“In the midst of hate, I found there was, within me, an invincible love.
In the midst of tears, I found there was, within me, an invincible smile.
In the midst of chaos, I found there was, within me, an invincible calm.
I realised, through it all, that…
In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer.
And that makes me happy.
For it says that no matter how hard the world pushes against me, within me, there’s something stronger – something better, pushing right back.” – Albert Camus
If I went back to when I was 18 and gave myself any advice, it might be a version of the above words.
“We have bigger houses but smaller families; more conveniences, but less time;
We have more degrees, but less sense; more knowledge, but less judgment; more experts, but more problems; more medicines, but less healthiness;
We’ve been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet the new neighbour.
We’ve built more computers to hold more information to produce more copies than ever, but have less communications;
We have become long on quantity, but short on quality.
These times are times of fast foods; but slow digestion;
Tall man but short character; Steep profits but shallow relationships. It is time when there is much in the window, but nothing in the room.” – Dalai Lama
Every now and then I come across words like the ones above that make me really stop, and reflect.
“Reality leaves a lot to the imagination.” – John Lennon
My wife, TLJ*, is a disaster when it comes to going to a cinema.
She literally gets immersed in the movie, to the extent that she lives and feels everything the characters do on screen.
She will become so engrossed in what’s happening that she has no awareness of being in a cinema or indeed that there is anyone else with her. As far as she’s concerned she is IN the world of the movie characters.
So if there’s any sort of scary scene in the movie, forget about it. TLJ will literally be beside herself and usually screams or shouts at the main character as they are about to enter a dark room where the murderer is… ‘Don’t go in there!!’.
“The key to success is to keep growing in all areas of life – mental, emotional, spiritual as well as physical.”
– Julius Erving
In today’s world, there’s a lot of hype and attention given to scaling a company. But not as much is given into ‘Scaling Yourself’…
In my experience, having worked with many companies who have scaled, the single best way to scale and grow a company is to grow the people FIRST.
“Concentration is the key to economic results.
No other principles of effectiveness is violated as constantly today as the basic principle of concentration.”
A client told me last year of a story about his 9 year old son.
When asked what his father did for a living he replied with:
“He answers emails.”
While a funny anecdote, my client admitted that it was closer to the truth than he would have liked.
“It’s funny how everyone considers honesty a virtue, but no-one wants to hear the truth.”
A couple of weeks ago, my wife TLJ*, stopped me in my tracks early one morning by saying this:
“Can I give you some feedback?”
As far as I’ve seen in my life so far, it’s rare that I’m going to ‘like’ what follows from that little opener. But I’m not sure I had a choice in the matter… 🙂
“So we see, to play successfully the game of life we must train the imaging faculty.” – Florence Schovel Shinn
“But what do I do with this?”
A client had called me unexpectedly because something had happened that literally blew their mind.
They had been focusing for a couple of years on a visualisation of a house they wanted to live in. He was so passionate about it that he created was is now known as a ‘vision board’ and would frequently look at it and daydream. (Key point…)
Many business people can see something like this as childish, but it might surprise you as to how many don’t…
“True life is lived when tiny changes occur.” ― Leo Tolstoy
I was up early this morning and went for a walk around Wicklow, a harbour town on the east coast of Ireland.
It was cold and dark but the sound of something familiar but yet, unfamiliar, caught my attention and made me smile.
It was the sound of beer kegs being loaded onto a waiting Guinness truck, parked on the side of the street. My smile must have been evident as the two men doing the loading smiled back, I think almost in silent recognition at their own delight to be back doing their work.
“Sometimes ideas hold us down;
they become heavy anchors that hold the bark of identity fixated in shallow dead water. ” – John O’Donohue
I remember there being a time in my life where I would dread Monday mornings – luckily for me, that is no longer the case.
The morning I’m writing and sending out this email/post is Monday 17th January 2022 – the third Monday of the new year.
Already I’ve heard one radio station proclaim that ‘Blue Monday’ has arrived – the worst day of the year, apparently. Except there’s nothing to back that up. It was an idea originally made up by a travel company as a way to encourage holiday sales.
And the phrase stuck, and spread.
“The cave you fear to enter, holds the treasure you seek.” ― Joseph Campbell
“I’m not ready to do that.”
So said the experienced entrepreneur to me in response to me challenging them to look in the mirror in relation to some problems they had. So we stopped working together.
They wouldn’t admit it but they were afraid. There’s nothing unusual about that because the truth is that everyone I know experiences fear – albeit in different ways and at different times.
