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The Swiss Cheese Theory of Life

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The Swiss Cheese Theory of LIfe, by Judith A. Belmont, MS and Lora Shor, MSW, is such a fun, delightful, and thought-provoking book that I only wish I could put a copy into each one of my reader’s hands.  I was sent my own review copy a few weeks ago and I’ve really gotten a kick out of it.

Don’t get me wrong. Just because it’s fun, delightful, colorful, and has a killer personality doesn’t mean there isn’t a great deal of substance here, because there is.  The fact that it has a great deal of fun serving up the wonderful nuggets of self growth simply means that you’ll stay with them all the way to the end.  I can’t imagine anyone bailing on this book midway – you’d be too afraid of missing what might come next!

From the back cover:

Take The Swiss Cheese Theory of Life Challenge

  • Are you trying to make changes in your life, yet find yourself digging deeper into a hole?
  • Do you “know better” but still continue unhealthy patterns and habits?
  • Do you often have “why does this happen to me” thinking?
  • Are you looking for happiness in all the wrong places?
  • Are you ready to make healthy changes in your life…. physically, emotionally, spiritually?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions – this book is for you!

The Swiss Cheese Theory of Life is a book about resiliency. Using Swiss Cheese as a metaphor for life itself, you will explore ways to get through life’s holes without getting stuck in them.  Swill is not like any other cheese – and neither are you!

Top 10 Things I Love About The Swiss Cheese Theory of Life:

  1. The book has such a positive vibe it floats off of the pages.  There’s no negativity, scare tactics, or heavy handed advice.
  2. The authors treat important matters as important matters but don’t take things overly seriously. Life’s fun and this book doesn’t just “get” that, it celebrates it.
  3. I look at reading as sitting down and having a friendly visit with an author or authors. These authors are great company and I’m hoping for more collaborations.
  4. This book is highly interactive, inviting the reader to think, solve, and resolve.  We don’t grow when others do all the thinking for us!
  5. There are many fascinating quotes, illustrations, and examples. The lively writing is compelling.
  6. There are FUN illustrations and even comics. LOVE that!
  7. The book reads very fast, but doesn’t at all feel like “fast food.”  It’s fine dining quality but can be read by even the busiest person in no time at all.
  8. The authors show you how to take complete control of your life and bring the changes about that YOU want – not the changes someone else wants for you. Very important.
  9. The authors take good ole human emotions and short-comings into consideration. Very often they hit you with your excuses before they’ve even completely formed in your mind! Best of all, they offer solutions.
  10. Last, but certainly not least, this book shows that it is never, ever too late.  Lifelong mistakes or even even consistent shortcomings can be turned around.  The ship can be “righted” and.. guess what… we’re at the helm!

About the Authors:

Judith A. Belmont, MS, is a national speaker and corporate wellness trainer, with over 30 years of experience as a psychotherapist. From college teaching to working with Fortune 500 companies, Judy uses practical, action-oriented strategies to get people through life s obstacles. She is the author of two professional books, 86 Tips for the Therapeutic Toolbox and 103 Group Activities and TIPS.

Lora Shor, LSW, is a psychotherapist, work/life consultant, and national speaker. She has helped thousands learn and implement resiliency skills and transformation techniques for happier, healthier, balanced lifestyle. Lora is an international consultant to Fortune 500 companies, the federal government, and non-profits, and also maintains a private clinical practice in the Philadelphia area.

The Swiss Cheese Theory of Life is JUST the book I want each of my readers to have by their side when the new year rolls in.  When you’re sitting at the table with pen and paper, making your New Year’s Resolutions, I want this book to be there with the three of you!  It just may be the glue that’ll make those resolutions stick.

Take a closer look at this very special book: The Swiss Cheese Theory of LIfe

Commit, Dang it, Commit!

