I’m in complete agreement.

The good news is that today is examination day.

Today is the day you take inventory of your life, your choices, and your results.

Ready?

• Do you have a clear sense of where you are going and how you will get there?
• Are you living the life you imagined, or just going through the motions?
• What are your proudest accomplishments since the beginning of the year?
• What important contributions have you made to your work, family and the community where you live?
• Are you starting fast and finish each day strong?
• Are you maintaining focus and following one course until successful?
• Are you using deadlines to maximize your performance?
• Are you using speed as a unique competitive advantage?
• Is your behavior worth modeling? Does it inspire excellence?
• Have you been using the word NO to set boundaries so that you can focus on the bigger YES?
• Are each of your choices taking you closer to your goals?
• How have you been practicing the fine art of gratitude?
• How have you demonstrated an indomitable spirit?
• What have you done to enhance and improve your reputation?
• Are you embracing inconvenience and increasing your appetite for pain and discomfort?

• Are you beginning each day with a written plan? If so, are you following it?
• Have you focused on simple strategies, simple solutions and simple methods for obtaining results?
• What have you done amazingly well to stand out from the crowd?
• In what ways have you been going the extra mile? For whom and how often?
• Are your commitments being honored and your promises being kept?
• Has boldness become part of your portfolio of skills?
• Are you consistently driven by a strong sense of urgency?
• In what ways have you exercised greater discipline and self-control?
• Does your work and daily actions demonstrate a commitment to excellence?
• Have you displayed passion and enthusiasm in your work and home life?



• Are you deliberately growing your network of contacts?
• Are you doing everything you can to make this the best year of your life?
• When was the last time you did anything for the first time?
• If you passed today, would you be proud of the legacy you are leaving behind?

What are you going to do as a result of answering these questions and examining your life?

It’s time to live large, it’s time to step it up, it’s time to rip the lid off your performance!

WHAT TO DO NOW? If this process was helpful to you, I’d love to hear about it. Leave your comments and share your personal observations!

He started his longitudinal study by offering a group of 4-year-olds one marshmallow, but told them that if they could wait for him to return after running an errand, they could have two marshmallows.

The “errand” took about fifteen minutes. The theory was that those children who could wait would demonstrate that they had the ability to delay gratification and control impulse.

Mischel varied the rewards and experimented with keeping them visible or hidden. He found that hiding them made it easier to wait, as did offering the children suggestions for how to distract themselves. The results deepened our understanding of the nature of willpower.

Moreover, by showing how thinking can change the manifestation of personality (in this case impulsivity); Mischel’s experiments supported his “social-cognitive” approach to personality.

This challenged Freud’s classic psychoanalytical approach, which saw personality as rooted in instinctual drives and wishes.

In follow-up studies, Mischel found that children better able to develop strategies for delaying gratification spontaneously at ages 4 and 5 became more educationally successful and emotionally intelligent.

“These delay abilities seem to be a protective buffer against the development of all kinds of vulnerabilities later in life,” he concluded.

Before we continue, I’d like you to consider 3 questions:

1. How important is a child’s ability to delay immediate gratification?

2. Is self-discipline a predictor of a child’s success later in life?

3. Can a child who does not know how to delay immediate gratification be taught this skill?

Ok. Let’s take a moment and think about the child in our lives before I give you the results of the study. Close your eyes, visualize your child, grandchild, niece or nephew in The Marshmallow Study room chair. Is she eating? Is he waiting?

We all know exactly what our children will do – or do we?

Fast forward fourteen years to 1988, when the children in the experiment graduated from high school, the Marshmallow Study revealed startling differences between the two groups:

The children who exercised self-discipline and waited for the two marshmallows (65%) were:

• More socially competent
• More personally effective
• More self-assertive
• Better able to cope with life’s frustrations
• Less likely to go to pieces under stress
• Less likely to become disorganized under pressure
• More persistent in the face of difficulties
• More self-reliant and confident
• More trustworthy and dependable
• More initiating and motivated with projects
• Still able to delay gratification in pursuit of goals
• More academically successful
• Better at concentration, planning
• More eager to learn
• Earned 210 points higher scores on SAT’s

These children had developed the habits of successful adults. The habits, the centerpiece of which is delayed gratification and self discipline, point to more thriving marriages, greater career satisfaction which leads to higher incomes, and better health.

The children with exercised low self-control and gobbled up the one marshmallow (35%) were:

• Socially introverted
• More stubborn and indecisive
• More easily upset by frustrations
• More likely to think of themselves as “bad” or unworthy
• More likely to regress or become immobilized by stress
• More mistrustful and resentful about not “getting enough”
• More prone to jealousy and envy
• More likely to overreact to irritations with a sharp temper
• Still unable to delay gratification or control impulses

If not corrected, lack of impulse control will continue to trip these kids up throughout life, resulting in unsuccessful marriages, low job satisfaction and as a result low income, bad health and all around frustration with life.

LET’S Focus on You!

OK. Back to you and the child in your life. If you have a child who is clearly going to be a one-marshmallow kind of kid, don’t despair.

Like any good habit, delayed gratification can be learned. Use your playtime to teach this skill. Choose toys and books and media that reinforce self-discipline and reward the behaviors daily.

