Real beauty comes from learning, growing, and loving in the ways of life. That is the Art of Life. You can learn slowly, and sometimes
painfully, by just waiting for life to happen to you. Or you can choose to accelerate your growth and intentionally devour life and all it offers.
You are the artist that paints your future with the brush of today. Paint a Masterpiece.
God gives every bird its food, but He doesn't throw it into its nest. Wherever you want to go, whatever you want to do, it's truly up to you.
Popularity
by Boogie Jack
The questions I get in the mail often amaze me, and I get enough odd questions that it doesn't surprise me to get
them anymore. Still, I occasionally get taken aback. The question asked of me below is one that made me lean back in my chair and go "huh?"
"How do I become more popular?" So, what do you say to a question
like that?
I said this...Being popular, to me, is simply being likeable. I think being likeable means:
1. To like yourself. Not in a vain-glory way, but just liking who you are on the inside. If you don't like yourself, imagine how
much harder is it for others to like you.
2. To listen. Everyone has a need to talk. Those that really listen will always have someone to talk with - and notice, I said
talk "with" not "to".
3. Don't talk too much about yourself. Bragging, constantly talking about yourself, and other forms of egotism are boring. If
you don't believe that go look in the mirror and look yourself in the eye and tell you how wonderful you are. You'll get tired of it quickly, so do others.
To be interesting to others is simply to be interested in others more than you are in talking about yourself.
4. Smile! Sounds simple, and it is, but people like people who smile at them. It makes them smile and smiling makes you
feel happy. If you smile when you first see someone, and each time you first see them, there's a good chance they'll like you just because they make you smile. It makes them
feel good about themselves.
5. Be generous of spirit. It doesn't matter how good a person feels about themselves, it's always nice for them to know
others appreciate their talent, accomplishments, personality, attitude, uniqueness, etc. There are hundreds of things you can compliment someone about, just be genuine and
don't go overboard with it. Insincerity can be sensed.
Genuinely complimenting someone costs you nothing, but to the recipient, it's something that can't be bought at any price.
6. Be slow to be critical. I probably get one letter critical of my web site or newsletter for every 99 that
compliment me. It still thrills me to receive compliments and still bothers me to be criticized. I know you can't please everyone, but I'm human and that's the way we
are. (Added note: another shattered illusion, huh? Some of you thought I really *was* an alien.)
7. Don't try too hard to be liked. Those that do are often perceived in negative ways - like emotionally needy,
overbearing, insincere, or many other things that will put distance between you and others. Not everyone will like you, just as you're not going to like everyone. In those
cases, accept that and move on.
8.Don't be a whiner! No one wants to listen to constant complaining, fault-finding and holier-than-thou attitudes.
9. Don't talk negatively about others. Others will realize if you talk badly to them about others behind their back,
you'll also speak poorly of them when they're not around.
10. Don't talk too loud. A whisper is heard better than a shout.
So how'd I do? What are your keys to popularity and friendship?
"We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak." -
Epictetus
"Popularity is a crime from the moment it is sought;
it is only a virtue where men have it whether they will
or no."
- George Savile
Excuses, Excuses
Some people go through life standing at the excuse counter.
People say they'd like to do this or that, but... then they offer all the excuses in the world why they can't do whatever 'it' is. No matter
what the excuses are, the only thing usually limiting them is their own self-perception.
If I've learned anything, I've learned a person, any person, can do just about anything they set their mind to do. The only thing you need
is a willingness to work for what you want, patience to learn what you need to know, and just a little bit of belief in yourself. The most important of these is belief in
yourself, but you only need a seed.
It will grow with you.
"You have powers you never dreamed of.
You can do things you never thought you could do.
There are no limitations in what you can do
except the limitations of your own mind."
- Darwin P. Kingsley
I have a friend... (oh hush, I really do!)...
...a friend that started an online business in August of '98. And though she had a little real world business experience,
she had no online experience and had never ran her own business. She partnered with another person who had also never ran a business before.
As start-ups always go when you have no capital to speak of, it started very slowly. There were many discouraging
nights and thoughts of giving up. But they hung in there. Partly out of desperation and partly because the options were very limited in the small town she lived in.
