foreign, it's nice to see all of you. I want to thank you for coming tonight. There's a lot of places you could be besides attending a seminar: home with your family, or visiting friends, or having a party, or whatever. But you've chosen to be here tonight, and I appreciate that very much. I keenly feel two responsibilities, and I'm sure you can guess what those are. Number one is to make sure you get your money's worth, right? When you shell out your hard-earned cash, and I know the money for the seminar is not the end of the money, right? By the time you take your family out to dinner, and hire a babysitter, and put gasoline in your car, right? The tab keeps going up, and by the time you add it all up, it's fairly substantial. And when you spend your hard-earned cash, you want to make sure you get your money's worth. So, hopefully, by the time we finish tonight, you'll have your money's worth. But I think I have a bigger responsibility, and that is to make sure

you get your time's worth, and I say that because time is more valuable than money. You can get more money, right, but you can't get more time. When you spend a day, you've got one less day to spend. So, if somebody has the audacity to ask you to spend one of your evenings, they darn well better have something important, right? An evening is a chunk of your life. I wouldn't waste one of my evenings for anybody, not anymore, once I discovered how valuable they were. So, hopefully, by the time we finish tonight, you'll have your time's worth as well as your money's worth. Okay, we're going to take a break about halfway, not just for the smokers, but for everybody. We can't sit here right three hours straight; that would be asking a little bit too much. Somebody once said the mind can only absorb what the seat can endure, and I think that's true. So, we're not going to make you endure too long before we take a break. Along about Midway, we'll stretch a little bit.

and then we'll come back, and we'll finish up. Does everybody have note paper, some note paper? If you don't have some, borrow from your neighbor. Make sure you've got something to take notes on. This is a work session tonight, okay? I have not come to entertain you, as you can tell by my opening joke, right? I wouldn't make it in Las Vegas. We don't have a dog and pony show tonight, but we've got some ideas to share. I'd like to have you capture them. Also, if there are several members of one family, my suggestion is all of you take notes. One will capture what the other one might miss, and that way you'll come up with a more complete set. I think you'll be happier about that. [Music] Okay, hopefully everybody can find a seat tonight. It's kind of jammed in here. Do we have any teenagers, teenagers 19 years or younger? Would you stand up? No cheating on this now. 19 years or younger, stand up wherever you are all over the audience. Let's give them a hand.

hey nice to see you. Thank you very much. I'm always flattered when the kids come. I've got a good story for you. Two little boys in school, one was very bright, the other one wasn't very bright. The teacher gave a test one day, 10 questions, and she's looking at the papers. To her surprise, the little boy who isn't very bright has answered nine of the ten questions perfect. And the teacher thought, well, that can't be right, he's not that smart. So she looked at the other paper, the little boy who was very bright, he had answered nine of the ten questions perfect. The teacher thought, well, something's wrong. And sure enough, the answer to the 10th question was the problem. The little boy who was very bright, when he got to the 10th question, he didn't know the answer and he was running out of time. So he just wrote down, I don't know the answer to this one, turned his paper in. The teacher looked at the other paper, the little boy who wasn't too bright, and he had answered the tenth question, I don't

know either he turned his way, which means don't cheat, I guess, right? It never works out well. Okay, the ideas I want to share with you tonight I started listening to at age 25, at a time in my life when I needed some additional ideas to help get my life straightened out and head in a little better direction. I got off to a pretty good start up in Idaho farm country where I was raised, southwestern corner of Idaho, a little community of four or five thousand people. In fact, my parents still live in the same little community where I was raised. I was just up to visit them last week, and they're doing extremely well. My father's 79, my mother's 73, and they're still very busy, very healthy, got all kinds of projects going, unbelievable land development, they're making money. I can't believe them. They've been a great example for me. They bought some property not long ago, signed up for a 30-year loan. I got to be impressed. I was up to visit him last year. We had a

big party one evening lasted till about two o'clock in the morning celebrating. And it was time to celebrate. My parents had bought gold at 125, and they were cashing in a big share of it at 680. And if you get to buy at 125, cash in at 680, you got to celebrate. So celebrate we did. But anyway, that's where I got started. I went to high school and graduated. I went to college for a year, year and a half, and I quit. Decided I was smart enough and got me a job and went to work to see if I could make all of my ambitions come true. A couple of years later, I met a very beautiful young lady, and I put probably my finest sales presentation on her. I promised her wealth and fame and fortune and world travel and all those good things. I said it will probably be the finest decision of your life to marry me. And she bought that story, fortunately for me, and we got married. And I'm continuing to work hard to see if I can't make all these dreams.