Molding desired behavior when children are young and receptive is far easier than the far more challenging work required to change behavior when they are older and perhaps -how can we put it – less receptive to Mom or Dad’s instruction.

Let me provide you with a practical way to do this regarding financial discipline:

If your kids are ‘tweens or teens and have been caught up in the daily barrage of the “I want, therefore I need” spending syndrome, try this riddle.

Ask your child to record what they spend on things they want every day for a week. They can even estimate at the end of each day before they go to bed what that dollar amount is.

Typically these expenses are in the “I want” category, such as snack food or a trinket, not the “I need” category as in laces for those overly expensive sneakers.

At the end of the week sit down and see if they have spent at least $4 a day on “I wants.” Chances are they have spent that, and then some. Then, ask them to quickly answer this multiple choice test – without using a calculator:

At age 12 you decide not to buy soda or extra snacks – either during the school week or on weekends or vacations. You save $4.00 a day. You put $4 a day in a savings vehicle such as a long-term IRA CD at five percent annual interest and leave it alone.

At age 67, your savings is:

(a) $1,159
(b) $25,355
(c) $80,352
(d) $427,025

Answer: (d), or $427,025. Note that $80,352 is from the daily deposits and the remaining $346,673 is interest!

Once you tell them the answer, or they realize it themselves, their eyes will widen with renewed respect for the power and importance of saving – aka delayed gratification and self-discipline.

If we can instill these valuable lessons, we will equip our children with lifelong skills. We will be able to do what every parent hopes – deliver our child into a successful adulthood having learned first-hand the power of two marshmallows.

WHAT TO DO NOW: Share your two-cents worth on the power of delayed gratification and it’s impact on your performance.

The issue is an old one. Almost 2500 years ago, the philosopher Socrates debated the question with his fellow Athenians.

Socrates’ position was clear: Ethics consists of knowing what we ought to do, and such knowledge can be taught.

What I’d like to do is teach you a systematic approach to everyday ethics and it is grounded in five questions.

I recommend that you ask yourself these five questions at the end of each day as they will help you to practice everyday morality.

1. Did I practice any virtues today?

In The Book of Virtues, William Bennett notes that virtues are “habits of the heart” we learn through models–the loving parent or aunt, the demanding teacher, the respectful manager, the honest shopkeeper. They are the best parts of ourselves.

Ask yourself, Did I cross a line today that gave up one of those parts? Or was I, at least some of the time, a person who showed integrity, trustworthiness, honesty, compassion, or any of the other virtues I was taught as a child?

2. Did I do more good than harm today? Or did I try to?

Consider the short term and long-term consequences of your actions.

3. Did I treat people with dignity and respect today?

All human beings should be treated with dignity simply because they are human. People have moral rights, especially the fundamental right to be treated as free and equal human beings, not as things to be manipulated, controlled, or cast away.

How did my actions today respect the moral rights and the dignified treatment to which every person is entitled?

4. Was I fair and just today?

Did I treat each person the same unless there was some relevant moral reason to treat him or her differently?

Justice requires that we be fair in the way we distribute benefits and burdens. Whom did I benefit and whom did I burden? How did I decide?

5. Was my community better because I was in it? Was I better because I was in my community?

Consider your primary community, however you define it–neighborhood, apartment building, family, company, church, etc. Now ask yourself, was I able to get beyond my own interests to make that community stronger?

Was I able to draw on my community’s strengths to help me in my own process of becoming more human?

CONNECTING Everyday Ethics to Moral Leadership

This everyday ethical reflection must occur before we can effectively confront the larger moral questions.

A person who wants to take moral leadership on national or international issues must take special responsibility for what’s going on inside his or her own self, inside his or her own consciousness, lest the act of leadership create more harm than good.

Every day, we decide who we are – truthful or dishonest? Every day, our actions have consequences — and can be defined as helpful or hurtful.

Every day, we either build up or tear down relationships. We tend to think of ethics as coming into view only in congressional investigations or intensive care units.

But, in reality, we practice ethics every day; we work together to be at our best–or our worst-every day and that is precisely why we must individually and collectively live with the highest ethical standards so that we can be and reflect the type of change we want demonstrated in our communities and future generations.

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your two-cents worth on the connection between everyday ethics and personal leadership.

If you and I were face to face right now and I asked you that question, you’d probably promptly reply with – my god, my family, my children or my spouse.

But are you actually living that way?

We say our family and relationships are most important, but our values are demonstrated not by our words, but by our deeds, not by what we say, but what we do, and that is why I feel so strongly that behavior never lies!

I have found if you want to know what someone really values most, simply look at their calendar and their checkbook.

How a person spends their time and money reveals what they really value most. Well, no more lip service.

It’s time to make the main thing in your life the main thing, and I would love to hear what you have to say on this issue.

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your two-cents worth on keeping the main thing the main thing!

Researchers at Harvard have been examining this question for 72 years by following 268 men who entered college in the late 1930s. Their discoveries might surprise you.

Just listen to Dr. George Vaillant. Since 1967, the Harvard Medical School professor has dedicated his career to the “Grant Study.” (It was named after its patron, the department-store magnate W.T. Grant.)

Vaillant’s specialty is the comprehensive study of a small number of people over a long period of time. His subjects were never a representative sample of society. They were all young men from relatively privileged backgrounds.

