Orrin Woodward LIFE Leadership Press

Personal Development Industry

Tim Marks explains why LIFE Leadership is moving to the front of the pack in the super-successful personal development field. Orrin Woodward, Chris Brady, Tim Marks, and Claude Hamilton spearheaded the launch of LIFE and it has a promising future. Here is Tim's article.

On November 1^st, 2011, eight business partners and friends, spearheaded by New York Times best-selling author Orrin Woodward, launched a brand-new company called LIFE.  I was blessed to have earned my place amongst these men, and together we flipped the ignition switch on a nearly two-decade dream: a company that would not only offer a life-changing business opportunity, but would market life-changing products.

Results speak for themselves: in our first year of business, our products through LIFE and LIFE TRAINING sold a combined total of $53 million.  As well, we give a financial incentive for people to change.  We for those individuals who build a thriving community, great financial rewards are around the corner.  It shouldn’t come as a surprise that we have achieved early success.  First and foremost, we have a high-performing team of business leaders and a thriving business community.  These folks could sell ice cream cones to Eskimos.  But we’ve been saddled in the past with clunky, overpriced products that would thrill your great-grandmother but were decidedly not “red-hot” or “cool” in any way, and still managed to break sales records.  With LIFE, we went a decidedly different direction.  Our LIFE products, including the books, CDs, DVDs, and seminars created and delivered by LIFE fit by definition within a niche industry that has best topping the best-selling charts for years: the self-help industry.

A decade ago, the global economy was in pretty good shape, but my personal economic situation was a disaster.  I had over 33 rental properties and my property manager had behaved in an unfortunate way with how she managed the books and the money.  I was caught holding the bag and faced crushing debt.  But I had discovered an amazing author and Christian motivational speaker, Zig Ziglar, when I stumbled across his audio cassette titled Goals.  That tape opened the door to my changing the way my mind thinks.  I devoured every book and cassette from Zig I could find, and even had the opportunity once to shake his hand and get his autograph.  I owe so much to that man and am so grateful he captured his positive message in books and tapes that I might one day stumble across and begin to change my life.

I believe so much of the success of the self-help industry is stories like mine: people who have had success point backwards in time saying, “My life was changed when I read Greatest Salesman in the World, Think and Grow Rich and Dale Carnegie books.”  However, there is a downside to the self-help industry that the LIFE business has worked diligently to address.

First of all, a lot of the stuff on shelves at your book stores is written by authors who aren’t walking their talk.  For one example, I know of a best-selling relationship book whose author has been divorced multiple times!  This is not true in the LIFE business.  All of our authors and speakers have been vetted through a very simple formula: results.  If someone hasn’t done it, they aren’t teaching it from our stage.

Secondly, the self-help industry grants the average guy on the street access to wisdom from successful people they might never meet, (which is a positive thing,) but with no follow-up action steps to guide them, the reader is left floundering as to what steps they should take!  You might buy a great book from a successful author who gets you pumped up, thinking, “Yeah, I can DO IT!”  But in the next breath, you are caught wondering, “Do what, exactly?!?”  Our books, CDs, DVDs and seminars leave people feeling motivated, but with the critical element of a GAME PLAN.  We have a franchised strategy that gets repeated over and over called POWER PLAYER.  LIFE combines the “One-two” punch of motivation with clear action steps to follow through on.

Third, the self-help industry is HUGE.  When someone walks into a bookstore, they might be overwhelmed, thinking, “Where do I begin?”  The LIFE business solves that problem by having teams of leaders scour the landscape for the brightest, most powerful, most credible advice captured in print or audio, sending the best books and CDS out each month in our SUBSCRIPTIONS.  This saves you the time of sifting through a riverbed of silt looking for the golden nuggets of wisdom.  Our leaders save YOU time so that you can get busy on learning to be a leader.

And fourth, the self-help industry promotes too much of the “self” in self-help.  Because the average person doesn’t have access to a mentor, they really are left to fend for themselves and figure things out through trial-and-error.  Our LIFE business brings that critical component of MENTORSHIP, when high-performing protégés can earn access to mentorship with the people who have massive results.  Mentors can trouble shoot with you as you attempt to apply leadership wisdom in books to real-life situations with all of the variables involved.  If a protégé can’t humble themselves to follow the advice of someone more experienced, they are in for a long and painful journey.  As a leader once said, “If you are too big to follow, you are too small to lead.”