Promises come true well two or three years after I'd gotten married. It didn't look like my new bride had made such a wise decision. I'm now starting to struggle. I'm not destitute, but it isn't working quite like I had promised. I'm looking at my paycheck on Friday, 57, and that isn't quite what I'd promised. And already I had fallen into the someday honey routine with my wife, right? Someday honey, you won't have to sit on this old furniture. Someday honey, you'll have a car of your own. I had already someday hunted myself into trouble. Well, now I'm wondering, what should I do? I'm struggling. I'm behind. Money's one of my problems. I got far too much month at the end of the money. If you've ever had that problem, I remember one time losing a ten-dollar bill, and I was physically ill for two days over ten dollars. And of course, my friends tried to be cheerful, right? They said, Look, maybe some poor person that needed it found it.

I'm willing to admit to you that that really didn't help. At age 25, benevolence had not yet seized me. You know, I'm the poor person that needs to find ten dollars, not lose ten dollars, but that's where I was. I thought, well, maybe I should go back to school. I've got one year of college. Doesn't look that good on an application, but I'm 25. I'm married now. My family's starting. I'm already working, and going back to school seemed like kind of a tough decision. But that's where I was at that time in my life, wondering what I should do to really turn it around and make the promises all come true. Well, at age 25, Good Fortune came my way. And sometimes it's a little difficult to describe Good Fortune. Why do unique things happen to you when they do? I don't know. Part of that's a mystery to me. One of my friends says, well, things don't just happen, they happen just. Maybe that's it. I don't know. But my good

fortune was at age 25. I met a very remarkable man. He was a businessman, he was wealthy, apparently looked very happy, prosperous to me when I met him, and my good fortune was a few months after I met this unique man, his name was Mr. Shelf, Mr. Earl Shelf. He hired me, gave me a job, and I went to work for him, and I spent the next five years working for it. And during that five-year period, Mr. Shoaf shared with me his ideas that helped to change my life. Unfortunately, at the end of that five years, Mr. Shoaf died, but I did get to spend five years with this very remarkable man. And the best thing he gave me during that period of time was not a job, the best thing he gave me was the benefit of his philosophy, how to be wealthy, how to be happy, and his ideas worked for me. Then about 16-17 years ago, I was living in Beverly Hills, and I was going through all the notes that I'd gathered up during that period.

in fact, that's one of the major things Mr. Shoaf taught me. Take good notes. Don't miss anything. Don't make your mind a filing cabinet trying to remember everything. Jot it down. If you hear a good sermon, take notes. If you read a good book, take notes. If you hear something good, jot it down. If you think something good, put it on paper. Then you can go over it. Repetition is the mother of skill. And someday, those ideas, if you repeat them often enough, they'll take root and start to grow. And someday, they'll show up in your bank account, and your personality, and your language, and your dress, and your lifestyle. So, he got me hooked on taking notes, and I did during that time. And I've taken them now all these years. And on this particular day, I was going through all those journals, and the idea occurred to me. Why don't I share this with other people? I've used it to build some of my other companies, but I've never shared it with the public. And I thought, well, that'd be an

intriguing idea. See if I could put into words my feelings and my ideas that helped me to make major changes. So I thought, well, I might as well try it. So I put the material together that I thought was the most important. And 17 years ago, at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, a few blocks from where I lived, I gave my first seminar. And fortunately, tonight, you are not in on my first seminar. I struggled. It really wasn't quite that good. In fact, I'm willing to admit now it was so bad. If I hadn't been conducting it, I'd have gone home. Right, that's how bad it was. But when you're doing them, it's hard to leave. But anyway, I struggled through it, did the best I could, and decided, well, I'll try it again, see if I get any better. Sure enough, I got a little more comfortable with making the presentation. And then I got invited other places to share my story, my ideas, and little by little, it started to grow. And finally, now, it's become my major enterprise. I've

