Archive for the 'Determination' Category

Riddle me this… What is scarier?…

1. Driving an Indy Race Car at 230 miles per hour
2. Dancing on TV in front of millions of viewers

While both are scary, only Indy car racing can kill you on any lap. Yet for me I would rather take my chances in a race car than humiliate myself in front of millions of people with my two left feet.

Helio Castroneves has overcome both to become a two time Indianapolis 500 race winner and now the winner of the Dancing with the Stars dance competition. Helio is an amazing person and his performance on this popular TV show these last few weeks has been a real inspiration to millions of viewers.

Helio, a 32 year old Brazilian race car driver, showed what it takes to overcome fear, both on the track and now on the stage. He faced fear in the eye and focused instead on winning.

Helio showed…

1. Vision: He knew what he wanted and he figured out a path to get there. In racing it was the coveted Indy 500 trophy and kissing the bricks at that famous racetrack. In dancing, it was the Mirrorball trophy. In short… Helio wanted to win!
2. Passion: Helio showed that he wanted to become the best he could be. Whether it is driving or dancing he exhibited incredible passion every step of the way. That is what makes him so exciting to watch. Without passion, he would have been just another dancer. From his bright yellow suit to his huge jump across the stage he showed he had the passion to win.
3. Determination: Dancing and driving are full of setbacks, and winning means overcoming them and learning from them. Helio and his dance partner, Julianne Hough, showed they had the determination to overcome a bad dance or a stubborn judge. Instead of getting down or letting fear overtake him, Helio pushed on with his signature smile and the attitude to do whatever it would take to make the next dance better.
4. Personality: Helio showed that winning is about being the best you can be… not trying to be someone else. With his smiling personality and glowing attitude the fans really got behind him. One week, he tried to play the bad guy, with a serious look and a bad attitude… it didn’t work. The judges scores reflected this. He learned from this and during the rest of the competition his true personality came out.

I really enjoyed the Dancing with The Stars program this year. Every week was about people showing what passion, practice, and determination can produce. Marie Osmond showed incredible courage after she fainted on stage one week and experienced the death of her father a few weeks later. At 48 years old, she made it to the finals and truly showed that age is not a factor to true greatness.

Melanie Brown of the Spice Girls showed what practice and determination can produce. With almost perfect moves dance after dance, her and her partner Maksim had the highest judges scores throughout the competition. Her performances were truly inspiring and they took her to the final round.

Cheetah girl, Sabrina Bryan, brought some amazing talent to the competition but showed how important personality and communication is to winning. One week her fans took it for granted that she would be in the finals and didn’t bother to call in and vote. Since the fan vote was half of the score, she was eliminated that week of the competition in the biggest upset of the series.

Fear and a negative attitude can keep us from trying different things and truly becoming the person we were meant to be. This show is a great example of what can happen when we face fear in the eye and forge ahead! Truly amazing things can happen!

Something remarkable is worth talking about. Worth noticing. Exceptional. New. Interesting. It’s a Purple Cow. Boring stuff is invisible. It’s a brown cow.
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Now that the new year has started and most people are back to work, you may find it hard to find time to set some written goals. Before you know it it will be December again and those lofty ideas that sounded so great in January will still be just that… lofty ideas. I propose that you take the Success Begins Today 5 Minute Success Challenge. It’s simple, it’s easy, and it may even impact your life.

Here are the three simple steps to success in 2006.

1. Download the 5 Minute Success Form and print it out.
2. Set a timer for 5 minutes
3. Fill in three boxes with a marking pen. Write down a five year goal, a one year goal, and a simple habit that you can develop this month. That’s it!
4. There is no step four

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Let me give you an example of how this works. Let’s say you have a health and fitness mindset and you really want to run a marathon in the next five years. You put the word “marathon” in the five year goal box. The holidays have added to your waistline and your one year goal is to lose 20 pounds. Put lose 20 pounds in the one year goal box.

You now have 12 monthly boxes on the sheet. Write one simple habit that you can develop this month that will move you closer to your one year goal. Make it easy, measurable and attainable. For our example you might put down “walk 15 minutes every morning” in the January box. Post this sheet where you can see it everyday such as on the refrigerator door.

To be successful, focus on this one habit until the end of the month. Make sure you are diligent and write the number of each day that you accomplish the goal in the January box. Keep this up till the end of the month.

On the last day of the month write down a new habit that will move you closer to your one year goal in the February box. As with January make it easy, measurable and attainable. For our example let’s put down give up french fries. This simple habit will save thousands of calories over the period of a month.

The key to this simple system is to keep doing January’s habit while developing the new habit in February. Repeat this pattern month after month and you will have twelve new habits by the end of the year. March may be “give up sodas”, April might bring “have an apple a day” and on and on.

