"You cannot take the mild approach to the weeds in your mental garden. You have got to hate weeds enough to kill them. Weeds are not something you handle; weeds are something you devastate." — Jim Rohn

This quote is a challenging one.

Similar to the area of tolerance, society seems to push us towards acceptance of the weeds that creep into our lives.

But weeds must be devastated and given no chance for survival in our lives.

Think about your own life. Are there any weeds creeping in?

A relationship that needs to be ended?

A habit that needs to be stopped?

A thought habit that needs to be changed?

Got something? Ok, time to get rid of it. Zero tolerance.

Make it a great day.

Jake

Below is a short story called “Father Forgets”. I know I have sent this out before but heard it again last night and since it was right after Father’s Day, I felt compelled to share.

The story is an important lesson for all our relationships, not just the one of father-son.

Remembering to support and appreciate those in our lives instead of criticizing can make a big difference in the lives of those we care about.

Is there someone in your life that you are being too critical of?

Make it a great day.

Jake

Father Forgets

by W. Livingston Larned

Listen, son; I am saying this as you lie asleep, one little paw crumpled under your cheek and the blond curls stickily wet on your damp forehead. I have stolen into your room alone. Just a few minutes ago, as I sat reading my paper in the library, a stifling wave of remorse swept over me. Guiltily I came to your bedside.

There are things I was thinking, son: I had been cross to you. I scolded you as you were dressing for school because you gave your face merely a dab with a towel. I took you to task for not cleaning your shoes. I called out angrily when you threw some of your things on the floor.

At breakfast I found fault, too. You spilled things. You gulped down your food. You put your elbows on the table. You spread butter too thick on your bread. And as you started off to play and I made for my train, you turned and waved a hand and called, "Goodbye, Daddy!" and I frowned, and said in reply, "Hold your shoulders back!"

Then it began all over again in the late afternoon. As I came Up the road, I spied you, down on your knees, playing marbles. There were holes in your stockings. I humiliated you before you boyfriends by marching you ahead of me to the house. Stockings were expensive – and if you had to buy them you would be more careful! Imagine that, son, form a father!

Do you remember, later, when I was reading in the library, how you came in timidly, with a sort of hurt look in your eyes? When I glanced up over my paper, impatient at the interruption, you hesitated at the door. "What is it you want?" I snapped.

You said nothing, but ran across in one tempestuous plunge, and threw your arms around my neck and kissed me, and your small arms tightened with an affection that God had set blooming in your heart and which even neglect could not wither. And then you were gone, pattering up the stairs.

Well, son, it was shortly afterwards that my paper slipped from my hands and a terrible sickening fear came over me. What has habit been doing to me? The habit of finding fault, of reprimanding – this was my reward to your for being a boy. It was not that I did not love you; it was that I expected too much of youth. I was measuring you by the yardstick of my own years.

And there was so much that was good and fine and true in your character. The little heart of you was as big as the dawn itself over the wide hills. This was shown by your spontaneous impulse to rush in and kiss me good night. Nothing else matters tonight, son. I have come to your bedside in the darkness, and I have knelt there, ashamed!

It is a feeble atonement; I know you would not understand these things if I told them to you during your waking hours. But tomorrow I will be a real daddy! I will chum with you, and suffer when you suffer, and laugh when you laugh. I will bite my tongue when impatient words come. I will keep saying as if it were a ritual: "He is nothing buy a boy – a little boy!"

I am afraid I have visualized you as a man. Yet as I see you now, son, crumpled and weary in your cot, I see that you are still a baby. Yesterday you were in your mother’s arms, your head on her shoulder. I have asked too much, too much.

“We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.” – Albert Einstein

As you look at your biggest challenge right now, how might this quote apply?

Are you having a hard time with one or two goals in particular because you are using the same kind of thinking?

I once read that simply changing something as simple as your route to work in the morning can change the way you think enough to work through a problem you are facing.

Just making some new pathways in your brain cause it to look at your old problem from a new angle.

What change could you make to shake things up?

Getting up early?

Staying up late?

No caffeine?

An extra latte in the afternoon?

A different route to work?

A new workout routine?

