Be Happy

I came across another quote that I think hits on a major part of “Growing Up”

“We tend to forget that happiness doesn’t come as a result of getting something we don’t have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.” ~Frederick Keonig

During our journey of growing up we often forget the fact that everything that impacts our life is up to us individually. I like this quote because we or at least I often look to outside forces to decide my success. I like to wander through life thinking the next task I set out on will be what makes me happy, forgetting what I already have, and what I have already accomplished. So the question for today is what do you already have in your life that makes you happy? Thanks for sharing your comments.

Know thyself?

Recently I came across this quote:

 ”Know thyself?”  If I knew myself, I’d run away.  ~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

 As I read over it a few times trying to understand the true meaning I realized that this simple, funny statement has great depth. Most of us run away from who we truly are. We each spend years building walls hiding secrets or conforming to persona’s that don’t match with our inner beings. So my question of the day is: What would happen if instead of running you opened up and truly got to know yourself? I look forward to any comments.

Everyone please get naked.

            With my New Year’s Resolutions beginning to be a distant memory I have been reviewing my life goals and how well I am doing towards achieving them. After I got done feeling sorry for myself I asked this important question: “John, what is holding you back?” Have you ever asked yourself this and honestly answered back? I found that my problem, the problem most people have; or what has been holding me back stopping me from achieving my dreams, my goals, being the person I know I am or feel I should be. I have been carrying around too much baggage putting layer on layers of thoughts, self-doubt, laziness, value in what others think of me (or what I worry they are thinking of me), and measuring myself against others. The problem is I am so weighed down emotionally with all the layers of thoughts I have been choosing to carry around making no way for me to succeed.

To be able to succeed we each most free ourselves from the limits we impose on ourselves every day. We must decide “Today I am going to be.” By deciding to “be” we are striping all the layers who what we are trying to be and getting naked or letting our true self-come out. Only when we become at peace with who we are deep at our core can we affect change and become what we desire. Each of us has supreme unlimited potential the problem is we waste all of our energy and time trying to be something that is at conflict with our central core.

             So who’s ready to get naked with me?

Lasting Change

There are events in each of our lives that take us by surprise and remind us that certain elements are out of our control. These experiences have a way of putting everything in perspective – at least for a moment. Maybe I am different than everyone else, but when these moments hit me everything else that seemed so important, such as what health care bill the US senate is going to pass, or who is President, or if the US should be at War, or not; even conflicts with my neighbors such as whose leafs are on whose lawn. All of these life encompassing events fade away and I find myself feeling as though I am standing alone in a room void of everything except this one event and the emotions I associate with it.

As I ponder this post I am waiting to hear the outcome of my father’s triple bypass heart surgery. I realize that although I always looked at my father as invincible; my days with him are numbered, and to my horror I have no way of knowing what that number may be. I remember when the last man I held close to heart lost his battle to cancer, when I knew he would pull through it… or I refused to accept how sick he was.

When we face these events, such as losing someone dear to us; have the power to stop everything else in our world and cause us to hold our loved ones a little closer and evaluate the purpose of our lives. I believe through these events each of us become a little bit better of a person; we stop arguing brother against brother. Sadly though the bitter sting soon wears off and we go back to hating, fighting, arguing, and being consumed with matters that have no impact on our lives.

This leaves to question what if, what if we could remember the bitter sting, what if we could remember our love and compassion for our fellowman? What would it take to create this last change in each of us?

I look forward to your comments. Thanks!

My review of: From the Query to the Call

After pouring my heart and soul into a manuscript for nearly 4 years I finally feel I am ready to look for a publisher. Although my book is nonfiction I have found myself searching for anything I can get my hands on which will teach me what I need to do next.

After writing a manuscript and hiring my own editor to help me with editing so I could rewrite for even more edits and what seemed like endless rewrites I thought that I had been through the hardest part of writing a book. Only to find myself what seemed like about a hundred feet up the face of a ten thousand foot high Mountainside.

FROM THE QUERRY TO THE CALL is a well written guide that anyone (beginner or seasoned pro) can gain helpful insight and directions from. Elana Johnson a schoolteacher by day and writer by night is a contributing editor at Querytracker.blogspot.com. Obviously, Elana knows the query writing industry. FROM THE QUERRY TO THE CALL takes the reader through every step a writer needs for their query including the hook, the setup, the conflict, the consequence and everything else imaginable. I thoroughly enjoyed reading FROM THE QUERRY TO THE CALL, and even though the submission guidelines for a nonfiction manuscript vary from the fiction query I found the information both helpful and entertaining.

Perhaps the most useful parts of FROM THE QUERRY TO THE CALL are the examples and interviews from Authors who have written successful queries. I found the book well laid out and because of the book marks, easy to go back to any section because I had questions, or needed a review on any subject covered such as: how to craft the perfect Cover Letter

I recommend that anyone who is even thinking about writing a book or presenting a manuscript to an agent to first read FROM THE QUERRY TO THE CALL, and use its worksheets to craft their own winning query letter.

Please click here to get your own copy of: FROM THE QUERRY TO THE CALL
Or you can visit its facebook fan page here: Face Book Fan Page

Human Tragedy

I think the greatest tragedy of human life is when we give up on ourselves before we have a chance for Greatness. You see, when we were young we all had goals. We all had dreams of being someone; maybe a Superhero, a Policeman, a Doctor, or even a Fireman. Then, as we grew older we changed. We let go of the dream of helping each other, or of achieving something unique. We resign our lives to paying the bills, figuring out how to keep food on the table, and just getting by.