Yet Vaillant’s findings offer profound insights into the human condition. They have universal applications. And they illuminate the one factor that correlates most highly with a positive life assessment in old age.

So let’s take a closer look…

From the beginning, the Grant Study was meant to be exhaustive. The researchers assembled a team that included medical doctors, physiologists, psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, and anthropologists.

Participants were monitored, interviewed, and studied from every conceivable angle. That included their eating and drinking habits, exercise, mental and physical health, career changes, and financial successes and setbacks.

They were subjected to general aptitude tests and personality inventories, and were required to provide regular documentation.

Many of the men achieved dramatic success. Some became captains of industry. One was a bestselling author. Four ran for the U.S. Senate. One served in a presidential cabinet. And one – JFK (we now know) – was president. (His files have been sealed until 2040.)

Some of the subjects were disappointments, too. Case number 47, for example, literally fell down drunk and died. (Not quite what the study had in mind.)

Most of the participants remain anonymous. (Although a few, like Ben Bradlee, the long-time editor of The Washington Post, have identified themselves.)

Over the last four decades, the lives of the Grant men were Vaillant’s personal and professional obsession. In his book Adaptation to Life, he writes, “Their lives were too human for science, too beautiful for numbers, too sad for diagnosis, and too immortal for bound journals.”

Yet more than 70 years of data and enabled Vaillant to reach some broad conclusions.

He found seven major factors that predict healthy aging, both physically and psychologically:

• education,
• stable marriage,
• healthy weight,
• exercise,
• not smoking,
• not abusing alcohol, and
• employing mature adaptations.

Vaillant believes social skills and coping methods are crucial in determining overall satisfaction. However, his most important finding was revealed in a 2008 interview. He was asked, “What have you learned from the Grant Study men?”

Vaillant’s response: “That the only thing that really matters in life are your relationships to other people.”

The Grant Study confirms what the wisest have always known. That a successful life is not about the grim determination to get or have more. Nor is it about low cholesterol levels or intellectual brilliance or career accomplishments.

It’s about human connections: parents, siblings, spouses, children, friends, neighbors, and mentors. Without them, life quickly loses its flavor, whatever material successes we enjoy.

Look back at your life. You’ll almost certainly find that the most significant moments were births, deaths, weddings, and celebrations.

Your most profound moments? When you touched others. Or they touched you.

In times of suffering – loss, sickness, death – it is not prescriptions, formulas, or advice we seek. It is the healing presence of another. When we forget this – when we think only of ourselves – we choke the source of our development.

Real meaning comes from taking care of those you love, letting them know how you feel. Fortunately, we have countless opportunities to give a bit of ourselves each day through a thoughtful act, a word of appreciation, or a sense of understanding.

As Dr. Vaillant concludes, true success “is more about us than me.”

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your two cents worth on the findings of the Grant Study and what it means to your life.

WHAT CAN YOU do to stand out from the crowd?

The answer has a lot to do with how you manage the brand called YOU!

Think about it, individuals are not much different from companies.

Having a trusted personal brand, or reputation, nets you the same advantages as a company.

You’re likely to foster loyalty, be trusted, be forgiven for occasional mistakes, and earn more money, especially if you develop a reputation for delivering insanely good and consistent results.

We all build, manage or destroy our personal brand every day through our character, choices, attitudes and actions.

The following are a few ways to STAND OUT from the crowd and build massive reputational capital:

• Question Management: When someone asks you a question, make sure they get an answer bigger and better than they ever expected.
• Problem Management: When someone brings you a problem, bring them a solution that not only solves the problem, but also delivers an opportunity for them to capitalize on.
• Project Management: When someone gives you a project, see to it that they get a plan bigger, bolder, and more detailed than they hoped for.
• Deadline Management: When you take on a task, finish it under budget, before the deadline, and with a cheerful attitude.
• Conflict Management: When a customer has a concern, go the extra mile as a policy, exceed expectations, and blow their mind by your professionalism and responsiveness.
• Quality Management: When you do your work, make your name and results synonymous with excellence, consistency, originality, and speed.

If you want to be the one that people seek out, than follow these strategies to ensure that you stand out!

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your two cents worth on what it takes to stand out from the crowd.

While preparing for a recent workshop, I was going through some notes looking for content ideas when I came across my file labeled “Affirmations”.

I had stashed away a story about  the Jeopardy Game Show and Kenneth Wayne Jennings III, its most successful contestant — EVER.

It got me thinking about the Ken Jenning’s saga and how it might inspire you to achieve bigger and better results.

When Ken Jennings was on the show he was Jeopardy’s whiz kid.

He is the all-time leading money winner on American game shows having won $3,172,700.

After 75 days, 975 different categories, and 4575 questions he finally lost.

You know, maybe he didn’t lose, but his opponent won.

Maybe Nancy Zerg, who unseated the phenomenal champion, had something to do with it.

At the time, she told the Associated Press, “She psyched herself up before the game show by repeating to herself this affirmation: someone’s got to beat him sometime, it might as well be me.”

While backstage with her rival contestants she observed one who had lost before the show even started. She heard him say he hoped he wouldn’t be humiliated.

Now let’s focus on you and your performance whatever that may be.

The next time you’re facing either a tough challenge or mental resistance, consider taking a page from Nancy Zerg’s playbook.

Look, it’s easy to worry and get stressed about your next sales call, presentation or meeting.

