Does that sound like a total contradiction to you? Me too. Especially, as I spend so much time talking about ‘focus’ this and ‘focus’ that, to then come out and declare that true success in life doesn’t require focus, sounds like I’m confused, delusional, or a little whacky! Well, do you know what? I am a little whacky! It actually just came out of my mouth whilst I was being interviewed. As I was formulating the words, I couldn’t stop them from just coming out and I really didn’t even know how I was going to justify what I had said.
But then, like magic, the words came out, made sense, enlightened me and now, I’m writing a blog about it. Yes, it’s true, I enlightened myself! I was talking to a guy in the USA who was interviewing me for a profile on the new wellness platform he is developing. He had asked me quite a few questions about me, what I was doing and what I believed about optimal wellbeing, or as I talk about now, living a life of joyful longevity. The final question he asked me was, ‘Do you think people should focus every day on their health and wellbeing?’ Without any conscious thought, and before I knew what I had done, I said, ‘No!’
The word came out of my mouth and then I had to justify it, because there was quite a large pregnant pause, as I know it was not the answer he was expecting. I went on to say, from somewhere in the recesses of my being, ‘Health and wellbeing should not be something we focus on, it should naturally be who we are, how we live and what we do, just like brushing our teeth.’
The mistake most people make is believing that being healthy and well takes a large commitment of time, energy and resources. That sounds way too hard. Therefore, people are sure it must be something requiring serious focus. Sure, creating the right habits will take some short-term focus, but once habitual, they are just what we do. I don’t believe eating breakfast should be a focus, I believe it should be just what we do. I don’t believe daily movement should be a focus, I believe it should be just what we do. I don’t believe being nice to people should be a focus, I believe it should be just what we do. I don’t believe making the necessary daily calls should be a focus, I believe it should be just what we do. Are you getting my point?
Success in life will not come from what you have to deliberately focus on every day. That will quickly become challenging, uncomfortable, tiresome and un-fun! Success will come from the things you work to move out of your conscious focus and into unconscious habit patterns, just like brushing your teeth. When walking up the stairs, eating breakfast and drinking water becomes what you do, you will be healthier. When making calls, saving money and daily meetings become what you do, you will be wealthier. When treating your partner how he or she deserves becomes what you do, you will have a better relationship. Success and happiness are not about what you focus on, but who you are and what you do… naturally!
This week has been an amazing one for me, in many ways. One way, in particular, it has powerfully reinforced to me the influence we all have to impact lives. No matter who you are, what you do or what you think about yourself, the thoughts you think, words you say and actions you take will have an incredible ripple effect that will influence many lives. Now, if you’re like most people, you will downplay your influence on others. So, if that’s you, I want you to pay close attention this week and believe in the impact you are having.
I’ve just finished reading the book, The Happiness Advantage, by Shawn Achor, he refers to another book called Connected. In this book, the co-authors Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler draw on years of research to show how our words, attitudes and actions are constantly cascading and bouncing off each other in every which way and direction. Their theory is that words, attitudes and actions don’t just impact and infect the people we interact with directly, like our family, friends and colleagues. Their research suggests that each individual influence actually appears to extend to people within three degrees. So, when you choose to and actually make positive change in your own life, you are unconsciously influencing the words, attitudes and actions of an incredible number of people.
James Fowler explains, about his life; “I know that I am not just having an impact on my son, I’m potentially having an impact on my son’s best friend’s mother.” This influence ripples out and adds up. Fowler and Christakis estimate that there are nearly 1,000 people within three degrees of most of us. Some less and some much more. This is powerful stuff. Simply as a result of you and I trying to be the best we can be, we are unknowingly positively impacting and improving the lives of 1,000 people. But what about the people within three degrees of those 1,000 people? Are you getting my drift here? This is why I am so passionate and excited at the moment, and, on a mission to help people live a purposeful life of joyful longevity.
