jungle jeff

People Talk About You All The Time

Balance can ruin a career, and it can save a career.

I heard a story about Walt Disney’s wife, secretary and even his physician, all saying, “Walt, you need to get a hobby or you’ll work yourself into an early grave.”

Having the distraction of a hobby can actually make you sharper, more focused, more creative, more observant.

And if your hobby not only fuels your passion, but also teaches you more than you could have ever imagined, imagine that!

People who study Walt Disney’s life know that he was labeled by many as crazy.  And that he insisted on nothing short of perfection. Always aim for perfection he’d say, and settle for excellence.

This is how life works. We face countless challenges. People may call us crazy, demanding.

They may also call us passionate, purposeful, visionary.

A real, work life saver.

The Road To Excellence Has No Finish Line

We see it everyday, don’t we?

Everywhere you look, people are trying to sell us easy, quick and painless solutions.

Come on people. When are we going to wake up?

Know what the ultimate short cut is?

If I have to tell you, you won’t understand or believe it.

You’re going to have to figure it out for yourself.

Fortune What?

Finding our passion and pursuing our dreams with sheer determination is something we all dream about.

When is the best time to ease off the dreaming and ramp up the doing? It really depends. There’s so much to consider. So much to take into account.

Have you given up?

Eventually, most people give up. I almost did too. Then a small child was born. He changed my life and my purpose. He was and is the catalyst that inspires me to work tirelessly.

Over time, my five daily blogs have slowly, but surely been getting better. It’s funny sometimes, to think that many readers have no idea how hard I work in my professional position with a Fortune 100 company.

All this blogging is extra. Ya with me? Extra. What are you doing that’s extra? That’s hard?  That’s difficult? That you love so much you can’t stop?

My blogs are so basic and simple it’s almost embarrassing.  When there’s some “spare” time, I’ll be looking to take another step to jazz up the blogs.  I’ll be clicking here for more WordPress Theme tips.

Do you let what you can’t do stop you from what you can?

Mistake or Gift?

Speaking of leadership with it’s titles, status, perks, benefits, bonuses, responsibility, accountability, opportunities…

This “bonus” (today’s second post) jungle jeff blog post shares my response to a faithful jungle jeff reader.

We are all leaders.  Every last one of us. Even if it doesn’t seem so.

We all travel through life with the exact same “currency” – time.

Mistakes are gifts.

Past mistakes become worse when we don’t open them up as the gifts they are, and reflect on the reason they happened, and the opportunity they represent.

To me, failure is never opening the gift.

The gift-giver is actually ourselves. If we cannot thank ourselves for our mistakes – our opportunities – we lose.

Stay strong, dig deep, find quiet space, and open your gift.

Then send yourself a thank you note

Money Tree?

Look at all these things we have to do:

• Buy Insurance
• Buckle our Seat Belt
• Say Thank You
• Brush Our Teeth
• Be Nice to Others
• Lock Our Doors Before Bedtime
• Do a Great Job at Work
• Blah, blah, blah

But, ask us to think about our personal vision statement, and you might as well ask us if we can grow a money tree.

Why is that?  Am I missing something?

“If you’re not going to come into the office on Thanksgiving Day, don’t even bother coming in on Christmas day”, the overworked, underpaid leader stated to the others on her team.

The Beatles got it right, didn’t they – “Eight Days A Week”.

This is a good time to be working harder than you ever have before.  I know firsthand, and some think I’m crazy, but I work seven days a week. And have for a long time.

Ain’t braggin’.  Just stating the facts.  And sometimes I wish the week had eight days. But mostly, an extra day just to sleep.

Hope you have an extraordinary week of hard work. We reap what we sow. This is the time to be out-working your competition. When others are ready to give up, it’ll be your opportunity to shine.

jungle jeff, Daily reflections on Excellence, has an overarching theme.  Money.

As I teach our son about life’s four big quadrants, jungle jeff’s blog is focused on only one.  Money.

Money is not the root of all evil. It is the love of money that is the root.

Whatever you believe, I’m teaching our son that every human should contribute to society in some way.  In return, society pays you with money, generally speaking.

With money, you can buy food, shelter, insurance, transportation, and even use money to help others.

And one more thing I’m trying to teach him, “He is rich who owes nothing.” — Hungarian Proverb

jungle jeff MBA.  Who woulda thought, after all these years, I’d be returning to school to get an MBA?

Why do people return to school after decades of real-world leadership experience?  Many reasons to be sure.

The main reason is the pursuit of a better way of life.  Can you imagine, “Nope, heading back to school because I have all this extra time and money.  Plus, I’m bored stiff just sitting around”?.

Dude, seriously, we need to talk.  It don’t happen like this.  In fact, my story is almost a fairy tale of a completely different sort.

My professor is crazy.  He’s cool, but tough.  On the first day, he told me everyone who attends his class has three years to do something that no other MBA requires….

“Money, Money, Money….Money“.  The O’Jays, 1974, For The Love of Money.

I want to make a ton of money.  Seriously.  Enough to buy whatever I want.

First on my list:

1. A Cure for Crohn’s disease

To take action, – to “put my money where my mouth is” – I’ve returned to school to earn my MBA.

Maybe that’ll be second on the list – pay off school loans.

Money.  Can’t live with it, can’t live without it.  Money has always been my biggest stressor.

Eventually, I learned a very simple and very profound rule.  It is the first rule that should be learned.

• Spend less than you earn

What made this most basic of rules so elusive for me, is that I did not subscribe to common sense.  A million reasons for that, which I’ll not even attempt to address.

The second rule I learned is have a business.  After reading “Rich Dad Poor Dad” last Christmas, my whole mindset about money was changed forever….