Folks, the self-help industry is booming, just like the food industry is booming.  But just because you can eat something doesn’t mean you should.  By combining results-based teaching, a strategy of Power Player, the specific selection of books in our subscriptions, and application under the guiding hand of a mentor, anyone can take the LIFE products and create the LIFE they’ve always wanted!

God bless, Tim

Denny Smith: Conversation Killers

Denny Smith shares some great thoughts on his blog on how to nurture great conversations. The LIFE Business is filled with LIFE training and skills. Sadly, most people spend more for entertainment than they do education throughout their life. Indeed, after college, few continue their education at all, which is the reason for the Mental Fitness Challenge. Denny shares below:

Improve your conversation by avoiding these traps:

 

And as suddenly as it began, it's over.

There you were, in the middle of a great Rhino conversation, when suddenly the wind died in your sails, leaving you stranded out in a large, unwelcoming and unforgiving desert. What happened ??

Not every conversation will work, but most of them can....

Sometimes Rhinos find yourself stuck with other animals you just don't connect with, that's life. When it happens, move on. Conversely, if your conversation is boring, predictable, meandering and dead on arrival, and suddenly you realize you're rather be at home arranging your sock drawer than continuing the torture, there's a good chance you are at least partially to blame.

Here are five conversation killers that can really destroy a conversation. We're all guilty of them from time to time because they're very easy to do.  So, be aware of the information in this list, and watch that you don't swim into a riptide and get sucked into the quicksand.

Conversation Killer #1: The Blabbermouth
Conversation is a two way street and monopolizing the entire thing is a bad idea, no matter how interesting you might think you are. If you do 85-95% of the talking, that means the other person is not an active participant. They are listening, nodding occasionally, and trying not to look like their falling asleep while they plot their escape from your lecture.

Keep it 50/50. If you find yourself doing all the talking, try and get the other person to open up a little more by asking questions that require a thoughtful answer, not things that can be answered with ‘yes' or ‘no.' When the other person finishes talking, pause for a beat before speaking to give it some air, this is encouraging because it shows you are listening and thinking about what was said, not waiting until they shut up so you can say your part.

Conversation Killer #2: The Choke
Talking to much is disastrous to a conversation. Not talking is just as serious, and can quickly lead to another roadblock.

Unless somebody is asking you a math problem, one word answers should be avoided. Here are a few scenarios:

Good:
"Hey John, whats two plus two?"

"Five?" (I'm not very good with numbers.)

Bad:
"Hey John, what did you do yesterday?"

"Nuthin."

Good:
"Hey John, what did you do yesterday?"

"I had a really funny thing happen yesterday morning, would you like to hear about it?"

Once again, keep it 50/50, your responses should add to and further the conversation.

Conversation Killer #3 : The Apathetic
It's impossible to talk to somebody who looks bored, whose eyes are scanning the room while you speak, who's fiddling around with their watch and generally not paying any attention to what you're saying.

Don't be this person!

Follow these simple guidelines and you'll never be the awful partner nobody wants to converse with.

Don't be distracted.

This is simple. Don't be the aforementioned person. Show interest, make eye contact, and most importantly, listen! If you find yourself speaking to someone who suddenly becomes detached, get their attention back. Stop speaking for a moment and it will snap them back to reality. Perhaps the history of the Tesla coil isn't as fascinating to them as you'd hoped, time for a new topic.

Be interested.

Listen and remark on what is being said to you. Ask questions, share similar experiences, but above all show interest in your conversation partner.

Be interesting.

Find topics of mutual interest, by listening and asking questions. Sometimes your stories will go over great, and sometimes you will bore the pants off your partner.

All you need to do is find a common ground, or at least a point of interest, and expand from there.

Conversation Killer #4: The Uncomfortable.
You can be having the greatest conversation of your life with the most interesting person you've ever met, but if you're standing two inches away with bad breath, you're going to wind up talking to yourself. Be aware of your body language.

Don't invade their personal space. Some cultures differ on this point, but try and stand no closer to a person that you would if you were shaking hands.

Don't stare. There's a fine line between making eye contact and staring somebody down, and done incorrectly you will only succeed in making them feel uncomfortable.

