In honor of President’s Day, I thought I would share a few more Presidential thoughts.

George Washington and the cherry tree story immediately popped into my mind when I thought of something to write about.

Here is a link to read it and a little bit about it:

http://georgewashingtoninn.wordpress.com/2009/03/21/the-legend-of-the-cherry-tree/

Regardless of whether it is a true story or not, there is an important life lesson in this little story.

The Bible says that those who are faithful with small things will be given responsibility over many things.

A little boy’s integrity over something as small as chopping a cherry tree can build into a man that is responsible for great things.

What can you be faithful with now so that your future will be brighter later?

Do you need to stick to your diet now so you can live a long and healthy life?

Do you need to stick to that exercise program so you can have the energy to take on your goals?

Do you need to learn a new skill that will take you to that next level?

Do you need to take responsibility for something?

Commit to yourself to be faithful while the amounts are small. Hold firm to that which you tell yourself you will do. Your own personal integrity to yourself is the most important.

Make it a great day.

Jake

Today we celebrate President’s Day.

One of the presidents we celebrate on this day is Abraham Lincoln.

His letter to Mrs. Bixby was made famous when it was used in the film Saving Private Ryan.

I have included it below.

It is short, but very powerful.

Let’s remember to appreciate all of our past presidents as well as our current one this holiday.

Make it a great week.

Jake

Executive Mansion, Washington, November 21, 1864.

Mrs. Bixby, Boston, Massachusetts:

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 words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering to 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,

Abraham Lincoln

The best thing about the future is that it comes only one day at a time. – Abraham Lincoln

This quote illustrates an important part of the success and happiness adventure we are all on.

All of the steps necessary to achieve success and be happy can’t happen in one day. They must happen in small increments, day by day.

Jim Rohn talks about “eating an apple a day” as an example of how small habits really add up. He goes on to say “you can’t eat 20 apples in one day”.

You can’t force all of the steps necessary to achieve your goals into one day. You must methodically check them off your list everyday. If you want to get to point Z and you are at point A, you must complete steps B – Y.

This is what people talk about when they talk about the potential that each of us have inside of us. If we apply ourselves diligently, day by day, you would be amazed at what one person is capable.

Apply that to Mavidea and the results explode. Multiply what one person is capable of by 25 and the possibilities are endless, as long as we are working together towards one vision and one plan for the future.

Trying to force your weight loss, wealth building, skill enhancement or other goals into one day will leave you frustrated and impatient. Create a plan for daily improvement and movement in a positive direction and you will be amazed at the results.

Make today one of those positive steps forward.

Jake

"Live your life each day as you would climb a mountain. An occasional glance towards the summit keeps the goal in mind, but many beautiful scenes are to be observed from each new vantage point." – Harold B. Melchart

This quote paints a great picture of one of the key’s to life.

In order to be happy we must be striving towards some worthy and overarching goals, but we must also relish each moment along the way.

How has this played out in your life?

Do you struggle with setting the overarching goal or with living in the moment?

As you think about your goals and your day to day life, think of the mountain. Let the pull of reaching the top propel you along the way, but don’t forget to enjoy the view along the way.

Make it a great day.

Jake

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Especially to my valentine, Meaghan. Hard to believe we been married almost ten years, thanks for putting up with me.

Love is one of those topics that seems too big for any words that Jake can produce.

Instead, I thought I would include some thoughts from a newsletter I receive.

Remember to give a little extra attention to your Valentine this year.

Jake

Of the ten basic motives that inspire all human action, love is probably the most powerful. More has been accomplished by people motivated by love for mothers, fathers, wives, husbands and children than any of the other motives.

It is very common to see athletes, musicians, and business people purchase beautiful houses for their parents when they make it big. I recently read about Gene Simmons, the famous bass player and singer for the band KISS, and his devotion and love for his mother, a Nazi concentration camp survivor who brought up her kids as a single mother. Famous, and not so famous, people recognize the love their parents gave them and the sacrifices they made to get them to where they are and want to ensure their parents never want for anything again.

Love for their wives has often been cited as the reason for the success of many men. Napoleon Hill wrote numerous times about the impact that the wives of the people he researched had on their success. Henry Ford and Thomas Edison had tremendously supportive wives and this propelled them to tremendous success, despite the many difficulties each of these men faced. John Wooden, the famous basketball coach, is well known for his love of his wife Nellie. Anybody studying John Wooden’s success will soon learn the importance of his wife Nellie to that success.

