Motivational speakers almost universally define 'success' in monetary terms.
Well, that's nothing more than a convenient shorthand. It's far easier to assess someone on the basis of their bank balance, house, or car than it is to determine their true worth and happiness, but it's both misleading and dangerous.
Our planet doesn't need any more people who are after material gain. Buying stuff messes up the environment and takes our attention away from those who need our help. And there are plenty of surveys which have shown there's no connection between wealth and happiness.
I think 'success' should be defined as 'the freedom to define success any way you want'. Mostly, that means being able to dream dreams and see some of them come true.
Money? That's just one of the tools you may use to get you there.
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Finding Paul Meyer
It was 25 years ago and I was working at a pretty tough gig. I was having a brief career as a corporate manager and I'd been lured to take over an outpost where I was just the meat in the sandwich between redneck unions and equally redneck senior management, both of them busy settling old scores.
The company had a two-pronged strategy to help managers in my situation. One prong was a well-stocked office bar which was flung wide at 5pm each day. And the other was an inhouse 'corporate development' guy whose job was to travel the branches, inspire the sales reps to hurl themselves back into the fray each day, and counsel the managers after a session at the bar had calmed them down a bit.
When this guy showed up in my office and starting raving about some guy called Paul Meyer who was coming to speak in our little city, I wasn't too interested. I was already pretty cynical about the corporate world and as far as I could see this Meyer guy was going to try and put lipstick on the pig.
Well I found myself with a few hundred people in a plush convention centre room with a puzzling but palpable air of excitement. A speaker got up to push some motivational materials, and my worst suspicions were confirmed. I was going to have to buy my way out of this room and go home with an armful of glossy but useless rubbish.
Then there was a kind of lull in proceedings and this little guy ambled up the aisle from the back of the room. I thought at first he was going to tell us about the hospitality arrangements. When he started to speak his voice was soft and halting and he had this country Texan accent that was almost hillbilly.
30 minutes later I was giving Paul Meyer a standing ovation, along with the rest of the room. My life began to change from that moment.
I'd like to be able to tell you what he said, but I wore out the tape of his address. Devoid of hype, he made more sense on the subject of how to manage your life than anybody I'd ever encountered.
Turns out Paul founded a company called Success Motivation Institute, which had racked up around $3billion in sales by the time he died in 2009. I wound up doing one of their courses and it laid the foundation for most of the lessons I'm going to talk about in this blog.
Now, I'm not here to sell you anything, and anyway it's been a couple of decades since I did that course and SMI's under new management these days so I have no idea how good or affordable their material is. But you'll find some fragments of Paul on YouTube and if you poke around the Web you'll find more of his work. I think you'll find it interesting.
The company had a two-pronged strategy to help managers in my situation. One prong was a well-stocked office bar which was flung wide at 5pm each day. And the other was an inhouse 'corporate development' guy whose job was to travel the branches, inspire the sales reps to hurl themselves back into the fray each day, and counsel the managers after a session at the bar had calmed them down a bit.
When this guy showed up in my office and starting raving about some guy called Paul Meyer who was coming to speak in our little city, I wasn't too interested. I was already pretty cynical about the corporate world and as far as I could see this Meyer guy was going to try and put lipstick on the pig.
Well I found myself with a few hundred people in a plush convention centre room with a puzzling but palpable air of excitement. A speaker got up to push some motivational materials, and my worst suspicions were confirmed. I was going to have to buy my way out of this room and go home with an armful of glossy but useless rubbish.
Then there was a kind of lull in proceedings and this little guy ambled up the aisle from the back of the room. I thought at first he was going to tell us about the hospitality arrangements. When he started to speak his voice was soft and halting and he had this country Texan accent that was almost hillbilly.
30 minutes later I was giving Paul Meyer a standing ovation, along with the rest of the room. My life began to change from that moment.
I'd like to be able to tell you what he said, but I wore out the tape of his address. Devoid of hype, he made more sense on the subject of how to manage your life than anybody I'd ever encountered.
Turns out Paul founded a company called Success Motivation Institute, which had racked up around $3billion in sales by the time he died in 2009. I wound up doing one of their courses and it laid the foundation for most of the lessons I'm going to talk about in this blog.
Now, I'm not here to sell you anything, and anyway it's been a couple of decades since I did that course and SMI's under new management these days so I have no idea how good or affordable their material is. But you'll find some fragments of Paul on YouTube and if you poke around the Web you'll find more of his work. I think you'll find it interesting.
The Dream Machine
The first motivational guru I came across, the late Paul Meyer of SMI (more about him later) liked to say "somebody broke your dream machine".
He would explain that before you can make changes in your life, you have to dream them. But most of us are conditioned to push dreams away when they come to us. They seem impossible, or they threaten our comfort zone.
Paul taught me that you have to welcome your dreams, embrace and explore them. Even the ones that never come true will stimulate you to dream those that will.
Thanks to his teachings I've finished up with a pretty nice lifestyle (more of that later, too).
Well, if you're a motorcyclist here's a pretty nice way to stimulate your dream machine.
He would explain that before you can make changes in your life, you have to dream them. But most of us are conditioned to push dreams away when they come to us. They seem impossible, or they threaten our comfort zone.
Paul taught me that you have to welcome your dreams, embrace and explore them. Even the ones that never come true will stimulate you to dream those that will.
Thanks to his teachings I've finished up with a pretty nice lifestyle (more of that later, too).
Well, if you're a motorcyclist here's a pretty nice way to stimulate your dream machine.
Monday, April 18, 2011
Mission Statement
After some decades of adulthood I'm finally starting to understand how a life works.
This blog is for my fabulous feisty kids and others that come into my life who might be interested in some of the lessons I've learned.
I'm not going to promise regular postings. But I hope that in time this will become a brew of potent thoughts that you'll be able to return to when you need a fix.
This blog is for my fabulous feisty kids and others that come into my life who might be interested in some of the lessons I've learned.
I'm not going to promise regular postings. But I hope that in time this will become a brew of potent thoughts that you'll be able to return to when you need a fix.
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