Don't look away either. Show your interested by making eye contact, but too little makes you appear distracted. A good rule of thumb is make eye contact around 50% of the time while speaking, and 70% while listening.

Halitosis. What can I say? Find a way to deal with it.

Hello Mr. Mumbles. Pace your speech and enunciate. Don't shout, whisper, speed talk or talk in slow motion unless the situation calls for it.

Hello Mr. Wiggles. Tapping your feet, swaying back and forth, pacing up and down, patting your elbows, jiggling change in your pockets, these are all distractions. Relax.

Conversation Killer #5: The Jerk.
While it's good to discuss and debate matters, it's usually a mistake to get mad and call someone an idiot. Try and avoid acting confrontational and negative. It's fine to disagree with someone, but criticizing, ridiculing and belittling them will lead nowhere.

Keep Charging....

D

Chris Mattis Reviews Mental Fitness Challenge

Chris Mattis, top leader in the LIFE Business, reviews the Mental Fitness Challenge. Based upon Orrin Woodward's bestselling Top 100 All-Time Top Leadership Book RESOLVED: 13 Resolutions for LIFE, Chris Brady and Orrin produced videos to walk a person through the personal development process. When a person is ready to change, there is no better personal development program in the marketplace. Here is Chris Mattis's article.

Orrin Woodward & Chris Brady’s MFC: “Mental Fitness Challenge”

Orrin Woodward and Chris Brady’s Mental Fitness Challengeis the single best corporate style tool I have ever seen to build unity and increase productivity in a very short period of time.   Predicated on creating life-long learning habits, it works through attacking 13 areas of our lives that fall under character, task, relationships and leadership.   Starting with a self assessment test, it provides a “You are Here” starting point.   From there accountability partners, 360 degree feedback and challenge partners (who you can invite to take it with you), can all be setup and accessed.   Feedback from people you trust can reveal blind spots that you don’t realize may be controlling the results you are getting in life.   My self assessment test looks like a smallish starfish, which means no new blind spots were revealed but there are lots of areas for improvement.

Once the study of the 1st module begins, reading, audio CDs and video emails from top leaders in their fields, highlighted by the #6 Orrin Woodward and #11 Chris Brady “Leadership Gurus” in the world, support the development of new thinking and new habits.   Exposure to purposeful, consistent and incremental learning allows the “Law of Compounding” to be applied to anyone’s life.   For many this is the first time that they choose to wage a “Media War” on the way that they think   (as opposed to the normal “Brain Washing” the average American gets from media “Programing” and control campaigns that many huge corporations and government agencies push).

Going through the “Resolutions” it occurs to me that they no longer appear as acts of the will, but as stepping stones on the way to pursuing one’s purpose.   As one of the newer Mental Fitness Challengers said, ”Resolutions are Get to’s not Have to’s.”   Resolutions are tools to equip us to chase our God-given dreams, to shape us into who we can be.

What a gift this MFC is to organizations of any type, to families, communities and individuals.   I’ve started asking people I know to review the “Ad CD” and point me in the right direction to who or what I should share this with.   My favorite question to ask is from Jim Martin, a huge community builder and leader in Florida, “Have you heard of the Mental Fitness Challenge?   It’s like P90X for the brain.   I want you to take it with me.   When can we meet?”   Don’t keep life changing information a secret, share it with anyone you care about.   What a difference new information and better thinking makes! Thank you Orrin and Chris.

 - Chris Mattis

Outstanding Customer Service

In the following article, George Guzzardo writes on the importance of spectacular customer service. In other words, don't just satisfy the customers, amaze them! George has been doing that for year which is why he has such an impressive business across the USA and Canada. The LIFE Business provides the training and leadership to help people amaze their customers no matter what field of business. With the flagship product - Mental Fitness Challenge, based upon Orrin Woodward's book RESOLVED: 13 Resolutions for LIFE - receiving rave reviews, LIFE is on its way to the top. Enjoy the article.

I recently came back from a trip where I stayed at a high - end hotel.  Looking back at my stay there, it doesn’t surprise me that with the excellent customer service I will go back there someday.  How many of us will make a decision to purchase a service or buy a product based on customer service.?