Use your imagination and make this fun. Pick things that are attainable and that you can write down in one sentence. Nothing complicated here. Don’t kill yourself if you miss a day but make sure you get back on track the following day.

Researchers say it takes 21 days to form a habit. This plan gives you 30. You can reprint the success challenge each month and mark off each successful day in each months category. The key to this whole plan is simplicity and WRITING things down.

Please keep us all informed how you do. Use the contact form or leave comments on your progress.

In the coming days we’ll have strategies and plans to help you make this simple plan a success!

As I was working out today, I was trying to think of some ways to motivate my wife and some of my co-workers to try the Body for Life exercise program. I went online to the BFL website and looked through some of their articles and found out there is a new book out by Dr Pamela Peeke. The book specializes in a women’s body for life program and may be the kick-start that women need to start weight training and exercising. It breaks the program down into specific areas that are of concern to women. In reading the reviews, it sounds like many women have found success with the book.

As I have restarted the program I have thought about varying the aerobic training to include cycling. My Dad was an avid cyclist and that form of exercise was easy on the body and kept him in shape well into his 80’s. Cycling though has never been real exciting to me but a friend told me to check out the Trek Bicycles website. Wow! They have some cool exercise tools. I even checked out their link on Tandem bicycles but I realized I’ll have enough trouble riding myself without worrying about a passenger. With one of their bikes exercise would certainly be fun.

I talked with my wife about starting the program and she mentioned that she would need a reward for working out so hard. I asked her what would motivate her and she immediately pointed out some
modern tanzanite ring settings in one of her magazines. Being a novice at jewelry I went to the web to learn more about this blue jewel. I found a site about grading tanzanite and also realized there were tanzanite auctions online. But I needed some more information including the big one… price. In doing a little research I found a site specializing in discount tanzanite which sounds real good to me.

The bottom line may be some creative shopping this Holiday season. A new bike and a blue jewel may add some needed motivation to complete the 90 day program.

In my post yesterday I talked about determination versus motivation. I am a big fan of motivation. I like to find new ways to motivate myself to do things I don’t like to do. I like taking a difficult task and making a game out of it. Rewards are always helpful in motivation. How many people could lose 20 pounds if someone was willing to give them a million dollars to do it? I bet many people would even do it for a thousand dollars. While motivation is great it doesn’t always work in the long run. It’s hard to stay motivated. Boredom or apathy soon take over and once the motivation is gone so is the intended action or goal.

I have found John Maxwell’s quote…

“The whole idea of motivation is a trap. Forget motivation. Just do it. Exercise, lose weight, test your blood sugar, or whatever. Do it without motivation. And then, guess what? After you start doing the thing, that’s when the motivation comes and makes it easy for you to keep on doing it.”

to be quite true. In the past month I have been trying to motivate myself to start the Body for Life exercise program again. I have looked for someone to start the program with me. Maybe even a weight loss contest. Nothing seemed to work out. With the holidays coming nobody wanted to take on the challenge.

Body for Life is a pretty big commitment with weight training 45 minutes/day for three days a week and 20 minutes of Aerobics three other days. You do get a free day every week. The basic program lasts 12 weeks. This exercise program along with a sensible eating plan works wonders.

But it’s not easy. It actually rather painful and takes lots of motivation.

After I read John’s Quotation… I asked myself… how about determination? His key words “Just Do It” flashed across my mind.

I woke up yesterday morning and said those words first thing… and you know what… I did it.

I did the same thing today… and I did it again.

Maybe there is something to this “determination” stuff?

As I have been working through many issues in the last two weeks since my Dad passed away, I have found comfort in a couple of quotations by John Maxwell. The two that have really made a difference are…

“The whole idea of motivation is a trap. Forget motivation. Just do it. Exercise, lose weight, test your blood sugar, or whatever. Do it without motivation. And then, guess what? After you start doing the thing, that’s when the motivation comes and makes it easy for you to keep on doing it.”

“As you begin changing your thinking, start immediately to change your behavior. Begin to act the part of the person you would like to become. Take action on your behavior. Too many people want to feel, then take action. This never works.”

One of the things that kept my dad going for 94 years was his love of exercise. Ever since I was a little kid he would get up every morning at 4:30 and go ride his bike for an hour or two. He would even get up in the dead of winter, bundle up in two jackets and gloves and head out. His determination was amazing. I want this habit in my life.

My problem has always been that I don’t “feel” like exercising. It’s real easy to go back to bed and say I’ll do that tomorrow. I’m going to try Maxwell’s solution and just do it. It worked for my Dad. I’m going to “begin to act the part of the person you would like to become,” which in this case is my Father.

I’ll let you know how it goes.

Hey… It’s cold outside…