I am sure you can come up with some better ideas on your own, the key is to just do something different. Begin the process of thinking differently.

Make it a great day.

Jake

http://youtu.be/kZlXWp6vFdE

Since yesterday was father’s day I thought I would send out one of my all time favorite father-son moments from sports.

The story is of Derek Redmond who tore his hamstring in the middle of his race in the Olympics. Despite being only able to hop on one leg he was determined to finish the race he had worked so long to be a part of.

And seeing his son in so much pain and struggling to make it across the finish line, his dad did what most dads would do. He ran down there and helped his son across the finish line.

Two great morals in one story. Never give up. We all need someone to lean on sometimes.

I hope everyone had a great father’s day.

Make it a great day.

Jake

JW* – “You know you’re in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.” ― Dr. Seuss

JM* – “Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.” ― Lao Tzu

EB* – I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear. – Martin Luther King, Jr.

JD – Where there is love there is life. – Mahatma Gandhi

In honor of Meaghan and I’s 11 anniversary today and since we aren’t having a management meeting I thought I would send out quotes on love.

I often say that I am the luckiest man in the world. I believe so mostly because I am lucky enough to be loved by such a wonderful woman.

We were built for love. You could say we are love machines. (Sorry couldn’t resist that one).

We were built to be loved and to love others.

Not just in a romantic sense, but in an all of mankind sense.

Make it a great day.

Jake

http://youtu.be/5xAwwQ_d0Ck

I wanted to send a song that would make Mrs. Davis smile this morning and for some reason this one popped into my head.

Today is our 11th anniversary.

This wedding scene reminds me of our wedding 11 years and why anniversaries are so great.

Having a reminder to pause for a minute and think back and be thankful for all the good in our lives is so important.

Take a minute today to think of anniversary in your life.

Make it a great day.

Jake

For some reason, the ant and the grasshopper story has crept up in a few recent conversations.

Because of that I thought I would share it with everyone today.

No particularly deep or meaningful thoughts in relation to the story, just a question.

Is there an area or time in your life/schedule right now where you are playing too much instead of working the way you should.

Make it a great day.

Jake

In a field one summer’s day a grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart’s content. A group of ants walked by, grunting as they struggled to carry plump kernels of corn.

"Where are you going with those heavy things?" asked the grasshopper.

Without stopping, the first ant replied, "To our ant hill. This is the third kernel I’ve delivered today."

"Why not come and sing with me," teased the grasshopper, "instead of working so hard?"

"We are helping to store food for the winter," said the ant, "and think you should do the same."

"Winter is far away and it is a glorious day to play," sang the grasshopper.

But the ants went on their way and continued their hard work.

The weather soon turned cold. All the food lying in the field was covered with a thick white blanket of snow that even the grasshopper could not dig through. Soon the grasshopper found itself dying of hunger.

He staggered to the ants’ hill and saw them handing out corn from the stores they had collected in the summer. He begged them for something to eat.

"What!" cried the ants in surprise, "haven’t you stored anything away for the winter? What in the world were you doing all last summer?"

"I didn’t have time to store any food," complained the grasshopper; "I was so busy playing music that before I knew it the summer was gone."

The ants shook their heads in disgust, turned their backs on the grasshopper and went on with their work.

Don’t forget — there is a time for work and a time for play!

Memorial – intended to commemorate someone or something.

Yesterday was Memorial Day. A day set aside to commemorate those that have lost their life in service to our country.

A seemingly consistent theme from those in the service is one of "doing their part". Being a part of protecting this great land and the cause of freedom world wide is something that they are inspired to do.

Maybe this next part is easier to say because I never served in the Armed Forces, but now we must do our part.

As we think of ways to commemorate those that have lost their life, the best way is to lives ours to the fullest.

Do you think they died with the hopes that we would spend our lives watching TV and complaining about our lot in life?

I don’t think that is what most of them had in mind.

Some of things I imagine those brave heroes thinking about as they faced mortal danger.

Their best girl back home. The love of their life. They probably pictured a life together filled with love, smiles and happiness. Take a minute to look at your spouse today as if through the eyes of a young soldier. Appreciate them the same way he would if given the chance.

