Archive No. 1
“Not everything that is faced can be
changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced. “
- James Baldwin
Most of us realize that
we are not going to hit a home run unless we step up to the plate. Why then would someone know that a problem
must be addressed and still not address it? Fear. Fear of rejection. Fear
of failure. Fear of success.
Fear of loss. Fear of gain. Fear. Fear. Fear. Truthfully,
isn’t procrastination just fear in one form or another?
I’ve learned something
about fear- everybody feels it. Why do
some people appear fearless? These are
people that understand that actions must be taken in spite of their
emotions. The more you stare down fear and
take action in its face, the weaker its grip will be on you. As your confidence grows and your
understanding of this concept expands, action in the face of fear will
become routine. It is at this point that
self-mastery comes into view and procrastination appears in the
rearview mirror.
-
Jeff
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"Don't measure yourself by what you have accomplished, but by what you
should have accomplished with your ability."
- John Wooden
John Wooden coached the
UCLA men’s basketball team to ten national titles, including seven in a
row between 1967 and 1973. Yet, he never
implored his team to beat another team. Coach
Wooden believed that the scoreboard was irrelevant to whether or not
you won or lost. He told his players that
only they would know whether or not they had won, because winning was
determined by whether or not they had given everything they had to give. He told them there was no honor in outscoring
another team simply because the other team was lousy or because they
got lucky. Likewise, there was no shame in
coming up short on the scoreboard if you had given it your all.
Be very careful when
comparing yourself to others, because disappointment via unrealistic
expectations is often the seedbed of failure. Can
we get over the notion that life is supposed to be fair?
It’s not fair, and it is never going to be fair.
Because everyone plays the game of life with advantages and
disadvantages others do not have, we must begin measuring our success
based upon our own abilities. What would
you do with someone else’s ability? Not a
damn thing if you’re not already utilizing the ability that you already
have. Regardless of where you are in life, start disciplining yourself
to give your all in all that you do and you won’t be there for long.
-
Jeff
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“Neither fire nor wind,
birth nor death can erase our good deeds.”
- Buddha
I often speak about
overcoming obstacles to obtain success in whatever form that might be. Feeling that our lives have been successful is
very important, but at the end of our lives will the world be a better
place for our having been in it? Our
bodies will rot, our toys and trophies rust, and if our heirs have not
been properly prepared to handle it, our money may well destroy them.
This may come as a shock to you, but when you die, the world is going
to go on without you. What will you have
left behind?
When a good deed is
performed, it is the sewing of positive energy. This
creates a ripple effect that reaches far beyond what we can comprehend. I don’t know if I consider doing my daily
quotations and commentary a good deed, but I am constantly getting
e-mail messages from people that tell me they pass on the messages to
their friends, family, co-workers, employees, etc.
If these people are passing the messages on, then I can assume
these recipients are doing the same- sewing positive energy.
If you have children,
then perhaps the noblest deed you can do is to invest time and love in
the lives of those children. Leaving behind children of character will
send ripples of positive energy down throughout the generations. While you may never know or live to see it,
the exponentially positive effect is impossible to erase.
-
Jeff
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”I do not seek, I find.”
Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)
One of the most important
and accurate barometers of whether or not an endeavor will be
successful is the degree to which you expect the desired outcome. The first thing I do every morning, even
before I am out of bed, is to incant my life’s mission statement
several times. This gets my mind focused
in the direction I want it to go before the undisciplined mind has a
chance to wander.
Once I am up and at my
desk, I begin to recite the following: Once I a make a
decision, it’s a done deal. I am
unstoppable. I repeat this over and over and with each repetition
try to up the emotional involvement. Being
that I cannot physically scream, I use my lips and my entire body as if
I was screaming with no sound coming out. Now
that I am completely revved up, I turn my attention back to my mission
statement and incant that again, taking full advantage of the emotional
high I have created. I seamlessly move on
to the list of my individual goals for the year.
What am I doing? Why would I go through this process day after
day? I’m setting up a level of expectation
that connotes an air of inevitability to everything important enough to
land on my list of goals. By investing my
mind, body, and emotions in the concept that something will be so
simply by my determining it, and reciting the list of what will be, the
inevitability of these happenings become part of me.
I no longer seek hoping to find, I just find.
-
Jeff
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“Never give up, for that
is just the place and time that the tide will turn.”
- Harriet Beecher Stowe
Before we are allowed to
enter the Promised Land, we are often dragged through a character
building journey in the wilderness. Even
so-called overnight sensations are usually the products of years of
hammering and chipping away at the door of opportunity before it
finally gives way.
Despite what some people
might imagine, I don’t often feel anger, bitterness, or even depression. What I struggle with most is pure
unadulterated frustration. When you are
driven, and yet must rely on others for even the most menial of task,
frustration is inevitable. I have had to
learn that small, but consistent chunks of productivity will eventually
turn the tide of success in my favor. The
moment you cross the finish line, you will care not about the rapidity
with which you ran, but only that you have finished.
Giving up ensures that moment will never come.
-
Jeff
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”It's kind of fun to do the impossible.”
- Walt Disney (1901-1966)
In 1954, the fastest any
human had run the mile was 4 minutes, 1.3 seconds.
It was a generally accepted fact that it was humanly impossible
to run the mile in under 4 minutes. Doctors
and scientists posited the notion that the human body could not
withstand the violence that running at a speed necessary to break the
4-minute barrier would take. Many even
suggested that the heart would simply explode.
On
- Jeff
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“A
pint of sweat, saves a gallon of blood.”
-
General George S. Patton
Too many people in their
quest to make life easy, make their lives infinitely more difficult. With what seems to be a universal epidemic of
procrastination, it almost seems to be the natural order.
What is procrastination? It is
merely relieving yourself of pain today in exchange for pain tomorrow.
Often times putting off a
task until tomorrow will have little consequence, but much of the time
we are talking about a compounding of consequences.
I cringe when I see parents of young children give in to their
children on disciplinary matters because they are too tired or just do
not want to deal with the headache of meting out proper disciplinary
measures. No matter how difficult it might
be to suck it up and consistently discipline your child, it is
infinitely more difficult to deal for a lifetime with the monster being
created. As Zig Ziglar says,
“Life is tough, but when you are tough on yourself, life is
going to be infinitely easier on you”.
“Nothing great was ever
achieved without enthusiasm.”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
Who are the people that
give up on an endeavor? These are people
that feel they cannot make progress and therefore feel their effort is
of little use. Haven’t you been in that
place where resignation to failure was setting in when suddenly the
light went on? In a flash of inspiration,
you realized a way to make a success of your endeavor and it was as if
a match was lit and ignited a fire on the inside of you.
Didn’t you magically transform from sagging Susie to Gung-ho
Gertrude? What determines whether or not
you will successfully finish your endeavor is whether or not you can
sustain your newfound enthusiasm.
Everyone likes to decry
the extremist, yet what makes extremists often times so successful? Enthusiasm. It is
often not the message, but rather the contagious fever pitched nature
of the message and the conviction of the messenger which propels a
cause. Light a fire within yourself and
people will come around just to watch you burn.
- Jeff
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“The best way to make
your dreams come true is to wake up!”
- Muhammad Ali
The champ has got it
figured out. This is the reason why the
working title of my book is Wake-Up Call: Why Your Life
Kicks Ass Even If You Don’t Know It. I
am firmly convinced that the vast majority of people in this country
are sleepwalking through life and desperately need a wake up call.
People often ask me what
I have learned from my struggle with ALS. I’ve
learned a myriad of lessons, but the most valuable and unmistakable one
is that you just don’t know. When your
head hits the pillow tonight, you can’t possibly know what tomorrow
will bring. Despite your best efforts to
rid your life of insecurity, you do not know if you will be healthy
tomorrow, if this might be the day you notice the first symptoms of a
catastrophic illness. You might win the
lottery, or it may be some unforeseeable event shakes your personal
finances. When you kiss your spouse and
children goodbye in the morning, you may never see them again. You just don’t know.
At some point in your
life, you had a dream. How long are you
going to wait to start living it? You are
capable of so much more than you know. With
how long you have been sleepwalking, it may be difficult, but if you
don’t wake up and start living now, then when? Tomorrow
might be too late.
- Jeff
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“Everything that
irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.
“
- Carl Gustav Jung
I often find myself
becoming impatient and at times irritated with others.
When this happens, I do not like myself much.
I once heard that you can measure the size of a man by the size
of the things that irritate him. This does not always provide positive
testimony for me, and as a result I often put myself under the
microscope for self-examination. I don’t
claim to be an expert in this area, but if you find yourself being
irritated by others, then take a break from finger pointing and examine
yourself. It may be that the other person
has some bad habits or is just plain annoying, but you will never learn
how to grow by developing the habit of blame first and ask no questions.
- Jeff
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“Obstacles cannot crush
me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed to a star
does not change his mind.”
- Leonardo da Vinci
Decide upon a definite
purpose for your life and determine that this must and will happen. Write down your purpose in the form of a
mission statement. Be specific and
succinct, and use language that will inculcate a feeling of
inevitability in your subconscious mind. The
best way to do this is to write your statement in the present tense as
if you have already begun achieving your purpose.
This statement should be
committed to memory and burned into your subconscious through daily
repetition. The best agent to burn this
into your subconscious mind is emotion. If
you have created a purpose for your life that absolutely must and will
happen, it shouldn’t be hard to create emotion about accomplishing it. And because your definite purpose is
inevitable, when obstacles attempt to crush you, you will shirk them
off, your resolve will strengthen, and your confidence will explode. There will be no second-guessing, no changing
of your mind. Your path is set and you
will not be denied.
- Jeff
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“One of the greatest
discoveries a man makes, one of his great surprises, is to find he can
do what he was afraid he couldn't do.”
- Henry Ford
(1863-1947)
Most people are severe underachievers and you
are probably one of them. How do I know
this? Because you are a human being and
most human beings never even scratch their potential.
The human mind is perhaps the most powerful force this world has
ever known, and yet, we use but a sliver of our brain cells. Through a lack of planning, a lack of
self-discipline, a lack of motivation, and a paucity of perseverance,
the vast majority of our potential achievement dissipates without our
having the slightest notion of it.
Every once in a while I will get a phone call
from someone exhibiting ALS like symptoms- muscle twitching, muscle
weakness, clumsiness, etc. They listen
carefully as I answer their questions about how my illness first
started. It does not take a psychic to
feel the subtext- “Oh my God! What if I
have ALS like Jeff? How could I live with
such a crippling disease?” Their sentiment
is understandable, but what they don’t realize is that they are feeding
the greatest crippler of all- fear. If we
were to eliminate all of the impediments to achieving our potential
enumerated in the paragraph above, would we then reach our potential? Not without dealing with the great crippler-
fear. What are you afraid to do? Do you realize you have the ability to do it?
Fear cannot be hidden
from or circumvented. You must force
yourself to face it and act in spite of it. Faith
is like a muscle. When you exercise it in
the face of fear this way, it will get stronger with use and fear will
lose its grip on you. It is a blessed day
of liberation when you discover that you are able to walk through fear
to accomplish what you once were afraid to do.
- Jeff
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"Obstacles are those
frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goal.”
Henry Ford (1863-1947)
We’ve all seen the movie
where someone is at a great height and told not to look down (which, of
course, the character promptly does). Immediately
he clings to the nearest object and freezes in terror.
It looks ridiculous because we clearly saw the person moving
ahead with steady progress as long as he kept his eyes (and emotions)
focused on the goal. We are struck by the fact that mere knowledge of
the danger involved has stifled the character’s progress and is
actually contributing to his peril. But
don’t we all do the same thing?
When you have a clearly
defined goal that is big enough, you will usually find a way to make it
happen. This is why I encourage people to write down their goals and
come up with reasons to make their attainment an absolute must. When something must happen, the obstacles to
that goal shrink from mountains to molehills. When
the goal loses its focus or its importance, every trifle of daily life
is going to get in the way your doing what is necessary to accomplish
it. If your goal is clearly emblazoned
upon your mind, and its importance written across your heart, obstacles
become mere nuisances to be swatted out of the way on the road to
triumph.
- Jeff
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“A
successful person is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks
that others throw at him or her.”
- David
Brinkley
You want to be successful?
Get ready, because the bricks of obstacles and criticism are
soon to be hurled your way. Sometimes it
is well meaning friends and family members that just don’t understand
what you are doing. Sometimes it is those
that emotionally cannot stand to see someone else succeed.
Sometimes it will be competitors that have a financial (or
other) interest in seeing you fail. Whatever
the case, know that obstacles and criticism are coming.
This is the way it has always been, and you are not going to be
the first to avoid it.
We have all heard the admonition about making
lemonade when life gives us lemons. We
have all heard it for a reason-it is true. If
used properly, obstacles can sharpen our problem solving skills and
strengthen our resolve. Criticism can be a
teacher and galvanize our determination. It
is usually when I am told that I can’t do something, I determine all
the more to prove that statement wrong. You
can’t avoid the bricks, so decide what you will do when they come
flying your way.
- Jeff
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“As
a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single
thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical
path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must
think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our
lives.”
- Henry David Thoreau
Would you expect to do
aerobics one time and then claim yourself physically fit for life? Would you expect to take a single golf lesson
and have the sport mastered? Then why
would someone read a positive thinking book, or tell themselves once or
twice that they are a winner, and expect wholesale, lasting change in
their life? You are not going to think
beautiful, uplifting thoughts before crawling into bed tonight and wake
up a new person tomorrow. Not happening.
You are who you are and
what you are because of what has gone into your mind.
