Example

Here is the power of leadership by example in a nutshell…

“Do not kiss your children so they will kiss you back but so they will kiss their children, and their children’s children.” ~ Noah benShea

Lesson for Today

Live before you die.

What do you say when you must say farewell?

A dear friend and follower of Me#3 moved on to the next phase of her life journey this week and I am deeply saddened and shocked.

The problem always comes up, what do you say?  There are no words that will make any of it better.  The best we can do is to reflect and look at what we learned from that person and what we can celebrate about them.

I learned a lot from my friend.  She taught me about being a friend, about support, about giving.  Her short life taught me that it’s not about how long you live, it’s about how you live.  Powerful stuff.

In addition, I can celebrate what she left behind for me.  She loved angels and the thought of having heavenly watchdogs and messengers.  She sent me a lot of them, coins with angels, keychain fobs of angels, etc.  Now she is with those same angels…and I hope she will continue to show me their power and protection.  I hope she will continue to share a more intimate knowledge of the power of the creator…she did that in this life, I hope it will go on.

I know she left behind a grieving mother and my hope is that her mother can find peace in the knowledge that her daughter made a difference in the lives of others and she brought light where there was darkness.  I will pray for her mother and hope she finds peace.

I look forward to seeing AM again and to the laughs, and most importantly, to the warmth of her heart.  With a tear I say farewell to my friend, thank you more than you can know.

Excellence … Thanks Martin.

It’s MLK day and what better time to celebrate great leadership …and… deliver a great message about how to be excellent.

“If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well.”   – Martin Luther King, Jr.

Thanks Martin.  Thanks for changing the world.  Thanks for standing up for what you believed in and showing us what it means to lead.

Christmas Wish

Here is a Christmas Wish or maybe even a prayer.  The words are Garth Brooks’ but the hope is mine.

When I close my eyes I see
The way this world shall be
When we all walk hand in hand

When the last child cries for a crust of bread
When the last man dies for just words that he said
When there’s shelter over the poorest head
We shall be free

When the last thing we notice is the color of skin
And the first thing we look for is the beauty within
When the skies and the oceans are clean again
Then we shall be free

When we’re free to love anyone we choose
When this world’s big enough for all different views
When we all can worship from our own kind of pew
Then we shall be free

When money talks for the very last time
And nobody walks a step behind
When there’s only one race and that’s mankind
Then we shall be free

Stand straight, walk proud, have a little faith, hold out
We shall be free

                       – Garth Brooks

 

Take a moment this holiday season to say a prayer for the world described above.  Happy holidays!

Go Tim Go

I don’t get it; all of the hubbub over Tim Tebow, the quarterback for the Denver Broncos.  Here is a young man who is outspoken about his faith and is proving to have some success against all of the odds.

For the longest time, NFL “experts” have been saying he doesn’t have the necessary skills to be an NFL quarterback.  He doesn’t throw the ball correctly; he runs too much.  All I can say is, “who cares?”  The guy is leading his team to wins and silencing the naysayers with what he does rather than what he says.  I hope he keeps on; right now I am his biggest champion and I am not even a Denver Broncos supporter.

While I don’t completely agree with some of Tebow’s beliefs, I respect them and admire his willingness to give God thanks for his accomplishments.  Unlike others, I don’t have a problem with him praising God for his gifts and success; we should all be doing that.  In fact, Tim Tebow has inspired me to not give up when others are saying that I can’t do something; he has inspired me to pray harder, to put God first more, and to always be grateful.  Wow, if all that is such a bad thing, keep it up Tim.

To all of the naysayers and those who have a problem with Mr Tebow thanking God, I don’t know what to say but look at results and look at integrity, you might just learn something.

Keep going Tim, keep inspiring and pushing us to be more faithful, more grateful and to lead with humility, our world needs more of that.

Favorite Bumper Sticker

I was at a horse show this weekend and saw one of my favorite bumper stickers.

God doesn’t carry a flag.

The Man In The Arena

I heard John Harbaugh, the coach of the Baltimore Ravens, quote Theodore Roosevelt yesterday after the Ravens win over the Pittsburgh Steelers. No matter what team you support or whether you care about sports or not, you can’t help but be stirred by this quote.

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.” – Excerpt from the speech “Citizenship In A Republic” delivered at the Sorbonne, in Paris, France on 23 April, 1910

Try, fail, try, fail, try again …. but never, ever quit … don’t listen to the critics.

Karma

“Whatever you give to life, it gives you back.  Do not hate anybody.  The hatred which comes out from you will someday come back to you.  Love others and love will come back to you.”  – Anonymous

The Future

“The future depends on what we do in the present.” – Mahatma Gandhi

Everything we do today has an effect on the future.  Even the smallest act has the ability to influence those around us.  If you’ve ever heard of the Butterfly Principle, you know, if a butterfly flaps its wings in China, it creates a wind in California, then you can understand the impact of small acts.  Become a believer in delivering random acts of kindness.
Influence a better world today … and every day … the future depends on it.