Disney Employee Engagement Speaker
Five daily blogs about life's 5 big choices on five different sites.
“Be willing to be uncomfortable. Be comfortable being uncomfortable. It may get tough.” — 2006 Fortune Cookie
A Lane 8 reader commented recently that part of her motivation, as she was training for a Marathon, came from a fortune cookie saying.
Had to read it several times.
Each time, it got better. Each time it had more power. Each time it made indomitable will seem more like an antidote than a pain.
Be willing to be uncomfortable.
Be comfortable being uncomfortable.
So the second week, I ran two mailboxes a day. Third week, three mailboxes a day.
Yes, many of you have heard this before. Which is one of the secrets to excellent results – repetition. Never get tired of doing the basic, common sense things.
Stories are critical to perpetuating past success and moving to even greater success. You already knew that right?
Eventually, the goals became impossible, but their pursuit was compelling.
What’s fascinating is how intense it was to rise to the level of representing the United States at the 2009 Master’s Track & Field World Championships, without anyone knowing.
Neighbors. Family. Work. Ten years. Ten years of dedicated, relentless effort.
Invisible to everyone around me. For a decade.
Now, neighbors know. And Family knows. Yet to this day, most where I work have no idea.
And so the question today is this, “What is your impossible goal and will you persue it without any fanfare or glory, but just for the sake that it’s a noble goal?”
Lane 8 is where the slowest competitor is placed. In swimming. In running.
You never saw Michael Phelps (world’s fastest swimmer) in Lane 8. You never saw Usain Bolt (world’s fastest runner) in Lane 8.
And yet Lane 8 is my goal.
This week, like most of you, there was a serious struggle to find the right balance of physical activity and healthy nutrition. Diet and exercise.
Here’s one of my little secrets. Are you interested in it?
Dream Big. Get There. Stay There.
Come up with a mantra, a saying, that will keep you focused on one simple goal.
To not give up, no matter the set backs. Ever!
Anyone out there disagree that diet and exercise are a good way to control and maintain decent health?
Anyone not heard of the Food Pyramid?
Okay, so these things are well-known common knowledge, right?
What’s at the base, the foundation, of the the food pyramid?
Then explain to me please, why is it that people will pick apart a sandwich and eat the meat and discard the bread?
Not trying to make anyone feel bad, I’m seriously trying to understand this. It confusing and bewildering.
Do these people know something that the rest of the scientific nutritional world is clueless to?
Steve Prefontaine. The son of an Oregon logger man.
Too small for football. Too slow for track. Not a sprinter. Also not fast enough to be a great miler.
But, he could endure more pain than anyone else.
He set the the National High School two-mile record. Bill Bowerman, the University of Oregon head Track Coach, recruited “Pre” and the two of them forever changed American running.
Steve Prefontaine is the only athlete, ever, which Nike has immortalized with a bronze statue. Are ya with me? The only one.
This You Tube video is the final five minutes (of a 13-minute race) of the 1972 Munich Olympics 5,000 meter final. It’s breathtaking, and awe inspiring to watch a man run the best race of his life, and finish fourth.
America thought the best was still to come and the world knew that Steve Prefontaine would return in four years, with a vengence and determination to win the Olympic Gold medal and set a new World Record.
But a tragic, late night car crash changed all that.
Carpe diem.