This semester I took a class called Interpersonal Communications. When I first signed up for it I didn’t expect anything extraordinary. I was only taking it because it was a gen ed I needed.

The class was life changing. I really noticed how life changing it was when we had our End of Semester presentations this past Tuesday.

Every single person found it to be life changing, therapeutic, and said they’d miss it. I started my speech by telling the class that if every person in the world picked up the skills we learned, the world would be a much better place. They agreed. Part of the reason why this class was so great was because of the teacher – he has had a huge impact on all of us.

Some of the speeches in class on Tuesday night were really moving. There were stories shared about the class’ impact that had the entire class crying. I’m serious. This class was VERY important/moving/inspirational.

Throughout the semester I took a variety of extra notes in the margins – things that my professor said on a whim that really stuck with me. I thought it’d be therapeutic to write these down again and share them.

Things to keep in mind during your day to day life:
- Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs (visualize a pyramid) – listed starting from the bottom: Physiological (food, water, etc), Safety, Social, Self-Esteem, Self-Actualization (being the best you can be with the talents you’re given).

- how you think is how you feel.

- the relationship should win… not you.

- don’t let a single moment define you.

- you are not better than anyone else. every person has their own unique knowledge base.

- we communicate to fill our needs.

- if you’re not assertive, your needs aren’t met.

- relationships are formed with people who support our self concept.

- relationships are all about being supportive of each other.

- key to any relationship: keep making a person feel special. why did you ever fall in love with anyone? they paid attention to you. they made you feel special.

- life is change – you change every day in a variety of different ways.

- try to not label feelings – see what it’s like. emotions are only labels.

- managing anger: step back, relax (breathe), think about the goal.

- people need to feel like they have value – this is accomplished through conflict management.

- outcomes to effective conflict management: people feel understood, accepted, valued, committed to a solution, and future conflict management episodes are increase.

These are only scratching the surface. There are many theories, cycles, and guidelines we learned that I’ve committed to memory. Hopefully those small notes made sense without much context. I’m going to continue studying interpersonal communications for as long as I live – it really made me a better person mentally and socially for 99.9% of my relationships (meaning friendships too). I’m not done yet. I want to continue to get better.

Do these things make sense? Any other words of wisdom to share? I’m really interested to know.

I thought I’d share some of my favorite Twitter accounts.  Of all the people/businesses I follow, these are the ones I most look forward to seeing tweets from:

- @cnnbrk – CNN’s Breaking News Twitter account.  Sometimes they post things on here that are NOT breaking news worthy, but hopefully they’ll learn in time.

- @google – Google posts a lot of good stuff on here.  Usually it’s information about their services.  And look how colorful their profile page is!

- @EWAusielloFiles – Michael Ausiello from Entertainment Weekly.  Lots of insider TV news revealed through this guy.

- @mashable – I LOVE Mashable.  It’s a site covering all things social media.  I discovered this site just a few months ago and check/read it all the time.

- @latimes – this one may not be as broadly appealing as the ones I’ve mentioned so far, but the Los Angeles Times is a wonderful news resource for Californians.

- @happysquared – This is SpongeBob Square Pants’ Twitter account!  He updates it once a day with a tip for better living.  Example: “The key to a secret box is puling the secret string to reveal the secret compartment!”

- @digg_2000 – all the stories on Digg that hit 2,000 diggs.  In other words, only the most digg-worthy content on the web.

That’s all for now!

I love Lady Gaga’s music. As fellow Gaga fans may know, her latest album (The Fame + 8 Songs = Fame Monster) is set to “drop” on November 23rd.

Before I continue… am I cool and relevant by using the term ‘drop’ to reference an album release in my blog post? I am!? Cool. Moving on…

The new album is already half released. Bad Romance (awesome), Alejandro (awesome), Dance in the Dark (awesome), and Telephone (close to awesome) have all leaked. That’s FOUR of the EIGHT new songs.

My question is: why don’t artists like Lady Gaga fight back against these leaks? Albums always leak at least a week before they’re due out. The rest of Gaga’s album will probably leak very soon. Why doesn’t Gaga release her album TODAY on iTunes?

This would do nothing but improve sales of Fame Monster. If the album were to be released right now, everyone would buy the full album to get the four songs that still haven’t leaked.  If this doesn’t happen, the entire album will leak very soon.