Why have so many of us observed a decline in customer service over the last several years? Steven Covey writes, “ The mind – set of the Industrial Age that still dominates today’s workplace will simply not work in the Knowledge Worker Age and the new economy.  The main assets and primary drivers of economic prosperity in the Industrial Age were machines and capital – things.  People were necessary but replaceable. When all you want is a person’s body and you don’t really want their mind, heart or spirit, you have reduced a person to a thing. So many of our modern management practices come from the Industrial Age. It gave us the belief that you have to control and manage people. What happens when you treat people like things today? It insults and alienates them, depersonalizes work, and creates low – trust, unionized litigious cultures.  What happens when you treat your teenage children like things? It too insults and alienates, depersonalizes precious family relationships and creates low trust, contention and rebellion.”

What is the report card coming out based on this current system?  As a student who is the customer of a school system, they would expect a viable career. How is that working when estimates of 50% of college grads cannot find a job? Also, a high percentage who do find a job do not find one in their chosen field.  We are now told to expect job changes up to seven times over your lifetime.  How is our personal development training in the area of life skills?  Divorce rate is hovering around 50%. The average person has maybe one confidant they can call a friend. The neighborhood where people feel a sense of community is rare.  How about the economy?  Who has experienced any type of debt problem, financial stress, or struggled with a mortgage or foreclosure?   How would you describe our current system of customer service if we the people are the customers?  If I was the customer of the current system I would say our system of customer service is failing. This is a bad problem unless you are an entrepreneur who realizes that you have a business designed to identify this problem and fix it.   

The LIFE business is a leadership and personal development model that is serviced by the Team system.  When you see the LIFE business for the first time you recognize how different it is in that the person who joins the business becomes the product.  What does that mean? The goal of the LIFE plan is to find out what you want and provide a service that will get it for you.  It means that whatever your target goals are (relationships, finances, faith, fitness, business etc.) the LIFE business should service you so you will enhance, multiply, or increase it. Sounds like good customer service to me. What if there was a compensation plan to reward those who expand this concept.  This concept is known as compensated communities.  The basic level of competency in this system is called power player. It is based on a service based model where you become the example.  One of the first steps of an accomplished power player would be to read the top five books. These books have been found to position people for the most success. From this you learn how to create positive morale through encouragement, develop the rare ability to recognize and edify another person’s abilities, learn the art of listening, and become adept in conflict resolution based on a win – win relationship.

Without a viable leadership model in place entrepreneurs have recognized a need. Top Leadership experts like Orrin Woodward have banded together to create a leadership and personal development business model designed to fill the void. You might expect that the person using this system would be seen developing the qualities that people are attracted to incrementally.  I would expect this type of customer service would become the bench - mark in an industry where the product is needed and that product is you!  God Bless,    George Guzzardo

Claude Hamilton: Truth and Freedom II

Here is the second part of Claude Hamilton's superb message on truth and freedom. Claude represents the principles of the LIFE Business. Having started as a military man living paycheck to paycheck, he has thrived on leadership information and now leads thousands of people. The Mental Fitness Challenge is a great way to kickstart a person's leadership journey. Like Orrin Woodward says, "A person either hates losing enough to change, or he hates changing enough to lose." Which is it for you? As for Claude and Lana Hamilton, they hate losing!

Courage that stems from your constitution (temperament or makeup) is very weak. It will leave you stranded.

What is courage? It’s overcoming and taking action steps while you’re in fear.

Here’s the answer:

• It’s courage that comes from duty.
• It’s reliable and consistent.
• Add faith to your courage you become very powerful.

Faith is knowing the sun will come up tomorrow even when you’ve just seen it go down. You don’t doubt that it will rise again tomorrow. No one would ever bet on that.

So how do you find that type of constitution?

Know that the constitution of your human body is very good at coming up with excuses. We’re not looking for perfection here but hey… Let’s be dependable so that people can count on us.

While in the military, I’d run, do push ups, chin ups, all that – until I’d groan and say, “I can’t do this any longer!” This was the hardest I’d ever worked in my life and I’d think to myself, “I don’t need to do this; I’ll never be as good as the other guys.” I was so tired that even the thought of lifting a finger was unimaginable. Many excuses popped into my head.

Then, I’d hear, “Man Overboard!”  You never knew if it was a real emergency or just an exercise. I’d hear those words and as adrenaline shot up my body, all of a sudden my courage was no longer based on my constitution or temperament. Not even on my physical body’s feelings.  Duty was calling and my body jumped to attention. Just the thought that someone was dying gave me all the strength I needed to overcome.  No way was I going to just sit there and let things happen. A sense of duty overcame any excuse I could have come up with and I shot into action.

