Clarity

To bridge the gap between a goal/dream and your current reality, you must be clear on both.

How did you get here?  What did you think and do or not do to create your current reality?  (Most people will blame someone or something else.)

What do you want exactly?  (Most people cannot answer that question.)

Without clarity, you will be a wandering generality.

You did this

Look at your life. 

This is what your thinking, actions, and habits were perfectly set up to produce.

Cause and effect.

If you want something different or better, you have to change how you are thinking and what you are doing.

Adversity builds strength

The schools around here closed for a few half days because it was “too hot”.  Our kids are learning that when it gets tough, fold your cards and go home.

Of course, there will be challenges to come far, far more difficult than that.

“It is in the most difficult of times, metaphorically fighting the battles of life, that we often gain the most valuable wisdom of all.” -Marcus Aurelieus

What have you learned from the most difficult times of your life?  Tell us with the orange comment button.

You gotta do what you gotta do…

You gotta do what you gotta do, until you can do what you want to do.

You’ll never be able to do what you want to do, unless you do what you gotta do really well.

Be tough on you.

For many years, and even now, each day I made sure I did what I had to to get better, not mess up, and live up to my commitments, and more.  I learned how to do this better and better, especially by making mistakes.  I made it a habit.  Then the habit of being self-disciplined made it easier to be self-disciplined.

If you are tough on yourself, then life, work, and other people will be far easier on you.

If you want independence, you have to be self-disciplined.

Independence

“I’ll walk where my own nature would be leading: it vexes me to choose another guide.” – Emily Bronte

“The first of earthly blessings, independence.” – Edward Glenn

“If you are not your own agent, you are someone else’s.” – Alice E. Molley

“There is no support so strong as the strength that enables one to stand alone.” – Ellen Glasgow

Notes on High School

“I have a friend whose theory is that you’re from wherever you went to high school.  I think that is mostly true.” – Steven Soderbergh

“High school – those are your prime suffering years.  They don’t get better suffering than that.” – Steve Carrell

“In high school, my desire for friendship outweighed my talent for it.” – Beth Kephart

“Friends aren’t any more important than breath or blood to a high school senior. – Betty Ford

“We spend our whole lives recovering from high school.” – Paula Danziger

Standing on the backs of giants

“A wise man can learn from the mistakes of others; a fool can’t learn from his own.” -Will Durant

If you are to get ahead you must learn from others – from what they have learned the hard way, the expensive way, and the long way.  By doing this you can learn the quick, easy, cheap way.

Read.  Listen to them.  Try things intelligently with this knowledge.

“You must learn from others.  You’ll never live long enough to learn it all yourself.” – Kip Kopmeyer

Quit drinking sugar

(The war on sugar continues…)

You may eat well, but do you drink well?

Soda, fruit juice, beer, wine, gatorade, iced tea…. it’s all loaded with sugar.

Best to drink water most of the time – don’t you think?

Changing your life

How you see changing your life makes a huge difference.

You can see it as a chore you have to go through, or as a gift you are giving yourself.

Do you prefer chores or opening gifts?

Are you consistent?

Let’s say I was traveling every day.  For two days I go north, then I accidentally veer off and go east for three days.  Then I change my mind and go southwest for five days, until I get distracted and go southeast for six days.  Then I refocus and start going north again for five days, until I think about going west, and do for eight days.  

Where am I?

Conversely, my friend set a clear direction (after careful informed thought), and started going north, and kept going north for a long time. 

Where is he?

Have you been going the same worthy direction for a long time?  Or have you changed directions a lot and not gone too far? 

Practice courage

“It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that things are difficult.” -Seneca

Do you step out of your comfort zone often?

Do more than you are paid to do

“If you do more than you are paid to do, you will eventually be paid for what you do” – Zig Ziglar

To put this to the test, who would pay you more if you did less than or just what you are paid to do now?

Sir John Templeton on Freedom….

Remarks by Sir John Templeton at Atlas Network, Sept 2001 –

To begin, let’s think back.  The idea has been going on since civilization started thousands of years ago, that the government should be a dictatorship.  Only very recently have we gotten away from the concept that everything should be determined by the king, emperor, or by the pope.  Only now do we have some freedom.