It’s easy to let your imagination run wild and become paralyzed by fear or self-doubt.

But here’s where Nancy’s game plan can help you improve your performance and achieve your goals.

• She played the game to win.
• She knows actions follow thoughts.
• She believed, without any self-doubt, she could win.
• She psyched herself up and said she could win by repeating this affirmation: “Someone’s got to beat him sometime, it might as well be me.”

You can change the words to Nancy’s affirmation to make it your own.

The lesson to learn is that affirmations do work, mental positioning is a smart move, and that you can overcome any challenge, no matter the size by assuming the position in advance.

Imagine how you will feel, and how well you will perform once you write down and repeat to yourself the ideal outcome.

If you’ve never done this before, you have no idea the impact this will have on your overall results.

Your attitude is everything and everything about your attitude counts.

The real secret to quickly achieving your goals and driving better results is to do what Nancy did.

And never forget this Henry Ford quote. “Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right!”

Naturally, I prefer to think you can.

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your two cents worth on the power of affirmations and how they helped you to achieve your goals.

Why? Balance is bogus, and too much focus on balance impedes forward progress.

Balance is a good thing for bicycles, tightrope walkers and ballerinas. Toddlers also need balance, as do the wheels on your car and those amazing young women who jump and spin on a four-inch wide balance beam in the Olympics.

The adage “all work and no play . . .” speaks to the need for variety. It’s often used in conversation where someone complains of needing to achieve balance in their activities but most of us would agree that “50% work and 50% play . . .” would be a poor formula for success.

In bike riding, ballet and circus acts, balance is not the objective but rather the means to a successful end.

You don’t balance a bicycle for the sake of balance, you do it to enable the bike to move forward.

Getting to Point B is the goal — balance is only part of the process.

Little children tumble over as they learn to walk because it’s necessary to upset their balance in order to take a step. If staying in balance were the objective, the toddler would simply stand up and stay standing. But they would never learn to walk.

The same is true of individuals and the teams, families and groups they populate. The most successful individuals, groups, and organizations are those where balance is not the focus but only part of the process.

In-N-Out Burger is widely popular because of, NOT DESPITE, their unbalanced menu – nothing but burgers and fries.

If every musician in an orchestra played their instrument at the same level of volume, the result would be – well, you’ve heard this if you’ve ever attended a junior high band concert.

Think about this: Instead of looking for balance, think about how each team or family member has a unique strength that can be applied to forward momentum.

Requiring the analytical people on your team to pretend they are visionary wastes their time and their talents just as much as asking the big picture people to plan out the details.

Let your dreamers dream and your analysts analyze.

Your team and family has a greater likelihood of achieving its goals if everyone on the team concentrates – not on maintaining a balance,  but rather – on playing their own part to the best of their ability.

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your two cents worth on this post and how you feel about the subject of balance in general.

• Write the book I’ve been talking about.
• Lose the weight I’ve been complaining about.
• Pay of the debt I’ve been dreading about.
• Start the business I’ve been thinking about.
• Live the life I’ve been dreaming about.

Of course, for most people these things won’t happen, not now – not ever!

Why?

Because they are waiting for the perfect timing, perfect circumstances, and a guarantee that success will be guaranteed.

Your life doesn’t just “happen.” Whether you know it, like it, or simply choose to dismiss this reality, your life is carefully designed by you.

The choices, after all, are yours. You choose happiness. you choose sadness. you choose decisiveness. You choose ambivalence. You choose success. You choose failure. You choose courage. You choose fear.

You also choose to take initiative and take control of your future, or you choose to suck your thumb and wait for someone to tell you what to do.

Just remember that every moment, every situation, provides a new choice. At any moment of your life, you can choose to take initiative or to offer up an excuse to procrastinate.

And in doing so, it gives you a perfect opportunity to do things differently to produce more positive results.

If you have have been using the “SOMEDAY” philosophy for running your life, I’ve got great news for you…

Someday has ARRIVED, and the richness of life is now yours to experience.

Today is the day you’ve been dreaming about.

It’s not too late to turn your dreams into reality, just later than it was.

This is the moment for bold, yet sincere action. Take action today and create the life you’ve always imagined.

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your thoughts on this post and how you can apply the idea to your life and career.

There is no room for “situational ethics” in business or in any area of your life for that matter. Something is either ethical or it isn’t. The situation does not matter.

If a person said, “Open the window but don’t open the window,” we would be at loss as to what to do; the command is contradictory and thus irrational.

In the same way, if our ethical principles and practices lack consistency, we, as rational people, will find ourselves at a loss as to what we ought to do and divided about how we ought to live.

Ethics requires consistency in the sense that our moral standards, actions, and values should not be contradictory. Examining our lives to uncover inconsistencies and then modifying our moral standards and behaviors so that they are consistent is an important part of moral development.

Where are we likely to uncover inconsistency or as what can be referred to as situational ethics?

First, our moral standards may be inconsistent with each other. We discover these inconsistencies by looking at situations in which our standards would require incompatible behaviors.

Suppose, for example, that you believe that it is wrong to disobey your employer, and also believe that it is wrong to harm innocent people.

Then suppose that one day your employer insists that you work on a project that might cause harm to innocent people. The situation reveals an inconsistency between my moral standards. You can either obey my employer or you can avoid harming innocent people, but you cannot do both.