I’d never have to rely on my constitution or temperament to guilt me the rest of my life for inaction when I could have made a difference.

You see, our constitution will never run out of excuses.  “I’m a jerk.”  “My wife will do it.” Or “I worked late last night,” or “I’m lazy by nature.” Not even, “It’s just the way I am.”

Why are you overweight? “It’s just the way I am.”

Why are you a jerk to your wife? “It’s just the way I am – it’s the way I was raised.”

If courage is based on your makeup, your constitution or your temperament, it will forsake you. It’s totally unreliable and will let you down… again and again.

You need to build up your sense of duty.  The The 8 F’s of Leadership provide you with more than enough for you to find where your duty lies.  Your duty to your spouse; your family, friends, faith, and more. It will build character into you so strong that it will allow you to follow through on your decision long after the feeling in which you made the decision is gone. Character is STRONGER than any constitution you may have.  Never wait for the right mood to push you forward into your success. Do not trust your feelings and just do it.

You know this is true; that is why you can be doing this business for years and keep your sense of duty. Each time, at an event or a meeting, you are imparted with your sense of duty and you’ll do what you need to do. That is awesome and it will change your life.

The rewards are immeasurable. Can you change your life right now – within this community without impacting others around you? No.  It’s the qualification.  You change your life and the domino effect rolls out to those in your circle of influence. Don’t rely on courage from your constitution. Rely on something way more resilient and make quality decisions based out of your sense of duty. It will come from your character and from what you believe in your heart.

If your goal is to make $2000 next month, that is good but it’s considered the most shallow form of motivation. Love for your spouse, your children, love for your country – the 8 F’s are bigger. Duty to your family, your team, your Maker… look at whatever is important to you.

Then, the peace will come as you simply do what you know you should do.  As you act from duty, you allow God to take care of your results. Only doing it for the money makes it hard and the time will come (yes, it will) that money will no longer motivate you.  But sense of duty?  That will.

If you’re looking to your constitution for courage, you won’t do what you need to do.  You see, your constitution and your temperament needs to be trained.  Being in the military has helped train and build mine a bit stronger; it’s become more reliable.

This business is great. It helps you become the person you need to be as you continue to attract the circumstances you’re looking for.  Let me repeat that: If you want your circumstances to change, become the person you need to be so you can attract what you need.  Did you hear how powerful that was?  Most people stay the way they are, thus attracting the very circumstances they are running away from. To me this is very sad.

Believe the RIGHT truth. Running away from problems and going by your feelings on commitments is foolishness. It does not work!  Phillip Brooks says it well: “Do not pray for easier lives, pray to become stronger men.”

Begin to pray for more strength in your duties.  Pray that you might invest all of yourself UNTIL you make it. Do not despise humble beginnings or hard times.  It’s okay to cry every now and again.  I know that.  Even if your sense of duty is born out of shame, take hold of it.  Strong commitment doesn’t always come through joy but it certainly comes with plenty of humility.  Pray for strength to move mountains, for even more than you need.  We serve a God of more than enough.  Moses and Joshua were told time and again to stay strong and be of good courage.  Good courage?  Is there even such a thing as bad courage?

Yes.  I can see how our temperament and our constitution could err our courage.  This is what I believe:  I know I’m a sinner.  How far could I really go if I based my decisions on my sinning temperament? I need a higher compass. I need that sense of duty I’ve been sharing with all of you. Good courage is based on God’s promises, on his duty… or responsibilities.  Imagine taking the 8 F’s and growing a sense of duty through them.  Are you getting the idea of this sense of duty?

I so want you to get it.  To grab it with both hands. We are guarding your back all the way, we’ll help you. We’ll run with you if you run. We’ll serve you.

I leave you with this: Be strong. Be of good courage. Now go do it.

God Bless.

Claude Hamilton

Chris Brady: Leaders Lead

Chris Brady says, "Leaders lead." If ever there was a time when leadership was needed it is today. In fact, that's way Orrin Woodward and Mr. Brady launched the LIFE Business. This isn't a time to be playing small.  Shortly after launching LIFE, they launched the Mental Fitness Challenge based around Orrin's All-Time Top 100 Leadership Book RESOLVED: 13 Resolutions for LIFE. What other leaders are producing such high-quality content affordable for the many? This is the LIFE difference. Here is Chris's article on leaders leading.