Your sensory organs have been your mind’s input receptors since
before you were born. Like the grooves cut
by a river, your patterns of thought have been etched upon your mind by
thinking specific thoughts over and over and over. There are some
tricks to shorten transition to a new way of thinking, but it is not
going to happen via the mental equivalent of a single session of
aerobic exercise. If you get the proper
amount of leverage on yourself (embracing the notion that you must
change), and you repeatedly play positive, inspiring thoughts in the
theater of your mind, you will eventually cut new grooves upon it.
Commit to overrunning your mind with positive, winning thoughts, and
eventually you will have beaten a path to a life dominated by them.
- Jeff
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"The quality of
persistence is to the character of man as carbon is to steel."
- Napoleon Hill
I am always amazed at how
many people give up on an endeavor at the first sign of resistance. Many intelligent, competent people will set a
goal, lay out a plan, attack that plan with vigor, and then fold up
their tent and quit as soon as the going gets rough.
Are you aware that there is no record of anyone having ever
accomplished anything significant without first meeting with temporary
defeat over and over again? Are you
supposing that you will be the first person to ever do so?
You will not. You must fail
repeatedly until you have learned the lessons necessary, and developed
the character demanded to attain the object of your desire.
If I could communicate
just one message to my readers, especially my young readers, it would
be this: you are never defeated until you concede that it is game
over. You can accomplish pretty much
anything you want in this life if you will do just two things: 1)
Get perfectly clear on exactly what it is you want to accomplish. 2) Relentlessly pursue your objective
until it is finally yours, paying whatever price is required. When you get knocked down, get back up. When you get discouraged, feel sorry for
yourself for about three seconds, and then get yourself back in the
fight. Accept that you- like every
successful person - will experience temporary defeat, but determine
ahead of time that this will only strengthen your resolve. Inoculate
yourself against the discouragement that causes one to give up on
oneself by anticipating temporary defeat and use its accompanying
lessons to catapult you to victory.
-
Jeff
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"Somebody should tell us,
right at the start of our lives, that we are dying.
Then we might live life to the limit, every minute of every day. Do it! I say. Whatever you want to do, do it now! There are only so many tomorrows."
- Michael Landon
To many this will seem
like an obvious and redundant admonition, but, I can tell you as
someone diagnosed with a terminal illness before my life even had a
chance to realize itself, what Mr. Landon is saying absolutely must be
taken to heart. This is not just a good
idea, it is absolutely vital to your very existence.
I can remember thinking, “I simply can’t lose.
I don’t know why God has blessed me so, but I’m unstoppable.” This was just before He began to strip so many
of those blessings (including my health and very life) away from me.
Few of life's regrets
come from what you do. Most of them will come from that which you
should have done but failed to do. You
don’t know what life has in store for you tomorrow, so you better not
waste today. There indeed are only so many
tomorrows.
- Jeff
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“Constant
dripping hollows out a stone. “
- Lucretius
It’s almost time for the
holidays again. Now, doesn’t it seem like
we just got through the holidays? Think
about how quickly this past year has gone. When
we look at a monumental task and think about what it will take to
accomplish that task, we often feel overwhelmed. But
what if, like the dripping water on the stone, you took a small bite
out of that task everyday? Not everyday
one week and twice the next week, then take a couple weeks off before
putting three more days together again. What
if you actually took that bite out of the task EVERY – SINGLE – DAY?
We’ve seen how quickly a
year goes by. Try to imagine how much
progress can be made on an endeavor taking 365 bites!
If you lost just one pound per week, at this time next year you
would be 52 pounds lighter. If you wrote
just one page per day on that novel you have wanted to write for years,
you would have a 365-page tome at this time next year.
It is the constant dripping of small actions that hollow out the
stone.
- Jeff
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”It is not because things
are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that
they are difficult.”
- Seneca (3 B.C. - 65
A.D.)
Most of the people I know
that have accomplished something extraordinary, made that
accomplishment because no one told them that they could not do it, or
they just refused to listen to the naysayers. It
usually takes a bold and daring strike against the grain to accomplish
something of significance. If these people
had listened to their critics (most of which are not successful
themselves), they would have either tried to eek out a victory by
playing it safe, or never even dared to try. Either
way, success would not have been forthcoming. If
you truly want to accomplish a great purpose, the most difficult cross
you will ever have to bear is the knowledge that you never truly gave
it your best shot. I choose to avoid this
regret as life is far too difficult to bear that cross on a daily basis.
- Jeff
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”He who limps is still
walking. “
- Stanislaw J. Lec
You would be amazed at the number of hoops I
must jump through to get these quotations and commentary out to you
each day. Should I quit doing them? If you could see the struggle I engage every
morning to get out of bed, get showered, and get dressed for the day,
you might ask, “is it worth it?” Should I
give up and just lie around in bed everyday? Even
going to the bathroom is a time consuming multi-step process. Should I just wet all over myself? People often wonder how I summon up the
courage and motivation to grind through all of this on a daily basis. I can do this because I have learned what most
people haven’t- life is a marathon, not a sprint.
Do you remember that
story we were told when we were children about the tortoise and the
hare? That story contains more than just
entertainment value for the small child, it speaks to a valuable lesson
in life that most of us continually overlook. If
you remember, the hare sprints out to a gigantic lead over the slow
plodding tortoise and decides he can afford to take a nap.
Consistently poking along the path to the finish line, the
tortoise passes the once front running hare and wins the race.
Too numerous to count are
the times I have seen people take off on an endeavor like a house afire
only to get side-tracked and eventually give up on their plans. In our quick-fix, microwave society, most
people give up if the answer (or victory) is not immediately
forthcoming. Let this be the other guy. In most situations, it is not how quickly you
finish, but whether or not you finish at all. Regardless
of whether you are sprinting, limping, or crawling, if you just keep
moving you will eventually cross that finish line and victory will be
yours.
- Jeff
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“Difficulties are meant
to rouse, not discourage.“
-
William Ellery Channing
My life is difficult. I cannot walk and
am confined to a wheelchair. I cannot lift
my arms and my hands are almost completely useless.
I am barely able to speak and every day the disease that ravages
my body takes away another small piece of my life. Even the
most fundamental activities of daily life are an ordeal.
Can you imagine what my life, and the lives of those around me,
would be like if I saw my difficulties as a reason to be discouraged? Everyone gets discouraged from time to time,
but the real question is- will you lie in the gutter and wallow in
self-pity, or snap out of your despair, rise up and start kicking ass? Until someone can explain to me the value of
wallowing in self-pity and giving up on life, I’ll just have to keep
kicking ass.
- Jeff
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“Few
people are successful unless a lot of other people want them to be.”
- Charles Brower
Motivational speaker, Zig
Ziglar, often repeats, “you can have everything in life you want if
you’ll just help enough other people get what they want.”
Success philosopher, Napoleon Hill, speaks of the necessity of creating
mastermind alliances. If we are going to be successful, we are
going to need the cooperation and help of a lot of other people.
Are you the type of
person people want to help? When you succeed, do you share the
credit with those who have helped, or does your ego simply
explode? When someone scratches your back to bump you up to the
next level of success, do you return the favor and scratch their back,
or do you simply pat your own and charge off to your next
conquest? Of those who might potentially help you, ask yourself,
“what’s in it for them?” Often times that will be nothing more
than the satisfaction of having helped someone who truly appreciates
it, but whatever the reward, it’s got to be win-win, or eventually both
are going to lose.
- Jeff
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Every new beginning comes
from some other beginning's end.
- Semisonic, Closing Time
At first this quotation
sounded like an old cliché I was forced to learn in English
class in high school. Yet, this is a
critically important concept to remember. Just
as every disaster in your life brings with it the seed of an equivalent
or greater opportunity, every ending brings with it a new beginning. Whether or not it is the beginning of
something good or something bad is really up to you.
Most of the hopes and
dreams of my youth were washed away with the advent of ALS in my life. Yet my hopes and dreams of today are no less
grandiose than before, just different. After
much soul searching, I decided to embrace the opportunities afforded me
by my new condition. Opportunities? Yes. How many
fathers are able to stay at home and raise their children around the
clock? How many people are able to find
the time to write that book they’ve been wanting to write?
How many people have been so lucky as to be challenged so hard
by life that they will necessarily build character or perish? Without ALS as the catalyst, I probably would
not be bringing this message to you. This
message is part of a philosophy of life that probably would never have
been born had ALS not entered my previous life. This
is a philosophy I intend to take to the world; a blessed opportunity
indeed.
- Jeff
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“Always do what you are
afraid to do.”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
(1803-1882)
I suppose it is a good
thing that you are afraid to jump off the KOIN center in downtown
“Genius is one percent
inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.”
- Thomas Edison
Many times I have heard
the songwriting duo of John Lennon and Paul McCartney referred to as
genius. I think this is a fair
representation, but how did they become genius songwriters? If you focus all of your attention and energy
on one particular subject, and study that subject inside and out,
obsessively working your tail off every day to improve yourself in this
area, there is a good chance others will eventually think you are some
kind of genius.
The first summer that
Lennon and McCartney spent together, they reportedly wrote over 150
songs, most of them throwaways. By
competing with each other, always trying to top the other, they quickly
honed their songwriting skills. So I ask
you, was it their natural God-given talent that made them geniuses? I don’t doubt that they had some natural
talent, but clearly their focus and obsessive devotion to their craft
paved the way for their wearing the genius monikers.
"Nothing
splendid has ever been achieved except by those who dared believe that
something inside of them was superior to circumstance."
-
Bruce Barton
Isn’t it amazing how many
well-meaning people in our lives crush our spirits and dreams by
imploring us to be realistic? Allow me to translate the admonishment to
be realistic- “Don’t try, don’t put yourself ‘out there’, don’t have
any expectations of anything good or get your hopes up.
If you do, you may end up disappointed.” Using
this logic, no one should ever have children for fear they might become
a drug addict or a criminal. Don’t ever
fly on an airplane, it might crash. Don’t
drive a car, talk to anyone you don’t know, own a dog, or even cross
the street. These could end in a fatal or
crippling accident, assault by a stranger, animal mauling, or being
struck by a bus. You might try avoiding
all disappointment and uncertainty by cloistering yourself up inside
your front door, but you would then be ensuring the greatest tragedy of
all- a wasted life.
We all have different
strengths and weaknesses and, therefore, are best suited for different
undertakings. The seeds of greatness,
however, have been planted inside every one of us by our creator and
need only be watered with the proper application of thought. Once you
understand and believe that something inside of you is superior to
circumstance, there is very little that can stop you.
Don’t listen to those that would rob you of your dreams. In
1984, realistic for me was to put my affairs in order and get ready to
die. Nothing great was ever accomplished
by being realistic. Dream the dream. Make it happen.
- Jeff
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"Autumn is a second
spring when every leaf is a flower."
- Albert Camus
Even if you think autumn’s turning leaves
from green to orange is beautiful, I bet you never thought of the
leaves as flowers. How we interpret the
world around us- as well as everyone and everything in it- will
determine how we approach life. If you see
the world as hostile and always trying to screw you, what will your
attitude be when genuine opportunity knocks? Will
you not be negative and cynical, looking for the catch?
What if you see the world as a playground of endless adventure
and exciting opportunities? Might you be
more likely to answer the door?
Haven’t you had the experience of meeting
someone for the first time and thought they were a complete jackass,
only to discover, once you got to know them, they were not such a
rotten apple after all? Clearly you
misjudged them- or did you? You see, most
people are not infallible angels, nor are they the devil’s spawn. If you keep your mind open and look hard
enough, you will find favor or fault with just about anyone. So it is with the world and the events of our
lives.
With everyone you meet, and in all the
circumstances you find yourself in, you should resolve to become a good
finder. Andrew Carnegie, the 19th
century steel baron, said that you develop people the same way you mine
for gold. You go in expecting to move a
lot of dirt, but you don’t go in looking for the dirt, you go in
looking for the gold. Somehow, the dirt in
life does not bother you so much when you expect it to be there, but
resolve to focus on the gold.
Try something with me. Everyone
that you come in contact with today, give them a compliment on their
appearance. Not phony flattery, but a
sincere compliment. If you will resolve to
find the gold in their appearance, you will find it.
They might be overweight, unattractive, and dress as tacky as
Madonna, but if you look close enough, you’ll find something you
appreciate, even if it’s just the colors in their socks!
You’ll make their day and feel better about yourself. Start with
a small nugget and you’ll soon be wondering how you’ve missed the
mother lode of good that’s surrounded you all these years. Learn to
find the blooming flower in the dying leaf.
- Jeff
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“All
things are difficult before they are easy.“
- Thomas Fuller, M.D.
Very little in life is
easy when you don’t know what you are doing. It
is unrealistic to the point of absurdity to expect anything different.
Still, people have the unfortunate tendency of shying away from that
which is new or difficult. The truth is,
there is very little in this life you cannot master if you consistently
focus your mind and energy on it.
Think of a skill you
would love to master. Do you think if you
devoted the time and energy necessary that you could improve your
ability at this skill just one percent every day? How
much improvement would that be over the course of a year?
Three hundred and sixty-five percent? No. You will improve far more than three hundred
and sixty-five percent because that daily one percent begins stacking
on top of itself and actually ends up compounding to 3,741 percent. That skill you desperately want to master
might be difficult when you start, but at 3,741 percent improvement per
year, how long until it becomes just another sharpened arrow in your
quiver of master skills?
- Jeff
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“Creativity
often consists of merely turning up what is already there. Did you know
that right and left shoes were thought up only a little more than a
century ago? “
- Bernice Fitz-Gibbon
Research shows that most
millionaires make their millions upon moving to a new location. The interesting thing is, people move from
In his landmark book, Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill trumpets the necessity
of imagination in the arena of success. He makes a distinction between
creative imagination and synthetic imagination. Creative imagination is
described as the faculty responsible for “inspirations” and new ideas.