arranged my other business affairs so I can spend most of my time now doing what I really like to do. And that share ideas, talk about things that matter with people who care. And now the seminar has been translated in several languages, so I get to travel to other countries and share my feelings and my ideas with other people around the world. And tonight I find myself in Anaheim, and I'm pleased to be here. What I would like to do is to share with you what I think made the major difference for me. I don't claim to have all the answers for doing well, but I've got some that worked for me. And what I would like to do is pass it along to you. That's the purpose of the seminar tonight. For you to pay your money and spend some of your time to be here is to see what you think of my ideas. Just capture them, take them home, and edit them as much as you wish. Throw out what you don't like, try what you do like, and see what happens. But give me your attention for the next

little while and let's go through the ideas that I think the major things that help me to really make the changes in my life. Okay, let me give you the table of contents first. I'm going to cover five subjects. Let me give you those five, and then we'll come back and take them one at a time, and we'll go through them. Okay, the first subject is personal development, which is the best place to start, right? If you don't start there, nothing much is going to happen. Here's the big challenge of life: you can have more than you've got because you can become more than you are. That's the challenge. And of course, the other side of the coin reads: unless you change how you are, you'll always have what you got. I have found in my experience that income does not far exceed personal development. Now, sometimes income takes a lucky jump, but sure enough, unless you grow out where it is, it'll usually come back where you are. Life has strange ways. If somebody hands you a million dollars, best you become a millionaire quickly.

so you get to keep the money. Otherwise, sure enough, it'll disappear. Somebody once said, If you took all the money in the world, divided it up equally among everybody, it would soon all be back in the same pockets. Incredible success is something you attract, not something you pursue. Success is looking for a good place to stay, so instead of going after it, you work on yourself - personal development. See, the major question to ask on the job is not, What are you getting? The major question to ask on the job is, What are you becoming? So, the big question is not, What am I getting paid here? The big question is, What am I becoming here? Because true happiness is not contained in what you get; happiness is contained in what you become. So, that's our major subject for tonight - personal development. Of all the assignments Mr. Shelf gave me at age 25, this was probably the most difficult. In fact, I'm still working on this one. I think it's an unending challenge to see what you can become. The next subject is called basic laws, and it's good to study the basics.

and I call these Basics primarily because they come from the Bible. Now I'm not a theologian or a minister, and that'll be apparent, but Mr. Shelf taught me that the Bible was a good textbook for ideas and stories and success equations, how to live the better life. I found out that was true. He also taught me that the Bible is as practical as it is spiritual, and I found out that's true. If you look at your bank account and your income and you're not happy, there are several places in the Bible to check to see what the heck's wrong so you can make the changes, and we're going to cover some of those tonight called basics, okay. The next subject is my favorite, setting goals. The Shelf taught me how to set goals, what a favor that was. One morning at breakfast shortly after I met him, he said, Jim, let me see your current list of goals, and let's go over them and talk about them. He said, Maybe that's the best way I can help you get a better direction started.

and I said, I don't have a list. He said, Well, is it out in the car or home somewhere? I said, No, sir, I don't have a list anywhere. He said, Well, young man, that's where we got to start. He said, I can tell you right now if you don't have a list of your goals with you. He said, I can guess your bank balance within a few hundred dollars, which he did, and that got my attention. I said, You mean my bank balance would change if I had a list of goals? He said, Drastically. That day, I became a willing student how to set goals, and sure enough, learning how to set goals changed my life, and I often wondered why no one had ever taught me how to set goals up until age 25. I went to high school, but if they offered it, I missed it. I went to college for a year, never heard it. I worked for Sears, really, and to my knowledge, Sears never taught it right how to set goals. So here I am, age 25, married, my family starting.

