Thinking Too Much !!!

"We are dying from over
thinking. 

We are slowly killing ourselves by thinking about everything. 

Think. Think. Think. You can never trust the human mind anyway. 

It's a death trap."  

(actor Anthony Hopkins)

I need a break from my mind. As we enter the 12th and final month of 2012 I am realizing I have been far too immersed in over thinking this year. 

I have spent hours and days and weeks reading about cancer treatments, comparing different procedures to limit the lesions associated with metastatic brain cancer, looking at the relative merits of different chemotherapy's, and have tried to think, "what would be the best choice to make to beat this very determined adversary?"

I have tried to think through hundreds of strategies in order to choose the optimum way to move forward to expand our production capability in the fastest, least expensive, and most prudent time period humanly possible here in Texas.

I have thought exhaustively about where in the world (literally), we should build our very first international production operation.

I have looked at at least 45 potential site locations, agonizing over the relative characteristics of each in order to decide which one would be the best place for our full blown Texas operation.

Think. Think. Think. 

All day and at all hours of the night, my mind has absorbed the data, analyzed the situations, rolled over the possibilities, all in order to think my way to making the best decision for that particular problem with which I was dealing at that moment.

You know what?  In every case, I mean in every one, all the thinking I did, all the agonizing I brought on myself, all the doubts I raised, all the fears I suffered, had not one whit of influence on the final choice nor did I. 

In every case, the choices and the paths forward were made for me. 

"How much pain have cost the evils which have never happened!" ( Thomas Jefferson)

The treatment for Lori's cancer came out of left field from NIH and was a clinical trial of which I had never heard.

The vaccine protocol that seems to hold real hope was in Israel and I agonized months over as to whether we should fly her to Israel once her lesions were stabilized by a current therapy. 

Guess what? As we are stabilizing her lesions at NIH that vaccine is now in trials in the USA so there is no need to even think about the logistical nightmare of moving our family to Israel.  When Lori is ready we can get her into a trial here.

It goes on. The site that suddenly looks as the "perfect" candidate for our future home for shrimp production in Texas just appeared 5 days ago. We had never even considered the area or were even aware the option existed.  

The engineers will do a site assessment next week, but all indications are we have an almost perfect geographical location to on which we will begin building our full commercial production center in early 2013.

And just a few weeks ago we came to a deal in principal for our first overseas production facility in a country I have never even considered but that now appears to be almost ideal as the first international operation for our aquaculture technology. 

So, I am going to take a little break from thinking. 

I have no doubt I will fall back in to my old habits of over thinking everything after a short respite but I am going to make a concerted effort to use this upcoming Christmas season as, (at the very least), offering me the opportunity to take a short hiatus from thinking. 

When I first read the opening quote I placed at the top of this blog from actor Anthony Hopkins, I thought, "That is a pretty clever observation by Sir Anthony." 

Now as I am just finishing this blog, I realized that the quote from Hopkins is not new, in fact a fellow named John Milton years ago expressed the exact same sentiment even more eloquently.  

"The mind is its own place, and in itself 
Can Make a Heaven of Hell, and a Hell  of Heaven." 

How true is that?