To be consistent, you must modify one or both of these standards by examining the reasons you have for accepting them and weighing these reasons to see which standard is more important and worth retaining and which is less important and in need of modification.

A more important kind of inconsistency is that which can emerge when we apply our moral standards to different situations.

To be consistent, we must apply the same moral standards to one situation that we apply to another unless we can show that the two situations differ in relevant ways.

You might believe, for example, that you have a right to buy a home in any neighborhood you wish, because you hold that people should be free to live wherever they choose.

Yet, you are among the first to oppose the sale of the house next door to a group of mentally handicapped persons.

But what is the difference between the two situations that justifies this difference in treatment?

What is the difference that makes it all right for you to buy a home in any neighborhood, but not them?

There is another sense in which the need for consistency enters into ethics.

We might hold consistent moral standards and apply them in consistent ways, but we may fail to be consistent in who we are as individuals.

We often use the word “integrity” to refer to people who act in ways that are consistent with their beliefs.

Here consistency means that a person’s actions are in harmony with his or her inner values.

Polonius, a character in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, points out–perhaps with some exaggeration–how critical such integrity is to the moral life when he says to his son, Laertes:

This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.

Consistency in our lives also implies an inner integrity. It may be the case that a person’s inner desires are allowed to conflict with each other.

For example, a desire to be courageous or honest may be contradicted by a desire to avoid the inconvenience or pain that courage or honesty often requires. Allowing such a conflict is self-defeating because these desires are contradictory. To achieve consistency, we must work to shape our desires to produce a kind of internal harmony.

So central is consistency to ethics that some moralists have held that it is the whole of ethics. They have argued that if people consistently treat all human beings the same, they will always act ethically.

Ethical behavior, they argue, is simply a matter of being consistent by extending to all persons the same respect and consideration that we claim for ourselves.

Religion, and I mean all religion seems to imply that ethics consists of nothing more than consistency with the words:

For example –

• Christianity: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
• Confucianism: Do not do to others what you would not want them to do to you.
• Buddhism: Seek for others the happiness you desire for yourself. Hurt not others with that which pains you.
• Hinduism: All your duties are included in this: Do nothing to others that would pain you if it were done to you.
• Judaism: That which is hurtful to you, do not do to your fellow man.
• Islam: Let none of you treat his brother in a way he himself would not like to be treated. No one of you is a believer until he loves for his brother what he loves for himself.
• Taoism: View your neighbor’s gain as your gain, and your neighbor’s loss as your loss.

Each of these verses have been interpreted as meaning that all of morality can be summed up in the requirement to avoid contradictions between what one thinks is appropriate for others and what one thinks is appropriate for oneself.

But is consistency all there is to ethics? We may be perfectly consistent with respect to our moral principles and values, yet our principles may be incorrect and our values misplaced.

We may even be consistent in treating others as we treat ourselves, but this kind of consistency would hardly be the mark of a moral life if we happen to treat ourselves poorly.

We might say that while consistency is surely not sufficient for ethics, it is at least necessary for ethics.

Ethics requires that there be consistency among our moral standards and in how we apply these standards.

Ethics also requires a consistency between our ethical standards and our actions, as well as among our inner desires.

Finally, ethics requires that there be consistency between how we treat ourselves and how we treat others.

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your thoughts on this post and how you can apply the idea to your life and career.

Everyone has a breaking point, turning point, stress point, life is permeated with it.

Our bodies are designed to feel stress and react to it. It keeps us alert and ready to avoid danger. It is not always possible to avoid or change events that may cause stress. We can feel trapped and unable to cope. When stress persists, the body begins to break down and illnesses can occur.

The key to coping with stress is identifying stressors in your life and learning ways to direct and reduce stress.

What is stress?

Stress is your reaction to any change that requires you to adjust or respond. It’s important to remember that you can learn to control stress, because stress comes from how you respond to stressful events.

What causes stress?

Stress can be caused by anything that requires you to adjust to a change in your environment. Your body reacts to these changes with physical, mental, and emotional responses. We all have our own ways of coping with change, so the causes of stress can be different for each person. Common causes include:

Serious Stress

• Death
• Illnesses
• Accidents
• Marriage
• Pregnancy
• Divorce
• Job change
• Deadlines
• Moving
• Money problems
• Confrontations
• Crowds
• Heavy traffic
• Legal problems
• Retirement

When you are not sure of the exact cause of your stress, it may be helpful for you to know the warning signs of stress. Once you can identify these signs, you can learn how your body responds to stress. Then you can take steps to reduce it.

What are the warning signs of stress?

Your body sends out physical, emotional, and behavioral warning signs of stress.

Emotional warning signs include:

• Anxiety
• Sleep disruption
• Anger
• Inability to concentrate
• Unproductive worry
• Sadness
• Frequent mood swings

Physical warning signs include:

• Stooped posture
• Sweaty palms
• Chronic fatigue
• Weight gain or loss
• Physical symptoms that your doctor cannot attribute to another condition

Behavioral warning signs include:

• Over-reacting
• Acting on impulse
• Using alcohol or drugs
• Withdrawing from relationships
• Changing jobs often
• Feeling agitated most of the time

What can I do to reduce stress?

Keep a positive attitude.