It is the tool responsible for the inspired works of geniuses like
Edison, Einstein, Shakespeare, and Mozart. It is the synthetic
imagination, however, that is employed the vast majority of the time
success is attained, even by the so-called geniuses. Hill describes
synthetic imagination as the arranging of “old concepts, ideas, or
plans into new combinations.” In other words, turning up what is
already there. You need not be a genius to make an impact in this
world, you just need a little imagination.
- Jeff
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“Do
or do not. There is no try.”
-
Yoda, character in the movie, The Empire
Strikes Back
Because of the invaluable
lessons that can be learned from failure, It is better to try and fail
than to never try at all. However, you
should never go into an endeavor with a mindset of, “I guess I’ll give
it a try.” The doubt conveyed to yourself
in that message will mushroom into an expectancy of failure at the
first sign of resistance. A feeling of
absolute faith needs to imbibe every part of your being when you attack
an endeavor.
Try something with me. Think of something important that you really
want or need to do. Close your eyes and
imagine yourself attempting this action with a sense of hope that it
will work out. Now, imagine yourself
attacking the same task with a feeling of absolute certainty that the
outcome will be the one you desire. I’m
talking about an resolute conviction that there is no possible outcome
except the one you have determined will happen. Do
you feel the difference? Which attitude do
you think will carry you through to victory when obstacles rear their
ugly heads and the path to victory looks cloudy and difficult?
* Try in this
instance refers to this Merriam-Webster definition of try: to put to test or trial, rather than this
one: to make an attempt at.
- Jeff
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“Luck
is the residue of design.”
- Baseball Hall of Famer
Branch Rickey
Luck is the most common
excuse made by the ignorant and the indolent for others success and
their own failure. It is true that people
start life with different advantages and disadvantages and some people
do get more breaks in life than others, but success usually occurs when
opportunity meets preparedness. Preparedness
is usually the result of long hard hours of work and consistent
application of success principles. There
are very few accidental successes or failures. If
you dig deep enough, you will find planning, hard work, perseverance
and the consistent application of success principles at the bottom of
what many call “luck”.
- Jeff
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"I shall allow no man to
belittle my soul by making me hate him."
- Booker T. Washington
Most sensible people
agree that hate is a venomous and destructive poison.
When we think of hatred, we often think of Hitler and the Nazi
concentration camps, or the horrifying violence heaped upon Black
Americans by the Ku Klux Klan. As
horrifying as it is that these victims of hatred had to endure such
malevolence, the biggest victim of hatred is the hater.
Hate and resentment will
tear you apart. If you have been wronged
and hold resentment towards someone, you need to forgive that person. Some of you have been hurt so bad and violated
so unjustly that the thought of letting that person off the hook might
seem more than you can handle, and bitterly unfair.
The problem is, by harboring resentment, you are not punishing
that person, but rather
yourself. Do you realize that the
person you resent probably considers you to be the bad guy or doesn’t
give any mind to you whatsoever? It’s
extremely unlikely that your resentment is harming that person in any
way, shape, or form. I guarantee, however,
that a smoldering cauldron of hate or resentment within you is
poisoning your life.
We forgive those that
have wronged us, not to be magnanimous and let the perpetrators off the
hook, but to free ourselves of the venom within that is tainting and
stunting our own lives. Release that
resentment and hate in your life and free yourself to be the person you
want to be, and begin enjoying the life you deserve.
- Jeff
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"People
with great vision will always encounter violent opposition from
mediocre minds."
- Albert Einstein
We should just face it-
most of us are sheep. From the time we are
in school, most of us spend our time and effort trying to fit in to be
accepted by others. While we all need love
and acceptance, how are you going to distinguish yourself by going with
the flow? What people don’t realize is
that it takes a bold strike against the grain to accomplish something
significant. Think of the scorn and
ridicule Columbus, Galileo, and Martin Luther endured.
When you try something new and people ridicule you, they are
usually bleeding ignorance or envy. Learn
to associate the scorn and laughter with the fact that you are probably
on the right track!
- Jeff
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“The
secret of joy in work is contained in one word -- excellence. To
know how to do something well is to enjoy it.”
- Pearl S. Buck
When I was a freshman in
high school, my algebra teacher was boring and incompetent. As a result, I couldn’t follow her lectures or
her individual instruction and promptly scraped by with a low C. It was
a miserable course for me and because my high school only required one
year of math at the time, I resolved not to take math ever again.
Though I was convinced that I had absolutely no aptitude for
mathematics, after a year off from the subject, I decided to grit my
teeth and suffer through it one more time. To
my surprise, I did quite well in geometry, and when I hit trigonometry,
I exploded. Though I had an extremely
demanding instructor, I scored 97% on all tests and homework for the
year. When I took the SAT’s, I scored high enough in the math section
to be one of only twelve incoming freshman invited to participate in my
college’s honors math program. Suddenly I
loved math! Hmmm, funny how that works.
Why do successful people
consistently implore the rest of us to find what we truly love when
striving for success? Because they know
that people shy away from that which they are not good at, and will
work tirelessly at that which they love. It
takes long hours of work and a commitment to excellence to truly be
excellent at something. You should find
what you love and are willing to work at tirelessly and then find a way
to get someone to pay you for it.
"You will
always miss 100% of the shots you never take."
- Hockey Legend, Wayne
Gretzky
A good friend once
told me that when hunting for women, “There is no shame in striking out
as long as you go down swinging." My
friend might be a cad, but his approach is dead on. To succeed in anything,
you must put yourself in a position to succeed. If
you don’t take the shot, how can you make the shot?
This seems so obvious that you are probably insulted I bring it
up. However, my experience tells me that
most people walk through life kicking themselves over lost
opportunities- they simply never took the shot available to them. I know that most of my regrets in life stem
from what I didn’t do rather than what I did do. Don’t
let an opportunity pass you by without at least taking a shot at it.
- Jeff
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“The tragedy in life doesn't lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy
lies in having no goal to reach.”
- Benjamin
Mays
In order to effectively
deal with an illness like ALS, one must be optimistic and
forward-looking. As much as anything else,
I have accomplished this through the use of setting and striving to
reach goals. Please take note of the fact that I said “setting and
striving” and purposely left out the idea of reaching my goals. There is nothing like reaching a goal to drive
your barbaric yawp up from your viscera and out over the rooftops, but
it really is in the setting and striving to obtain
your goals where the greatest life benefits are found.
Everybody has goals. The
problem is that most people’s goals are either extremely uninspiring
(to make it through the week until Thursday night when Friends is on. Oops! Now what?),
or their goals are so vague (be a good person, be a good parent, make
more money, etc) they lack the focus and therefore the drive to inspire
any particular action. I believe everyone
should have clearly defined goals with a written plan for their
achievement. I have pages and pages of goals, most of which I will
never bring to my current goal list, and of those that do make the
list, I rarely reach the majority of them in the time frame I allot. Remember, to make it into the Baseball Hall of
Fame you need only be successful three out of ten times at bat.
“Argue
for your limitations and sure enough they're yours. “
Be very careful what you
argue for or against. The most powerful
part of your mind is the subconscious. The
subconscious mind makes no judgments; it simply believes whatever it
has been instructed to believe. When a
thought enters the conscious mind, it is either rejected or passed on
to the subconscious mind to become part of your subconscious belief
system. How much a part of that belief
system is determined by the number of repetitions this thought has in
your mind and the amount of emotion with which it is passed from the
conscious mind to the subconscious.
When you argue for or
against something, you are emotionalizing that belief.
Even if at first you don’t believe what you are saying, if the
subconscious receives this message over and over with emotion attached
to it, it becomes part of your programming and part of who you are. If you argue (emotionalized messages) that you
are not intelligent enough, competent enough, young enough, old enough,
experienced enough, healthy enough, then eventually you will be right. Take stock of the thoughts you hold in your
mind and refuse to play host to any that do not empower you.
- Jeff
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"Self-responsibility
is the first step to self-esteem."
- Nathaniel Branden
We all know somebody that
just cannot take personal responsibility for their actions. Think about that person and tell me whether or
not they are a successful, healthy and well-adjusted person. Usually when someone cannot handle
responsibility for their own actions it is because their self image is
so low that it cannot handle the blow associated with “blame “. Conversely, someone self-assured can easily
look himself or herself in the mirror, accept that they have made a
mistake, take action to rectify that mistake and move on.
Taking responsibility for oneself is not just an indication of a
sound self-image, but a first step towards one.
- Jeff
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“Live
with an attitude of gratitude”
- Anthony Robbins
Whenever I start to feel
blue or like the deck of life has been stacked against me, I pull out a
list I created several years ago. This
list is entitled “My Life’s Greatest Blessings”, and includes
everything and everyone that I am thankful for. Whenever I do this, I
am quickly reminded that I have a ton more to be thankful for than one
could ever imagine. How about the fact that I was born in
If
you’ll just play a little game of contrast you’ll see that living in a
free and prosperous country, you’re pretty damned spoiled compared to
the rest of the world and have almost certainly lost perspective on
that. There is no better medicine for the
soul than to count your blessings and live with an attitude of
gratitude.
- Jeff
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“Always do
right; this will gratify some people and astonish the rest. “
I remember, several years
back, listening to the great
Not only was this a great
lesson for my daughter, but it feels good to do right.
Think about how you feel when you’ve done wrong.
Whether you hang your head in shame, figure out a way to blame
everybody else, or are able to cover it up so that you get to stew in
your own personal guilt without the rest of the world knowing, it sucks! It either gnaws away at your soul, or worse,
you become numb to it, and then you’ve lost your soul.
Always do right. Always do right.
You will astonish and give hope to many, and feel a whole lot better
about yourself.
- Jeff
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"Success is
not forever and failure is never fatal"
- Don Shula, Hall of Fame NFL Coach
We have all
heard the admonishment about not resting on our laurels, yet most of us
lose at least some perspective once we achieve an overwhelming success. In the 2003 college football season, the
Oregon Ducks hammered the third ranked Michigan Wolverines and climbed
into the top ten college football rankings. it seemed the sky was the
limit for the mighty Ducks until they spent the next two weeks looking
like the Keystone Cops in shoulder pads and fell completely out of the
top 25 rankings.
Whatever
success principles and habits you employ to gain success, you must
continue to exercise those habits or your success will be fleeting. Ask any entertainer that has made it to the
top of their profession and they will tell you that as tough as it was
to get to the top, staying atop their perch is that much more difficult.
Success is
not forever, neither is failure. Until you
quit, the game of life is not over. Whether
or not you get back up off the ground and fight when life knocks you to
ground, or roll over and wet on yourself is as simple as a decision. What is awesome is the fact that that decision
is entirely yours. Don’t get too high or
complacent when things are rolling your way, or too low and down on
yourself when things seem to be getting away from you.
Stay the course with a sound set of success principles and
habits and you will win in the end.
- Jeff
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"Pain is
Temporary. Quitting is forever."
- Lance Armstrong
This is one of the most
valuable lessons people can learn. In our
“quick fix” society, too many people want everything to be quick, easy
and fun or they want nothing to do with it. The
problem with this type of thinking is that if everything was quick,
easy and fun, then everyone would be able to succeed at everything and
there would be no reward for achievement for anyone. The unmistakable
joy and satisfaction you see on the faces of athletes that become world
champions is the gratification they receive at the end of a long
struggle, recognizing the fact that they are one of the elite, select
few to achieve what they have achieved.
"True friendship is like sound health; the value of it is seldom known
until it be lost."
- Charles Caleb Colton
I have always believed
that the best way to acquire good friends is to be a good friend. Judging by my wealth of friends, I must have
made good on my philosophy and feel as wealthy as King Solomon because
of them. As someone that has not been of sound health, I have no
hesitation in saying that I would not want my health back if it came at
the price of losing my friends. I’ve seen too many people without these
treasures to feel I could get along without them.
I’ve heard it said that
if at the end of your life you can count two or three true friends you
have lived a rich life. I agree. Cherish your health and thank God
daily for your family and friends. You don’t know when you might lose
these jewels.
- Jeff
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“The
more you recognize and express gratitude for the things you have, the
more things you will have to express gratitude for.”
-Zig Ziglar
I remember once when a
girlfriend and I had been getting on each other’s nerves, we decided to
present each other with a list of all the things that were bothering us
about each other. We had intended to
present our lists to each other in hopes of working out our differences. When I sat down to write the list, I was
suddenly struck with the fact that I had been consumed with everything
“wrong” about her.
I took some time to
reflect, and decided instead to write down everything “right” about her. My list of everything I appreciate and admire
about her began to grow and slowly the negative began to shrink and
dissipate. I began finding myself saying
things like, “how many people would really do that for me?” And, “I’ve always wanted someone that has this
characteristic, but almost nobody does.” Suddenly,
this person that I had been so “fed up” with began to grow in my eyes,
and my love and appreciation for her began to skyrocket.
From then on, whenever I
began to complain to myself about her, I just pulled out the list and
reminded my petty self of everything “right” with her.
How long has it been since you have meditated on and expressed
gratitude for everything you love in and about your spouse or partner
or children? How much would you miss those
things if these people were taken from you? Whatever
you focus on and emotionalize, you tend to manifest in your life. Be very careful.
- Jeff
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“Of all the sad words of
tongue and pen, the saddest are these: it might have been.“
- John Greenleaf Whittier
There is perhaps no more
torturous pain than living under the omnipresent black cloud of regret. I recently witnessed the documentary, Some
Kind of Monster, about the making of heavy metal band Metallica’s
album, St. Anger. In this film, former
Metallica guitarist, Dave Mustaine, speaks very openly and honestly
about the tortured life of regret he has lived for nearly a quarter
century. Mustaine’s drunken belligerency got him tossed out of what
would become one of the most successful bands in the history of rock n
roll while the band was still in its infancy. Although
Mr. Mustaine had sold more than 15 million records, he is adamant that
looking back over the last two plus decades, all he sees is what might
have been. All he feels is the painful
haunt of regret. There is no mistaking
this when he ruefully explains that he would do anything to be able to
go back and do it all over again.
