Tag Archives: motivate

When Misfortune Strikes

When I was a boy growing up, I believed good things only happened to good people, and bad things happened to bad people. When I became an adult I soon realized that bad things happen to good people, and good things can happen to bad people. Of course, the opposite can be true as well. But we’re left asking the proverbial question, “WHY?”

One could conclude, by watching the news or reading a newspaper, that the world is, objectively speaking, full of misery and misfortune. But I learned this past weekend, personally speaking, that when misfortune strikes there’s always a lesson to be learned. Often times we refuse to see the lesson because we’re so weighed down by the event and caught up in feeling miserable about it.

This past weekend the Riddington’s were ready to go on our very first camping trip as a family. Both my wife Catherine and I both grew up in families that camped, so we aren’t strangers to the wonderful world of tents, camp fires and canned food. But this past weekend, misfortune paid us a visit, and we paid its steep toll. But it left me with some insightful lessons.

The story began on Thursday evening.

Are You Successful?

There are a multitude of interesting tidbits I come across each and every day I log onto the Internet, thanks to the power of sharing through various social media platforms. This one piece I came across got me thinking about how we as human beings can easily get stuck in a rut operating inside our everyday lives which over time can distant us from becoming the person we desire to be.

Success in today’s society is often described as how much money, or personal items such as cars, homes, jewelry and clothing we own. However, if we take all these so called markers for success away, what we are left with are a person’s consistent ability to take action everyday that will often determine how much they accomplish in life.

1% Better

“Success is a few simple disciplines, practiced every day; while failure is simply a few errors in judgment, repeated every day.” —Jim Rohn

As of 2010, there had never been a British cyclist who had won a Tour De France. Then, Dave Brailsford stepped in as the newly-appointed General Manager and Performance Director for Great Britain’s national cycling team.

Brailsford took a simple approach and applied a single strategy. He believed that using the concept he referred to as, the “aggregation of marginal gains,” would help propel Great Britain into the spotlight, and change their cycling history forever.