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Commitment

“There’s a difference between interest and commitment. When you’re interested in doing something, you do it only when circumstance permit. When you’re committed to something, you accept no excuses, only results.” – Unknown

In times of need, I’ve been known to speak to myself. Most of the time, the words from me to me are silent, taking place only inside my head. However, I have had a few times (usually behind the wheel of a vehicle) when the words come fast, furious, and audible. Just yesterday, I was half paying attention when a car swerved over into my lane. At the last possible second, I swerved out of their way. “Would you pay attention to what you’re doing? Is that asking too much?!” came angrily out of my mouth and it wasn’t toward the reckless man in a {insert any name of any vehicle and we’ll pretend I can actually identify anything outside of a Dodge Caravan}. I pinned my own ears back because my mind was in the future… playing baseball.

I’m trying to make the playoffs after all and I’m running out of time.

I gave myself another scolding recently and it’s kind of stayed with me. I wounded my pride I suppose, but it has given me something to think about. I was in the middle of re-designing one of my websites. A particular element I was working on should have been a 10 minute (20 at the most) task. An hour later, I’d had enough. I realized that my brain (probably on the diamond again – it’s obvious that diamonds are this girl’s friend!) was wavering.

I couldn’t make up my mind about something and, literally, went back and forth about a dozen times. To make matters worse, it was a minor detail. Less than minor! Have you ever become irritated with yourself? I was so irritated with me at that moment I could have called myself a dozen names. Since I cry easily, I held back. I just went with, “Commit, dang it, commit!”

Exact words.

Being all about self improvement and self growth, I started thinking about the words COMMIT and COMMITMENT… after I committed to the design element and put it in place. I was afraid that the next outburst would upgrade from Dang it and I didn’t want to hear what it might be. My cat was in the room after all.

My situation was a very minor one. Truth be told, I’m sure I looked almost comical sitting there switching back and forth with my coding – Refresh, look, go back, Refresh, look, go back. Silly Nilly.

However, commitment is serious business and a lack of it can lead to just about every conceivable ill.

  • Divorce rates are sky high because people seem incapable to committing to a relationship.  The words “For better or worse” seem as disposable as paper towels.
  • Obesity (adults and children) has become a grave concern in our country.  People begin diets or exercise routines but don’t follow through.  They fail to commit.
  • Individuals go into business for themselves with high hopes and beautiful dreams but when the going gets tough, they cave in.  They realize that commitment isn’t always easy. It never claimed to be.
  • People drop out of college, and often even high school, because they refuse to commit to their studies.
  • Health problems escalate because individuals won’t commit to a healthy lifestyle and diet.

Commitment may take you out of your comfort zone, but isn’t that where growth and change happen?  We don’t become all that we can become by remaining all that we are.

I see a lack of commitment in the areas of mental fitness and brain health as well.  Someone will read an article about the importance of staying mentally active.  The light bulb will come on for them and they’ll vow to read more educational books, do more crossword puzzles, and get more activity.  And God love them, they’ll do so, too!

For about a week.

Those of us who write a lot of self help articles and/or are obsessed with inspirational quotes will throw around a lot of great, juicy buzz words.  Ability, Action, Determination, Perseverance, and Gambaru…. they’re a few of my own favorites.  Then there’s commitment.  Good old, unassuming, humble, simplistic, nuts and bolts commitment.

My husband and I were watching baseball a few nights ago (I swear we do more than just watch baseball.  Geez, we watch college basketball and football too.).  He pointed out one of our best slugger’s swing.  He hasn’t been hitting like his old self for a while and my keen-eyed hubby pointed out the young man’s “follow through.”  It was non-existent.  As soon as the ball came near him and his once mighty bat, he gritted his teeth and began his swing like a baseball beast!

Then?  Then?!

Then… nothing.  Instead of COMMITTING to the FOLLOW THROUGH, his swing more or less wimped out. Strike three and he’s out.

If there’s an area in your life where progress isn’t happening at the rate you’d like, ask yourself the following questions:

  • Am I committed to making this change? (if you answer yes, tell yourself to prove it!)
  • What is my follow through? Am I swinging through the ball or wimping out?
  • What could I be doing differently to effect the sort of swing through to reach the fences?!

Whether it’s work-related, health-related, relationship-related, or something else, commitment may need to be your new buzz word. When you feel yourself slacking off, force yourself to refocus by saying, “Commit!” You could also write the words COMMIT TO IT! on an index card or piece of paper – put where you’ll see it throughout the day.

