Going into this New Year I am developing a greater appreciation for my most precious resource…TIME.  This life we have appears to come with a time limit on it.  Whether it is 25, 50, or one hundred years everyone who lives has to check out at some point.  This is a sobering reality. 

Consider this. There are:    

• 60 seconds in 1 minute
• 60 minutes in 1 hour
• 24 hours in 1 day
• 365.2564 Days in 1 year

Now if the average person lives 75 years, then a 50 year old would have 25 years of life left.  25 years is only 219,153.8 hours of life left to live. Imagine that. Having only 219, 153 hours left to live.

Under the same assumption of 75 years of life, a 25 year old would have only 438,307.7 hours left to live.  Also, if we consider roughly 8 hours of sleep per day, then the number of hours left to live that are spent awake would be only 292,202.21 hours left for a 25 year old and 146,102.38 hours left for a 50 year old.  None of these calculations include an early termination due to accident or illness or the like.  Sounds morbid? Sorry, thats not my intention. 

My intention is for all of us to look at how we spend our time.  Who are we with?  What are we doing?   This planet is enormous with billions of people, and roughly 196,940,000 square miles to travel. There are millions of books to read and places to visit, and trillions of things to do. The range of experience and positive emotions are nearly inexhaustable.  The possibilities of how we can spend are time are virtually endless.  So if the possibilites are endless and the time is very short, then shouldn’t we wake up and make better use of our most precious resource? 

Right now, there are people running around stressing over losing some money or not making enough money and these same people will waste endless hours and not even realize it.  Time is more valuable than money.  Think about it. If you were faced with death, would you be willing to give all your money away if it could get you another year of life? Probably so. So get creative.  Get serious.  And use your time wisely.  There is so much to do and experience and so little time.

My advice to you: Be more careful with your time than your money. 

While you may guard your spending of cash, guard closer your spending of time.

It is by far, your most precious resource, and it is very limited.

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One of my goals in my character development is to develop more compassion.  On December 24, of this year, I was leaving my office when a stranger wished me a Merry Christmas.  I returned the same to him and added “Happy Holidays”. He replied, “There is nothing happy about these holidays for me”.  I was walking behind him to get to my car when I said, “Is it that bad, that there is nothing to be happy about? What’s so bad?”  He then explained how he had no family at all, had an infection or cancer in his leg and that he was homeless.  I couldn’t deny the gravity of his circumstances so I didn’t try to persuade him otherwise.  All I could think of was to reach in my pocket and give him a $20 bill.  He accepted the $20, but said that what he really wanted was for he and I to pray together.

I obliged and he began to pray.  Strangely though, he began to pray for me and my family not for himself.  When he finished the prayer, he seemed diffferent.  He turned and made comments on how a dodge magnum actually loooked like the old camino.  He was really excited about it. He pulled other passers by into his observations.  His attitude had changed radically.  He then said he felt better and he realized that he had alot to be happy about.

I was surprised.   We exchanged goodbye’s.  As I walked away, I wondered what had just happened.  I soon realized that the compassison I wanted to develop was being granted.  I realized that in order for someone to develop a characteristic, an opportunity for the trait to be displayed has to be presented.   The circumstances reveal the personal characteristic.  

I was grateful for that moment. I was grateful for that man.  That exchange helped me develop more compassion. Oddly though, I realy didnt get it until he prayed for me. Had I paid for a prayer?

Nah. I showed concern and compassion for a man who turned and showed concern and compassion for me.  It was an authentic moment that is the best of this holiday tradition.  It was reciprocal.

In this case compassion was both contagious and transformative.  As a social entrepreneur I appreciated what the needs of that man gave to me.  He helped to make my day as I am sure I helped to make his.  Who knew that my desire for greater compassion would result in such an unusual encounter.   Consider what you ask for, and watch how circumstances arise to give it to you in unexpected ways.  

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As I listen to all of the talk about the current unemployment levels and the U.S. recession, I am challenged to decide how I view the current situation?  You know, “Is the glass half empty or half full?”  Are we in a downward spiral and our hope is to ride it out or is there a silver lining in this dark cloud.  Well, the answer is that things have changed where money and income are concerned, but unfortunately most of us didn’t get the notification.

We continued to think our general understanding of things, and our basic education, both college and high school, prepared us for the real world and the “new economy”.  Well it didn’t.  Many of us are largely unprepared.  The primary reason is because of our inability to see things the way they are and to recognize where they are headed.   The assumptions in this new world are different.  And stubbornness will only result in frustration or failure.