I have just recently finished up a 63-day Joyful Longevity program with an organisation. It was early last week that I delivered the last session, which was mind-blowing to me in terms of the ripple effect of small, simple and seemingly insignificant actions. The people who chose to participate in this program had to do just a few very simple things. The first was to identify what was most important in their life and what would keep them on track for the 63-days it takes to create a strong neural pathway in the brain, and, embedded behaviour change. The next thing they had to do was choose a small number of very basic actions they wanted to develop into powerful routines. Thirdly, they had to simply; take the action, tick the box and win every day for 63-days. They were supported and encouraged throughout this process.
The power of one!
As I sat down with the group last week, I asked them to share their experiences, and, what I heard was incredibly inspiring and gratifying to me, even mind-blowing. Every one of these people, in just 63-days, had changed their lives, and, the lives of people around them who they’d inspired. One lady shared how the one and only action she committed to was to eat breakfast every day for 63 days. As you can see, it’s a pretty simple choice and one that you wouldn’t necessarily believe could make much of a difference. Well, I stood there listening to this lady, amazed.
She started talking about some of the personal benefits she had experienced. When she mentioned she had more energy, I wasn’t surprised. When she discussed how it had helped her with her moods and food choices during the day, I was pretty much expecting that. When she explained that the way she was feeling had inspired her to drink more water and start doing more walking, I was gaining interest. When she declared she had dropped two dress sizes, in just two months, I was amazed. Then, the next thing she discussed brought tears to my eyes.
As a result of her decision to eat breakfast, she had started getting up earlier, preparing her breakfast and taking the time to eat it. A few days after she had been doing it regularly, her son, by his own choice, started joining her. As she was talking about this, you could see her getting emotional. She explained how her son would normally just rush out the door, say very little to her, with no breakfast, or something quick & processed. Now he sits with her, eating a healthy breakfast and they talk and connect. Then, her husband, seeing what was happening, started to join them as well. Wow!!! The power of that one tiny, seemingly insignificant decision to eat breakfast that she stuck to for 63 days, had rippled and made a massive difference to her, her son, her husband, her relationships and… who else?
In the same room was the man who explained that, just a couple of months earlier, he was angry, unhealthy and just diagnosed with a condition for which there was apparently no cure. He decided to make some simple changes; to be happy, to stop drinking alcohol and to eat breakfast. The first miracle from these decisions occurred when he went back to his doctor for a check-up, just before this session. His doctor’s jaw hit the floor when, after the tests had been done, he found that the condition was completely gone from his patient’s body! Then the ripple effect began due to the impact this had, is having and will continue to have on his family, and, the people they influence. His change in moods initially confused his family, but then bought them all closer together.
The last quick story I want to share is about the man who had identified himself as a workaholic and wanted to focus his 63-days towards getting home earlier and reconnecting with his family. He admitted it was a struggle for him, because he had a deeply entrenched habit of overworking and feeling responsible to be at the beck-and-call when work needed him. He worked hard over 63-days and wasn’t sure that it was having the impact he wanted, until the last day… day 63! It was a Sunday, and he was out working in the garden, when his son, who didn’t enjoy gardening, came out and spend the afternoon with his dad, helping him and connecting with him. Again, as this man was describing this, you could see the emotion and just how important it was for him. The power of the ripple effect was at work.
All of these examples, and many more, were not born out of life-interrupting events or massive commitments, but of tiny seemingly insignificant daily actions. Do you want to change your life and impact the people around you? Then just focus on you and what you can do, one day at a time. Make no mistake, your thoughts, words and actions will ripple out and impact 1000’s of lives.
Welcome to a new year, in fact a new decade. This year is my year, and, I am excited for what it will bring into my life and through my life. I hope you feel the same way. I am excited because I have made some decisions, have some clear focus and am very much cleaning out the doubt, confusion and clutter to simplify my life. For a short time, I was wondering whether I was good enough to truly have the impact on the world that I want to have. The result was that I wandered off the path, was distracted by shiny objects, and away from what was most important.