I've been to college, I'm working, and I still don't know how to set goals. But fortunately, when I was 25, I met the man who taught me how, and it revolutionized my whole life - economically, socially, personally. It's incredible. So I want to share with you tonight what Mr. show shared with me - how to set goals. It can be a life changer. Okay, the next subject is the negative part of the seminar. Life is part negative, so we got to talk about the negative, and this subject is called diseases of attitude - diseases of attitude. There's a lot of things that can wreck your chances to do well. We live in a rather dangerous world, so you got to be not only wise, you've got to be careful. Now, attitude diseases are just as bad as physical diseases, right? High blood pressure, heart trouble - I mean a lot of things lace your chances to do well. So you've got to be careful, and attitude diseases are deadly. I mean, they'll destroy all the good things you start. Okay, so we'll go through those attitude

diseases. How to spot them, how to look for them, what they are, and the cure. And I'm a pro on these because I've had them all, so I can give you excellent advice on these. Now, the last subject we're going to consider tonight is called the day that turns your life around, the day that turns your life around. And under this subject, we're going to talk about the emotions that can change your life. Human beings are emotional creatures, and emotions are powerful for life change. Now, of course, emotions are so powerful they can go either way on you. Emotions can either build or destroy, so you really have to employ emotions properly. We call civilization the intelligent management of human emotions. If you can intelligently apply your emotions in the right direction, no telling what can happen. Could turn your life around one day would be sufficient. So, we'll talk about those. Okay, now that's a lot to cover in one evening, but we'll keep at it here and see if we can't get it all done.

I'd like to have you now jot down the theme of the seminar. Every seminar should have a theme. I guess we've got one. It's on some of our literature. If you happen to notice it, but if you didn't, for your notes, here it is. The theme of the seminar goes like this: The major key to your better future [Music] is you. That's the theme of our seminar tonight. The major key to your better future is you. And I'd like to have you underline two words just to give it some added punch. Underline the word major and the word you so that it reads: The major key to your better future is you. Now, my first suggestion is transfer this to a card or something where you can put it up where you can see it every day. Preferably put it up where you can see it at the beginning of the day before you go off to put the day together. This is a good phrase just to glance at to keep in mind as you're putting the day together. It's called The Silent seminar.

if you'll just let this talk to you during the day, I found it to be tremendously helpful. The major key to your better future is you. For a big share of my life now, I didn't have this one quite figured out. Among a lot of things I didn't have quite figured out, many things used to puzzle me. Back in those early days, I used to wonder why two people could work for the same company, one make twice as much money. Now, see, that used to puzzle me. And maybe they were the same age, graduated from the same school, live in the same community, work for the same company with the same products and the same services. They've got the same traffic, the same problems, and one makes a thousand a month, the other one makes two thousand a month. Now, that was my puzzling question. Why would this long list be the same and the money twice as much? I asked, what's the difference between a thousand a month and two thousand a month? And I don't mean a thousand a month, right? I can figure that out.

but what makes the difference? Why would one person do twice as well, three times as well speaking economically? Now, I know there's more than one way to do well. I understand that. But in this little narrow area called compensation, what's the difference? Well, back then with my faulty thinking, I'm trying to reason it out. I thought, well, maybe time makes some of the difference, right? Some people do better because they have more time. I used to say, Harold ought to be able to do well. He's got a lot of time. If I had all of Harold's time, I could do well. Now, that's got to be dumb, right? Number one, you can't get somebody else's time. A guy says to me one time, he says, You know, if I had some extra time, I could make some extra money. I said, Then forget it. There isn't any extra time. Hey, when the clock strikes 12 midnight, that about wraps it up, right? I mean, you can look around the gongs here for a little more, but it's over. You say to the guy, What are you doing? He

said, I'm looking for extra time. See, they'll come and take you away right there. Isn't any more time now. If you can't get more time, which you can't, what could you get more of that would make a difference in economic results? And here's the key word, make it a part of your notes. We're going to consider it tonight. The word is value, and I have a little phrase for your notes. Value makes the difference in results. Value makes the difference. You can't get more time, but you can create more value. Now, here's the first lesson of Economics everybody should learn it from the time they're old enough to understand what a dollar means, how to earn one, how to get one, how to keep one, what to do with it. First lesson of Economics, we primarily get paid for value. That's lesson one, bringing value to the marketplace. That's how you get paid. You don't get paid for the time. I know it takes time to bring value to the marketplace, but you get paid for the value, not the time.

