Tag: Audacious

Five A Day Blogger Explosion

To Serve, To Strive, and not To Yield
To Serve, To Strive, and not To Yield

In March 2009, just ten short months ago, I made a promise – a 100-day challenge.

Have you ever made important promises, big promises, promises that you could almost taste the life-changing benefits?

Some call it dreaming big dreams.  Walt Disney, one of my heroes, was like that. But Walt Disney also had something different.

He had drive. And Walt Disney did what he set out to do. And Walt turned a deaf ear to the multitudes who called him crazy.

Walt Disney did things others said were impossible. When I set out to write five daily blogs for 100 days, not even I could imagine what it’s turned into.

Here we are, not 50 blog posts later, not 100, not 500 blog posts later, not 1,000 either, but over 1,500 blog posts – in ten short months.

It is quite literally a Five-A-Day Blogger explosion.

PS.  Who would you rather listen to:

  1. A big-time dreamer?
  2. A big-time dreamer and a big-time doer?

Audacious, antagonistic, insightful, servant.

Here’s Why I’m Right

The title here will ruffle some feathers and simultaneously, get others to cheer.  Why?  Because, as the 1960’s psychedelic rock band The Doors summed up in one of their songs, “People are strange.”

One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.  You get the point.

So how does working seven days a week lend itself to balance?

First, the big picture intent is to NOT work seven days a week.  When the early pioneering Americans had a vison to become farmers, they spent countless hours clearing the land.  We can’t even comprehend the hardships they endured.

Every time I fly and look out the window, I imagine America, long before it was tamed – covered with trees and forests for as far as the eye can see.

What I’m doing now, working seven days a week is this:

  • Working to become a world-class professional speaker
  • Establishing processes to teach our son “life’s big four”
  • Preparing a metaphorical “hurricane disaster plan”
  • Preparing for the responsibility that comes with aging parents
  • Figuring out how to become a speaker, author, mentor of choice
  • Working to hear, “Well done”

The reason some succeed over others, is that successful people outwork the others.  This shouldn’t surprise anyone.  It’s a basic survival of the fittest, of the smartest, of the most creative, etc.

So, in summary, I’m clearing a hostile land, cutting down trees, digging up roots, making piles to burn, removing boulders, caring for sick animals, hunting for food, building shelter from the seasonally harsh climate, dealing with the emotional loss of my home state or mother country, protecting my family from wild animals and unknown diseases.

So really, if you don’t come from a lineage of hand-me-down success or riches, you have got to out work the competition.

Don’t beleive me?  Try and do it any other way.

Seth Godin’s Top Book Picks

Seth Godin announced his November Top Book picks. Click here.

Most people, like I was three months ago, are clueless who Seth Godin is.

If you are serious about your career, and committed to becoming better at your leadership performance, and especially your leadership thinking, you better should become familiar with Seth Godin.

I first read Purple Cow (about being remarkable) and now Tribes (about, well, stay tuned).

Seth Godin is also on You Tube and you can start to see how refreshingly different, and amazingly brilliant, his thinking is.

But wait. I almost forgot. Most humans (like 90%) are not proactively seeking change.  Leaders say they embrace change, but how often do you see leaders transforming themselves and others?

Wasn’t Looking for This

Writing five blogs every day has wonderful, and may I audaciously say, transformational benefits.  Far beyond what was ever thought possible.  And yet….

What comes along with the good – and everyone knows this as a “truth” – is the bad.  The bad in this case is writers block.  My first little bout came and went a few days ago.  It lasted a couple days.  Triggered mostly by time pressures, not lack of desire.

Anyway, following a daily routine of scanning Facebook, Twitter, LnkedIn, blogs, etc, I stumbled upon a LinkedIn status update.

Susan Harrow’s article, Changing Your Body Changes Your Self, is definitely worth a quick read.  Why?  Because she speaks about what is common knowledge, but not common practice.

One of the best ways to change our bodies is to use common sense. One of the best ways to use common sense is to focus on it every day. Ya with me?  Every single day.  Period.  Carpe diem.