Leaders lead because it is the right thing to do, because it is "in them," and because they were born for it.  Sometimes, it even gets recognized. 

For this reason, I particularly like it when historians dig up lost stories of selfless sacrifice by unsung leaders.  This exerpt from Alan Axelrod is interesting, partly because it is so little known, and partly because the hero of the story is a woman; a solid reminder that leadership does not have a prefered gender.

"Paul Revere was not the Revolution's only rider of note.  Sixteen-year-old Sybil Ludington lived in the small Putnam County, New York, village named for her family, Ludington Mills, the daughter of a Patriot militia colonel.  On April 26, 1777, a messenger appeared at Ludington's door, warning of the approach of the British.  Colonel Ludington had little time to summon and organize his militiamen, who lived miles apart form one another across the countryside.  The messenger and his horse were spent, and the colonel had to remain at home, planning the regiment's action.  It fell to Sybil, a strong and capable rider, and her horse, Star, to make a thirty-mile circuit through the night and rain sounding the alarm: 'Muster at the Ludingtons!'"

Skillful, selfless, brave, spontaneous, and heroic: a simple, great historical example of leadership.  Remember, leaders may be needed at any time: one cannot predict when - best to be willing and prepared!

Stellar LIFE Business First Year

Orrin Woodward released results for the first year of the LIFE Business. Rarely will one find a business that doubles in its first year, but that's exactly what LIFE did. Moreover, the Team also had its best year for operationally, both offices under the leadership of  Rob Hallstrand. It wasn't too many years ago, when Team was in a battle for its life. Rob, working with the PC leaders, cut the office staff in half, cut cost in all departments, and turned around the company. Nonetheless, it wasn't easy. Indeed, many said it was an impossible task; however, evidently for those on a mission to change the world, like the LIFE Founders, impossible isn't a word in their vocabulary. :)

Chris Brady, in the middle of the darkest times, said, "I would rather lose my money than lose my character." Accordingly, it's this type of character committment that has led to the impressive results for the LIFE founders. The future is bright for the LIFE Business because its leaders desire to fulfill their purpose more than they desire peace and affluence.

Here are the eight bullet points from Orrin's blog post.

1. The LIFE business surpassed 100% increase in subscriptions of the LIFE and LLR Series in under one year of business.
2. The LIFE business launched the Mental Fitness Challenge and sold thousands of 90-day challenges throughout North America.
3. The LIFE business paid out over $1,800,000 in end-of-year bonuses and free trips its first year.
4. The LIFE business paid out over 70% bonuses on its product volume points in its first year in business.
5. Rob Hallstrand, Chief Operating Officer (COO) of TEAM and a LIFE founder, coordinated operations for both companies, and combined sales blew past $50,000,000 (with LIFE leading the charge) from the Flint, Michigan based office. Since Chris Brady and I formed our first leadership training company in 1999, it is very special to have accomplished the best sales and profits ever this past year.
6. Team training produced its best operating margins ever (of which 100% of profits flow back to field trainers), as Mr. Hallstrand continued his dramatic turnaround of Team operations. In fact, employee cost-per-profit-dollar has decreased over six times in his three years as COO, leading to increased bonuses for field trainers and office staff—a truly stunning performance.
7. Customers composed nearly 20% of total LIFE business subscriptions in its first year. Considering new members have six months to learn how to develop customers, this number will only grow as members complete training. What other community building business hits 20% customer subscriptions in its first year?
8. The LIFE business launched the Edge Series for youth and has added thousands of satisfied families in LIFE’s first year.

LIFE Business Builds Significant Lives

Here is another fantastic article from Clint Fix, engineer and LIFE Business member. Change only happens when a person is ready to change. In the same way, the LIFE Business is a great tool to help drive change, but only when a person is ready to change. Are you ready to change? Reading Orrin Woodward's book RESOLVED: 13 Resolutions for LIFE or Chris Brady's book Rascal would be a great way to start.