It was only two centuries ago that the great book on this subject was written by Adam Smith called An Inquiry into the Causes of the Wealth of Nations.  And now, only two centuries later – in our own lifetime, in fact – this great struggle between mental control from the top and freedom has been won.  It has been won by freedom.

And the reason it’s been won in most areas of the world is because of the people who fought for it.  But even today among some scholarly academics, there remains some feeling that somehow top-down dictatorship from the government can enrich the poor.  Also, there is a rather subconscious feeling that somehow free competition can lead to selfishness, not to ethics and spirituality.

We must understand the benefits for all people worldwide by keeping government very small, and by continually opening wider the incentives for invention, efficiency, and discovery – all of which result from free competition.

Invention and creativity are rewarded under free competition, which is a major reason why free competition enriches the poor.  Likewise, freedom to change jobs enriches the poor.

Let me point out some very obvious reasons why free enterprise is the best way yet invented to enrich the poor and also the best way yet invented to teach good character.

Let’s look at just three clear comparisons among neighbor nations, one under socialism and the neighbor with free competition.  The first, South Korea whose standard of living is over three times that of socialist North Korea, just since they separated less than 50 years ago.  Secondly Florida, which borders on Cuba, has over ten times the standard of living as people in socialist Cuba.  And third, Switzerland, whose standard of living is now 20 times what it is in those countries that have remained socialist, such as Belarus and Ukraine.

These are so clear and obvious, but it is not yet widely understood by all of the acedemics.  We must help the acedemics see that free competition is on their side.  They all want to help the poor.  They all want to teach ethics, and free competition is their best tool.  Just ask any people who vote for bureaucracy, as many do, why so many millions of poor people with experience under socailism want to emigrate to free nations.  Whereas almost no one tries to emigrate out of the free nations, and almost no one tries to immigrate into a socialist nation.  Those things are so simple and easy to understand.

Turning now to the evidence that free competition may is effective in teaching ethics – common sense will tell you that unless you treat your customer and your employees better than your competitor does, they will go to your  competitors.  Unless you and your enterprise build a reputation for reliability and honesty, your customers will go elsewhere.

Better service to customers brings you more customers.  Now if these few concepts could be put across to the great minds in acedemia it would be a huge advance for freedom, creativity and innovation in the world. 

Invictus

At the second to last pit, I said to my team “See you at the next pit”.  “OK”.  Sometimes when you’re in a hurry there is not good communication.  They decided to skip the last pit and go right to the finish line to get there before I did.  (Remember they had to drive 520 miles like did.  That’s a long way!)  I should have said, “See you at the next pit where I will need clear goggles”.  They would have said, “You better take them now”.  

I had tinted mirrored goggles on to shield me from the harsh desert sun, but it was getting dark now.  When I arrive at a pit I pull into the gas stop (independent from them) and they are usually there.  The deal is that if they are not there I keep going.  What am I going to do – wait for them?  This is a race!

My tracker was working intermittently (as many friends found out – sorry I know you were worried) and they could not tell where I was either.  I took off out of the pit and it got darker and darker.  It was like wearing sunglasses when driving at night – except if I missed seeing one rock it could be lights out for me.  I heard little tick tick ticks against my helmet.  Was it raining?  It did rain on and off around me during the afternoon – you could see it falling from the clouds in the distance.  But no, it was bugs; swarms of bugs hitting my helmet and goggles making little noises.

This is the worst time for that because I wanted to take my goggles off.  So long as I wasn’t in dust and not going so fast, it should be okay.  I was in a technical rick section so speed was slower.  I left my goggles on for a while longer hoping to ride out of the buggy area.  I tried taking my goggles off, riding with them dangling from my arm.  The little bug swarms came and went.  I slowed and squinted.  It was getting darker by the minute and I didn’t want to put those dark lenses on again.  

A perfect day so far, until now.  I was going so slow because of lost vision.  There were patches of fans on the side of the course watching.  I thought about pulling over and asking some UTV guys to trade goggles.  I should have.  I put mine back on because my eyes were full of dang little bugs.  I descended in elevation slowly because of the bad vision.  Finally, I had to take them off again.  Less bugs here.  I brought it into the finish in 13 1/2 hours in third place.

My knee held up.  No issues.  A pretty good race.

