Build Your Relationship

 There's a man who finds himself upset after failing at multiple relationships. He has even been divorced a few times and is now seeking the advice of a guru.

He speaks to the guru saying,  "As it turns out, every relationship I get into fails. I seem to be very poor at picking the right woman.  What do I need to do to find a good woman?"

"Your effort should not be wasted in finding a good woman," the guru says, "but rather focused on becoming a good man."

 

I've noticed with friends and family that when you have a relationship, you either increase and grown better or decrease and get worse. It mostly happens little by little. You grow slowly apart or slowly together. In any case, you "find yourself" exactly where you are now.

And better doesn't mean more "successful" in terms of what you have. Better means you grown more comfortable being yourself around the person you love, and they grow more comfortable being their self around you. You're less and less embarrassed about your dreams, your shortcomings, and your body. You can share each with quite a lot of joy.

It's obvious but nearly undetectable. Have you ever noticed the insecurity a woman has about her body or a man about his identity and paycheck? Since when did we forget that a woman's body after kids is still quite impressive, and works just as well. And.... Did we forget that a man can only control how hard he works and not how much he gets paid?

You can easily find flaws in people, but if that is your goal, then you should get out of the relationship business. You should find a log cabin, and live there alone forever. Please do... And stay the hell away from me and my family.

The perfect person to be in a relationship with is empathic, caring, authentic, funny, and ironically ... Imperfect.

Put Forth Intense Effort First

When you are aiming to be a success in life, there is certainly a time to push yourself to the far reaches of your limits.

(Success, by the way, has been defined in many terms. Earl Nightingale had a great definition when he said, "success is the progressive realization of a worthy ideal".)

Life is filled with examples of people who give their all for achievement.

Mark Divine, Navy Seal Author of Unbeatable Mind, recounts his training at Navy Seal indoctrination. He conveys that his instructors would have had to kill him to make him quit... A sentiment later echoed by Navy Seal Author of Lone Survivor, Marcus Lutrell... As I'm sure most any Seal would echo that sentiment.

Billionaire Mark Cuban advises that it is unwise to be "in balance", while pursuinch something that you want to achieve.

Mark Cuban, Beyoncé, 50-cent... They all recount going days without noticing that they hadn't eaten or slept, because they were so wrapped up in their work.

It's an amazing testament toward resisting the biological urge to take a break, in favor of the passion in pursuing the thing.

Benjamin Disraelie, former prime minister of the United Kingdom stated that, "Nothing can resist a will that will stake even existence for its fulfillment."

I actually set out to write about providing yourself with "breaks" and periods of "renewal", but my notes reminded me deeply that there are two sides to that story. Perhaps the time for renewal and rejuvenation should always be preceded by a time of intense effort.

Watch "I'm not your guru" on Netflix

I have been a fan of Tony Robbins since 2006. When I came back from Iraq in 2006, I bought and read his book Unlimited Power. It was my first introduction of any kind to self development literature, and it was a mind blower. It was a turning point.

I have been following Tony ever since, and I've always wanted to go to one of his seminars. I even consider sneeking into one at one point!

The reason I am thinking or writing about Tony Robbins in the first place is because there's a new documentary out about a seminar he does once a year in the United States called "date with destiny". The documentary is called "I am not your guru".


I highly recommend it, especially if you are ready for a good cry.


My primary Takeaway was owning the fact that all of the negative circumstances from the past have actually happened to me for my own benefit. Gosh that sounds stupid to say, but if you watch the intervention with the girl who is blaming her father it will really open your eyes to the sky.


Tony helps this woman realize that her drug addicted father actually served her to become the strong woman that she was. She was now to let go of blaming and start thanking him for the woman that he made her. It sounds fucking ridiculous, I know, but it is so touching and it really is true.

It reached me to the point that I am greatful for all of the negative circumstances that I have ever had to endure. I have even gone so far as to search my past for bad stuff, and prove to myself that it actually made me the amazing man I am today.

Everything in life happens FOR us. I am beginning to internalize this mantra more with contemplation and reason.


I'm not your guru! Watch it. 

Don't Eat After Dinner

 Here's something very interesting, that I will be looking into further.  In fact, I am four days in to testing this thing out. I will post back in about 21 days to review the results of this style of eating. It is very simple and it doesn't require altering the content of the diet (while that may help... OK it will definitely help), it only adjusts the timing of the food intake. Enjoy, and I'll check back in with you on this...



