Some years ago, while on a nationwide seminar tour, I happened to be staying overnight in Houston. After a particularly tiring, stressful day, I made an appointment for a massage at the health spa in the hotel where I was staying. By the time my appointment rolled around, I was in a pretty gruff mood […]
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When I used to drive my son to school, one particular roadside advertisement always caught my attention. In it, a mother was tending a tray of burnt cookies, with the caption “You don’t have to be Perfect to Be a Perfect Parent.” I often pondered the meaning of the ad and sensed that the message […]
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In the Preface to Stephen M.R. Covey’s book The Speed of Trust, his father, Stephen R. Covey (of Seven Habits fame), stated: “My interactions with business leaders around the world have made it increasingly evident that ‘speed to market’ is now the ultimate competitive weapon.” Just think about that for a moment — the ultimate […]
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It’s amazing how often we automatically assume that someone’s words represent set-in-stone fact. Nothing amazes me more than when someone says, “I know that for a fact,” then, when pressed for his source of information, says that Freddie Fibber told him so. Of course, just because someone tells you something that turns out to be […]
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I’ve always loved this time of year. Summer winds down and the weather changes. Students go back to school, and spiritual and cultural events take place all over the world to welcome fall. One of those events is the Days of Awe — a time for introspection and conscious gratitude for the miracles we take […]
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Here’s a great excerpt from a book I’m reading that I think you’ll want to pay close attention to: This brief company history may leave the impression that our experience has been one of ever-improving results, with one success after another, each building on the one before. Nothing could be further from the truth. Progress, […]
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The uproar over the Ray Rice domestic-abuse incident cries out for a truthful, politically incorrect article, so I decided to volunteer for the job. Rice’s Ali-like left jab to his then-fiancée’s kisser is but a blip on the crime screen of the hoodlum-saturated National Football League. Stuff like this, and worse — much worse — […]
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The Kirundi proverb, “You may get up before the dawn, but destiny gets up before you,” raises some interesting questions. If our fate is determined by Destiny, why bother to pursue our dreams? Why bother to have goals? Why bother to put any effort into life at all? Though fate will always play a role […]
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Sometimes it’s difficult to muster up the positive mental attitude to see opportunity in a bad situation. Things get so out of hand that it’s easy to become discouraged to the point of feeling despair. Those are the times when your mettle and sinew are really put to the test — sometimes very long tests. […]
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Oversimplified, chaos theory is about the underlying chaos that exists in seemingly orderly systems. The so-called butterfly effect comes into play here, because a small change in initial conditions can dramatically change the long-term behavior of a “system.” A system, of course, can be just about anything — the weather, a mathematical formula, a sporting […]
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