The opportunity for meaningful work. I imagine them sitting around at night dreaming up enterprising schemes and plans to rule the business world. Take a fresh view of your job today. Think about as if you have just started after returning home from war.

To love others as ourselves. I imagine them struggling with all the senseless violence, meanness and coldness displayed in regards to human life. I imagine many of them making a vow to help others the minute they are given the chance. Today, smile at a stranger as if you had just seen the depths of humanity and were determined to balance that ledger through your own helpfulness and service to others.

These are just a few things that popped into my head to think about as ways to honor those that have gone before us.

Anything come to mind for you?

Make it a great day.

Jake

As in the past, I also feel compelled to share my two favorite pieces from Abraham Lincoln in honor of our Veterans.

Gettysburg Address

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Letter to Mrs. Bixby

Dear Madam,

I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.

Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,

A. Lincoln

http://youtu.be/5xAwwQ_d0Ck

Jesus gave us a commandment: Love your neighbor as yourself.

Love is also a choice.

Everyday we can choose to look at others in our life with love.

Today you can make that choice.

Make it a great day.

Jake

I recently received the email below and thought it was worth sharing with everyone as the daily attitude email.

Make it a great day.

Jake

A young person I know was explaining to me the changes that he wanted to make in his life. At one point in the conversation he got excited and said, "I am going to make a 360 degree change in my life." I appreciated the sentiment, and I struggled not to laugh. I didn’t want to interrupt his excitement to point out that turning 360 degrees would point him right back in the direction he was already heading.

You might be laughing to yourself, believing that what this young person meant to say was, "I am going make a 180 degree change in my life." But that’s not correct either. Turning 180 degrees means that you completely change directions. If you were heading north, changing 180 degrees means you are heading south. That kind of serious correction may be necessary from time to time. But most of the time the corrections you need to make are something less than that.

Let’s use the metaphor "179 degrees" to describe these changes. It’s less than 180 degrees. Reaching your goals in business, in sales, and life requires that you trim you sails and make adjustments. But it’s likely you are not off course by so much that you have to change directions completely. Changing that much is what causes people to go from failed effort to failed effort, always seeking the magic bullet answer.

Here’s a personal example. Last year I lost 25 pounds. For years I had a healthy smoothie for breakfast (one cup of frozen mixed berries, one cup of frozen spinach, two scoops of carb-free Iso-Pure protein powder, aloe vera, ground flax seed, and water in a blender). I almost always had a salad with chicken for lunch. But it was dinners and snacking with my three kids on the weekends that kept the weight on. To lose the weight, I stopped eating bad carbs for dinner and snacking with the kids and the pounds fell off. I didn’t exercise once during the time I lost the weight. I wasn’t that far off, and I changed something far less than 180 degrees.

Whether your goals are around your physical health, your financial health, your results in business, or your results in sales, reaching those goals requires that you make changes. You arrived at your present state by holding certain beliefs and taking certain actions as a result of those beliefs. To reach your desired future state you need new beliefs and new actions. But everything you believe and everything you’re doing isn’t wrong. You might not be that far off.

Have you ever tried to make 180 degree turn only to find out that it was too much change and that it was impossibly difficult to sustain? It might not have even been necessary.

Tim Ferris, author of The 4-Hour Work Week, The 4-Hour Body, and The 4-Hour Chef has made his career by studying how get massive changes with a little effort as possible. He searches for the "minimum effective dosage," the least amount of work that you can do to produce outstanding results. He looks for "effectiveness" instead of changes that require massive effort.

Think of some area of your life where you want better results. What are the 179-degree (less than 180) changes that you can make to produce those results?

When something isn’t working, we often want to scrap the whole idea, believing that the idea was bad or that we failed. But that isn’t always true. Sometimes you’re mostly right, but you need to trim the sails to produce the results you’re after. Think of some project that you’ve abandoned (or that you are about to abandon). What are the 179-degree changes you might make to produce better results instead of abandoning your project?

What are the one or two little actions you can take (or stop taking) that would change your results and correct your course?

Make this week rock and I’ll see you back here next week.

Anthony Iannarino