There is no doubt about it, I was, and still am to a certain extent, very tempted by shiny objects. I think we all are, at times in our life. For me, it happens only when I start wondering. As a human being, and one with self-doubts, fears and who enjoys the comforts of life, I often start to wonder whether I good enough to or even want to pay the price to achieve the success I want in life. Do you know what I mean? When something is hard to achieve, like everything in life, we often; either doubt our ability, or, whether we truly want to go through the discomfort to achieve. In those moments of wondering, we wander off the track that will lead us to the success we want.
I can give you an example when I stayed laser-focused, strong, determined and achieved something totally unlikely, and, when, in the same field of endeavour, I wondered and wandered to my own destruction. From a young age my dream was to play professional Australian Football. It was an obsession. It guided and directed my thinking, my choices, and much to the chagrin of my parents and teachers, my actions. As a result of this one-eyed, laser-focussed and obsessive desire, I was invited to come and train at a professional club at the age of 16. At 17, I played my first senior level game and at 18, I was playing the highest level of professional football in the country.
There was no doubt in my mind, there were no other options and I was easily able to resist any and all temptations to wander. I knew what I wanted, I knew why, and I was determined to make it happen. To cut a long story short, that’s the reason I played professional sport, certainly not because of talent! So, what then happened to derail a career I worked so hard to create? Simple, I started wondering. I had been playing regular senior football for four years, and we had not experienced much on-field success at all. To be honest, the training, the effort and the losing were becoming a bit of a drag. I started to wonder whether it was worth the pain and suffering. I started wondering whether I really needed to put in the same effort, since I was now a proven senior player (or so I mistakenly thought). I started wondering if it’s what I still wanted.
You can’t wander to success!
Have you ever noticed that when you wonder, you are easily distracted by shiny objects? Well, that happened to me anyway. All of a sudden, the temptations I was so easily able to resist, when I was focused and clear-minded, seemed to be appearing everywhere, and, much harder to resist. In fact, so hard to resist, that at times, I didn’t. Instead, I wandered. I’m not going to go into the whole sad story, you can read that in my book ‘Kicking On’ with a box of tissues! What I will say, with great confidence, is that you cannot wander to success in life. The result of my distracted wandering was that my intensity dropped, my performances suffered and, before I knew what had happened, I was a sacked professional footballer.
Unfortunately, it seems, that we human beings tend to do too much wondering. We wonder whether we are good enough, and the result of that is that we are constantly looking for something easier or different or shinier or better. The second we realise that success is not easy, no matter which path we take, and we focus on what we want and move towards it, without wonder, is the moment we will start to experience the success we want in 2020 and life. Have you set a new year’s goal or resolution? As you are reading this blog, the year is almost one-week in. Are you still focussed and on track, or have you wondered and wandered already? Many people, I guarantee, have already given up, because they wondered.
There are people who wanted to get their health and wellbeing back on track and decided to join a gym and/or start a new regime. Within a short time, they wondered whether they were good enough to stick it, wondered whether the gym they chose was the right one, wondered whether they could do the work, and wondered whether they really needed to improve their health. They wondered so much, they, already so soon, wandered to an easier option, and, gave up on their goal.
What about the people who wanted to build their business or enhance their career, but very quickly started to wonder if they had what it took? Then there are those who want to improve their relationships with important people but started to wonder if the other person really wanted to do the same, or if there was a better option for them elsewhere. Many people have goals to increase their financial position but will wonder themselves right out of the game because they doubt their discipline, the interest rates and will simply settle for what they have.
Are you writing a book right now? Do you want to be a better person? Do you want to be leaner and healthier? Do you want better relationships with your partner or your kids? Do you want to be out of debt and in the black? Do you want business success? I’m sure you do want one or more of those things. I know I do. Well, let me tell you how to achieve everything you want; stop wondering. Stop wondering whether you have the discipline and decide to have it. Stop wondering if your partner wants a better relationship. Assume it and go for it. Stop wondering if you can achieve your financial goals and just follow the predictable plan for its achievement. Stop wondering if you’ll ever be a best-selling author and commit to the only thing that will allow you to know for sure.