• Accept that there are events that you cannot control.
• Be assertive instead of aggressive. “Assert” your feelings, opinions, or beliefs instead of becoming angry, combative, or passive.
• Learn to relax.
• Exercise regularly. Your body can fight stress better when it is fit.
• Eat well-balanced meals.
• Rest and sleep. Your body needs time to recover from stressful events.
• Don’t rely on alcohol or drugs to reduce stress.

How can I learn to relax?

There are a number of exercises that you can do to relax. These exercises include breathing, muscle and mind relaxation, relaxation to music, and biofeedback. A few that you can try are listed below. First, be sure that you have:

• A quiet location that is free of distractions.
• A comfortable body position. Sit or recline on a chair or sofa.
• A good state of mind. Try to block out worries and distracting thoughts.

Relaxation exercises

2-minute relaxation–Concentrate your thoughts on yourself and your breathing. Take a few deep breaths, exhaling slowly. Mentally scan your body. Notice areas that feel tense or cramped.

Quickly loosen up these areas. Let go of as much tension as you can. Rotate your head in a smooth, circular motion once or twice. (Stop any movements that cause pain.) Roll your shoulders forward and backward several times. Let all of your muscles completely relax. Recall a pleasant thought for a few seconds. Take another deep breath and exhale slowly. You should feel more relaxed.

Mind relaxation–Close your eyes. Breathe normally through your nose. As you exhale, silently say to yourself the word “one,” a short word such as “peaceful” or a short phrase such as “I feel quiet” or “I’m safe.” Continue for 10 minutes. If your mind wanders, gently remind yourself to think about your breathing and your chosen word or phrase. Let your breathing become slow and steady.

Deep breathing relaxation–Imagine a spot just below your navel. Breath into that spot and fill your abdomen with air. Let the air fill you from the abdomen up, then let it out, like deflating a balloon. With every long, slow breath out, you should feel more relaxed.

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your thoughts on this post and how you can apply the idea to your life and career.

Ethics Today

You may tempted to laugh at the idea that a person who’s been dead for nearly 2,400 years has anything practical to say about modern organizations. But Aristotle remains relevant because he is particularly interested in defining principles in terms of the ethics of leadership.

In his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle concludes that the role of the leader is to create the environment in which all members of an organization have the opportunity to realize their own potential.

He says that the ethical role of the leader is not to enhance his or her own power but to create the conditions under which followers can achieve their potential.

Of course Aristotle never heard of a large business or corporation. Nonetheless, he did raise a set of ethical questions that are directly relevant to ANY leader who wish to behave in ethical ways.

Here are some of them. (I’m only slightly paraphrasing them in turning them from a political context into an organizational context.)

• Am I behaving in a virtuous way?
• How would I want to be treated if I were a member of this organization?
• What form of social contract would allow all our members to develop their full potential in order that they may each make their greatest contribution to the good of the whole?
• To what extent are there real opportunities for all employees to develop their talents and their potential?
• To what extent do employees participate in decisions that effect their work?
• To what extent do all employees participate in the financial gain resulting from their own ideas and efforts?

If you translate Aristotle into modern terms, you will see a whole set of questions about the extent to which the organization provides an environment that is conducive to human growth and fulfillment.

He also raises a lot of useful questions about the distribution of rewards in organizations based on the ethical principle of rewarding people proportionate to their contributions.

For example, in 2006, Exxon Mobil’s Board of Directors provided outgoing CEO Lee Raymond with an astounding $400 million retirement package.

Now, I don’t pretend to have all the data about how much Mr Raymond deserves, but thanks to Aristotle, we do have some questions that a virtuous member of the Exxon Mobil Board Compensation Committee might ask in making decisions about his compensation, including:

Is the CEO’s proportionate contribution to the organization 10, 100, 1,000 times greater than that of a refinery worker?

Aristotle doesn’t provide a single, clear principle for the just distribution of enterprise-created wealth, nor do I believe it would be possible for anyone to formulate a monolithic rule.

Nonetheless, here are some Aristotelian questions that virtuous leaders might ask:

• Am I taking more than my share of rewards-more than my contribution is worth?
• Does the distribution of goods preserve the happiness of the community?
• Does it have a negative effect on morale? Would everyone enter into the employment contract under the current terms if they truly had different choices?
• Would we come to a different principle of allocation if all the parties concerned were represented at the table?

Again, the only hard and fast principle of distributive justice is that fairness is likely to arise out of a process of rational and moral deliberation among the participating parties.

All Aristotle says is that virtue and wisdom will definitely elude leaders who fail to engage in ethical analysis of their actions.

He tells us that the bottom line of ethics depends on asking tough questions, and I for one agree wholeheartedly.

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your thoughts on this post and how you can apply the idea to your life and career.

…to change.
…to take a risk.
…to tell the truth.
…to get in shape.
…to fall in love.
…to simplify your life.
…to act with integrity.
…to do the right thing.
…to enjoy the journey.
…to expand your mind.
…to dream big dreams.
…to make a comeback.
…to ask for forgiveness.
…to live happily ever after.
…to take full responsibility.
…to create a breakthrough
…to honor your commitments.
…to break out of a comfort zone.
…to expose yourself to greatness.
…to commit your life to excellence.
…to be what you might have been.
…to start heading in the right direction.
…to make a significant contribution to society.
…to make everything you say, think and do count.