Whether it is a career
move, finally acting on that dream vacation, or finally taking the time
to get involved in the lives of your family members, if there is
something you need to do, either do it now or make the plans to get it
done. Whatever the ramifications of going
for your dream and failing, you can live with them, because you will
have the consolation of having given it your all. What
is nearly impossible to live with is the torturous stain of what might
have been. Just ask Dave Mustaine.
- Jeff
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“A
life making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a
life spent doing nothing at all.”
- George Bernard Shaw
My father is a retired
schoolteacher. One of my most enduring
memories of him is his coming home through the garage and utility room,
carrying his box of schoolwork. On that
box was a sign that said, “To err is human, but to wear out the eraser
before the pencil is ridiculous!” When we
read something like that, we usually chuckle and don’t give it a second
thought. The truth is, to err is human. It is part of the human condition and a
necessary part of life. In fact, if you are not blowing it, you are not
trying. You’re not living either.
What happened the first
time you tried to drive a car with a stick shift? If
it was anything like my first experience, you heard- clunk, clunk,
grinnnnnnd! After grinding the gears and
killing the engine several times, you started to get the hang of it,
didn’t you? Life is the same way. Growing pains in the form of mistakes are a
vital part of true success in any endeavor in life.
Think of this- a hall of fame baseball player failed seven out
of ten times he stepped up to the plate. If
you know you that for long term success you are going to blow it more
times than you succeed in the short term, then just start taking action
and get all the mistakes out of the way early. Follow
the lead of multi-level marketing pioneer, Bill Britt, who once said,
“I didn’t care if they told me no, I just wanted them to hurry up and
tell me no so I could get on to the people who would tell me yes.” Next time you find yourself paralyzed by the
fear of making a mistake, know that like the airplane pilot, when you
take off you will be off course- until you adjust your instruments.
After that, you will land at your destination- probably on a dime.
- Jeff
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“This the last of human
freedoms--to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances,
to choose ones own way.”
- Victor Frankl
Of all the factors that
impact one’s life, nothing will color it more brilliantly or dismally
than one’s attitude. And of all the
factors determining one’s attitude, there is nothing more impacting
than one’s own decision about what that attitude will be.
This is a fact proven every day in the laboratory of life. If you will remove the veil of
self-absorption, the evidence is all around you and incontrovertible.
Whenever I make this
assertion, I inevitably get those who want to argue with me. I am served up a litany of reasons why this
principle does not apply to them. When
they realize who they are speaking to, most begin to take inventory of
my situation and I start hearing reasons why my situation is
“different”. I don’t have to have a job, I
get to have others take care of me, I don’t have to venture out into
the real world (it’s a jungle out there don’t you know!), etc. If you are inclined to believe that being an
unemployed shut-in that must rely on others for even the most
rudimentary function of daily life disqualifies me from speaking about
attitude, let me introduce you to someone only a fool would argue with.
“We do not sing because
we are happy, we are happy because we sing.”
- William
James
I have talked at length
about self-talk and the messages we send to our brain and subconscious
mind, but words are not the only medium through which we communicate. If someone approaches you to shake your hand
and their shoulders are slumped, their head down, and they cannot even
look you in the eye, does this not communicate something to you? In this same manner, when you stand up
straight, throw your shoulders back, and speak in a commanding tone, do
you not feel more confident? Why? You are the same person with the same level of
competency, knowledge, and skill no matter how you move your body. Just as our slump shouldered fellow
communicated to you that he was not confident or competent by his body
language, you convey to your own conscious and subconscious mind that
you are confident and in control by your body language.
Emotion follows motion. Never forget what I just wrote.
If you can get your arms around this concept and embrace it, you
will make magic in your life. It is one of
the most powerful, reliable and easy to use methods of controlling your
mind and emotions available, yet, it is little understood and rarely
employed. When you sing, what are you
conveying to your conscious and subconscious minds?
Isn’t your body language enthusiastic, the words draped in
emotion, driven into your brain with rhythm and melody?
Use your body to create states of mind. If
you want to be enthusiastic, act enthusiastic. If
you want to be confident, fake it ‘til you make it.
Emotion follows motion. Put my
words to the test and see if it is not true. I’m
sitting up with my shoulders back, knowing the results of that test.
- Jeff
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“If you can’t feel pain,
you can’t feel anything else either.”
- Judd Hirsch, Ordinary
People
Would you like to see a
grown man cry? If you would, just come
watch the film Ordinary People with me. I
have seen this film about seven or eight times and I am reduced to a
pathetic ball of blather every time. Somehow,
I am able to slip right into the Timothy Hutton character’s shoes; I
experience what he experiences, feel what he feels.
I think the reason I am able to do this so easily is because
this person is on a journey through physical, mental, and emotional
pain, and he’s going through it alone. No
matter how many friends and supporters I have, there is a part of this
journey I am on where I cannot be joined. No
matter how empathetic and sympathetic one is, they cannot crawl inside
of me and know what it is like to go through what I am going through. In other words, I am no stranger to pain.
Most people will do
almost anything to avoid pain. Motivational
guru, Anthony Robbins, claims that the avoidance of pain is the single
most powerful driving force of human behavior. I
do not recommend suffering unnecessary pain for the sake of suffering,
but pain is a natural part of life. When I
see someone taking extraordinary measures to avoid pain, they are
usually just exchanging one form of pain for another, often compounding
their troubles. This would include using
drugs or alcohol to numb pain, avoiding the bill collector or the
taxman, or repeatedly avoiding unpleasant confrontations that simply
have to take place.
"I am more and more convinced that our happiness or our unhappiness
depends far more on the way we meet the events of life than on the
nature of those events themselves."
- Wilhelm von Humboldt
Every single one of us has seen someone that appears to have it all and
yet is miserable. Haven’t we also seen
someone that has nothing or has perhaps been dealt a brutally cruel
blow by life and yet is happy, full of life and optimistic? How can this be? NEWSFLASH: The quality of your life is NOT determined by
the events and circumstances of your life, but rather by your
interpretation and internalization of those circumstances and events.
At the root of the interpretation of the events and the circumstances
of your life is a decision. You must
decide to be happy and determine that the events in your life happen
for a decidedly positive reason. The
dreams of my youth were washed away by the advent of a disease I did
nothing to bring upon myself. Once a
college athlete, I am now confined to a wheelchair with the ability to
lift my arms or speak clearly taken from me. Can
anyone tell me what my level of happiness would be if I decided to view
myself as a helpless victim? We all know
the answer.
"Far better is it to dare
mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by
failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy
much or suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows
not victory or defeat.”
- Theodore Roosevelt
I hate to fail. Even when I am learning something valuable
from a failure that I know will enable me to succeed in the future, I
detest it. The truth is, however, if you
are not failing, you are not trying. If a
batter in baseball fails to get a hit seven out of ten times, he is
considered a hall of fame caliber player. In
fact, if you attempt to avoid failure by not trying something, you’ll
have experienced the greatest failure of all by ceding victory before
you even begin.
I have found that life’s
greatest regrets come not from what we do, but rather from what we fail
to attempt to do. Imagine these two
situations. You have powerful feelings for
someone and upon expressing those feelings, you are rejected. Or,
fearing rejection, you never express your feelings, and over time you
realize this was the one person you truly love. Now that it is too
late, you discover that the feeling was mutual and if you had only made
your feelings known, you might have had a lifetime of intimacy with
your true soul mate. Which would be tougher to live with?
The pain of rejection in
this situation would be substantial, but it would fade away after time,
especially when you found your true mate. But
the pain of wondering “what if” and kicking yourself for not having
acted would be immeasurably worse.
Failure is a bitter pill
to swallow, but until you quit, failure and defeat are but the
temporary prices to be paid for victory and success.
Understanding this, I can live with temporary defeat, though I
loathe it. What I cannot live with is not
trying.
- Jeff
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“Having once decided to
achieve a certain task, achieve it at all costs of tedium and distaste.
The gain in self-confidence of having accomplished a tiresome labor is
immense. “
- Thomas Arnold Bennett
I remember when I first
set out to write a screenplay. I was a new
father and the primary caregiver for my new daughter.
For many, caring for an infant is tough enough, but I was
fighting a debilitating disease and had to come up with makeshift ways
to carry out my childcare responsibilities safely.
In addition, I didn’t know how to write a screenplay. I had been given some advice by a couple
people in the industry and had a stack of “how to” books, but had to
teach myself the craft I was pursuing. All
of this made for a hectic schedule and I often got sidetracked from my
goals.
When I told people I was
writing a screenplay, many people piped up with, “Me too!
I’ve got this great idea I’ve been working on and blah blah blah
blah…” Before I had even completed the
first draft of my script, I noticed many people had already abandoned
the project they shared so much enthusiasm for. This
“attrition” of the competition only fueled my fire.
Despite all I had to deal with to get my screenplay written, I
forged ahead through all of the hassles and finally finished my script. While I have not sold my screenplay, I learned
powerful lessons in seeing something through to the end as not a single
person that told me of their desire to write a screenplay has ever even
finished theirs!
In the above quotation, I
think it is important to recognize that after the words “achieve it at
all costs” are the words “of tedium and distaste”.
Accomplishing a task at all costs is foolishness.
If the cost of writing my screenplays was to ignore my daughter,
then the cost would have been prohibitive. Nothing
is worth jeopardizing your faith, family, your health, or your personal
integrity. But if mere annoyance or hard
work is what stands between you and your goal, you must force yourself
to push through these barriers and attain victory.
You will astonish yourself with what you can do and soon this
will become habit.
- Jeff
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“Most
of our obstacles would melt away if, instead of cowering before them,
we should make up our minds to walk boldly through them.”
-
Orison Swett Marden
How many times have you
been confronted with a situation that you would have done practically
anything to avoid? Isn’t it true that you
played the worst possible outcome of your dilemma in the theater of
your mind over and over, ratcheting up your anxiety level and making
yourself sick? Isn’t it also true that in
the vast majority of these cases (perhaps all) this horrifying scenario
that you tormented yourself with never occurred? The
problem is, it did occur- in your mind. And
if you emotionalize an event in your mind, you’ll drag your entire
being through the experience just as if it really happened.
I remember my college
football coach telling my teammates and me that when you are afraid of
getting hurt that’s when injury occurs. It’s
true. The players that were afraid of
injury would play tentative, causing them to go less than full speed. In football, when you are not attacking, you
are being attacked. So it is when facing
obstacles. Your problems probably aren’t
as big as they seem and those outcomes we dread are unlikely to be
anywhere near as bad as we imagine. Put
your chin up, your shoulders back and, boldly walk through them. Chances are they will fall like a tree in the
forest. If by chance, you do not like the
result, at least you only experienced that result one time, instead of
over and over and over in your mind.
- Jeff
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“Men occasionally stumble
over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if
nothing had happened.”
Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)
Life is not just a test,
it is also an instruction lab. The problem is that much of the time we
are simply not paying attention, resulting in failing the same tests
time and again. How do you respond to failure? Did you know that if you
set up the right definition of success, it will be impossible to fail? I am not talking about lowering standards, I’m
talking about depositing priceless knowledge of what works and what
doesn’t into your archive of personal experience.
I hear and I forget. I
see and I remember. I do and I understand.
- Confucius
In his Personal Power
program, Anthony Robbins tells the story of a conversation he had with
his martial arts instructor. The
instructor says that most people never achieve black belt status
because they refuse to master the fundamentals of their art. When this instructor’s students learn
something, they immediately want to learn something new.
Simply understanding the
basics of how something works is not commensurate with mastering it. If you simply listen to an instructors
lecture, you will lose the ability to recall and use that information
in short order. You might have understood what you heard at the time,
but without the ability to recall it when you need it, it will be of no
practical use to you. If you take notes during the lecture, much more
of that lecture will be imbedded in your memory because of your active
participation. I did not completely
understand this concept of active participation until I began recording
my instructor’s lectures and playing them back within 24 hours to
outline them. I then began pounding my brain with the material in as
many different ways as possible. The first course I tried this with
brought the final exam before I missed a single exam question!
Life is not a spectator
sport, it is a participator sport. Whatever benefit you are
receiving from these daily quotations and commentaries, I am learning
that much more. When you begin to teach
something, your understanding and mastery of the subject goes up
exponentially. If you need to master a
subject, try teaching it to others and see if this is not the case. By
your active “doing”, your level of understanding and consequent mastery
will explode.
- Jeff
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“Those
who are not prepared for the apprehension of a great purpose should fix
their thoughts upon the faultless performance of their duty, no matter
how insignificant their task may appear. Only in this way can the
thoughts be gathered and focused, and resolution and energy be
developed, which being done, there is nothing which may not be
accomplished.”
- James Allen, As A Man
Thinketh
Mastery and the attitude
of going the extra mile need to become habits. If
you think you are being unfairly compensated for your job performance,
or, if you think your daily tasks are trivial and unimportant, think
again. You might not be getting paid what you are worth, and your tasks
might not be important in the overall scheme of the universe, but how
you perform where you are, doing exactly what you are doing means
everything to your destiny.
Mastery takes a certain
attitude. The habit of going the extra
mile is also an attitude. You will either
develop the attitude necessary for the habits of mastery and going the
extra mile or you won’t. It might be time
to look in a different direction for your life’s ambition, but if you
have not developed the proper attitude and work ethic, that search may
well be in vain. Whether you are boldly striking out on a daring new
adventure, or trying to improve your circumstances right where you are,
the degree to which you develop these two attitudes will go a long way
in determining what happens when opportunity finally knocks. Hadn’t you best be ready?