I understand that even if the album were officially released today people would still download illegal copies of the full thing. But there are groups of people out there (myself included) who appreciate and respect an artist’s work and will purchase their full album whether or not they already have a leaked copy.

All artists should be kicking pirating/leaks in the ass by releasing their albums THE MOMENT one or two songs leak. This isn’t me being an impatient fan. This is me looking out for their bottom line! You’re DAMN welcome!

U2 took the release-it-sooner path when their 2004 album “How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb” leaked VERY early. More recently, Summit did this when “New Moon: the Soundtrack” leaked ahead of schedule.

I’m talking to the people out there who don’t like how popular Twilight has become. At first these people just went with it (“Okay, so people like this series and I don’t, whatever”). But now that it has become a huge deal, these same people are now the first ones to regularly comment on how stupid they think it is.

I could comment on how I disagree with your liking of certain television shows. Twilight fan #1389134 could comment on how you must be clinically insane if you’re reading any book by Sarah Palin. But we don’t. Believe it or not, there are people out there who like something you don’t like – and vice versa.

Moreover, Twilight fans and/or your friends don’t really care that you don’t like Twilight. It’s like telling us you pee’d twice. Who cares? It makes no difference in my life unless I’m your doctor and I have been concerned about your urinary system.

Point: the only reason people like to regularly bring up their problems with Twilight is because they hate how popular it is today. It’s here, and it’s gonna be here for a while (haters probably aren’t aware that Eclipse will be released in June 2010 and filming for Breaking Dawn is scheduled to start next Fall). So get used to it!

To everyone: enjoy New Moon when it comes out next week! I hear it is awesome. Very awesome.

I’m still trying to get the hang of LinkedIn (“omg how do I adapt to any social network site other than Facebook?! *cry*”). Today I fleshed out my profile so it’s filled with content.

If you have a LinkedIn profile, why don’t you ‘link’ with me? A new button is permanently available under my pretty picture on the right side of this page.

From what I gather, the purpose of LinkedIn is to stay in contact with people you’re in business or what to be in business with. It’s nice. I need to get this thing showing up on Google instead of my Facebook profile.

November is a good month if you’re fans of the following things:

Disney/Pixar’s UP is coming to Blu-Ray on November 10th. Exciting! UP was a really good movie (not my favorite Pixar movie), and Pixar films on Blu-Ray are ammmmmazing quality. Speaking of Pixar/Blu-Ray…

MONSTERS INC on Blu-Ray… coming out the same day as UP! I LOVE Monsters Inc and I cannot wait to see this baby in high def.

I don’t play video games anymore, but there are two this month I’m gonna boot up my systems for.

I’ve always been a huge fan of every Mario game known to man, and I have high hopes for this one. Classic Super Mario Bros gameplay ON THE WII. 16:9 side-scrolling action? Yes please.

Okay, I’m kinda over Sims 3.. but now that Sims 3: World Adventures went gold, I’m starting to think I may try it out. It seems like a lame expansion pack (just give me more objects and pets and I’ll be happy), but I’m hoping there’s a good amount of new objects/home design stuff to use.

Lady Gaga can’t write a bad song. This new album with 8 new songs is gonna be sick. Two singles – Bad Romance and Alejando – have already been released/leaked. Both are really good.

And of course…

With Chris Weitz directing, an awesome line up cast for the Volturi, and a bigger budget, this film is gonna be damn sweet.

I must first thank Joe Fedele, who came up with a beautiful design for this site several months ago. I bothered him to make it, but then realized I wanted to take my site a different way. He does great work and if you’re looking for someone to design something for you (he made our Smart Mouths album art), please visit his site and vote for his shirt designs on Threadless: Shirt 1 | Shirt 2.

So, this blog is legit. I mean it this time. I’ve recently been reading about some ‘things’ that have inspired and motivated me to keep an active online ‘portal’ for myself.

This is going to be the go-to place for me. Me me me. All Andy, all the time. You’ll see I already have a Resume page, a Favorite Sites page, and a basic About page. I’ll add more pages as soon as I think of them (any requests? let me know in the comments).

Twitter is still my favorite blogging system (you may remember I told everyone on my old LiveJournal blog I was quitting LiveJournal and going full-time Twitter), so expect most updates to be Tweet’d.

By the way, have you read my old blog? I haven’t changed a bit. All the posts are about Springsteen, weight loss, SoCal, iPhone love, etc.