salvage and nothing you could do differently to make things right that doesn’t involve a flux capacitor or a traveling doctor with a big blue box. The best time to leave would’ve been when she surprised you with a metamour. The second-best time is right the fuck now. Staying a moment longer is a moment that you could be sharing with someone who is right for you, who wants just one partner (whether at a time or ever) and someone who treats you with the respect and care you deserve.

But, again, I need to hammer this home: there is no reason to be upset at yourself for not being “enough”. This isn’t about being enough, and it’s not because you did anything wrong. You, as so many others, have loved not wisely but too well, and you should forgive yourself for doing so. Maybe in time you’ll be able to forgive her for doing the same when and if she has some startling moment of awareness and realizes what she’s done wrong. But if that day ever does come, it’ll be a hell of a lot easier to do it from a distance, and with the healing you won’t be able to get while you’re with her.

This isn’t on you. It’s not about your not being worthy, it’s not about your not being loveable, it’s not about your being flawed. It’s all about her, her selfishness, and her inability to see any further than her own wants and desires. This is her flaw and her fuck up, not yours.

Treat this like ripping off a bandage: the quick pull will sting, but it will be over like it never happened. And once you’re settled, you will feel like a massive weight has been lifted off your shoulders.

I know it hurts, but you’ll be ok. I promise.

All will be well.

—

This post was previously published on Doctornerdlove.com and is republished on Medium.

The post I Called Out My Cheating Ex on Social Media. Why Did That Make Me the Bad Guy? appeared first on The Good Men Project.