Idea Vampire [eye-d-ah vam-pie-er]
-noun
1. a person who ruthlessly preys on the unsuspecting ideas of others by sinking their Crest White Stripped little fangs into them and sucking the livin’ life out until the ideas wither and die
2. may dress in traditional garb (see image above) but often assimilate into society looking and dressing like regular folk
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Well, as I knew would invariably happen by exposing my ideas publicly, I recently received emails from a couple of idea vampires who crash landed onto my blog.
The first one I got was actually quite funny. The person felt I should “quit” telling people what to do. I wanted to respond by saying, “Quit telling people they can’t tell others to quit,” but I feared we would get into an ungodly long run-on sentence that would contain the word quit like 57 times, so I simply thanked her for her feedback.
To clarify, it is not my intent to tell people what to do. Sure the post, especially the title, comes across that way, but I am simply putting ideas out there for people to consider.
Truthfully, every article I write is really a message to me on things I want to focus on purging from my life in some form or another. Readers have the freedom to adopt my idea in its entirety, in small pieces or disregard it altogether. It is the process I use when I read the work of others, why should it be any different when others read my blog?
That same person then went on to call me a “Double Cheese Burger!” I have two theories what this could be.
Being that I am vegetarian, it is possible she was slinging a vegetarian slur my way. It’s kind of a goofy slur though, which makes me wonder if this is the same person who, back in grade one, called me a “dum dum poopy head.”
Either that or, I have accidentally gotten myself mixed up in some Quentin Tarantino Reservoir Dogs type-conspiracy, which has adopted a McDonald’s theme for code names.
Personally, I am offended. It is tough to garner respect in the world of international espionage with a goofy code name.
| passpasspass |  |
007 (Double 07) | PASS | |
 |
Double Cheeseburger | FAIL | FAIL | |
| passpasspass |
The other idea vampire left a comment on what was perceived to be my failed “infomercial”, with an f-bomb dropped in for good measure.
That would be the video where I discuss my monthly challenge and how I am using P90X as my primary exercise program.
Now that I think about it, I am inclined to agree with the guy. My “infomercial” failed miserably.
I had no 1-800 number for people to call to buy “my” product. I listed no price, so people would mistakenly think it was free. And I confused people by showing my rabbit in the video.
Consumers might think Bubbles (aka…Los Bubblitos, the monster, poopmeister) was some add on. You know, buy P90X within the next 12 minutes, and I will throw in one 5 year old rabbit pooping machine at no extra charge. Available while quantity (singular-there is only one) lasts.
Idea Vampires are eternal…
As I mentioned in an earlier post, Quit Thinking you Won’t have Detractors, idea vampires are everywhere and have existed since the dawn of time.
I’m pretty sure that during an overly aggressive game of cave wall pictionary, some caveman thought fire was a dumb idea. Why would they need fire, I’m sure he argued, when they had clubs and stones and ah, look, more stones.
Some thought the idea of flight was a dumb idea. Why would they need airplanes, when they could take a rat infested steamer from say, New York to Europe for example, in a measly 3 weeks (one way.)
A lot of people thought the internet was a dumb idea 15 years ago. Why send messages electronically when they could be sent inefficiently through our dysfunctional mail service. All I can do is give a shout out to Al Gore* for not letting his creation die.
[*Just so I don't corrupt anyone's mind, Al Gore didn't invent the internet. But he thinks he did. The correct answer would be the Egyptians or was it the Vikings?]
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Idea vampires do an excellent job blending into society with clever unsuspecting disguises. They can be mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, husbands, wives, teachers, friends, critics, politicians, clowns and/or mimes or, in our new Web 3.0, internet trolls who do nothing but look for ideas to kill.
How to lay a beatdown to an idea vampire…
The good news is you need no formal combat training, wooden stakes or silver bullets. (Oh wait that might be for werewolfs or is it werewolves?)
No, with a few simple suggestions, an idea vampire can be neutralized and in rare cases, rehabilitated.
1. Limit your carry on please…
Idea vampires come complete with their own fractured DNA. There are a lot of things that have occurred over their lifetime to create the “broken” product you are now confronted with. All of which, has nothing to do with you.
Sometimes we feel the need to take ownership of someone else’s baggage and make it our own. Don’t. This has absolutely nothing to do with you. Simply step aside and let them and their baggage find some other idea to feed off of.
2. Stand Down Soldier…
When I am caught off guard, my initial instinct is to engage in a dialogue battle or to step up and defend my idea. That is what they want. They are looking to draw you into battle.
Put the suit of armour away. When they see they are standing alone in the battle field, they will hightail it out of there quickly for fear they may get ambushed.
3. The good, the bad and the ugly…
I must admit I was taken aback when I first got the comments, simply because my intention is to help not harm. But after a few moments, I realized I didn’t have to see the negative in it and in fact, could take the good from it and have some fun with it as well. It ultimately became the genesis for this post.
This is real life stuff here. We experience this all the time and if we don’t have a default mechanism in place to deal with it, we unknowingly end up taking ownership of someone else’s shit. We could do ourselves a world of good by simply recognizing we have veto power over what we choose to take on in our lives.
4. Yo dude, what would Jesus do…
Ben Franklin used this as his marker for character development. Somehow, I can’t picture Jesus as a blogger or using twitter, but I do think he would respond with kindness.
[Jesus Twit: Just getting home now from last supper. Those dang apostles stuck me with doing all the dishes.]
I struggle with this one because in the heat of an emotion I don’t want to be kind. I want to be right. But if I can get past that, I have seen kindness do amassing things when practiced.
5. Talk to the hand gurlfriend…
Some things are not worthy of a response or attention if it takes you away from doing those things where you can really make a contribution.
In the second example I wrote about, I simply deleted the comment. If someone is going to drop the f-bomb to a complete stranger then there are greater forces at play that even words of kindness can’t help.
I simply hit the delete button and all that work and energy that individual used to send the message is gone in one simple keystroke. It’s really quite liberating.
Got a story? A comment? A vampire you have slain? Do tell.
To ideas worth quitting,
Dean
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