In 2004 I realized that the lifestyle I was leading would eventually lead to permanent health problems or even premature death. I was obese and had been for as long as I could remember. With the help of a stack of books on nutrition and exercise and some friends who were in excellent shape, I began a journey to overhaul my health. I set some goals and began the painstaking process of losing weight the healthy way (after trying out the crash diet thing.) Over the course of a few years I lost 85lbs and dropped my body fat to less than 10%. I achieved my goals. I thought I had it all under control. For a few years I thought I was “maintaining,” but in reality, I was slowly packing the pounds back on. I was still working out, but less consistently. I was still eating right…most of the time. By the time I realized what was happening my body fat percentage was peaking over 15% and I had packed on enough fat that I no longer fit in my clothes. What happened to me? The same thing that happens to us all in every area of our lives. I tried to coast on my past efforts. I didn’t have the next goal set. I wasn’t focused on moving forward. As a result I slacked in my effort and in my education on the subject. In the end, I learned a very important lesson:

If you’re not moving forward, you are going backwards.

There is no maintaining. Momentum may carry you forward for a time, but you will inevitably slip backwards. Discipline is not a choice; either we discipline ourselves now or outside forces will discipline us later. If I hadn’t done the hard work of disciplining myself with regards to my health, eventually I would have lost the freedom to eat certain foods and may have been forced to take certain medications. I use the example of my weight loss journey, but the principle is the same in every part of life. It’s my experience that if we aren’t continually focused on the hard work of improving ourselves in the most important facets of our lives, life is eventually going to get much harder.

To live a significant and successful life, I believe there are a handful of areas where it’s valuable to engage in a program to help us continually learn and grow so that we don’t slip backwards:

Faith
Relationships (marriage, parenting, and friendship)
Finances
Fitness
Leadership (people skills, conflict resolution, vision, etc)
Freedom (history and economics)

Obviously there are many other areas that you may want to work on, but the areas listed will impact every area of your life. There are many different avenues for getting education in these areas so I’ll highlight some principles and questions which I recommend that you use to weigh the different programs that are available.

1. Do the people that are teaching have the results that you want in the area in which they are teaching?

Anybody can spout theories, but if you want to get better in a certain area, find someone who has results in that area.

2. Are they currently active in the area they are teaching or are they speaking on past results?

This is an important question, especially for areas like leadership and finances. Just because someone did something once a decade ago doesn’t mean that it’s applicable right now and in this economy.

3. Is the information and teaching packaged in a format that makes engaging with it easy?

While a college course or a leadership institute may have fantastic information, usually the format requires large blocks of dedicated time which is a hindrance to most. Look for programs which allow you to plug into the information in the cracks of wasted time that we all have throughout the day: while commuting in the car, working out, cleaning the house, etc. Audio learning is is one of my favorite formats because you can listen to it repeatedly and cement it in your mind. Humans learn best through small bits of information repeated over time.

4. Does the program give you access to one-on-one coaching from someone that has the results you’re looking for?

We are all very good at deceiving ourselves. Having an outside perceptive to lovingly point out blind spots and help us correct our thinking is a non-negotiable if you want to lead a significant life. All the greatest people throughout history had mentors. Even one of the best basketball players ever, Michael Jordan, had a basketball coach.

5. Does the program have a community that you can associate with?

Building relationships with people who are on a similar journey is critical for your success. The encouragement and accountability of a community can be the difference between success and failure in any self-improvement journey.

6. Is it continuous?

One-off seminars and classroom teaching has its place, but neither one will create the consistency needed for changing the habits that are holding us back. Look for a program that is on-going. Most of us have been taught the things we need to do, but we forget easily. We need continuous reminders. On-going training programs should not only teach new information, but remind us of the things we’ve forgotten.

Obviously there are other factors to take into account, but this should narrow the choices considerably. The program that I personally plug into is the one crafted by a company called LIFE. It was founded in 2011 by Orrin Woodward, Chris Brady, Tim Marks, Bill Lewis, George Guzzardo, Claude Hamilton, and Dan Hawkins. Check out some of the LIFE reviews and testimonials.

Making the decision to embark on a good personal development program will change your life. Most people are trying to coast on their knowledge from formal schooling, much like I tried to coast in my health after achieving my goal. We know how that turned out. If you want to stand out from the crowd plug into a program with a specific intent to continue learning and getting better.