In my 59-year-old mind, who had a rough two years with knee replacement recovery, at least to do what I was accustomed to doing, I thought – “I was back”.

Invictus.

Vegas to Reno

On August 18 I entered a 520-mile race across the Nevada desert on a motorcycle – “Vegas to Reno”.  I had done this race before in 2020 and did well.  The terrain is not as difficult as the terrain in Baja Mexico where I have raced many times before, so you can go faster on average.  

It was the longest race since my knee replacement 2 1/2 years ago, and I was looking forward to the test – not just of my knee, but my fitness, as I cannot work out like I used to; no running, and caution overall.

There were 15 in my class.  It was an Ironman Class – meaning solo, no teammates.  I started 12th.  It’s great when there is little or no drama.  Drama means things probably didn’t go well.

There were 13 pits where I could get gas and see my chase team at many of them.  My wife Marie, daughter Jasmine, and son Liam would be chasing with the mechanics – the kids seeing their first race.  It was really cool to share the experience.  

I was worried about the dust.  It’s so thick with bikes starting every 30 seconds at dawn when there is no wind, that you have to slow down to a crawl because you can’t see.  You get that feeling you get when you walk with your eyes closed, waiting to hit something.  But this morning there was a little intermittent breeze, and I knew as the sun came up it would get stronger.  Great news!

I took off the start at about 6:30 a.m.  The bikes in front of me were filling the air to capacity with dry baked desert dust – lighter than air it seems as it just floats in no hurry to obey gravity.  To pass, I’d wait until there was a section where the wind was blowing left to right (or vice versa) and I could see the bike way ahead, with the dust going right, but not left.  If I could race up on him just a couple feet to his left, I’d stay out of the dust; a wall of unbroken blinding dust just to my right.  If he was riding on the left side of the course, I’d have to be on the extreme edge of the course to stay on his left.  

As soon as I’d pass a rider on his upwind side, he’d have to cut his throttle because he could not see in my dust.  I’d been the victim of that plenty in my career, but now I was the veteran, and I knew the dust game. 

I passed 8 riders before the first pit.  By the second pit, Marie told me I was in third.  By the fourth pit, she told me I was in second place.  At about mile 200 my hands started hurting.  75 miles later they were okay.  They “wear in”.  I stayed in second place until about mile 300 where I got passed. I tried to mount a fight but it wasn’t to be.  

There were two remote pits that my team would never be able to get into and out of and still keep up with me.  So there were about 100 miles where I would not see them. The first racing truck passed me at mile 375.  Oh boy.  This meant a pack of them would come through me.  Very sketchy.  Four of them passed me some minutes apart.

In a rocky downhill river wash, I came upon a rider standing in the course.  As I approached I could see another young rider with his back leaned against him.  His femur was broken, and probably his hip too, with his foot facing a direction it should not go.  He said he had help coming.

No more trucks passed me for 100 miles because when a helicopter landed in the wash to help the hurt rider and take him away, they blocked the course and no more trucks could get by.  Lucky for me.

As the race wore on and the hours went by, I counted the miles behind me and the miles ahead.  I rationed my energy to use it all without running out before the finish, which drew nearer and nearer.  But a mile at 387 was a lot more difficult than a mile at 37.  Keep going…..

To be continued…

My "Blueprint" Album

This link should be to an album I produced called Blueprint.  

I worked with very talented musicians and producers – mostly Jessie Dostie.  More credit to them than me!

There is a whole album – it’s on YouTube, though there isn’t really a video.

Check it out.  Which is your favorite track?

Control the controllables – or don't complain

“You can’t get mad at the things you can’t control if you don’t control the things you can.”

Isn’t that true?  Often we complain about things outside of our control, while at the same time not doing a great job on the things we can.

I have found that the bandwidth of things you CAN control, is sufficiently wide to have a great life.

No complaining.  

Get on it!

A Better World

The opportunities you get when you are excellent are greater than the opportunities you get when you are average.  The way you experience the world when you are excellent is vastly different from the way you experience it when you are operating at the level of mediocrity.

The person who is fully committed to what they are doing, lives in a very different world than the person who doesn’t – and it’s a much better world.

Are you fully committed?

Your choice.

Today can be the last day of the way you used to be.

But that is up to you.