now since that's true, here's one of the key questions of the evening: is it possible to become twice as valuable in the marketplace and make twice as much money in the same time? Could you become three times as valuable, make three times as much money in the same time? Is that possible? The answer is yes, if – and it's always if, right? Life is known as the big if. Harry Truman once said, Life is iffy. How true. And here's the big gift we're going to consider it tonight. It's possible to do much better at the marketplace if you go to work primarily on yourself. And that's the theme of our seminar tonight: learning to work primarily on yourself. People have asked me for the last 24 years, How do you develop an above-average income? And the answer is, become an above-average person. Develop an above-average handshake. Some people want to be successful; they don't even work on their handshake, as easy as that would be to start on. They let it slide. They don't understand: develop an above-average smile. Develop

an above-average excitement develop an above-average interest in other people develop an above-average intensity to win see that'll change everything probably one of the most frustrating experiences in life is looking for an above-average job with above-average pay without becoming an above-average person it's called frustration and Mr. shelf gave me probably the greatest clue he gave me when I first met him he said Jim if you want to be wealthy and happy the rest of your life just learn this lesson well he said learn to work harder on yourself than you do on your job that was it the beginning of the philosophy that helped to change my life work harder on yourself than you do on your job when he said that I suddenly understood why I was broke I was a hard worker on my job if anybody would have asked me age 25 Mr. only you a hard worker I'd have said yes I'm a hard worker check my record I work as hard as anybody and that was true I was a hard worker I really was but see

that was my problem. I was working hard on my job, but I wasn't working hard on myself, and that was my reason for lack of progress. Some people look for more money, but they look for it in the wrong direction. The guy says, I need more money. I'm gonna go work on my boss. Well, number one, bosses are notorious; they do not play fast and loose with the company till. I've never seen a boss get excited and triple somebody's wages, right? I mean, they don't behave in such an irrational manner. So, see, that's not what you work on. Some people say, Well, I'll go on strike for more. Well, big deal. The problem with that game is, once you start it, it's never over. You'll always have to strike. And I'll tell you what you get by demand: little bitty pieces, barely enough. And now inflation beats that game, right? The guy demands ten percent; inflation's 12. He's behind two, right? I mean, it never ends. So, see, that's not the key to success, maybe survival, but not

Success, the guy in sales says, I've got it. I'll get me some of those books that teach you the tricky sales, and I'll go leap upon my prospects, dazzling with my sales footwork, grab their money before they know what's happened. Well, you can play those kind of tricks if you want to. My observation shows the last 24 years, you wind up at the bottom of the economic ladder, not the top. See, it's not what you get by tricks, it's not what you get by demand, it's what you get by performance that counts. So that's one of the key phrases of the evening: it's performance that counts. And I discovered this performance comes from inside, not outside. For a share of my life, I'm looking for the answers to do well outside, found out they were inside. Then Mr. Shelf gave me probably one of the most important clues. Among so many things he taught me, but this was in those early days. Mr. Shelf is very kind, but he was also very abrupt, and he had these interesting questions.

to ask. I'm giving him a little rundown one day on how things hadn't worked out for me. He said, Mr. Owen, I've got the answer for you if you will listen carefully, and listen carefully I did that day and for the next five years. If somebody's wealthy and happy, you gotta listen, he said. Jim, I've only known you a short time, but it's already my honest opinion that for things to change for you, you've got to change. That wasn't quite the answer I was looking for, but that's the answer he gave me, and I pass it along to you on this warm summer evening in Anaheim, California, 1981. For things to change for you, you've got to change; otherwise, it isn't going to change. Before I met Mr. shelf, I used to say, I sure hope things will change, right? That seemed to be my only hope. If it isn't going to change, I'm in serious trouble. And then I discovered, It isn't going to change, so I'm in serious.