It’s never to late to do anything, just a little later than it was!

Dreams deferred are dreams that die — a process that can take the dreamer along with them. The good news is that it’s never too late to revisit, and relive, one’s deepest desires.

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your thoughts on this post and how you can apply the idea to your life and career.

He asks one what they’re doing.

“What does it look like?” he says with a sneer. “Hauling rocks.”

Unsatisfied with that answer, the passerby asks another construction worker the same question.

The workman doesn’t bother looking up. “We’re putting up a wall.”

Frustrated, the man tries one last time. “I say there,” he asks the next fellow, “can you tell me what you men are doing here?”

The workman puts down his wheelbarrow, wipes his forehead and says with a broad smile, “We’re building a cathedral.”

Here are three men, all doing the same job. One is hauling rocks. One is putting up a wall. One is building a cathedral.

This story says a lot about the attitude that each of us brings to our lives… or could if we were willing to change our perspective.

My primary occupation, for example, is creating and distributing advice / information. One reason I write is to meet my overhead and put food on the table. To that extent, I’m hauling rocks.

A greater objective is to build a publishing and media business. The more successfully we market ourselves, the more people we attract, the better our business performs. To that extent, I’m
putting up walls.

But the real objective of my creating and distributing advice is to help people throughout the world to achieve and maintain high levels of performance excellence. When I stay focused on that, I’m building a cathedral. (And, not incidentally, meeting my lesser goals, as well.)

Idealists will counter that achieving and maintaining high levels of performance excellence has nothing to do with building cathedrals. They are mistaken.

You can improve yourself, voice your opinions, or organize around a cause without a commitment to excellence. But you won’t effect much change in your community – or build an actual cathedral – without it.

Contrary to what some believe, performance excellence isn’t about “showing off nor showing up the other guy.”

Excellence is about pride, high-standards, and healthy self-esteem along with a commitment to being the best you can be. It liberates you from the crowded field of mediocrity allowing you to stand out, rise up and shine bright!

You can’t reach your potential or live life to the fullest if you spend your days making excuses, having or accepting low standards, and doing just enough to get by. No one can attain greatness by demonstrating mediocre behavior nor accepting it from the people they surround themselves with.

A commitment to performance excellence in every area of your life is the great equalizer. It doesn’t matter if you’re a man or woman, black or white, young or old, handsome or homely, educated or not.

If you focus on excellence, and never make an exception, you will find in short order that the cream ALWAYS rises to the top.

Performance excellence is freedom, security and peace of mind. It allows you to inspire and help others, to do and be what you want. It enables you to follow your dreams, to spend your life the way you choose on your terms.

A commitment to excellence gives you dignity. It gives you choices and fills you with immense pride. That’s why every man and woman has the right – and I believe the responsibility – to pursue excellence and to become their very best.

When my advice empowers people, when it gives them direction, comfort, hope and peace of mind, I feel good about my work. I’m building a cathedral.

You can apply the same line of thinking to whatever you do.

I created the 100 Day Challenge to show you how to achieve and maintain high levels of performance and invite you to join a very special community of people who are all committed to a common goal — creating lives of excellence.

The choice is yours. You can haul rocks. You can put up walls. Or you can build a cathedral.

Come join us and let me help you build your cathedral.

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your thoughts on this post and come check out the most extreme performance acceleration program on earth!

When you’re late, forgiveness counts.

When you’re mad, self-control counts.

When you’re broke, every penny counts.

When you’re depressed, every hug counts.

When you’re on a diet, self-discipline counts.

When you’re in a hurry, every second counts.

When you’re negotiating, transparency counts.

When making a decision, good judgement counts.

When you run into obstacles, perseverance counts.

When you’re designing a new product, simplicity counts.

Your entire life is an accumulation of tiny details and small decisions .

While we measure our lives in years, we live them in days, hours, minutes, and seconds.

Every action—every detail of our lives has bottom line consequences, everything counts!

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your two cents worth on what this post means to you.

Every action — every detail of our lives — has bottom-line repercussions, and it’s dangerous and derogatory to think of any of those details as trivial, unimportant, or inconsequential.

You may be familiar with the old nursery rhyme which teaches this principle to children:

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

Downplaying small details, dismissing them as minutia — can and oftentimes will sabotage the biggest goal or project you can conceive.

Ultimately, the key to quality and excellence in every aspect of our lives is doing little things correctly — all the time, every time — so that each action produces a quality result.

When every nitty-gritty detail is lovingly attended to, and each step in the process is given complete and careful attention, the result inevitably will be of the highest quality.


WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your two cents on the importance of nitty-gritty details.

I’m referring to the goals and accomplishments that will drive you to the success you desire.

So what specifically is your life designed to accomplish?

Brace yourself…

Right now, your life and career is perfectly designed to achieve the results you are CURRENTLY GETTING!

And, if you aren’t getting the results you want, that simply means you haven’t designed a life strategy that will get them for you.

Think about that!

When you set the right objectives (the ones that get you to your goals the fastest), you focus your activities like a laser.

Why?

Because every decision you make will be judged by its ability to move you closer to your stated objectives.

So how do you determine and set the right objectives for your life?

Honestly, the right objectives will vary from person to person, and business to business.