"12. Don’t Eat 3-4 Hours Before Bedtime. Anything you eat, even healthy food, a few hours before bedtime causes a surge in insulin and causes you to gain weight. Not eating after dinner induces a sort of fast. I don’t eat from 6pm to 8am the next morning. This gives my body 14 hours to detox, repair, and burn fat. If you eat after dinner, your body will burn that food for energy and never kicks into fat-burning mode for energy. Ideally, try to get your entire food intake in an 8-10 hour period. The rest of the time you’ll be burning FAT."

https://liveto110.com/cutting-edge-weight-loss-tips/

Gain Wisdom Through Experience

In the 1920's, Dale Carnegie wrote a book called How to Win Friends and Influence People. I highly recommend it.

My favorite part of this books is when Dale writes about the angry letters Abraham Lincoln used to write. Letters that Lincoln wrote, but never sent. He knew the damage it would do to the recipient, and he knew the benefit it would have to get off his chest.

I was reminded, upon picking up a National Geographic at the airport, that How to Win Friends and Influence People is not a prerequisite for success, neither are the products hawked from today's productivity gurus.

Confucius, Augustus Caesar, Socrates... They didn't have the book. Emperors, philosophers, inventors, Warriors... They didn't either.

Rather...

Deep wisdom has always seemed to come from a place of experience, as a result of action.

Create Products That Help Others

In 2013, I was wrapping up the final class in a 45 credit hour degree MBA program. The entire class was centered around a business simulation called CAPSIM.

Things were not going so well. I was failing. I had not failed a single college class...ever ... until now. I failed the final class in my graduate program. FRUSTRATING! to say the least.

I matched my frustration with a commitment to help other people not fall into the pitfall that it did. See, I traced my failure back to getting a slow start at learning the "ins and outs" of CAPSIM. The various inputs of human resources, marketing,  research and development, and especially finance were difficult to navigate. Furthermore, it was nearly impossible to learn the simulation from the materials on the CAPSIM web page. I had to learn by failing the class..

As a response, I created some insightful tutorials (on YouTube) on how to use the CAPSIM website, as well as, a blogpost on what were the key objectives of the student role in the program.

I published these products in 2013, and I am still getting views and followers, though I haven't updated or responded to the comments. (side note, it is uncharacteristic of me not to respond, but I no longer have access to the simulation to get the most current info for folks. I'm sure a lot has changed.)

Long story short, my CAPSIM blogpost has had over 5,000 views. The YouTube tutorials have 227 subscribers and nearly 150, 000 views!

I have had a ton of positive feedback, and a few negative comments as well. Here are a few of my favorite comments on my YouTube videos:

"That was incredibly helpful to watch before my group's first meeting"
"You are a GODSEND, these videos are so helpful!! Thanks for taking the time to make these!"
"your voice is as small as your dick"
"useless" (ok, that one hurts a little bit)

Subscribe to a Podcast

Call me old-fashioned but I like the long form of communication. It's the opposite of what we usually see today in interviews on shows like the today show. In those small segments with five minute interviews we usually see the highlights and the punchlines and the marketing techniques come to life. We don't get in-depth. And I like to get deep...

I like to see how people live and how people deal with different things in their lives. What habits, tricks, techniques, did people implement to cope with all the different things that happen in life? How do people become good fathers? How do people become physically fit? Not just in a vacuum, but in the midst of a life that is like a whirl wind most of the time.

I found that podcasts do this relatively well. They go on for an hour/ hour and a half/ two hours sometimes, and they go in depth with the people that are on the podcast. It's like being a fly on the wall, listening to the Giants just talk it out. The Giants are billionaires, athletes, chess prodigies etc.

For podcasting I would recommend the Tim Ferris show as well as the Ted radio hour.

These shows, and others, have really provided a lot of value and insight to me. It has replaced most of my book reading fact. 

These podcasts capture conversations between experts in just about any field you can think of. For example, I came across and listened to a podcast about pens and journals. The guy was an expert on ink pens and paper. He talked for about a half an hour about moleskin notebooks, field notes, and different kinds of notebooks and pens that are best for different situations. Who would've thought?

The availability of knowledge from experts is really quite amazing. And it's very portable as well.  

I hope you can find one that you like! Happy listening.