trouble see. I can tell you what the 80s are going to be like. You have dropped into the right place. I did a seminar one time for Standard Oil Executives and management in Honolulu and uh we're having a conference one day on this big conference table and one of them said to me, Mr. Roan, you know some fairly important people halfway around the world. What do you think the 80s are going to be like? I said, Gentlemen, I do know the right people. I can tell you. So they all listen very carefully and I said, Gentlemen, based on my wide experience, I can really honestly say to you, in my opinion, in the 80s it's going to be about like it's always been. Aren't you glad you came? That's inside. I don't pass that around just everywhere. Now of course I said that to make a point but I also said it because it's accurate. It's going to be about like it's always been. It isn't going to change. The tide comes in and then what?

it goes out for six and a half thousand years that we know of recorded history, and probably long before that. So it is not going to change. It gets light, and then what? It turns dark. Six and a half thousand years. See, it's not likely to change, and we're not to be startled by that. And if the sun goes down, the guy says, What's happened? What's happened? It means he hasn't been here long, I guess, right? It always goes down about this time, the guy says, Well, I don't like that arrangement. Well, you got to talk to somebody besides me, right? It gets light, then it turns dark in rotation. The next season after fall is what? Winter. Pray tell, how often does winter follow fall? Every year, regularly, for the last six and a half thousand that we know of. See, it is not going to change. Now, some winters are long, and some are short, and some are hard, and some are easy, but they always come right after falls. It isn't gonna change. Sometimes you can figure it out, sometimes there's no way to figure it.

out sometimes it goes well, sometimes it gets in a knot, sometimes it sails along, sometimes it gets in Reverse. See, that's not going to change. The last 6,000 years reads like this: opportunity mixed with difficulty, that's how it reads. It isn't going to change. The man says, Well, if it isn't going to change, how will my life ever change? Answer: when you change. And whether I'm talking to high school kids or business executives, my message is always the same, and it goes like this: the only way it gets better for you is when you get better. Let me give you the four major lessons in life to learn. Here's four majors. It's good to study the majors. In our weekend seminar, we teach, some people don't do well because they major in minor things. To be on the lookout at the end of every weekend, of every month, you got to check, make sure you're not spending major time on minor things. We go through that whole series, majors and minors. Now let me give you two phrases before

we get to the four majors this will set it up and you'll see where I'm going. Two key phrases for your notes. Here's the first one: life and business is like the changing seasons. That's the first phrase, life and business is like the changing seasons. One of the best ways to describe life, it's like the seasons. Frank Sinatra sings, Life is Like the seasons. Now here's the second phrase, very important: you cannot change the seasons, but you can change yourself. You can't change the seasons, but you can change yourself. And see, that's how life gets better for you, not by chance, but by change. Now here's the four major lessons in life to learn. I've got my first book finished, came out a couple of weeks ago. This is in it, the four major lessons in life to learn. Here they are. Number one: learn how to handle the winters. That's lesson one. They come right after Falls with regularity. Some are long and some are short, and some are hard and some are easy, but they keep coming.

you must learn to handle the knights. They come right after days. You must learn to handle difficulty. It comes right after opportunity. You must learn to handle recessions. They always follow progressions. For the last six thousand see it isn't going to change. The lesson you must learn is how to handle it. And there's all kinds of winters, right? The winter when you can't figure it out. The winter when it all goes smash. The winter when it turns Belly Up. The winter when it won't work when you've run out of money and you've got a broken heart. See, those are winter times. There's all kinds economic Winters, social Winters, personal Winters when your heart is smashed in a thousand pieces and the nights are unusually long. Your prayers seem to go no higher than your head. It's winter time. Barbra Streisand sings, It used to be so natural to talk about forever, but 'used to bees' don't count anymore. They just lay on the floor until we sweep them away. You don't sing me love songs.