Wondering is the killer of success, because you’ll never wander your way to your dream. It will never come knocking on your door or bump into you in the street. It will only happen with; belief, focus, determination and persistence, but you already knew that. The only reason you wonder is because you don’t believe in yourself. So, I’m going to say it here again; you are enough! No need to wonder, you have everything it takes to create amazing success in 2020. Why not just believe that? It takes just as much effort to believe you can as believe you can’t. Why not just believe in yourself? Trust me, before this year goes any further, if you wonder, you will wander. So, simply focus and have your best year ever.
It’s just a few days before the end of another year, and in fact, we are soon to be entering a new decade. That being the case, now is the time to clear the slate, hit the refresh button and heal your hurts from the year and decade just passed. We all have them. What we don’t all do, much to our own detriment, is to use the most effective healing, cleansing and renewing strategy there is. That is to forgive; ourselves and others.
I’m sure someone, or more than one person has said or done something this year that has hurt, angered or upset you. I’m sure, even without realising, you have done the same to other people. My question to you is; if you unintentionally did or said something that hurt someone in some way, do you feel you are worthy of being forgiven? The answer to that is, yes, you are? That being the case, if someone unintentionally did or said something that hurt you in some way, then doesn’t it seem fair they are also worthy of being forgiven? The answer to that is also; yes!
What if someone does something to you that they are not sorry or repentant for, are they worthy of forgiveness, or is it okay to stay angry, bitter and resentful towards them? The bottom line is that you get to choose whether you release it through forgiveness or whether you carry it around with you. Just know this; anger, bitterness and resentment are only hurting one person, and it’s not the person you’re angry with. I love the saying that anger, bitterness and resentment is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. Yes, these dangerous emotions are poisonous and will kill you. They will shut down your immune system, damage your DNA and cause destructive neural pathways in your brain. Whether the feelings are towards other people or towards yourself.
There is only one antidote to the damaging effect of anger, bitterness and resentment. It’s not just an antidote to stop the damaging effects, but one that will enhance healing, strengthen you physically, build you emotionally, and, one that will help you live a purposeful life of joyful longevity. You know what that antidote is, don’t you? That one thing is forgiveness. I’m not even talking about justifiable or rational forgiveness, I’m talking about illogical, unreasonable and unconditional forgiveness.
Sound tough? Maybe, but wouldn’t it be tougher to live a damaged and unfulfilled life due to unresolved anger, bitterness and resentment? The powerful solution is simply a matter of shoving your ego in your pocket, getting off your high-horse and forgiving. As we come to the end of 2019, I really want to encourage you to be the one who is the bigger person and forgives, even if you don’t feel like you, or, the other person deserves it. When you do forgive, you will feel and incredible weight lift off your shoulders and a lightness appear that will help you launch into 2020 with power, positivity and purpose.
Forgive and watch what happens!
In the week before Christmas, I was speaking for an organisation about my regular thing; creating and living a life of joyful longevity. In this talk, I discussed the power of our emotional state in terms of its impact on our physical wellbeing, our happiness and our longevity. I referred to a study that was done on fifty people who had lived joyfully and purposefully beyond 100 years of age, to find the common theme to their quality and quantity of life. Above all else, the two things that stood out most prominently, as having the greatest impact, were gratitude and forgiveness.
After the session, I was approached by a very cheerful man who came to thank me for my talk and agree with what I said. He then told me a story, which left me in awe and totally inspired. Many years earlier, he had been involved in a very serious car accident which left him just barely hanging onto his life. He was side-swiped by very negligent driver, and had every reason to be bitter, angry and resentful. As he was lying in a hospital bed with plaster, braces, tubes and machines holding him together and keeping him alive, he made a decision I’m not sure I would have made had I been in his situation. This decision not only saved his life, but helped him recover fully and heal in a period of time that doctors found it hard to explain from their medical perspective.