- Jeff
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"People are
just about as happy as they make up their minds to be"
- Abraham Lincoln
… or as miserable, or as
successful, or as fearful, or as confident, or… The
truth is, we have an incredible computer between our ears that will
give us whatever result we desire. The
problem is, this incredible piece of machinery does not come with a
user’s manual and it is not user friendly! It
is also vulnerable to outside programming, and can easily be fooled by
something called emotions. We need to
realize that this incredible source of power called the human mind is
at our beck and call. It is not simply
gray matter to be pushed here and there by what happened to us as
children or what others do or say, it is our own personal power slave
ready to carry out our every command. But
not even the most powerful and competent slave can carry out an order
that is never given.
Life is about decisions. Your entire world and destiny can change in an
instant with the decision for it to be so. Decide
to be happy, and determine that it will be so. Think
happy thoughts. Choose to be optimistic
and quash all pessimistic thoughts. Take
on the posture and demeanor of a happy individual and begin to treat
others as a happy and fulfilled person would. Determine
to do all of this and if you are still not happy, you soon will be
- Jeff
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Thought and
character are one, and as character can only manifest and discover
itself through environment and circumstance, the outer conditions of a
person’s life will always be found to be harmoniously related to his
inner state.
- James Allen, As A Man
Thinketh
Haven’t we all seen
someone that had it all together, but for one major chink in his or her
armor that continually brings down this person’s entire life? Still, I have to take issue with Mr. Allen on
at least one aspect of this quotation. I
am happy that he goes on to state that one cannot judge a man’s entire
character by his outer circumstances, but that his outward conditions
and circumstances are tied inextricably to at least part of one’s
character. As one who is suffering from a
virulent disease through no fault of my own, I’m aware that not all
aspects of our circumstances are by our own choosing, or by our own
making.
Nevertheless, it is
simply an unavoidable fact that people generally make the very beds
they lie in. I am from the
- Jeff
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"Every man is an
impossibility until he is born."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
Emerson could have meant
lots of things with this quotation, but I see this as a description of
someone coming into their own. How many
people suffer from fear and self-doubt, making their objectives in life
impossible? As long as you allow fear and
doubt to plague you, most of what you truly desire to accomplish will
be impossible. But, haven’t you seen
people suffer from a crisis of self-confidence and then suddenly put it
all together? In almost an instant what
seemed impossible is suddenly routine. Never,
ever give up. As long as you take
responsibility for steering the rudder, your ship may very well still
be coming in.
- Jeff
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“Man is buffeted by
circumstances so long as he believes himself to be the creature of
outside conditions, but when he realizes that he is a creative power,
and that he may command the hidden soil and seeds of his being out of
which circumstances grow, he then becomes the rightful master of
himself.”
- James Allen, As A Man
Thinketh
There is an incredible
feeling that comes with the realization that you control your own life
by the proper application of thought. The
thoughts in your own mind are really the only thing we have complete
control over. Acceptance of the fact that
you control your life through the decisions you make regarding your own
thoughts places your destiny squarely in your own hands.
What could be more exciting and invigorating than this? Believe and act upon this, and you will indeed
become the rightful master of yourself.
- Jeff
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“My Definite
Purpose burns all negative thoughts from my mind. I am free of mental
weeds.”
-
Jeff
David Young
When a negative thought slips into my mind
either through outside stimulus, or through manufacture by my own
faculties, I try to immediately kill it. If
it takes root and begins to grow, it is like a cancer that will be
difficult to cut out once it takes hold. Much
like the blackberry bush, you can pull it out, perhaps even dig it out,
seemingly roots and all, only to have it come back again and again. Once a negative thought takes root in your
mind, trying to loose your mind from it is akin to freeing yourself of
a blackberry bush.
When I say the above affirmation to myself, I
imagine a side cutaway view of my head and brain. I
imagine the negative thoughts of my mind starting to weave its roots
through my gray matter. I then imagine my
definite major purpose literally on fire and use the heat and energy
from that visual to singe and burn the roots of the negative thought
right out of my mind. The charred remains
of the thought fall from my brain and the warmth and feeling from my
definite major purpose envelopes my entire mind.
I do this to symbolize to myself that
allowing the negative to take a hold in my mind will destroy and choke
out the positive purpose to which I am committed. This
is completely unacceptable. I refuse to
let something I have control over cheat me out of attaining my purpose
in life. Instead, I use the power of
having that purpose to burn away the weeds in the garden of my mind and
allow the centerpiece in my mental garden to reach full bloom.
- Jeff
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"The most thoroughly
wasted of days is that on which one has not laughed"
- Chamfort
I have a dear friend that
when we get together, we are often accused of having too much fun. Complete strangers have approached us on more
than one occasion and admiringly told us as much. One
woman even went so far as to anonymously pay our dinner bill at one
restaurant. Apparently, it was not always this way with my friend. On one occasion, when we were busting our guts
with laughter, I chided her, “I’ll bet you never laughed so much before
you met me, did you?” I was stunned to
hear her tell me that she had never really laughed before.
For the most part, she had led a life that was serious, sober,
and almost completely devoid of laughter.
One afternoon, while
showing her some of the hand written cartoons from my past, she laughed
so hard that she fell onto my bed and could literally not sit up. When she did gather herself, she took another
look at the absurd image and fell back to the bed, laughing
uncontrollably. Just knowing that I was in
some way responsible for this woman’s newfound ability to laugh and
find humor in life, provided me with one of my proudest moments. It was like feeling, at least in part,
responsible for breaking someone out of a dark prison they had been
locked in their entire life. She describes it as though the floodgates
have opened and a lifetime of laughter is now pouring out.
“Let me listen to me and
not to them.”
- Gertrude Stein
In his seminal
publication, Think And Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill lists
three fears that are at the bottom of most people’s worries, any of
which are singularly capable of destroying any chance of great
accomplishment or enduring happiness. The second of these is fear of
criticism. Such fear crushes initiative, stifles imagination, and
causes one to second guess oneself before expressing new ideas or
making significant decisions. This devastating fear induces one to
conform to the “crowd”, often causing one to choose “fitting in” at the
sacrifice of their own principles and moral values, and guaranteeing
one’s inability to break out ahead of the pack. People are so driven by
the fear of being criticized that they will often risk their futures
and their very lives to avoid it, even to the point of engaging in
unprotected sex, and leveraging oneself into bankruptcy to “keep up
with the Joneses.”
“Many people die at
twenty five and aren't buried until they are seventy five.”
- Benjamin
Franklin
Do you remember the sense
of awe and inspiration you felt with the world as a young child? Perhaps you cannot remember simply because it
has been forever and a day since you have felt that way.
In this case, observe the small child chasing butterflies or
playing with an empty box. They squeal for
joy and entertain themselves for hours with such trivia that we say to
ourselves, “I wish I could be that easily entertained!”
You might have outgrown the box and the butterflies, but life is
still a daring pursuit and a hilarious adventure, if you will let it be
so.
“Someone's sitting in the
shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.”
- Les Brown
If you are thirty years
or more in age, you must realize that those graduating from high school
this year think of you as ancient. Isn’t this true?
I can remember at that age feeling that life had to be over when
you were thirty. The truth is, these kids will be joining the
thirty-something crowd before they have any idea what hit them.
As we grow older, life
gathers a certain momentum that turns the pages of our lives with
ever-increasing speed. Ten years may sound
like a long time, but those of us that have lived three or four or more
of these decades realize that it really is not, and five years ago
seems like yesterday. It has been
correctly said that people expect far too much from their efforts in
one year, but not nearly enough for five years of effort.
If this is true, and if five years will be upon us in the blink
of an eye, do you suppose our lives would benefit from a little long
term thinking? Something more than just what is on TV tonight?
Mr. Brown’s call for long
term thinking and planning seems almost anachronistic in this day and
age of the quick fix. Feel the need for a
new toy or a new wardrobe? Just charge it. Have a health problem, or life just bringing
you down? Just pop a pill.
Is your child hooked on drugs? Don’t
worry, your favorite sitcom will show you how that problem is resolved
in thirty minutes. Life is not this way
and we should disabuse ourselves of the notion that it is.
A successful life takes planning, hard work, and long term
vision. The tomorrows of your life are
being determined by your actions today. If
you want to bask in the shade of the life you truly desire tomorrow,
you need to have enough foresight to start planting the appropriate
seeds of action today.
- Jeff
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"All my life, I always
wanted to be somebody. Now I see that I should have been more
specific."
- Jane Wagner
Everybody wants to feel
important, that their life means something, that their time spent on
earth is more than just passing days. I
believe that God has a unique plan for every man and every woman. Not
only has He planted in us the seeds of greatness, but more importantly,
a purpose for our lives and the ability to fulfill that purpose. There
is a powerful sense inside each of us that we are meant to do something
important, to make something of our lives. And
yet, with the hustle and bustle of executing of our daily lives, we
often end up feeling as if we have merely spent energy spinning our
wheels and have come no closer to fulfilling our purpose in life. There is no more desperate feeling than to
watch the weeks, months, and years tick off the calendar while we grind
away at life not knowing where we are going or what we are even
grinding for.
Ask yourself these
questions:
Who am I?
What is my purpose in
life?
What is the legacy I want
my life to leave behind when I die?
Imagine you are at your
own funeral, invisible, hovering about. What
are people saying about you? What is the
epitaph on your tombstone? Are you happy
about what you hear and see? Are you
satisfied with the person you became and what you did with your life? While you still have time, pray about it,
meditate on it. Seek with an open mind
what it is that God would have you to do. It
might be too late to accomplish certain objectives; I doubt it, but
it’s possible. It is never too late to become the person you were meant
to be.
- Jeff
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“The
elevator to success is out of service. But the stairs are always open.“
-
Zig
Ziglar
I have a friend that is a very successful
businessman. He has worked hard and smart,
and put in the equity payments due to get where he is at.
When speaking of his employees and those striving to get where
he is now, he once shared with me in amazement, “everyone wants a
six-figure income, but few want to work for it.” Likewise,
a friend of mine that works at one our
In a society where we have figured out how to
travel faster than the speed of sound and cook a meal in less than two
minutes, it would seem there must be a short cut to the top. Right? Sorry,
success will not bargain with you. If you
want it, you are going to have to pay the price it demands in full, and
pay it in advance. Bunker Hunt, the
one-time bankrupt cotton farmer turned multi-billionaire, said there
are only two things you need for success: 1) Determine precisely what
it is you want. 2) Determine what the
price is to acquire it, and pay that price. That’s
it.
I give you my personal guarantee that success
will not run up and mug you. However, if you will arm yourself with a
clear goal and a detailed plan of attack, and back that goal with an
abiding faith that simply will not take no for an answer, you’ll get
your success. What will make its arrival all the sweeter is that you
will have obtained it the old fashioned way- you will have earned it.
- Jeff
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“By the yard it’s hard;
by the inch it’s a cinch.”
- Old Saying
Imagine you are on a
desert island and had not had a thing to eat in more than a week when
we cross paths. If I offered you an apple, could you eat it? In a flash. But
what if I put the stipulation on my offer that you must eat the apple
whole, in a single bite? No matter how
badly you wanted that apple in your stomach, you could not swallow it
whole, could you? Then why do you look at
big important challenges in your life and either shy away from them or
think you are going to devour them in a single bite?
Everything big is made up
of small parts. The structure you are
sitting in right now was not erected in a single day was it? Was it erected in its entirety? Does writing a
300 page book sound somewhere between intimidating and impossible? It
might until you consider that if you wrote just one page per day, you
could take off 65 days and still complete the project in one year.
If you have a large goal
that is important to you, write it down on paper. Working
backwards from the goals completion, on the next line, write down the
necessary step just before final completion of your goal. Below that,
write down the step before, and so forth, until you have listed all of
the steps necessary from completion down to the project’s starting
point. At the bottom of this list, set a
reasonable deadline for the accomplishment of this first step. If necessary, break this step down into
several baby steps and set dates for their completion.
Work your way up the list, doing this for every step and you’ll
eventually get a handle on this one time colossus you were afraid to
even contemplate. Learn to take bite-size pieces- they’re easier to
digest.
- Jeff
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“Realize what you truly
want. It stops you from chasing butterflies and puts you to work
digging for gold."
-
William Moulton Marsden
What do you get when you
chase butterflies? Usually not butterflies. It is a beautiful thing to watch a child chase
butterflies here, there, and everywhere- they’ll sleep well that night. It is quite another matter when we find
ourselves going round and round, putting out the fires in our lives
only to find ourselves right back where we started.
Sound familiar?
Everyone should have a
definite major purpose in life. It should
be clear and very specific with an action plan for its achievement. If you fail to focus and program your mind in
this way, I guarantee you will be pulled to and fro by every
distraction that comes into your life. When
your mind is clearly focused on your definite purpose, you will be able
to differentiate between those tasks that will take you closer to what
you truly want in life, and those that will take you further away. You will then be able to concentrate your
efforts on digging for the gold in your life instead of chasing every
butterfly, phantom, or will o‘ the wisp that floats into your life.
- Jeff
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"We are not limited by
our old age; we are liberated by it."
- Stu Mittleman
Even when reality is
black and white, it is often gray. The straight facts may be A, but
what is reality to the person that interprets them to be B? The reality
we create by our perception and interpretation of facts determines what
we believe about ourselves, believe about others, believe about the
world, and radically influences our behavior. It controls how we
approach life and what we are even willing to try.