and you don't say you need me, and you don't bring me flowers anymore. A song of winter, but see, the disappointments come. Those are normal, that's part of life. But the question is, how do you handle it? How do you handle the coming winters and the disappointments in the down times? Well, you can't get rid of January by tearing it off the calendar. You can do, you can get stronger, you can get wiser, and you can get better. The winters won't change, but you can, and that's how life changes for you. See, before, I understood when it was winter, I used to wish it was summer. I didn't understand when it was hard, I used to wish it was easy. I didn't know. And then, Mr. Shelf gave me a part of his very unique philosophy when he said, Don't wish it was easier, wish you were better. See, that triggered my whole life change. Don't wish for less problems, wish for more skills. Don't wish for less challenge, wish for more wisdom. That's the key.

so that's lesson one learn how to handle the winters. Here's lesson two learn how to take advantage of the spring. That's the second one. Spring is called opportunity, and spring follows winter. What a great place for it. If you were going to put it somewhere, that'd be the place to put it right after winter. And pray tell how often does spring follow winter every year with regularity. Six thousand you can almost count on it. See opportunity always comes days follow nights isn't that terrific. Opportunity follows difficulty. But here's what you must learn to do underline these two words in that key phrase take advantage underline those two. You must learn to take advantage of the spring. See just because spring rolls around is no sign you're going to look good come fall. You got to do something with it. In fact, you have to get good at one of two things in life planting in the spring or begging in the fall or get somebody to do it for you. See those are about the only alternatives. Now here's what else you must do take

advantage of the Springs quickly because there's only a few just a handful of Springs have been handed to each of us. They don't come forever life is fairly brief so you got to read every book you can get your hands on and what to do with your Springs while they're here and take advantage they soon run out. The Beatles wrote life is so short and for John Lennon it was extra short but life is brief Elton John sings She lived her life like a Candle in the Wind it's brief so whatever you're going to do with your life you got to get at it don't just let the Springs pass pass here's the third major lesson in life to learn learn how to protect your crops all summer you got to take care of what you start sure enough as soon as you've planted your garden in the spring the busy bugs and the noxious weeds are out to take it and here's the next bit of Truth they will take it unless you prevent it and that's the third major skill to

learn you've got to learn to prevent the Intruder from taking all the good you start. It's one of the challenges. Here's two key phrases under number three. First one, all good will be attacked on this planet, maybe not the next one we get to, but on this one all good will be attacked. Every Garden will be invaded. Not to think so is naive. And here's the second phrase, all values must be defended. Political values, social values, Community Values, Family Values, marriage values, friendship values, business values. Every Garden must be tended all summer. Third major lesson. Now here's number four, th major lesson in life to learn. Learn how to reap in the fall without complaint. Learn to reap come Harvest Time without complaint. Take full responsibility for what happens to you. It's one of the highest forms of human maturity, accepting full responsibility. It's the day you know you've passed from childhood to adulthood, the day you accept full responsibility. And another note, learn to reap in the fall without apology, without apology if you do well

without complaint. If you don't, that's maturity. I used to have that long list of reasons why I wasn't doing well. To explain, you got to explain right. Otherwise, you're going to look bad. I used to have this funny list called reasons for not looking good. I used to blame the government. I mean, you can believe that or not. It was at the top of my list. I had a lecture Second To None the government that was on my list. I used to blame taxes. Look what you got left after they take everything and they expect you to do well. That was on my list. Their prices, that one's easy, right? You walk into the supermarket with twenty dollars, come out with a little half bag. So, I had that on the list. I used to blame the weather. I blame the traffic. I used to blame my car. I blame the manufacturers. I used to blame the company. I blamed company policy. I used to blame the training program. I blame my negative relatives. They were always putting me down. I blame my cynical neighbors. They're just selfish, looking out for themselves.