Learning to Walk

As I looked at a picture of Malachi, my 18 month old son, standing on his own for one of the first times ever, I began to understand one of the most important lessons we need to learn in life. Never give up. Malachi for some strange reason has waited what seems like forever to even be interested in walking. But over the past weekend he has fallen in love with it. No matter where he is he loves to stand and walk. This is a funny site to see: My little baby, looking like a short drunk man staggering around and lunging at furniture. At that moment what I recognized was no matter how unstable he is he still keeps trying and whenever he falls he gets right back up with a smile on his face; proud of himself for taking any steps at all.

No matter who we are, there are hard times in store for us. When those times come, and we fall hard onto the ground, we might just want to give up and lay on the floor crying. But, the only thing that matters is that we get back up, and that we smile, because at least we made it that far.

Warning: Following College Football can lead to Greatness

 A few days ago I attended a breakfast with Bronco Mendenhall the head coach of the Brigham Young University Football Program. BYU has a long history of winning, however 7 years ago they had a coach that went through three seasons of not just loosing but what many say was being slaughtered on the field. At that time BYU fired the head coach and as a last resort, according to Bronco, brought Bronco Mendenhall on as their head coach to clean up the problems, which include some of their players being charged with criminal offenses, while the school found a permanent head coach. Half way through his first season as the Coach, Bronco had a defining moment for his career; he decided to change the program from being just a football team to a program that focused on service, tradition, faith and honor. Many ridiculed him, Time Magazine wrote an article saying it would take a miracle for his program to work. However, since that moment BYU football has followed Bronco’s system and has stayed as one of the top 25 teams in college football for the last three years. In fact, they have kept a record that only 5 others teams have been able to accomplish.

There are many reasons that their program has been successful, I would like to comment on just one of them that became clear to me as I was listening to Bronco. To become great you have to define yourself, and then no matter what anyone else says, stick to it. Bronco defined his team half way through his first year as coach. It occurred to him that if they kept following the same path they would keep having the same results. But even more importantly Bronco, like all great ones, saw a clear vision of the path he should take to lead his team to glory. Each of us must have a defining moment, in which we stand up for who we want to be, or what we want to accomplish. This is the moment that we stop wondering and everything suddenly becomes clear with exact focus. Then Bronco locked all the naysayers out of his mind. Bronco knows what he is doing and doesn’t make excuses for it, his last words to us were: “now you know the direction we are going and if you don’t agree with it; it’s just the way it’s going to be.” I believe this statement shows his commitment to his vision, the great ones understand this and perhaps its one way they separate themselves from everyone else.

Will all the whiney people, please sit down!

whine  (hw n, w n)

v. whined, whin·ing, whines

v.intr.

1. To utter a plaintive, high-pitched, protracted sound, as in pain, fear, supplication, or complaint.

2. To complain or protest in a childish fashion.

3. To produce a sustained noise of relatively high pitch: jet engines whining.

Will all the whiney people, please sit down!

Over the last few years I have been striving to achieve greatness. I have found myself looking to those who have already figured it out; contrasting their actions and, what I perceive to be, their thoughts with those of my own.

Through my observation of the great ones I have distinguished a few key points that drastically separate society into two categories: Those who seem to have the Midas Touch, where everything turns to gold and works out for them; and the rest of us, mere Mortals, who struggle each day to keep food on the table and a roof over our head.

One key point I have learned is that Winners are not Whiners. We all, including Superman, have days that are hard, where nothing seems to work out. The separation between Winners and Whiners is in how they handle these days. We have all seen people who, at the least bit of resistance, act as though all hope is lost and that the entire world is out to get them. Now, I will admit that my five year old daughter fits this description. Her life is an emotional rollercoaster; if someone simply looks at her when she doesn’t want them to look at her, you would think it was the end of the world. I’m not saying that she is not a winner, because this behavior is to be expected from a five year old; the separating characteristic only applies to those adults who haven’t yet learned that growing up and becoming wiser means leaving behind this five year old mentality. These individuals’ lives consist of constant drama. They have major emotional melt-downs in front of other people. They typically are those who, on a regular basis, loudly proclaim “I’m done, I’m not going to do it anymore”, referring to topics they are tired of dealing with at the moment.  They are then found to be enthralled in the same topic by the end of the week. They don’t understand why others are not considerate toward them, or their needs. In their eyes the entire universe should revolve around them. Because these people are so caught up on themselves, and worried about their own lives, they just don’t understand the fact that others around them are faced with the same struggles.  Others’ struggles will not likely be formatted identically to those of the overdramatic whiner, and will definitely not manifest in the same broadcast way, but all struggles are the same in that they are struggles.

As we look at winners they never seem to be caught up in any of these things. Winners have a seemingly laser focus, and a skin so tough that it sheds anything thrown at it. I’ve learned that winners are kind to others, and seem to be a rock of emotional strength. They get up every day and, although they may have the same fears and feel like giving up when times get tough, bow their head, put their fears and inadequacies aside and refuse to accept, or give in to, their own personal short comings.

So, I guess the only question here is: Who do you want to be: a Winner, or a Whiner?

Get over yourself! Quit Whining, and start Winning… or please, sit down.