I’m off to my bedroom for 30 minutes of yoga with my cat. I’m committing to getting back the yoga form I had in my twenties.  Better make it 60 minutes….

The motivational print at the top of the post says, “Determination is often the first chapter in the book of excellence.”

The Number 1 Question You Should be Asking Yourself

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Influences

In the self help and self growth field, we ask a lot of questions.  The reason, of course, is that any sort of growth involves seeing where you are now. REALLY seeing. There’s just no way to get THERE from HERE unless we know where HERE is.  Two of my daughters (Emily and Stephany) and I recently went hiking. The trails winded through beautiful woods, with several swinging bridges over creeks. A few times we sort of misplaced ourselves on the winding trails.  We had taken so many turns, backtracking wasn’t an option.

Just as we were beginning to get a little flustered, we found a huge mounted map – like the ones in malls.  As we positioned our tired, sweaty bodies in front of the map, we all said, in unison, “Okay, where are we?”  Complete with the Okay at the first.  My girls didn’t fall far from the tree.

How effective would these maps be if they didn’t have the YOU ARE HERE point of reference?  Can you say useless?

When it comes to self growth or improvement of any type, the questions bring us to a point of reference.  Basically, they tell us… “You are here!”

Some of the most popular questions we are supposed to ask ourselves are:

  • How do I spend my time?
  • Do I spend my time wisely?
  • Are most of my thoughts positive thoughts or negative thoughts?
  • How do I react when things go wrong?
  • How much exercise do I get a day?
  • Do I eat enough fruit and vegetables?
  • etc etc etc

However, a question that I, personally, believe is one of the most important questions is one that’s seldom asked.  The answers to this question could make all the difference in the world.  That question is: What influences you?

Influence. verb (used with object) <——- Guess who’s the object?!?!

1. to exercise influence on; affect; sway: to influence a person.
2. to move or impel (a person) to some action.

If you take only one thing away from this article, I want it to be this: 

  • Everything you do influences you
  • Everyone you “hang out with,” influences you
  •  Everything you read influences you
  • Every song you listen to  influences you
  • Every book you read influences you

You know, Influence, as in AFFECT, SWAY, MOVE, IMPEL….

Sometimes the Influence isn’t immediate.  Take commercials.  We can see a commercial, sometimes 8 or 9 times, before we decide we HAVE to HAVE what’s being shown. Take the new Taco Bell commercial. I’d seen this commercial (for a huge burrito… because everything’s bigger in America) probably about 8 times before it hit me a few nights ago, “I want that!!!”  Fortunately, I have the sweetest hubby in the world and he went and got one for us to split.  (Delicious by the way.)  The commercials influenced me – they subtly swayed me, causing me to make my move.

It’s this sort of thing that makes parents panic when their kids hang out with the wrong kind of friends.  Their son or daughter promises that they would never do the things their friend does, and maybe they wouldn’t for the first 8 or 9 weeks or months – but after a steady influential diet, the parent knows all too well that they can be subtly swayed, causing them to make their move – in a wrong direction.  We are influenced by the people we spend the most time with.

Of course, the scenario isn’t just for kids.  Adults are influenced by those they hang around with as well. If one individual is a real go-getter and has high aspirations and goals in life, hanging around people with similar mindsets will spur him or her along. When that much positive energy shares a room, it’s electrifying! However, if one of these firecrackers continually hangs out with someone with zero ambition or aspirations, it won’t be long before they’re dragged down to their level.

It is what it is.  We are greatly influenced by those around us – for better or worse.

But it doesn’t just stop there. We’re also influenced by the books we read, the television shows we watch, the websites we visit, and even the music we listen to. Swayed, moved, impelled…

Picture a swimming pool for a minute. It’s a hot July day and you’re going for a swim (yay, you).  When you first step in, it feels like ice water! You pinch up your face and hope no one notices your teeth chattering. Ten minutes later, the water that once felt like ice now feels like Heaven poured into a cement hole. No pinched face. No teeth chattering.