won't loan you money. They were on my list. I used to blame the economy. I blame the community. That's a pretty good list for not doing well, isn't it? I thought it was good. I'll never forget one day. Mr. Shelf is very kind, but he was also very blunt, and this was no exception. And I'm glad he was blunt. There's a lot of things I'd have missed if he hadn't been blunt. One day, with sort of a curious look on his face, he said, Jim, just out of curiosity, tell me how come you haven't done well up until now? Excellent question, I thought. Well, so I won't look too bad, I'll go through my list. And this list I just gave you, I put that on him, and he was very patient. He let me go through the whole thing. The government, the weather, I went through this whole thing. When I finished, he looked my list over very carefully. He said, Mr. Own, big problem with your list, you ain't on it. How brilliant. When I went to work for him a few months

later, I learned very quickly to tear up my list reasons for not doing well, and I threw it away. I got me a fresh piece of paper, and I put one word on it: me. There's a black Heritage spiritual that says, It's not my mother, nor my father, nor my brother, nor my sister, but it's me, O Lord, standing in the need of prayer. See, I used to blame everything outside. And then, let me give you a little philosophy that helped turn my life around. For your notes, here it is: it's not what happens that determines the quality or the quantity of your life. It's not what happens. And the reason is because what happens happens to about everybody. No different. The sun went down on all of us last night, a common event, a happening. I found out that the same things can happen to two different people: one gets rich, and one stays poor. Why is that? It's because it's not what happens, but rather, it's what you do that changes everything. So, that's a key phrase: It's not what

happens. It's what you do. What happens is about the same. You might put that in parenthesis here. Same what people do. That's what's different. Anything can happen, right? Everything can happen. I've heard all the stories. I've been one of the stories. Hey, we could all tell stories all night long, right? Happenings. Anything Can Happen. Have you heard of Murphy's laws? Anybody here heard of Murphy's laws? Okay, most of you have. Murph had these laws. One of them was, if anything can go wrong, it will. That's one of Murphy's laws. He was not one of the great positive speakers of the day, but anyway, it's still true though, right? Anything can go wrong. Everything can go wrong, for sure. I've fallen out of the sky so many times. Once to the tune of a couple of million. Devastating. Took me a while to survive that one. Now it wasn't all that much, but it was all I had. I mean that's when it's much, right? When it's all you got.

if you got three to go, you got one left. You ain't looking that bad. But when it all goes, has anybody been there when it all went? Anybody come on Rescue Liars. Hey, we've all been there, right, when it all went. Of course, it used to be a long time ago, right, when you ran out of money, got to zero, you were all through. Heck, now you can whistle right on by zero, right. They will bury you, that's what they will do. But see, those are the happenings, right. Everything can happen, anything can happen. But it's not the happenings, it's what you do about it. Somebody says, Yeah, but you don't understand the disappointments I've had. Come on, everybody's had their share. Disappointments are not special gifts reserved for the poor. Everybody has them. The difference is what you do about them. It's not the weather. I used to blame the weather, and I discovered it rains on the rich. So see, that won't help. Two men wake up one morning, there's a

rainstorm. One of them looks out his window, sees the rainstorm, and he says, Wow, what a storm! With weather like this, they can't expect you to go out and make sales. He stays home. Same morning, the other guy looks out his window, sees the same storm, says, Wow, what a storm! But he says, You know what? With weather like this, what a great day to go out and make sales. Most everybody will probably be home, especially the salesman. For him, see, that's the difference in how your life works out. It's not what happens, it's what you do. So here's one of the key questions of the evening: Starting tomorrow, what are you going to do that'll make a change in your life's direction? Good question. What are you going to do starting tomorrow that'll make a difference? Now see, if you don't do something starting tomorrow that'll make a difference, guess what? It's gonna be the same. And see, that way you can guess what the next five years are going to be like. Look at the last five, because the next five are going to be

like the last five unless you major key tomorrow. Change it all or change a little or change something or don't change. It's choice time. You can do whatever you want, but it's nice to know any day you wish you can change your whole life. What can you do starting tomorrow that'll make a difference? Good question. What can you do with economic chaos, massive disappointment? What can you do with a broken heart? What can you do and it won't work? Good question.

The Challenge to Succeed (Part 1) - Jim Rohn

The Challenge to Succeed (Part 1) - Jim Rohn