God Bless,

Clint Fix

Purpose: Developing Specific Intent

Chris Brady and Orrin Woodward are all about specific intent. Both of them plan their work and work their plan. In 2007, they co-wrote the NY Times and Wall Street Journal best-seller Launching a Leadership Revolution, but that was just the start. Orrin Woodward and Chris Brady have both been recognized as top leaders in various list, and Orrin recently won the 2011 IAB Top Leader Award. With the launch of the Mental Fitness Challenge, these two have established themselves as a leadership juggernaut! Are you living your life on purpose or accident? Here are some thought to help by Chris:

On the wall of my garage I have posted a photo of a lion. It contains the message of how a lion awakes in the morning and begins hunting for a gazelle. It also shows a distant gazelle and states how it must be ready to run to escape the lion. The message is that when the sun comes up, lion or gazelle, each must awake ready to run.

I believe it is that way with winners. Driven by the purpose for which they were born, winners awake running their race. It only requires a moment of observation to realize that most people do not live this way. Instead, they awake to drudgery, plow through a day uninspired, and chalk it up to "earning a living."

Sad.

Perhaps money is the culprit. Everything is fine until money gets involved. Then all sorts of weirdness breaks out. People surrender their freedoms, their dignity, and sometimes both, just to obtain the illusion of security that income brings. There are very few things more unsightly than someone bent on economic gain at the price of their honor. 

True champions, however, deal in the currency of purpose. They trade their time and effort for greater contribution. Their blood, sweat, and toil is invested in the pursuit of a God-given calling. And for those true to their inner voice, they never actually "work" at all, because everything they do is in line with their highest picture of themselves. 

Separate yourself from the herd. Step out from the crowded chamber of complacency. Dare to live the life you've always known you could, and should. If you don't try, you'll never know. If you don't risk, you'll always wonder. Live your purpose and pursue your calling. Be about your business. And when the sun comes up, we'll look for you among the champions. I'm sure we'll find you, like the lion and the gazelle, running.

Power of Team Work

When's the last time you thanked your teammates for doing what they do so you can do what you can do? No man is an island unto himself so each of us has people to thank in his life. Orrin Woodward has built a team of people who are true teammates and are constantly thanking one another for the outstanding services rendered. With the launch of the Mental Fitness Challenge, now the world can be part of a community like this. Charles Plumb's story is a beautiful example of the concept in action. Read the article and start appreciating the people who make your life worth living.

Sometimes in the daily challenges that life gives us, we miss what is really important. We may fail to say hello, please, or thank you, congratulate someone on something wonderful that has happened to them, give a compliment, or just do something nice for no reason.

Charles Plumb, a US Naval Academy graduate, was a jet fighter pilot in Vietnam. After 75 combat missions, his plane was destroyed by a surface-to-air missile. Plumb ejected and parachuted into enemy hands. He was captured and spent 6 years in a communist Vietnamese prison. He survived the ordeal and now lectures on lessons learned from that experience.

One day, when Plumb and his wife were sitting in a restaurant, a man at another table came up and said, "You're Plumb! You flew jet fighters in Vietnam from the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk. You were shot down!"

"How in the world did you know that?" asked Plumb. "I packed your parachute," the man replied. Plumb gasped in surprise and gratitude.

The man pumped his hand and said, "I guess it worked!" Plumb assured him, "It sure did. If your chute hadn't worked, I wouldn't be here today."

Plumb couldn't sleep that night, thinking about that man. Plumb says, "I kept pondering what he might have looked like in a Navy uniform - a Dixie cup hat, a bib in the back, and bell bottom trousers. I wonder how many times I might have seen him and not even said good morning, how are you or anything because, you see, I was a fighter pilot and he was just a sailor."

Plumb thought of the many hours the sailor had spent on a long wooden table in the bowels of the ship, carefully weaving the shrouds and folding the silks of each chute, holding in his hands each time the fate of someone he didn't know.

Now, Plumb asks his audience, "Who's packing your parachute?" Everyone has someone who provides what they need to make it through the day. Plumb also points out that he needed many kinds of parachutes when his plane was shot down over enemy territory- he needed his physical parachute, his mental parachute, his emotional parachute, and his spiritual parachute. He called on all these supports before reaching safety.

His experience reminds us all to prepare ourselves to weather whatever storms lie ahead. As you go through this week, this month, this year...recognize the people who pack your parachute!

(source: businessfundamentals)