Finally, they attracted their first client. Their first client was very demanding of their time, requiring an inordinate amount
of support and attention. But they went above and beyond the call of duty and earned the clients respect, and a referral.
Word got around a bit and a few more clients signed on. They weren't making a lot of money yet, and what little they
were making had to be split two ways after the bills were paid, but at least there were signs of hope now.
Then disaster struck. Her computer, which was old and requiring a lot of nickel and dime repairs to keep working,
finally gave up. Without her computer and without the means to replace it, it looked like the end of their business.
Then an angel came a calling. Not a celestial angel with wings and halo, but an angel just the same. One of their past
clients who was so pleased with the service they'd given him had a brand new state-of-the-art Dell computer delivered to her doorstep! It was a gift from him to her for a
job well done.
I could end this here and have a nice story about how good things happen to good people. It could end with a few
thoughts about how hard work and a desire to succeed pay off. It could be about the spirit of giving - how it always comes back to you...
It is about all that, and more. She fought through all this while battling life threatening cancer. She did it with a fear of
dying, with people telling her she couldn't do it, and with very little complaining and feeling sorry for herself.
This story is really about courage and the will to live and hold life to account. I can't tell you how much I admire the grit
and resolve she has shown, but I can tell you this...
Where there is a will to achieve and succeed, where there is a desire to make the best of the hand you're dealt;
indeed, where there is life itself, there is always hope.
My friend didn't let tremendous adversity stop her, though that would have been the easiest thing to do. Had she given
in, this story would have had another, sadder outcome. But she didn't, and I'm proud and inspired to know her.
So to you, my cyberspace friends, I finish this with one thought.
When the world seems against you and your days are colored black,
light your own candle of hope, and fight right back.
"There is not enough darkness in all the world to put out the light of even one small candle."
- Robert Alden
"There is in every true woman's heart a spark of heavenly fire, which lies dormant
in the broad daylight of prosperity; but which kindles up, and beams and blazes
in the dark hour of adversity."
- Washington Irving
The Right Foot
Years ago, one of the girls in a group I used to pal around with met a boy. He was new in town and seemed quite pleasant, had a pixie-
like smile and was fun to be around. We welcomed him into our circle. Donna and Kevin
(not their real names) became an item. Before long, Donna noticed a few things missing, but she was a woman in love and excused them away without telling anyone.
In the meantime, her new love rented a room from another member of our gang, a local deputy sheriff. The deputy noticed something
missing too, but he didn't excuse it. He confronted Kevin about some missing money. Kevin admitted he took it but said he thought he could put it back before it was
missed, he was desperate and no one was there to ask. He said he knows it was wrong and he felt terrible about it, and said if he would forgive him he'd put the right
foot forward. The deputy forgave him.
A few weeks later, Donna caught Kevin on a date with another woman. She was really hurt, but Kevin said he just wanted one last date
to be sure he was in love because he wanted to ask her to marry him. He said if she'd marry him he'd be the happiest man in the world and he'd put the right foot
forward from now on. Donna bought into that line too.
A few days later Kevin disappeared, along with over $2000 of Donna's money and the deputy's checkbook. He was caught 2 weeks
later writing stolen checks. Donna's money was gone.
When he came to trial Kevin told the judge how sorry he was, and that he was anxious to make restitution. He said he wanted to put the
right foot forward and turn his life around. He was sentenced to time served, probation, community service, and ordered to make restitution and undergo counseling.
A few months later Kevin attempted to rob a bank. There was a high speed chase and he lost control of his car. He survived a crash into
a stone wall guarding a cemetery.
Kevin was fond of saying he wanted to put the right foot forward when he was in trouble, he'd been saying it all his life. Kevin lost his left
leg in that car crash. Now, the right foot is all he has to put forward.
Self-fulfilling prophecy? Freak coincidence? Consider this...
Jeremy has a speech habit, and he doesn't even realize he says the following most of the time.Whenever anything goes amiss, he says
"well that just makes me sick." He's said it so often that it has developed into an unconscious,
repetitive expression.
Jeremy also spends a *lot* of time at the doctors office, sick in bed or in the hospital with a variety of maladies. I see these as
connected realities. He continually internalizes the phrase that something just makes him sick, and the consequence is that he often is.