While there are some
facts that are dangerous when monkeying with their meanings, we should
be in the practice of interpreting life through an ethical prism of
self-empowerment. Look for the interpretation and meaning of events and
situations that empower you instead of the one that leaves you feeling
impotent and victimized. What you think of, and how you feel about
yourself and a situation is usually far more important than any facts
involved in the situation. If you are sixty pounds overweight and want
to get yourself in shape, it is disempowering to envy those that are a
mere ten pounds over their ideal weight. Consider yourself lucky to
have more room in which to get some weight loss momentum going, and to
have the opportunity for a big accomplishment. Few will even notice the
loss on the person that loses ten pounds. So concentrate on how you
will feel about yourself when you look in the mirror, feel the pats on
the back, and hear the praise after dropping sixty!
Pretty much every set of
facts in life can be reinterpreted to have a positive empowering
meaning. If not for ALS, I wouldn’t have this opportunity to be
influencing you right now. That positive interpretation of my
predicament empowers me. Find that empowering meaning that liberates
you to be all you can be. If you are young, then youth and vigor should
be power to you. If you are more senior,
then maturity and experience should be considered indispensable. Master the lens through which you view life
and you will master life itself.
- Jeff
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"Sol Lucet
Omnibus" (The sun shines for everyone)
- Unknown
It seems as if everyone I
have ever met, at some point, says, “with my luck, so and so will
happen.” If everyone has bad luck, is it
really bad luck? I assure you that God is
not up in Heaven spinning a wheel with your name on it, playing Wheel
of Fortune, Heaven Edition. When it rains,
it rains on all of us. When the sun
shines, it shines upon all of us. Not
everyone starts out in life with the same advantages and disadvantages,
but since happiness is found in the mind, and our own thoughts are the
only thing we have complete control over, happiness or unhappiness is a
product of choice.
When I decided to do
these messages and to write my book, it was because I grew frustrated
and despondent watching people poison their own lives and the lives of
those around them with negative, acerbic attitudes.
Stop! This is the most regrettable
and unnecessary tragedy I have witnessed in my four plus decades of
living. God is not out to get you, He is
on your side. The world is not out to
crush you, it is your oyster. Outside, it
rains sometimes, it shines sometimes. Whatever
it is doing, it does for everyone. On the
inside, the sun is always shining. The
question is whether or not you are going to pull the blinds.
- Jeff
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“Too many people
overvalue what they are not and undervalue what they are.”
-
Malcolm Forbes
One of the truly
destructive things we can do is to compare ourselves to other people. If ever there was an area where the grass is
always greener on the other side it is in personal comparisons. If a woman is blessed with a fabulous figure,
a beautiful head of hair, and eyes that could make a Hell’s Angel weep,
but has less than perfect teeth, what do you think she focuses on and
thinks about every time she meets another woman with a gorgeous smile? It’s not her own index of assets, is it? The human animal seems obsessively intent on
fanning the flames of its’ own insecurity instead of recognizing and
building on the incredible assets we possess.
You are a miracle. Because you have not recognized your innate
gifts and talents and developed them to their full potential does not
change that fact. God has engineered you
for success and endowed you with the seeds of greatness, going so far
as to create you in His own image. Did you
know that most people never use more than 2% of their mental capacity? Stop focusing on what you don’t have and what
you are not, and start developing that 98% of your brain that most of
the world will continue to keep dormant. Leave
the comparisons to others and start recognizing what you are- a miracle
of God with unlimited human potential.
- Jeff
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“A
pessimist is one who feels bad when he feels good for fear he'll feel
worse when he feels better."
- Unknown
When I first came across
this quotation, I was regaled by its witty humor and clever cadence. After thinking about it for a few minutes, I
was much more impressed by the life truth it represents.
Absolutely everyone has a subconscious idea of what they think
they deserve and an internal prosperity thermostat set accordingly. What happens when people start getting more
than they think deserve? Self-sabotage.
Are you one of these
people that gets uneasy when things get too good? The
reason everything turns sour when you start to taste something sweet is
because you are the victim of your own self-fulfilling prophecy. The law of attraction says that whatever you
focus your mind on you will eventually attract to your life. The law of expectation says that whatever you
expect to happen in your life, you act and speak to yourself according
to this expectation, and therefore bring upon yourself.
With these two laws in effect, and your mind focused on the
storm you are convinced is on the horizon, is it any wonder that it
shows up? It is absolutely critical that
you purge this expectancy of doom and gloom from your mindset, or you
will continue to purge success, happiness, and those seeking refuge
from the “big downer” (you) out of your life.
While there is no
possible way to comprehensively detail the causes and remedy for
“Gloomitis” in this forum, start this way:
1)
Resolve
to change.
2)
Become
acutely aware of when you slide into Dr. Gloom mode.
3)
Develop
a phrase or action (or both together) to interrupt your negative
pattern. For instance, try pinching
yourself and saying out loud (or internally if vocalizing is
inappropriate) a phrase like, “Knock it off! You’re
done with that, so just knock it off!”
4)
Substitute
a positive phrase for the negative one you started to tell yourself. If you are totally convinced your sales
presentation or classroom speech is going to flop, substitute in, “I’m
going to kick ass with this presentation, so I can’t wait to give it!”
The important thing is to
recognize when you are pessimistic, and refuse to cave in to it. If you will get emotionally involved with
this, I think you’ll find it more effective than you now imagine.
- Jeff
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Quotes
"Each of us
inevitable; each of us limitless; each of us with his or her right upon
the earth; each of us allowed the eternal purports of the earth; each
of us here as divinely as any is here."
- Walt
Whitman
As a human being, you
have limitations- we all do. Greg Oden is not going to make it as a
jockey, you are not capable of leaping tall buildings in a single
bound, and no matter how hard he trains, nor how much he believes,
William Hung is not going to win American Idol. There
are indeed limitations to what each of us can do. However,
the effect one's life can have on society and on the lives of others is
indeed limitless. Mother Theresa could not
feed, clothe, and save the entire world, yet the ramifications of the
life she led have touched millions of lives, and her good works will
ripple throughout eternity. Billy Graham
is not a dynamic public speaker, but his traveling crusades have been
under way for decades and will affect lives for decades after he
departs this earth. James Earl Ray managed
to end Martin Luther King Jr's life, yet the effect of Dr. King's push
for civil rights will live forever more.
I do not believe
greatness is an accident. I believe it is
the result of an individual committing himself to a cause bigger than
himself for which he is uniquely designed. This
is the true definition of a life with purpose. When
I was younger, my life was about me, about getting rich and famous. My life has now been redirected so that I
concern myself with inspiring members of our next generation, leaving a
positive imprint of my spirit on the world, and leaving a legacy and
road map for my beloved daughter, Priya. Whether
or not my purpose in life is "great" I do not concern myself with- I
will leave that to be judged by others. The
point is, I have found purpose and meaning in positively touching
others.
Very few of us ever
scratch our potential as individuals, and certainly not as agents of a
divine purpose. I believe each of us has
such a purpose and, whether we know it or not, we are all constantly
touching other lives. When you
touch a life– positively or negatively –that life touches another. As a
result, you will probably never know how many lives your life can and
will impact. With all of our potential, and all the resources upon this
earth, combined with the fact that God has providently chosen for each
of us to be here, we need to make our lives count. What you do with
your life matters and how you affect others may have exponential
repercussions for generations and beyond. Your life is important. Live
it in a manner that expresses just how much it really does count.
- Jeff
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Quotes
“Self-discipline is the
ability to make yourself do what you should do when you should do it,
whether you feel like it or not. “
- Elbert Hubbard
How difficult is it to
force yourself to do what you love to do? Not
very. That is why so many people are
successful when they are doing what they love. But
whether you love what you do or not, at some point, for long term
success, you will be forced to do something you don’t enjoy. How many times have you seen an artist, of
some sort, say that they love performing or creating their art, but
hate all of the other nonsense that goes with it? How
many of these celebrities have been burned by leaving their money and
business matters to others because they don’t want to be bothered by
such unpleasant “trivialities”? If people
that can afford to hire the very best people to do for them what they
don’t want to do, must still do that which they don’t want to do, how
much more is required of you and I that are still grinding our way to
the top?
In both my life, and the
lives I have observed, the employment of an ounce of self-discipline
today is worth pound upon pound of output down the road.
Consider that if, at age 20, you were to start investing just
$100 per month in an average performing mutual fund, you would have
well over $1,000,000 to retire with at age 65. How
many people cannot come up with $100 in any given month if they knew
that the result in the end would be a $1,000,000? The
problem is not finding the $100 (you’d somehow manage to pay the IRS if
congress boosted your taxes by $100 per month), the problem is
disciplining yourself to systematically invest it month after month.
Self-discipline is
perhaps the hallmark trait of the successful. In
the long run, mediocre talent with loads of self-discipline will
outperform loads of talent lacking self-discipline every time. To break the stranglehold of procrastination,
develop a catch phrase for yourself like, “Do it now!”
Whenever you need to be doing something and resistance rears its
ugly head, pull out that phrase and jam it down the throat of the
resistance, “Do it now! Do it now!” It will be difficult at first, but over time
it will get easier, and when you begin to see the payoff from
disciplining yourself, you will be juiced to keep the victory train
rolling.
- Jeff
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Quotes
"We have time enough if
we will but use it right."
- Johann
Wolfgang Von Goethe
Napoleon said that he won all of his famous
(some say infamous) battles because he understood the value of five
minutes. All of us have exactly
twenty-four hours in every day, but have you noticed how much more
productive some people are than others? Even
the people that run around like chickens with their heads cut off often
accomplish very little, but claim they have no time for anything.
All of us are in a time crunch.
Try making a list of the most important things you have to do
the night before, prioritize these items, then focus on those items
deemed highest priority. Do not let
yourself get “caught up”. Stay focused,
work diligently, and keep a record of your accomplishment.
It sounds simple, but even this rudimentary process of
prioritizing your schedule will help. There is never enough time for
everything, but, if we use it right, we have enough time for the
important things.
- Jeff
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Quotes
“A man should conceive of
a legitimate purpose in his heart, and set out to accomplish it... Even
if he fails again and again to accomplish his purpose (as he
necessarily must until weakness is overcome), the strength of character
gained will be the measure of his true success, and this will form a
new starting point for future power and triumph.”
- James Allen, As A Man
Thinketh
When you get sky-high and
charge into a new endeavor, what do you do when your objective starts
to push back? Most people fold up their tent and quit at the first sign
of resistance. Do you not know that you must suffer temporary defeat in
order to learn the requisite lessons and build the necessary character
to conquer your goal? I don’t know what your goal is, but the bigger it
is, the more wisdom and character will be required. Translation- the
grander the objective, the more temporary defeat necessary.
In the late 1980s, John
Elway and the Denver Broncos suffered three crushing Super Bowl losses
and were the butt of endless Super Bowl loser jokes. I will never
forget Mr. Elway’s response when asked if maybe it would be better to
lose the week before the Super Bowl rather than to keep suffering the
personal ignominy of these cruel barbs. He insisted he would rather go
back again and again and keep swinging until he finally won one. He didn’t win one, he won two.
It took until the final two seasons of his sixteen year career,
however, for that to happen.
Victory is usually
accorded the last person standing. This is
usually the person that gets up after being knocked to the floor one
more time than his competition. It is a lot easier to accept temporary
defeat and keep getting up when you realize that it is absolutely
coming but only need be temporary. Be like John Elway; get up again and
again until you are the last person standing.
- Jeff
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Quotes
ATTENTION LAKER FOOTBALL PLAYERS: As you prepare for
training camp next month with visions of a state title dancing in your
heads, the ground work for the success or failure of that vision is
being laid now. As you read what I’ve written below, think about the
effect of your training efforts now being compounded daily until
December 8th at Autzen Stadium. Decide how much sweat your
willing to pour forth, and how much pain it is worth to avoid feeling
like we felt after our last game last season, and to replace that
experience with hoisting that state championship trophy. I’m upping my
involvement this year, in part, because I don’t want to ever feel that
way again. If you’re a competitor, neither do you.
“Don’t
think you can make up for it (slacking) by working twice as hard
tomorrow. If you have it within your power to work twice as hard, why
aren’t you doing it now?”
-
John Wooden
One of the true treasures
in my life has been the privilege of working with the Lake Oswego High
School Football team. I play much the same role I do here in that I try
to motivate, teach, and inspire these young men to be the best they can
be, to get more out of themselves than they thought possible. Each
fall, I try to sell my guys on something I call The Two Percent
Formula. Like trying to teach teens the concept of compound interest
and convincing them of the necessity of starting investing for
retirement early in life, I can only hope they are buying.
The Two Percent Formula
posits the concept of compounding improvement at a particular skill. What if you were to make a commitment to
improving yourself at this particular skill just two percent each and
every day? With focused commitment, could
you manage that? How much improvement would you show in just fifteen
days? Thirty percent? No. Your improvement will begin stacking on top
of itself and after just fifteen days of a relentless commitment to two
percent daily improvement, you will have improved by nearly thirty-five
percent. After thirty and sixty days? Eighty-one and Two Hundred
Twenty-eight percent. The upward trajectory of such compounded
improvement is staggering.
Now
let’s say that you are our slothful friend Mr. Wooden refers to and
would like to take every other day off. We know that people’s skill
levels are dynamic and never static- your skill level is either
improving or degrading. We’ll assume you only degrade half as much on
your lazy days as you improve on your industrious days- one percent.
After fifteen days on this “Intermittent Plan”, you will have improved
by just nine percent compared to thirty-five percent on the Two Percent
Daily Plan. After thirty and sixty days? A comparatively paltry sixteen
and thirty-five percent. By just applying yourself to the best of your
ability each day, you improve by nearly seven times what you do taking
every other day off.
