Trust me, you want me to be selfish.
And I want you to be selfish, too.
Being selfish doesn’t seem like a good idea. Especially if building community and relationships is important to you. After all, being selfish is about being self-centered. It’s about the “me” and not the “we”. The focus on individual accomplishment and development can’t possibly be beneficial to the collective good of our society.
I disagree.
It’s not every day that a cactus teaches you about love…
So, I finally made it to California. It was a promise I made to the world via my high school yearbook, that California was in my future. That’s what it said under the picture of the long-haired, seventeen year old soon-to-be high school graduate.
It just took me 29 years to get there.
I don’t remember exactly why I wanted to go to California. I think it was because I had a crush on a girl who had plans to go to Continue reading “Love, Rain and the Cactus Heart”
WARNING:
This post contains a BIG BOLD STATEMENT.
It seems like a lot of people are looking for happiness. Walk through any bookstore and count the number of times you see the words “happy” or “happiness”. If you had $5 for each time you saw those words you could probably make a mortgage payment. Just for fun, Google the word “happiness”. The last time I did, Google came back with over 75,400,000 entries. I found sites about happiness quotes, happiness poems, happiness articles, happiness blogs, happiness affirmations, happiness posters, happiness videos, even happiness retreats. I found happiness everything.
I can’t help but wonder…with such an overly abundant supply of happiness support materials, are we in the middle of some sort of Continue reading “2,134 Ways To Be Happy: Confessions From The Functionally Unhappy”
— Uta Hagen
Are you giving yourself permission to simply be ordinary? To simply settle for “good enough” when greatness lies within? Raise your own expectations of yourself and fulfill your capacity for greatness!
Greatness isn’t what it used to be.
Not in my book, anyway.
The traditional interpretation of greatness has always relied on an external comparison component. You know, the you’re-better-than-me she’s-better-than-her evaluative comparison stuff. Only through comparison can something be considered greater than something else.
Without the comparison, there is just is. If Mount Everest was the only mountain in the world, would anyone refer to it as being the tallest? No. It would just be a mountain. It needs lesser mountains around it to claim its greatness.
Continue reading “Three Simple Steps to Extracting Your Greatness!”
–Rumi, 13th century Persian poet
You need not look any further. You’ve found greatness. It is within you.
Rediscover the treasure that is you!
How many more children would have died if Jonas Salk didn’t live up to his potential?
I write a great deal about potential and greatness simply because I have yet to live up to my own. Sure, I’ve enjoyed personal and professional successes, but I sometimes feel like I’m a Formula 1 Indy car cruising on a winding country road on a lazy Sunday afternoon..
I know there is no scientific gauge to measure potential-lived-up-to, but I just know that there’s still a lot more in my tank. Conversely, if there was a scientific gauge to measure excuses-made-as-to-why-potential-has-not-been-lived-up-to, I’d be off the charts.
PROFOUND QUESTION Is living up to my potential and maximizing my capacity for greatness really necessary? Or, is it just a self-indulgent quest…just to see what I am actually capable of?
Continue reading “Why the World Needs You to Live Up to Your Greatness”
This post was inspired by lunch.
As a consumer, I am inundated with requests to complete surveys rating my shopping or dining experience. These requests are usually found at the bottom of the sales receipt or dinner check, usually highlighted in bright yellow or aggressively circled a dozen times as to be sure I knew exactly what I needed to do. With my marketing background I can greatly appreciate a company’s interest in real-world feedback from their lifeblood — the customer. But even with the opportunity to win $5,000 or some other great prize designed to motivate me to rush home and complete the survey on-line, I usually never do.
Almost never.
Even with the bright yellow highlighting.
Continue reading “Cold Soup and a Dirty Spoon…with a Smile!”
–Thomas Edison
I never understood Greek mythology when I was in school. I never quite got it. But I always enjoyed the story of Icarus.
Perhaps you recall the story of Icarus. Icarus and his Dad, Daedalus, were imprisoned on the island of Crete by King Minos. The only way to escape from their captivity was by air. Daedalus was a gifted inventor and created two pairs of wings that he and Icarus would use to fly to freedom. The father’s instructions to the son were simple; do not fly too close to the sun, as the wings were crafted of feathers and wax. Flying too close to the sun would melt the wax and destroy the wings. Unfortunately, that was exactly what Icarus did, which cost Icarus his life on his flight to freedom.
Peter Mis LivingHalfFull.com 