But as you plan and strategize your life, there is one overriding definition you must use as a yard stick to engage in this behavior properly.

The RIGHT OBJECTIVES are the fewest number of accomplishments, and the least number of objectives you can determine that will allow you to reach your goals.

This is really at the heart of what it means to be a strategic thinker. It’s the core idea that makes your life efficient and profitable.

What sense does it make to take fifteen steps, when only five will get you where you want to go?

To learn how to fast track your life and results based on the right objectives than check out the 100 Day Challenge.

Over 42,000 people from more than 80 countries around the world are waiting for you to join us in the most extreme performance acceleration program on earth!

Man of La Mancha rocked Broadway in 1966 with its thundering theme song, THE IMPOSSIBLE DREAM.

You remember that song, don’t you?

It opens in soft reflection, “To dream the impossible dream… To fight the unbeatable foe…” but then it defies mortal gravity to rise heavenward on a column of fury like an old Apollo rocket.

This is my Quest: to follow that star!
No matter how hopeless, no matter how far!
To fight for the right
Without question or pause,
To be willing to march into hell
For a heavenly cause!
And I know, if I’ll only be true
To this glorious Quest,
That my heart will lie peaceful and calm
When I’m laid to my rest…

Wise Men follow a star when they believe the destination will be worth the journey.

Time and money: you can always save one by spending more of the other.

But money can be replaced and time cannot.

We spend the hours of our lives like a pocketful of pennies, one by one until they are gone.

What are you buying with yours?

Can you name your current journey?

Are you pursuing your impossible dream?

You can call it your 5-year plan, your business plan, your goal, your mission.

You can dress it up with numerals and call it a pro forma or wrap it in legalese and call it a prospectus.

All that really matters is that you understand your time, your energy, indeed the hours of your life are being spent in the pursuit of something.

“And I know, if I’ll only be true to this glorious Quest, that my heart will lie peaceful and calm when I’m laid to my rest…”

Wait a minute… are we talking about business goals, life goals, or the Broadway musical of 1966?

Yes, yes, and yes; we are talking about those.

That’s the thing about an archetypal story. Its message will echo through different actors dressed in different costumes but the play never changes:

Each of us follows a star. How clearly can you see yours?

By now, you are well aware that I am committed to helping individuals and organizations achieve the things they have committed to do.

You choose the star. My job is to get you there.

Polaris is know as the North Star and it has served as a navigational tool for millennia because unlike other stars, its position NEVER changes.

Can you name the star that beckons you?

If you’ll allow me, I’d like to help you achieve your impossible dream.

I’ve put together a life changing program called the 100 Day Challenge that is making dreams come true for people all over the world.

Please understand that this program is not for whiners, thumb suckers, posers, devil’s advocates, nitpickers, hand-wringers, crybabies, complainers, chicken-hearts or fools.

But it is definitely the program for you, that is, if you are ready to make that dream come true.

Come and join us as the next chapter of your adventure is about to begin!

• Dive for a loose ball. It counts.
• Miss that one field goal. It counts
• Make the tiniest mistake. It counts.
• Take your eye off the ball. It counts.
• Throw a ball instead of a strike. It counts.
• Following through on that swing. It counts.
• Extending your body on that play. It counts.
• Slow to help out on a double team. It counts.
• Your foot position on that pirouette. It counts.
• Finishing strong competing to the end. It counts.
• Leave the field with nothing else to give. It counts.

Every drill, every sprint, every long hour of practice leads to the performance. It counts.

Regardless of the endeavor, every time you enter the practice or playing filed, everything counts.

Your performance is representative of your practice, and your philosophy. It shows and it counts.

There will be drama, heartache, triumph and heroes. The one constant is the champions attitude, and every champion knows that everything counts.

Play like a champion today!

WHAT TO DO NOW? Share your two cents worth on what it means to play like a champion.

The following is a question I want you to seriously consider as the answer will tell you a lot about your future and ability to change. This question has allowed me to coach people to make monumental performance gains in all areas of their lives and careers.

I’d love to see your answers and will do my best to use them in the creation of future lessons and posts.

And the question is…

Q: Can you make yourself do something you really don’t want to do, in order to get a result you would really like to have?

When you are able to answer this question affirmatively, you will experience a massive shift in your perception of the immediate future.

This single concept can dramatically alter your relationships, your finances, and even your health!

The deeper question, of course, is:

What result would you like to have?

• How healthy (or unhealthy) are you willing to be?
• What kind of marriage do you really want to experience?
• Does it really matter to you whether or not your family is debt-free?
• Okay . . . So you want to be in peak physical shape . . .
• You desire a marriage filled with love, excitement, and laughter . . .
• You crave freedom from the stress and uncertainty of monthly bills . . .

BUT…

What activities must be done – with a single-minded focus – to achieve the life you long for?

And can you make yourself do those things?

I am betting that you can!

Remember, I’m The Goals Guy and I have personally witnessed the amazing changes people can make when they challenge themselves to do the things they really don’t want to do.

There it is. No more sugarcoating or explanation needed.

Do you truly want to succeed in your chosen endeavor?

Do you want to radically and permanently change your life?

Then, can you make yourself do something you really don’t want to do, in order to get a result you would really like to have?

Yes or No?

WHAT TO DO NOW? Post your response to these questions. I look forward to reading your replies!