Perhaps you think my Two
Percent Formula too theoretical and
academic to be useful, but it does serve to illustrate the power of
daily, incremental improvement. Your personal
Supporting Data
|
Percent
Improved |
||
|
Day |
Intermittent Plan |
Two
Percent Daily Plan |
|
1 |
2% |
2% |
|
|
.98 |
4.04 |
|
|
2.99 |
6.12 |
|
|
1.97 |
8.24 |
|
5 |
4.01 |
10.41 |
|
|
2.97 |
12.62 |
|
|
5.03 |
14.87 |
|
|
3.98 |
17.17 |
|
|
6.06 |
19.51 |
|
10 |
5 |
22 |
|
|
7.1 |
24.34 |
|
|
6.03 |
26.82 |
|
|
8.15 |
29.36 |
|
|
7.07 |
31.95 |
|
15 |
9.2 |
34.6 |
|
20 |
10.24 |
48.6 |
|
25 |
14.66 |
64 |
|
30 |
15.75 |
81 |
|
35 |
21.61 |
100 |
|
40 |
22.76 |
120.8 |
|
45 |
27.69 |
144 |
|
50 |
28. 9 |
169 |
|
55 |
34.07 |
197 |
|
60 |
35.34 |
228 |
“Whenever
you find something getting done, you find a monomaniac with a mission.”
-
Peter
Drucker
It has been said that one
person with a commitment is worth ninety-nine with only an interest. Unless you are a bored cynic living by the
philosophy of life sucks and then you die, you
probably have much you would like to accomplish and do in this life. It is not just your job to figure out what all
of those things specifically are, but also to determine what is the
single most important thing you want to do, be, or have.
When you focus your
life’s mission on that one thing that is most important, the planets
seem to align in your favor to help you get what you want, and to where
you want to go. Obstacles will arise, but
when you refuse to accept no for an answer, the obstacles will
eventually give up and relent. With this
attitude, not only will you be worth more than any ninety-nine with
only an interest, but the passion and enthusiasm you will generate for
your life’s mission will be infectious. That
will make you worth ninety-nine times the ninety-nine in my book.
- Jeff
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Quotes
"You will not be put in a
position to lead until your life is worth following."
- Rod Jao, Financially
Independent Businessman at Age 19
It is amazing how many
times we get things 180 degrees out of phase in our lives.
I often hear people say things like, “I would be more committed
to my company if the cheapskates would pay me more”.
The law of compensation doesn't work that way.
After you have shown the dedication and commitment, and have
gone the extra mile, your company (or perhaps a rival company if you
keep it up) becomes the agent of the law of compensation and you are
justly compensated. Leadership is much the
same way. Expecting to get your act
together and start acting like a leader after you have been put in a
leadership position is folly. You must
first be someone worth following and then leadership opportunities will
begin springing forth.
- Jeff
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“I alone pull the levers
of my life. No excuses, no blame. I am 100 percent responsible for
where I am today and where I am going tomorrow.”
- Jeff David Young
Most people want to be
happy, successful, and at least reasonably prosperous.
If this is true, why did Henry David Thoreau strike such a nerve
when he made the observation that most men live lives of quiet
desperation? There are many factors that
explain the achievement gap between what people say they want and what
most people end up getting, but I believe one of the most insidious
culprits is the refusal to accept total responsibility for one’s life. Nearly everyone will echo the need for all of
us to exercise personal responsibility in our lives, but then ramble
off a list of people and circumstances to blame to for their failures.
People are only able to
reach their full potential when they have a strong internal locus of
control. This happens when you feel that
you are in control of yourself and your life as opposed to people and
events external to yourself. When you
point fingers, assign blame, and make excuses, what happens is, you
yield control to those people and circumstances you ascribe blame to.
Take that control back by proclaiming that you, and you alone, are
totally responsible for your life.
There will be times in
your life when you are dealt an unfair hand not of your choosing. I did not choose to have ALS, but I have a
choice as to how I will respond to having ALS. It
has forced me to navigate the waters of life different than I otherwise
would, but it will not be an excuse to rob me of my rightful place as
the captain of my life’s ship. You only
have as much control over your life as you take responsibility for-
resolve to take to take 100 percent of both.
- Jeff
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Quotes
“A man should conceive of
a legitimate purpose in his heart, and set out to accomplish it... He
should make this purpose his supreme duty, and should devote himself to
its attainment, not allowing his thoughts to wander away into ephemeral
fancies, longings, and imaginings. This is the royal road to
self-control and true concentration of thought.”
- James Allen, As A Man
Thinketh
Not having the
self-discipline to stay focused is one of the key stumbling blocks to
most peoples’ success. As we grow from
childhood to adulthood, our responsibilities grow exponentially and our
free time shrinks accordingly. This makes
it tough to stay committed and focused on a big undertaking. This is why you need to make your definite
major purpose a “must” instead of a “should”. If
a kidnapper was dangling your son or daughter off a bridge and stating
that if you didn’t make it to the bridge within thirty minutes he would
drop him or her, you’d make it, wouldn’t you? It
would become a must. Make your definite major purpose a burning “must”
and you’ll stay focused and get there.
- Jeff
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Quotes
"It was involuntary; they sank my boat."
-
John F. Kennedy, when asked how he'd become a hero
People often ask me, “How
do you do it?” They are asking me how I
continue to face every day and all the challenges my ALS has brought to
me. The short answer is- I have no choice!
Tomorrow is coming whether I consent to it or not, and I will still be
suffering the ravages of ALS. I suppose I could ruin my life by
concentrating on all I have lost and the difficulties with which I have
to confront everyday life, but what good would that do? I have but one
central decision upon awakening every morning- will I allow ALS to rob
me of the central factor in determining the quality of my life- my
attitudes?
The longer I live, the
more I am convinced that your attitudes will determine the quality of
your life. I am also convinced that mankind has been given complete
control over just one thing in this life- his (or her) own thoughts.
This means that you have the power to choose your attitudes. I DECIDED
a long time ago that I would rise above my circumstances and CHOOSE to
suck the juice out of life and share it with a thirsty world. I had no
choice in contracting ALS; it was involuntary. What is very voluntary
is how I decide to live with it. I am privileged with that choice every
single day.
- Jeff
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“Direction
creates time and frees the brain to think creatively and innovatively.”
- Zig Ziglar
If you have a “ton” of
“stuff” to do, but no specific game plan for achieving your objective,
you will feel overwhelmed and waste a tremendous amount of time before
even getting started. Once started, you
might get some “stuff” done, but unless you have the “stuff”
prioritized, you can bet that at the end of the day, you will feel like
you got little or nothing done.
When you clearly define
your goals and prioritize your activities, you program your left brain. This frees your right brain to exercise its
creativity. Not only does your economy of action and work efficiency
sky rocket, but your clarity of thought begins to crystallize. It is
akin to being lost in an overgrown jungle where after desperately
trying in vain to fight your way out, you are suddenly lifted high
above the forest’s canopy. Free of the blind confusion that comes with
directionless, haphazard activity, everything becomes clear. You now
see where you have been, where you are, and where you need to go. Give
yourself the gift of clarity and start making your precious time and
effort truly count for all it’s capable of.
- Jeff
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Quotes
"The first day that you
do not practice a good habit is the first day that you start a bad
habit."
- Unknown
Life, for the most part,
is a series of habits. Bad habits are
easily formed and most often simply fallen into. Good
habits usually take conscious thought, consistency, and a lot of
self-discipline to develop. Once you break
the pattern of a good habit, how easy is it to slide back into old
negative habits? And how tough is it to
get back into your good habits once you’ve fallen out of them? If you are someone who struggles to maintain a
diet or exercise schedule, you know exactly what I’m talking about.
When you develop a set of
habits, you steer your life in a direction that will eventually become
your destiny. You will either consciously choose your destiny by
getting hyper clear on exactly what you want in life and develop a set
of habits that supports that destination, or you will most likely fall
into a pattern of behavior that leaves you confused and frustrated
about what you are doing, why you are doing it, and where life is
taking you. This is not a place you want to end up. Once you have
developed a set of habits that will put you in alignment with the
destiny you have decided must be yours, turn neither to the right nor
to left. Keep in mind just how difficult it will be to recapture these
good habits once you’ve let them go, and refuse to start the bad habit
of not practicing a good habit. This is a
habit you want nothing to do with.
- Jeff
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“It’s
not what others do to keep you down; it’s what you do to keep yourself
up.”
- Chris, African American
talk radio caller
One afternoon I was
listening to a popular radio talk show, when the subject of racial
discrimination was being discussed. An African American woman called to
weigh in on the subject. She spoke about the discrimination she had
faced in her life in a very matter of fact and care free tone. There
was something so uplifting and triumphant in the way this woman spoke
that I stopped what I was doing to make sure I concentrated on every
word she uttered. Then in one clean swipe of the tongue, she summarily
dismissed the impact of the injustice she had suffered by imparting one
of the most poignant lessons one can learn. In an unmistakably
empowered spirit, she proclaimed, “It’s not what others do
to keep you down; it’s what you do to keep yourself up.”
As a white male, I won’t
pretend to know what it is to suffer from racial or ethnic bias, nor do
I know what it is to be a woman in a man’s world. I do know, however,
what it is to be mocked, ridiculed, and discriminated against because
of my disabilities. Imagine calling a friend’s business and asking for
him only to be told in a mock intoxicated voice to call back after I’ve
“had few more.” Or perhaps it would be more pleasant to have a group of
children walk alongside you giggling as the pack leader mimics your
severely disturbed gait. I’ve been manhandled, and roughly tossed out
of a nightclub because bouncers mistook my disability for severe
intoxication. My personal least favorite is when a well meaning
individual assumes difficulty with speech is synonymous with mental
deficiency and hearing loss, pats me on the head or shoulder, and
speaks slowly and loudly to make sure I understand the simplistic
concept they are attempting to convey. But the most demeaning treatment
of all is when people simply pretend you don’t exist so they won’t have
to deal with you.
Like Chris, I understand
discrimination. But like this triumphant woman, I also understand that
what is inside of me, and how I see myself has far more impact on my
destiny and the quality of my life than any thought, opinion, or action
of anyone outside of myself. If the obstacles are higher, then I will
just throw my heart up further over the bar so the rest of me can
follow. I have trouble speaking- I give speeches. I am confined to a
wheelchair- I coach football. With no job, no money, and a terminal
illness, I won a custody battle with an involved mother. Never let the
ignorant opinions of others affect your opinion of you, because it is
impossible to consistently act inconsistent with the way you see
yourself. Regardless of who or what tries to keep you down, ultimately,
victory or defeat will be determined by what you do to keep yourself up.
- Jeff
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Quotes
"Never
mistake activity for accomplishment."
-
John Wooden
To the surprise of many,
I rarely feel sadness, pessimism, helplessness, or hopelessness. The negative emotion that often plagues me is
frustration. As one might imagine, I feel
frustrated over many things, but the worse source of frustration
derives from the feeling of not getting anything done. When I explain
this to people, they are often stunned. They see me working feverously
from the time I get up to the time I go to bed and rightfully comment
that I have been getting all kinds of things done.
The implication is that I should be happy with the results
because of my effort and that it is time to just give myself a break. In light of what I have to fight through
everyday, this is a reasonable assessment. Yet,
I often feel vacant at the end of the day due to a lack of
accomplishment on my major objective in life.
There is an old saying: If you get up every morning and the first
thing you do is eat a live frog, you can have the satisfaction of
knowing that it is probably the worst thing that will happen to you all
day. Your frog is the task or activity that will contribute most to
the long-term success and happiness of your family and yourself. We all need to eat that frog first thing to
avoid getting “caught up” with daily life and neglect our single most
priority. For various reasons, I often end up busying myself with
legitimately urgent activity all day long, but fail to eat my frog- my
writing. When this happens, I feel
frustrated, angry, and extremely discouraged. By contrast, when I eat
my frog and put my head on the pillow at day’s end knowing that I have
made real accomplishment towards my definite major purpose, I feel
blissfully content.
I have some sad news- you will never get caught up on all you have to do in life. Knowing this, you had better learn to focus on, and put your energy into the top priority in your life. If you don’t, you will mistake activity for accomplishment, continue to chase your tail, and end up wondering what in the heck you have been killing yourself over. I know, I do it do it far too much.
- JeffLast
football season, many of my readers asked if I would share my letters
to my players in my daily messages so all could benefit from the
concepts they convey. After much discussion with Coach Coury, we
decided it was in the best interest of the team to keep these letters
private amongst the team. I have, however, gone through some of the
letters and pulled the concepts out in a way that keeps the privacy of
our Laker family intact, but allows all of you to participate in the
concepts I share with our players. This is one of these concepts.
“Vision
without action is merely a dream. Action without vision just passes the
time. Vision with action can change the world.”
- Joel A.
Barker
Every
great accomplishment was, in its infancy, a dream. Before skyscrapers
were erected, or the airplane took flight, they were but dreams. They
were dreams in the hearts and minds of men that dared believe, with
unparalleled conviction, that their vision was bigger than any
obstacle, any criticism, and or setback they could face. Nothing would
deter these men from turning their visions to reality – nothing. Most
people have dreams of one form or another, even if they have lost
belief their ability to make them become reality. My question for you
is- has your dream crystallized into a vision?
A
dream is the chrysalis of a vision. It is the beginning stage of what
becomes one’s destiny. It is the opening up of the imagination to a
possibility so profound and so enticing that you no longer want the
realization of that possibility- you need it. It becomes a desire so
intense, so consuming, that you cannot help but walk it, talk it, eat
it, and sleep it. It becomes so much a part of what you are about as to
become indistinguishable from who you are. When
your dream reaches a level of conviction that your mind can no longer
fathom the possibility of an outcome other than the full and complete
realization of that dream, then, and only then, do you have a vision.