That decision was to forgive the driver who caused the accident and to be grateful for the fact that we was still alive. He explained to me how, as he lay in that bed with negativity, sickness and death all around him, he chose to think of the positives and what he was grateful for. He was grateful when he could breathe on his own. He was grateful for when he could sit up. He was grateful when he could take his first unassisted step. When he thought of the negligent driver, he felt forgiveness and empathy. He explained that this mindset helped him to heal much quicker. In fact, he told me how there were other people around him, with far less severe injuries, but a negative, victim-minded and blaming attitude who took much longer to recover than he did, despite his critical condition.
He is now fully recovered and explained to me how he has created the habit and character of seeing each day as a precious gift, being grateful for his life and being easily able to forgive others. He not only lives this way personally, but as I discussed in last week’s blog, he shares his positivity with other people, and it ripples out to impact many lives. He smiles at everyone, says hello to passers-by and is the first to offer help when it’s needed. After just a few minutes of talking to this man, I felt light and inspired. My intention when I went into that room was to inspire others, which I hope I did, but I walked out feeling like I had been the recipient of amazing inspiration.
For me, the first thing I did, as I left that day, was to smile at everyone I walked past who made eye-contact with me. I then sent some messages to people whom I am incredibly grateful for. I then chose to forgive some people, starting with myself, who deserved to be given a break. I felt, and still feel amazing. What about you? What have you got to be grateful for and who do you have to forgive? As this year comes to a close and a new year and decade is about to start, can I suggest you start it renewed, and, with a clean slate? What are you carrying around that is making you sick or keeping you in a bad place? Isn’t it time to spit out the poison and swallow the antidote?
For your own benefit, your life and for the sake of the people most important to you, take the antidote for 2020. Forgive, even if it makes no sense to forgive. Be grateful even if you feel there’s nothing to be grateful for. These are the two most freeing and healing emotions there are and will have the greatest positive impact of your life. Start your list now, of the things you are grateful and the people you are holding any anger, bitterness and resentment towards. Then, on the stroke of midnight as January 1, 2020 appears, feel the gratitude and release the hurt through forgiveness. Nothing will help you have a better 2020 than this simple decision. In the new year, enjoy the healing power of forgiveness.
My favourite description of the word faith is; trusting in advance that which only makes sense in reverse. In other words, you don’t need to know how to get somewhere, or achieve something, you just have to get started and then the path will open itself up to you. I have experienced this time and time again in my life. The only thing you do need to realise is that, between where you start and where you want to be, faith alone is not enough. You will also need to move, work, persist and overcome. I know that’s probably not what you want to hear, but faith without fortitude will leave you flailing.
Make no mistake about it – I have said so many times it’s boring and worn-out – your success and happiness in life is not about luck, talent, intellect, money, experience, knowledge or most of the things you may think it is. It’s about faith with fortitude. You must have both parts. Faith without fortitude will leave you feeling calm, but with nothing. Fortitude without faith will lead you around in circles. I want to share an exciting achievement I experienced recently, and, as I thought about how it happened, the words that came into my heads were; faith and fortitude.
Sometimes I’m a little resistant to share things I’ve achieved because I don’t want you to think I’m doing it to impress you. I truly am telling you this because I know you can do the same in your life, no matter who you are or what your circumstances may be. I want this to inspire and encourage you to use faith with fortitude in your own life. In the Cambridge dictionary, the definition of fortitude is; courage over a long period. I would correlate it with persistence and perseverance, but I wanted a word starting with ‘F’!
I am very passionate right now about my purpose of creating a wave of wellness around the world and helping people live a life of joyful longevity. I am confident about my message and I have total faith that it will change lives. On a daily basis, I contact leaders in organisations, on LinkedIn, to try and get into their organisation to share my message and engage the un-engageable to taking positive steps towards living the life of joyful longevity. I send messages, I send emails and I follow up with phone calls until; I either get told to stop calling or I get booked to speak for their company. I truly have faith that if I keep going, I will get the result I want.
Well, I received a message last week from Nicole, the HR Director at a company that I had been contacting since January this year. You can read if for yourself, so you know I didn’t just send her one message and hope for the best. This message arrived on December 5th and on December 13th I spoke to 100 people at an off-site conference in the Legends Room at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
Dance until it Rains!