I think of the story that Zig Ziglar tells of his friend Bernie Lofchick. Bernie became a wealthy, successful, business person because his son David was born with Cerebral Palsy. Bernie and his wife did everything they possibly could to make sure their son David had as normal a life as he could. Part of doing everything possible was earning an above average income to pay for the extensive therapy his son would need throughout his life.

The motive of love can also help people endure tough situations for long periods of time. I think about single mothers who often work tirelessly and still manage to impact their children positively to become contributing citizens of the world. I think of parents who endure jobs they do not like so that their kids will have the best life they can possibly give them. I think of people who experience physical disabilities and challenges in their lives and their spouses make adjustments to their lifestyle and dreams to lovingly care for them.

Think of the person you love the most in this world and who you would do the most for. If you were to find out that person would die in one year and suffer in the process, unless you earned say, $20,000 more in the next 12 months than you did in the previous 12 months, would you earn the additional $20,000? Would you sleep less? Would you watch television less? Would you waste less time? I believe that, if your love is strong enough, anyone could do it.

Think of the people in your life that you love the most. Think of the needs they have. Think about how you could help them with those needs, big and small. Bringing happiness, joy, and comfort to loved ones can motivate you more than anything else in life to do what you need to do.

Worry. A topic that could probably take up a whole month’s worth of Daily Attitude Emails.

I received the excerpt below the other day and thought about how worry probably effects most of us that receive this email.

I especially liked the last line “Anxiety does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow, but only empties today of its strength.”

How many days have gone by in your life without strength because you spent them worrying about tomorrow and what might happen?

Spending even one day worrying instead of living out or moving towards your dreams is a waste.

We only get one chance to live each day, let’s make the best of them.

Make it a great week.

Jake

An excerpt from

Attitude is Everything

by Vicki Hitzges

I used to worry. A lot. The more I fretted, the more proficient I became at it. Anxiety begets anxiety. I even worried that I worried too much! Ulcers might develop. My health could fail. My finances could deplete to pay the hospital bills.

A comedian once said, "I tried to drown my worries with gin, but my worries are equipped with flotation devices." While not a drinker, I certainly could identify! My worries could swim, jump and pole vault!

To get some perspective, I visited a well known, Dallas businessman, Fred Smith. Fred mentored such luminaries as motivational whiz Zig Ziglar, business guru Ken Blanchard and leadership expert John Maxwell. Fred listened as I poured out my concerns and then said, "Vicki, you need to learn to wait to worry."

As the words sank in, I asked Fred if he ever spent time fretting. (I was quite certain he wouldn’t admit it if he did. He was pretty full of testosterone—even at age 90.) To my surprise, he confessed that in years gone by he had been a top-notch worrier!

"I decided that I would wait to worry!" he explained. "I decided that I’d wait until I actually had a reason to worry—something that was happening, not just something that might happen—before I worried."

"When I’m tempted to get alarmed," he confided, "I tell myself, ‘Fred, you’ve got to wait to worry! Until you know differently, don’t worry.’ And I don’t. Waiting to worry helps me develop the habit of not worrying and that helps me not be tempted to worry."

Fred possessed a quick mind and a gift for gab. As such, he became a captivating public speaker. "I frequently ask audiences what they were worried about this time last year. I get a lot of laughs," he said, "because most people can’t remember. Then I ask if they have a current worry—you see nods from everybody. Then I remind them that the average worrier is 92% inefficient—only 8% of what we worry about ever comes true."

Charles Spurgeon said it best. "Anxiety does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow, but only empties today of its strength."

I received the article below over email the other day and had to share it with everyone.

At a time when celebrities and athletes are generally maligned (and rightfully so in many cases), this is a reminder of the difference that someone in that position can make and that some do the right things for the right reasons.

Make it a great day.

Jake

Friday, January 13, 2012
I believe in Tim Tebow

By Rick Reilly
ESPN.com

I’ve come to believe in Tim Tebow, but not for what he does on a football field, which is still three parts Dr. Jekyll and two parts Mr. Hyde.
No, I’ve come to believe in Tim Tebow for what he does off a football field, which is represent the best parts of us, the parts I want to be and so rarely am.