 Here is a fundamental truth for us to consider.  “If you really want it you, have to create it.”

 This doesn’t mean that everything you want, you have to physically create it.  But it does mean you may have to create the opportunity to get it.  Or you may have to create within yourself the ability to do it. Or maybe you create the relationship or entity to get something done. This is the new reality.

The idea of being a Jr. creator is that you take 100% responsibility for what is at all times and you use your creative mind to make it what you desire it to be, at all times. No excuses. This applies to every aspect of one’s life, which includes income and employment. There are no exceptions.    

Good luck!

A few weeks ago I was having a conversation about compassion with my doctor, who is also one of my business partners and mentors. Now this may sound a little cold if you don’t know me, but here is how the conversation started. I was sharing with him a point I made to my daughter about what happens to the grasshopper that has broken legs. Of course the answer is, it dies.  Why?  Because nature is designed that way.  The faster gazelles tend to survive and thus breed to make faster gazelles, while the slower ones tend to be eaten by lions and eventually die off.  This is a principle in nature that the stronger, healthier, and smarter tend to be preferred to the weak, sicker, and unintelligent.  As a result the superior tends to attract the superior and make a better offspring. While the sicker, weaker, unintelligent attracts the same as itself and its offspring struggles to survive and gradually the weaker characteristics die off.  The realization is that nature is an evolving process where inferior traits have to give way to superior traits. 

Again, it does sound cold but here was the question I raised to him. “If nature is designed in this way then where does compassion fit into the equation?  Why should the stronger carry the weaker if the natural process of the stronger surviving is designed to make people better since the stronger survives?  And is compassion a contradiction to the process commonly known as “natural selection”? 

Here was his answer, and it is deep by the way.  He explained that compassion is the means by which the stronger, smarter, healthier or superior improves.  He explained that in order for someone to be able to help someone else then they have to develop their capacity to help. And as a result of developing their capacity to help, they get better.   In other words, compassion benefits the compassionate as much as it does the one who inspired the compassion.

See it’s like this; you help the sick when you have the compassion that moves you to develop yourself to be able to serve the needs of the sick by building a clinic or becoming a physician.  Or you help the poor when you have the compassion that moves you to be able to accumulate the resources to help the poor. You help the uneducated when compassion moves you to develop yourself to become an educator or build schools etc. 

So by having compassion you can expand yourself and your capacity to be able to help others.  In fact, since compassion causes growth then your expansion can also be an indicator that you are compassionate.  Otherwise what is called compassion may just be sympathy. And sympathy is simply an attitude which says “Oh I feel sorry for those people” but does nothing to help.  

After the talk I realized that my life is a witness to that principle.  Virtually ever change I have made in my life was in response to the need of others.  And it made me a much better, stronger, smarter, more prosperous person. It helped me to evolve. Otherwise, without it, I may have never really grown.

Compassion is a good thing with phenomenal benefit.  So my advice is feel compassion and let compassion move you to get bigger and better. Life is so much more enjoyable and rewarding when you do.  

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Michael

Hopefully you have read the post just before this one, entitled that 1 thing; if not, read it before this one if you don’t mind.  Done? Okay now for the response to the question, “How do you get yourself to perform at higher and higher levels when nothing in your environment compels you to do so?”

The answer is simple, self discipline.  You simply have to take the first step in the desired direction and then do it again and again and again. Eventually, the more you build upon  the right behaviors or thoughts or actions then the easier they become.  Each act of self discipline in each moment is a little victory.  These little vistories start to become habits and eventually lead to an overall direction.  

Sometimes we make things to overwhelming because we look at the long journey ahead.  We get intimidated by the difficulty of the tasks ahead.  But all that is necessary is to just take the first step.  Do something right. Then do something right again.  And just keep that up. Don’t worry about the big picture or the big goal.  Just take the correct next step or have the correct thought and keep that up.  Soon you will see the progress you wanted. 

I’m doing it now.  Disciplining myself to write this blog is an act of self discipline that I exercise on a regular basis.  Nothing in my environment compels me to write.  Nor was I ever a “writer”.  And certainly never a literature buff, but when writing became an important part of my evolution and growth then I had to step it up. I had to exercise self discipline, despite my own laziness and the ordinary expectations of others. This is what it takes to achieve your goals.

Self discipline is the path.  Whatever your goal is, take some time right now to do something that is a step in the right direction.  It is a powerful act.  One that will transform your life in small but compelling ways.

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