I wrote a book called Dance Until It Rains, about my amazing and inspiring mother, her life and her courageous journey with cancer. She had fortitude like no other person I know. She outlived her predicted diagnosis by 15 years and impacted, and is still impacting, many lives along the way. The title of the book came to me after hearing the story of the Red Indians and their ability to dance and make rain. The truth is that the rain comes, not because of; the dance moves, the whooping and singing or the magic they claim to have. When looking for the answer, the chiefs of very dry tribes found the tribe that was making it rain and asked, ‘What’s the secret?’ With that, the chief of this tribe answered, ‘There is no secret, we just dance until it rains.’ In other words, the answer is faith with fortitude. They knew it would eventually rain, if they just kept dancing!
This is a screen shot I took from the tracking I did on an excel spreadsheet as I relentlessly followed up with Nicole. I do this for every person I am following up. My theory is; I will keep going, with faith, until I either get told to stop calling, or, I get a job. As you can see, this interaction all started back on January 27, 2019. There were several messages left from January to April, and then a flash of activity and hope in April and May. For the next seven months, I got no response from her, with the exception of one message on May 14. I’m not sure what kept me making call after call, when I was getting no response. All I had was faith that if I kept going then I would get the result. Well, it happened as I was walking my dog in the afternoon of December 5, when the text message came through. Then, one week later, on December 13, I spoke at their event. Nicole loved it and said they will definitely be using me again. The secret; faith with fortitude. I get told by people all the time how lucky I am. I believe I am blessed, but not lucky. The things I achieve are not because of luck, talent or intellect, they happen because I combine faith and fortitude with everything I do.
I’m telling you about this exciting experience in my life, not to impress you, but, because I want you to be encouraged by it. I didn’t get the speaking job because I am an unbelievable speaker. I believe I am a good speaker, but they had never heard me speak before. I got it for one reason and one reason only; persistence. In fact, Nicole explained to me that, as they were putting together the program for this day, and she thought about who she could get to fill that speaking spot, my name just instantly came into her head. Why? Because she had heard my phone messages so regularly for so long!
It’s always too early to give up. In fact, there is only one certain way to fail, and that is to give up trying. It was faith with fortitude that helped Colonel Sanders overcome 1009 rejections to find someone who would buy his recipe for fried chicken. It was faith with fortitude that is the reason you have ever heard of JK Rowling and Harry Potter, after more than forty rejections from publishers. It will be faith with fortitude that helps you achieve the things in your life that many people will consider as luck, but you will know better. So please, take this message to your heart, and believe without a shadow of a doubt, that your success in life is inevitable when you combine faith with fortitude.
Are you ready to have your mind blown? Well get this; on average, we make 35,000 decisions per day! Yes, you read correctly, 35,000 decisions every day! It’s amazing our heads don’t explode! What type of decisions do we make? Big ones, little ones, conscious ones, unconscious ones, significant ones and those that may seem to be insignificant ones. Out of all of those decisions, how many do you think are actually insignificant? 1000, 5000, 10,000 or 20,000 of them? The truth is, none of them are insignificant. Each one of them will start a ripple that will impact lives. Make no mistake, every decision you make, makes you!
The alarm goes off and you make your first decision; get up or hit snooze? Significant or insignificant? Incredibly significant, because it indicates a mindset of proactivity or procrastination. It means, more or less time in the day to do things to do meaningful things. That one simple decision will make you, more than you can realise. You make many decisions, and those decisions are going to impact your day; the people you interact with, the ripple effect they will produce, and in fact, your whole life. You get to choose to be in a good mood or not, exercise or not, eat breakfast or not, enjoy your day or not and the many other decisions that come your way during the course of the day. Make no mistake about it, these decisions you deliberately make, will absolutely make you.
Why is it that two people with similar ages, abilities, career paths and interests in life can end up in two totally different destinations? One can create amazing success and the other crippling destruction. Those who find themselves in undesirable situations will often blame luck, other people or external circumstances, but the reality is it all comes down to the decisions they made, which ended up making them. Yes, it’s true, we can face horrendous circumstances, but there are many people who rise from adversity to create incredible success. So, let’s not blame them, shall we?