In short, pay attention to the way you talk, to yourself and to others. Because you might just get what you confess. That's not to say
that everytime you use a phrase it becomes reality, but the power of your self-talk is a real force in your life. Anything repeated often enough becomes internalized and
has a greater chance of becoming true for you.
"Beware of your habits. The better they are the more surely they will be your undoing."
-Holbrook Jackson
The Only Bed In Town
With several major conventions in town, there was not a room to be rented anywhere. When an elderly couple walked
in out of the cold rain, the desk clerk knew they would never find lodging. In an act of kindness, he offered them the only bed in town, his own bed.
The couple at first refused, but through reason and kindness, he persuaded the couple to accept his offer. When they
checked out the next morning, the elderly gentleman said to the desk clerk, "you are the kind of person who should be managing the best hotel in the United
States. Maybe someday I'll build one." They chuckled about that and the elderly couple left.
The incident and the elderly couple were forgotten by the desk clerk until two years later when he received a letter from
the old man requesting he come up to New York and see him. There was a round-trip airline ticket with the letter.
The desk clerk thought "why not?" and took the flight to New York. The old man met him at the airport and
immediately took him to a construction site to show him an enormous castle-like structure being built there.
"That," proclaimed the old man, "is the hotel I'm building for you to manage!"
The old man was William Waldorf Astor, and the hotel would soon be know as the Waldorf-Astoria. The former desk
clerk, George C. Boldt, became the first manager.
"Giving never moves in a straight line - it always travels in circles."
- Dr. Robert Schuller
"One of the most difficult things to give away is kindness, for it is usually returned."
- Mark Ortman
"From what we get, we can make a living; what we give, however, makes a life."
- Arthur Ashe
"It matters if you just don't give up."
- Stephen Hawking
"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage."
- Anais Nin
The Rubber Band Sorter
Joey has a problem. He wants to be a programmer. Joey's big problem is that, while he wants success, he does things to make sure he
will never have the success he dreams of. Joey constantly prioritizes trivial accomplishments that have immediate results ahead of potentially much greater
accomplishments that have no immediate result.
For example, once when I asked him what he was doing he said he was sorting rubber bands. Sorting rubber bands? He picked up a big
box of rubber bands at a garage sale and was sorting them by size. He was proud of that.
I asked him why he wasn't studying programming instead. He said there wasn't time to finish anything he might start so was waiting
until tomorrow. As is always the case with Joey, when tomorrow came, he had other priorities.
Joey is smart enough to know that he doesn't need to sort the rubber bands. Psychiatrists might say Joey has a fear of failure, so he
does things he knows he can succeed at rather than attempting the things he wants, but might fail at. Joey's dreams are crippled by his fear of failure.
On the rare occasions when he does work with programming, he's usually going over the same exercises he already knows. Joey will
never get out of his tiny apartment and fulfill his other dream, that of owning a home, unless he learns to master his fear.
Joey doesn't realize that if he doesn't learn to take the risks and steps necessary to accomplish his goals, then he is the failure he fears
whether he ever writes a working program or not. In such cases as these, failing to act is a greater failure than acting and not succeeding.
In acting, you give yourself a chance to succeed. If you don't, you can learn from unsuccessful attempts and may succeed on the next
try. You can only succeed if you act. Inaction teaches nothing, offers no rewards, and keeps you from your dreams. Fear and inaction steal your life away while you
passively watch the years go by, and the dreams die.
Joey wants life to be better, but he's unwilling give what it takes. He'd do well to remember what Abraham Lincoln said, "in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years."
Joey isn't putting any life into his years, he's putting fears into his years. Day after day, year after year. It's a dirty shame that a fear of
failure stops anyone from trying that which they long for. We'd still be living in caves if everyone did that.
"If you have the will to win, you have achieved half your success;
if you don't, you have achieved half your failure."
- David Ambrose
"The man who succeeds has faced failure more times than success,
but he never gave up."
- Tom Dean
"Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice.
It is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved."
- Jeremy Kitson
"If you want your life to be a magnificent story, then begin by realizing that
you are the author, and everyday you have the opportunity to write a new page."
- Mark Houlahan