Who among us is this selfless?

Every week, Tebow picks out someone who is suffering, or who is dying, or who is injured. He flies these people and their families to the Broncos game, rents them a car, puts them up in a nice hotel, buys them dinner (usually at a Dave & Buster’s), gets them and their families pregame passes, visits with them just before kickoff (!), gets them 30-yard-line tickets down low, visits with them after the game (sometimes for an hour), has them walk him to his car, and sends them off with a basket of gifts.

Home or road, win or lose, hero or goat.

Remember last week, when the world was pulling its hair out in the hour after Tebow had stunned the Pittsburgh Steelers with an 80-yard OT touchdown pass to Demaryius Thomas in the playoffs? And Twitter was exploding with 9,420 tweets about Tebow per second? When an ESPN poll was naming him the most popular athlete in America?

Tebow was spending that hour talking to 16-year-old Bailey Knaub about her 73 surgeries so far and what TV shows she likes.

“Here he’d just played the game of his life,” recalls Bailey’s mother, Kathy, of Loveland, Colo., “and the first thing he does after his press conference is come find Bailey and ask, ‘Did you get anything to eat?’ He acted like what he’d just done wasn’t anything, like it was all about Bailey.”
More than that, Tebow kept corralling people into the room for Bailey to meet. Hey, Demaryius, come in here a minute. Hey, Mr. Elway. Hey, Coach Fox.

Even though sometimes-fatal Wegener’s granulomatosis has left Bailey with only one lung, the attention took her breath away.
“It was the best day of my life,” she emailed. “It was a bright star among very gloomy and difficult days. Tim Tebow gave me the greatest gift I could ever imagine. He gave me the strength for the future. I know now that I can face any obstacle placed in front of me. Tim taught me to never give up because at the end of the day, today might seem bleak but it can’t rain forever and tomorrow is a new day, with new promises.”

I read that email to Tebow, and he was honestly floored.

“Why me? Why should I inspire her?” he said. “I just don’t feel, I don’t know, adequate. Really, hearing her story inspires me.”
It’s not just NFL defenses that get Tebowed. It’s high school girls who don’t know whether they’ll ever go to a prom. It’s adults who can hardly stand. It’s kids who will die soon.

For the game at Buffalo, it was Charlottesville, Va., blue-chip high school QB Jacob Rainey, who lost his leg after a freak tackle in a scrimmage. Tebow threw three interceptions in that Buffalo game and the Broncos were crushed 40-14.

“He walked in and took a big sigh and said, ‘Well, that didn’t go as planned,'” Rainey remembers. “Where I’m from, people wonder how sincere and genuine he is. But I think he’s the most genuine person I’ve ever met.”

There’s not an ounce of artifice or phoniness or Hollywood in this kid Tebow, and I’ve looked everywhere for it.

Take 9-year-old Zac Taylor, a child who lives in constant pain. Immediately after Tebow shocked the Chicago Bears with a 13-10 comeback win, Tebow spent an hour with Zac and his family. At one point, Zac, who has 10 doctors, asked Tebow whether he has a secret prayer for hospital visits. Tebow whispered it in his ear. And because Tebow still needed to be checked out by the Broncos’ team doctor, he took Zac in with him, but only after they had whispered it together.

And it’s not always kids. Tom Driscoll, a 55-year-old who is dying of brain cancer at a hospice in Denver, was Tebow’s guest for the Cincinnati game. “The doctors took some of my brain,” Driscoll says, “so my short-term memory is kind of shot. But that day I’ll never forget. Tim is such a good man.”

This whole thing makes no football sense, of course. Most NFL players hardly talk to teammates before a game, much less visit with the sick and dying.

Isn’t that a huge distraction?

“Just the opposite,” Tebow says. “It’s by far the best thing I do to get myself ready. Here you are, about to play a game that the world says is the most important thing in the world. Win and they praise you. Lose and they crush you. And here I have a chance to talk to the coolest, most courageous people. It puts it all into perspective. The game doesn’t really matter. I mean, I’ll give 100 percent of my heart to win it, but in the end, the thing I most want to do is not win championships or make a lot of money, it’s to invest in people’s lives, to make a difference.”
So that’s it. I’ve given up giving up on him. I’m a 100 percent believer. Not in his arm. Not in his skills. I believe in his heart, his there-will-definitely-be-a-pony-under-the-tree optimism, the way his love pours into people, right up to their eyeballs, until they believe they can master the hopeless comeback, too.