I often talk about my inspiring mother, whose choices helped her outlive a miserable cancer prediction by fifteen glorious and joy-filled years. But rarely do I talk about another inspiring person in my life. This person, who has always been rock solid and an absolute blessing, is my father, Bill. Much like my mother, he never chased after fanfare or recognition, he just did and still does what he needs to do to be a great husband and father. He supported, loved and protected his family. He did and still does an amazing job. At 85 years old, as I write this, he is the man I look up to most in the whole world. He is a man whose decisions in life made him who is today; a wealthy, healthy, loving and generous man of high integrity and moral fibre.
My father was an only child born to a couple who had no idea how to show affection to their young son. In fact, so ill-equipped were they to be parents, they very quickly bundled him up and sent him off to a boarding school in a place called Geelong, two hours from where they lived. My dad learned to survive the hard way, growing up in a tough all male boarding school environment in the 1940’s and 50’s. He learned he needed to be assertive and fight for what he wanted, if he were to survive.
Make the right decisions, anyway!
Very quickly he developed an interest in Geology and followed that passion through his secondary and tertiary education and came out the other end as a qualified Geologist. Like many of us, as teenagers who never really think through the long-term impact of our career choices, my father found his life as a Geologist, whilst an interest, was not going to give him the time, money or options he wanted in his life and that of his family. So, what should he do? He really had no other skills or qualifications, and, he was – and still is – a very shy person who prefers to keep to himself. He tried his hand working in a business owned by my mother’s parents, but that was not the answer. Then in the 1970’s, he had a thought that led to a decision.
I absolutely know where my propensity for illogical thinking comes from, and whilst my father is not spontaneous like I am – in fact, if anything, the total opposite – on this particular occasion, he followed through on a pretty irrational, but every exciting thought. He saw an opportunity and identified a massive gap in the marketplace. Computers were just becoming more common in workplaces, and there was a lack of people who manage, repair and build systems. So, my father, with a geological background, and if you don’t know what that is, it’s rocks and fossils, made a decision, launched off, taught himself computer systems and became a computer systems analyst.
Now, why and how did he do that, based on his total lack of skills, qualifications and experience in that space? Why, particularly considering the embryonic stage of computers in Australia and the world? Let’s face it, in the 1970’s a microchip was a crumb left in the packet of potato chips, a gigabyte was getting supersized at McDonalds, a laptop was a small pet and a USB came from outer-space! He did it, because of a thought, a feeling and then a decision. The thought was that he wanted to create a better life for his family, that he wanted to be a provider and that there was an opportunity in the computing space. That’s all he needed to know at that time.
The thought empowered and excited him, and those feelings got him into action. He is truly a detailed oriented man, and so he studied, he learned and acted until he developed the habits which led him to amazing success. He truly was ahead of his time, and, was one of the very few people who did what he did. Consequently, he became in demand and very highly paid. He took his money, invested and set up self-managed superannuation funds and, with work, focus, persistence and the right decisions, he was predictably a millionaire at an early age. When my mother was diagnosed with her secondary cancer of the liver, and they made the decision to make her life and recovery a priority, my dad was able to retire from full time work and support his wife, emotionally, physically and financially at all times. That was thirty years ago. He is 85 as I write this book today.
My father could have made a different decision, all those years ago, to persist with geology. If he did, where would he be today? A different place, altogether. There is no doubt about it, his decisions made him a wealthy, healthy, loving and generous man of high integrity and moral fibre. It is today as you read this, right? The fact that you even made the decision to read this blog today will make a difference in your life, if you apply the information. Are you getting the results you want in life, right now? Then, look at your decisions, not your circumstances. Look at your choices, not other people’s opinions. Look at your selections, not what’s out of your control. When you start making the decisions you know you should be making, whether you want to, like them or not, you will start becoming the person who will live the life you have always desired. Understand clearly, your decisions make you!