Do you have a dream, or have you caught a vision?
If
your vision is large and profound, a mere dream will not be enough to
complete your mission. A mere dream leaves room for wishing and hoping
and is therefore susceptible to the cancer of doubt.
A vision is a commitment to the creation of a reality so real to
you that hope and wish fulfillment are completely out of place, and
doubt can find no pathway of entry. It is a done deal. All that remains
is the price in blood, sweat, and tears to be paid. When you have truly
caught a
vision, you will have no problem
paying that price.
- Jeff
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Quotes
“A journey
of a thousand leagues begins with a single step.”
- Confucius
I lament how many times I
have seen people repeatedly postpone starting a project, claiming that
they are simply gathering their ducks in a row. Many
of these people refuse to answer the starting bell so many times that
they become tone deaf and after a while don’t even hear it anymore. Even more disturbing is the fact that often
times that person has been me.
What makes us paralyzed
when facing an important project, one that is perhaps even the major
objective of our lives? For some it is a
fear of failure, for others, paradoxically, a fear of success. I think the biggest reason, however, is that
within our busy lives, digging into a behemoth of a goal just looks
like too daunting a task this week, maybe next week it will look
smaller. Does it ever get smaller? No, usually it begins to grow in weight on our
shoulders as we realize that we have done nothing toward our major
objective. If this keeps up long enough,
we either give up the goal, or we shove it to the back of our minds
where it won’t bother us and we kid ourselves that we will get to it
soon.
What can we do to stop
putting off the most important thing we must do? The
short answer is to dive in and merely get some momentum going. You might not know what the hell you are
doing, but you will at least be in the water dog paddling until you
figure out how to swim. If we don’t, we
are likely to stand at the edge of the pool forever. Knowing that this
project is not going to get done by next week or even next month, break
the project down into small, bite size pieces and dive in.
You might need to wander around in the dark for a while until
you get your bearings, but at least you’ll be wandering.
Once you are on the journey, you’ll get your compass straight,
and those baby steps will soon start adding up. You’ll get some
confidence and momentum going, and those monstrous thousand leagues
will begin shrinking.
- Jeff
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“With the majority, the
bark of thought is allowed to “drift” upon the ocean of life.
Aimlessness is a vice, and such drifting must not continue for him who
would steer clear of catastrophe and destruction.“
- James Allen, As A Man
Thinketh
Don’t fool yourself into
thinking that living with clearly defined goals and a real purpose is
somehow akin to not being able to relax and enjoy life.
Aimless drifting is a trap. Stay
out of the trap! Life is about living with
meaning and purpose and not about merely stimulating oneself with
pleasure. Don’t believe me?
Watch an episode of COPS and tell me what you think the central
purposes of these people’s lives are. When
people are merely adrift in life and don’t know where they are going,
they are certain not to get anywhere they want to be.
Eventually people just give up. Don’t
let this happen to you. Half of a
successful journey is just knowing where you are going.
“What comes out of you
when you are squeezed is what is inside you.”
- Wayne Dyer
Before my life had a
chance to get untracked, I was dealt the severe blow of being told it
was essentially over due to one of this world’s most virulent diseases-
ALS. It did not take a lot of introspection to figure out that I was
going to quickly find out what I was made of. Although I feel certain
that I have acquitted myself at least reasonably well to date, the
squeeze is not done with me. While past behavior is the best indicator
of future behavior, I’m constantly being squeezed with new challenges
and many of them compound the earlier challenges. It remains to be seen
how I will respond to future squeezing, but I am well aware that it is
my character on trial.
How do you respond when
life puts the screws to you? Do you wilt, lash out, or perhaps even
spin out of control? What if you understood that with every adversity
comes the seed of an equal or greater benefit? When life puts the
squeeze on you and hands you lemons, is what comes out of you lemonade?
It is not healthy to live in perpetual crisis mode, however, crisis
does create invaluable opportunity for growth and change. I am
convinced that autopilot is the natural state of mankind and that is
tragic. If you are on autopilot, perhaps you could do with a little
crisis to rattle you out of your slumber and wake you up to all the
possibility life is dangling right in front of your nose. You might
find God’s purpose for your life gift wrapped in the harshest set of
circumstances you could imagine. When this package shows up, try
looking.
- Jeff
“Victory
belongs to the most persevering.”
~ Napoleon
Bonaparte
When my
daughter was born in 1989, I had already outlived the doctor’s
prognosis by a couple years. Shortly
after, I made the determination that I would watch my daughter graduate
from high school. Thursday night this
happened. Against the nature of my
illness, it was an absurd thought to think I could possibly live that
long. Abusurdity aside, I determined that
it must happen and I knew the Grim Reaper would be in overdrive to see
that my plans were foiled.
About nine
years into my illness I remember asking my neurologist if there was a
possiblity of a medical breakthrough that would reverse the damage
already done by my ALS. She could see no
scenario under which that could happen. I
smiled and confidently stated there would be such a breakthrough and
that I was going to hang around long enough to be the beneficiary of
that breakthrough. She smiled sweetly as
if to say, “I admire your fighting spirit, but that just ain’t gonna
happen.” It is going to happen, and now, unlike then, we can see the
ground being laid for such a breakthrough with research like that done
with stem cells.
“Your outer life is a
mirror image of your inner life. Everywhere you look, there you are.”
- The Law of
Correspondence
Are you happy with the
results you are getting in life? Not
everyone starts out in life with the same advantages and disadvantages,
and there is no question that the bad breaks in life are not handed out
evenly. However, if you are consistently
disappointed, in trouble, or fouling things up, it is not because God
has it in for you. It is because your
outer world is conforming to the way you see and feel about yourself,
others, and the world at large. Likewise,
the person with the Midas touch is not the recipient of God’s
prejudicial favor; he or she is someone who is continually feeding life
with the correct input in order to get their desired output. Their circumstances are an outward expression
of the way they habitually think and feel.
I have an incredible
amount of true and sincere friends that care deeply about me. Did God just decide to select me to be the
random recipient of a heavenly gift? There
isn’t a shred of doubt in my mind that His divine providence determined
that the paths of my friends and my own would cross, but if I was sour
and bitter about my condition, and saw the world and the people in it
as self-absorbed and uncaring, would they really be in my life today? Life is built from the inside out and the
foundation is laid with a decision. You
can choose to be happy, or you can choose to be sad.
You can choose to be a positive, uplifting influence on those
around you, or you can be the bane of their existence.
If you are ever to have the life you desire; you must first take
responsibility for the architect, contractor, and construction laborer
of you life. No one else can, because
these people all reside in the mirror.
- Jeff
"Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among the stars."
- Les Brown
Let’s say you set your
life’s ambition to become president of the
I don’t know exactly when Robert Joseph Dole decided to set his sights
on the White House, but if he had decided to play life safe and avoid
disappointment by only targeting easily attainable objectives, do you
think he would have put together the impressive list of achievements
above? Dream big dreams, set lofty goals. The process of stretching to
reach these dreams and goals will open doors you may never have even
imagined existed. Besides, does common sense not tell us you will go
further attempting to walk one hundred miles than setting your goal at
one mile? If you shoot for the moon, you’re bound to land somewhere
amongst the stars
- Jeff
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History is made at night.
Character is what you are in the dark.
- Lord John Whorfin
The Merriam-Webster
Dictionary defines character as follows: the complex of
mental and ethical traits marking and often individualizing a person,
group, or nation. Whether you are
making history as Abraham Lincoln or Adolf Hitler, your deeds are the
natural extension of your character as a human being.
One of these men did not wake up one morning and decide to
become a genocidal maniac, nor was the other the passive recipient of
conscience and moral leadership. Both of
these men had long been chiseling their characters out of the thoughts
they dwelled upon, the emotions they harbored in their hearts, and
their choices of responses to their experiences in life.
- Jeff
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“Do you respond to life
or are you merely reacting to it?“
- Zig Ziglar
When life puts the screws
to you, do you react or respond? Reacting is negative because it takes
control out of your hands and usually involves a sort of lashing out at
the cause or the world in general. Responding, on the other hand, often
involves making the best out of a bad situation, or, if you are wise
and pragmatic, turning your lemons into lemonade.
The best way to turn
adversity on its head and convert it to advantage is via the
application of questions. Usually when calamity strikes you’ll get your
underwear tied in knots, spew a few curse words, and if any questions
are asked, they resemble, “Why does this always happen to me? “, or,
“Why did this have to happen now?“ These questions will have you
chasing your tail in a fury of negative energy to no possible positive
end. What if, instead, you asked a question that presupposes a positive
reason for the unsavory hand you’ve been dealt, like, “What is God
trying to make me understand by giving me this challenge?”, or, even
more positively assertive, “Where is the opportunity in this situation,
and how can I turn it into a blessing in disguise?“
Reacting to trouble with
negative questions guarantees a negative answer and probably an adverse outcome. Responding
to misadventure with questions that presuppose a positive reason for
its occurrence and an expectation of positive resolve will yield a
vastly different outcome and make all the difference.
“You got to
taste the sour to appreciate the sweet”.
Jason Lee,
Vanilla Sky
As I watched this film, these words rifled up
and down my spine and radiated throughout my soul.
What statement could be truer? Who
respects and appreciates a glass of cool water more, Donald Trump high
atop his
As I reflect upon my life, it has been tough
to be sure, and while I would jump at the chance to have my ALS
removed, I would not want to remove the struggle I have been through. It has strengthened my character, stiffened my
resolve, and taught me innumerable life lessons I could have gotten no
other way, including the gratitude for the simplest of life’s
privileges. Do you suppose God owes you a
long, happy, healthy life? He does not. For all of the sour I have tasted in this
life, it has only served to heighten my appreciation for the sweet. For this, I am indeed grateful.
- Jeff
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"There is nothing like a
dream to create the future. Utopia today,
flesh and blood tomorrow."
- Victor Hugo
As I look around this
room I am in, it is a powerful reminder of the principle stated above.
In the early 1990s, my bedroom was in sore need of a remodel. My
bedroom must serve as my office as well as my bedroom and must also be
accommodative of my special needs. At the time, the room was a
hodgepodge of furniture, makeshift shelves and storage space, office
equipment, etc. It was a functional disaster for my needs and plain ol’
butt ugly.
I decided to take the
principle above to heart and design the room I wanted. I thought about
the equipment I had and didn’t have, but wanted. I thought about the
functionality needed and the aesthetic appeal desired. I sat down and
married my needs, wants, and desires with my imagination and forged a
blueprint on the computer of what I determined I would have. I made up
my mind that this was a done deal – it absolutely was going to happen.
I hadn’t a penny to my name, nor a clue how to pull this project off.
From my list of goals for 1993, I copy and paste the following edict to
myself with date for completion:
REDESIGN
BEDROOM
It took four years from
conception to completion, and the funding came from a source I could
never have imagined, but I write this from the very room I designed and
determined to have all those years ago.
There is nothing more
exciting and faith building than to stake out a goal, draw up a
detailed plan, put that plan into action, and then watch that dream or
goal materialize in front of your eyes. If you want to generate
confidence in your life, set a goal and refuse to accept defeat in
reaching that goal. Start small and as your successes pile up, your
confidence will snowball. Soon enough you will not recognize that
unconfident person of little faith that used to occupy your body.
- Jeff
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“Do not go where the path
may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
(1803-1882)
This quotation is more
than just a call to leadership, it is a proclamation of a fundamental
principle for success. Common sense tells
us there is not enough room at the top for everyone, so how will you
get there if you are merely one of the herd?
In
I would always take the
extra step to try to put some distance between myself and my fellow
students. It usually took about six months
to move from the beginning class to the intermediate class and another
six months to the advanced class. While my
health cut short my pursuit of an acting career, I was moved from the
beginning class directly into the advanced class in just over 3 months. It takes a bold strike against the grain to be
successful, so stay out of the complacency trap simply because that’s
what everyone else is doing. Let others
try to follow in the trail that you blaze.
- Jeff
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“You
must write for the waste basket.”
- Johnny Mercer
When you see the above
quotation, does Mr. Mercer’s point immediately strike you? Why would a
writer write for the waste basket? Johnny Mercer hailed from a small
town in southeastern
Hours before I wrote what
you are now reading, I saw an interview with the late George Harrison
of Beatles fame. He spoke of the difficulty he had in breaking through
the monopoly of the Lennon/McCartney song writing duo to get his
material on Beatles records. He admitted to being somewhat intimidated
when first presenting his songs to the band simply because John and
Paul had “already gotten their bad ones out of the way.” Are you
following the simple genius of writing for the waste basket? Developing
the ability to write some of the most memorable music in history was
more a function of getting garbage fit for the waste basket written and
out of the way than it was any level of innate giftedness. Even Lennon
and McCartney acknowledged their superiority to
“Never, never, never give
up.”
Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)
People often look at me
and say, “He’s such a strong person. He’s
just so strong.” I know this, I hear them. They’re right- I’ve had to be.
But even the strongest cable will snap if more and more weight
is constantly applied to it. My life is
hard. I must rely on others for even the
most simple and mundane tasks, or struggle mightily to accomplish them
myself. Sometimes it gets overwhelming. I rarely let it show and almost never
complain, but sometimes it feels too much to endure.
I confess to wanting to
quit and have even fantasized from time to time about going home to be
with the Lord, bask in a new and glorified body. Then I remember that I have a teenage daughter
that needs me. I remember that God has allowed this disease to ravage
me for a purpose that has not yet been fulfilled. I
have a message to take to the world that most people have not yet heard. I realize that I have no business giving up. I will stay and I will fight and God’s purpose
for my life will be fulfilled. I will
never, never, never give up- neither should you.
- Jeff
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