Remember the QB who lost his leg, Jacob Rainey? He got his prosthetic leg a few weeks ago, and he wants to play high school football next season. Yes, tackle football. He’d be the first to do that on an above-the-knee amputation. Hmmm. Wonder where he got that crazy idea?

“Tim told me to keep fighting, no matter what,” Rainey says. “I am.”

Again today I found something written by someone else that says things more powerfully than I can.

The end is great….yours is the earth and everything that’s in it.

Anything is possible…..if.

Make it a great day.

Jake

If by Rudyard Kipling

IF you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream – and not make dreams your master;

If you can think – and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

‘ Or walk with Kings – nor lose the common touch,

if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,

And – which is more – you’ll be a Man, my son!

When searching for something to write about this morning I found this short story and thought I would share it instead.

Interesting exercise….how do you think you would do?

Jake

When my brother and I we were children we spent a few weeks each summer in the countryside. Our childless uncle owned a big house there and didn´t mind having children around, so of course our parents were happy to loan us for a few days at a time.

Our uncle was a geologist and loved to go on long walks to find stones to his collection

at the university. More often than not we followed him. He had a housekeeper who could cook like an angel and always gave uncle a big basket full of good food for those trips. We didn´t mind sharing the goodies so we eagerly waited for those excursions.

One day we left early and this time uncle had bought us backpacks.

– You can help me carry the samples, he explained.

Sure, why not. The whole day we then walked around the countryside and every now and again uncle put stones in our bags. We were a bit surprised he also took some stones out from our bags at times, but figured he had just found better samples than the ones we already had.

Still, when we reached the house in late afternoon, we were beat. The backpacks were so heavy we gave a big sigh of relief when we thumped them on the porch. Yet uncle´s backpack was half empty.

– Why did you give us so many stones? we asked.

– I didn´t. You did, he said cryptically.

He waited for a while before continuing:

– You did not know it, but I made you go through a little attitude test today.

– What do you mean with attitude test? we wanted to know.

– It is something someone once did to me – and I shall always remember it. You see I listened to every word you said. And when ever you were complaining about anyone or anything, I added a stone to your bags. And when ever you talked about something in an attitude of gratitude and positive thinking, I took off a stone. And now look at your backpacks.

We did. They were almost bursting at their seams.

– I hope you remember this little attitude test. You see your negative thoughts are like stones. You carry them on in your mind just like those stones in a backbag. The more negative thoughts, the heavier your mind is. A positive thought, however, cancels a negative one. So look at those bags and start paying attention to what you say and how you say it.

This little lesson was one of the most important I ever had and I remember uncle with great love for teaching us one of the most important lessons in life – the power of attitude.

What if you tried this little exercise too for one day? No need to use stones or backpacks- you could buy little plastic pearls (you know – the kind you can use to make your own jewelry). You might put the pearls in one pocket and move to the other when you recognize a negative thought. And then take the pearl out when you think positively.

And I don´t mean that if you pay attention to something in your life that doesn´t work that would be counted as a negative thought. No – the point is not to avoid difficult subjects.

Instead pay attention on your emotions – when you think of the thing, do you approach it with "this will never work"- or with "I´ll figure this one out" -attitude? It might reveal do you see yourself as a victim or as someone who is actively doing something about your life´s issues. (We all have issues, so that in itself is not alarming or a sign your life would be any worse than someone else´s).

An interesting experiment to say the least!

The dictionary is the only place that success comes before work. Hard work is the price we must pay for success. I think you can accomplish anything if you’re willing to pay the price. – Vince Lombardi

All success, achieving anything of value, requires hard work.

Whether it be hard work on yourself and self-improvement or hard work in a particular field or on a particular task, it is a requirement.

If you are going to work hard, you might as well make it worth it.

I think those that are happiest are the ones that whose passion for the “work” in their life makes it seem like there isn’t any “work” being done at all. I don’t think they like to do everything associated with their passion, but they do have a passion for the overarching vision and result they are working towards.

What excites you? What would get you out of bed early and staying up late? What would make any kind of work bearable?

Do you have something in your life that would make all the hard work worth it?

Make it a great week.

Jake