The water didn’t change. Your body acclimated to the conditions.  Your body adapted and conformed to fit more comfortably into the situation.  Now tell me it doesn’t really matter who you spend the most time with.

If you’re skeptical about the assertion that music, websites, and television shows influence people, think about it for a minute.  These things influence fads, fashions, and even the way we talk.  They’re just done subtly. Now you know I love a lot of television shows, and several of my favorite ones are “reality shows” (Survivor, Amazing Race, Biggest Loser).  However, I don’t have a problem with saying that many reality shows are influencing society in negative ways.

For one thing, everyone’s always mad and yelling on most of them! Grown women screaming, pulling hair, and turning over tables.  If an individual gives themselves a steady diet of this ridiculousness, there’s no way they can keep from being influenced… even if the influence is slight.  One reality show…. one single reality show… set off the entire FAKE BAKE fad!  A tv show.

If you’re really serious about self improvement, enlightenment, and growth, I urge you to ask yourself, “What things influence me?”  (The answer is simply the things you spend time with or doing.)  Then sit down with these influences – each of them.  Gather them around the table with you:

  • the books and magazines you read
  • the music you listen to (and can I just wax old fashioned here for a minute and ask if anyone’s capable of making songs that don’t involve alcohol,sex, or drugs?)
  • the websites you visit
  • the e-mail you read
  • the games you play
  • the hobbies you enjoy
  • the places you go
  • the people you spend time with
  • your most frequent thoughts – the ones on repeat cycle

Now put each one under  interrogation:

  • Are YOU helping me get where I want to go?
  • Are YOU making me a better person?
  • What have you done for me lately?

One final thought:  If anything isn’t moving you TOWARD becoming the person you want to be and having the life you want, it’s taking you FURTHER AWAY.  Choose your influences wisely, they’ll leave a lasting mark.

I Don’t Always Get Impressed, But When I Do…

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If you want to be more interesting, you should take a page out of Benjamin Franklin’s book.  The man could have starred in his own “The Most Interesting Man in the World” commercials.  Then again, he was too busy pursuing his interests anyway.

First of all, I have a confession to make. I’m the biggest commercial fanatic in the world. My oldest daughter and my youngest daughter are charter members of the I Hate Commercials fan club, so they think I’m a complete loon (probably not the first time), but I am fascinated with commercials. When a favorite television show goes to commercials, for me, it’s like, “Let the fun begin!” I love to see which commercials I think are well done (Michelle Wie’s Kia commercials, the most interesting man in the world commercials for Dos Equis, Hardee’s “Ugly models don’t sell” ad – brilliant! The model’s face when she says, “It’s true” gets me every time.) I also love to poke fun of the ones that are lame (messing with Sasquatch…. seriously? I wish I bought what they sold just so I could stop.).

Anyway, there you have it. My confession for the day. When everyone’s running out of the room to grab a snack or check Twitter, I’m in my element.

Recently, my husband and I were watching a fascinating show on another obsession, The History Channel, about Benjamin Franklin. Now, with all due respect to the hilarious “Stay Thirsty, my friends” guy, Benjamin Franklin truly was one of the most interesting men in the world.  Here’s the thing we can take away from his life: He was interesting because he was interested. In just about everything!

As the narrator went from one of Benjamin Franklin’s inventions and areas of interest to the next, I couldn’t help but be impressed. To the tune of staggeringly impressed.

Benjamin Franklin’s Inventions and Credits:

  • Bifocals
  • Lightning rod
  • Franklin stove
  • One of the first to successfully chart the Gulf Stream
  • The first to explain how electricity works.
  • Swim fins – perhaps a precursor to foot flippers. Ben Franklin loved swimming and was even inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 1968.
  • Glass armonica (because of his love of music, this was his personal favorite invention)
  • Odometer
  • Flexible catheter – invented due to his love of his older brother, John, who suffered from kidney stones
  • “Long arm” for reaching books on high shelves –  still used in books as well as stores
  • Credited for being the first to suggest Daylight Savings Time
  • Fire Department
  • Library
  • Credited with creating the first political cartoon
  • Years before Dr. Oz, Franklin touted the benefits of fruit, particularly for maintaining gums and skin.
  • And who knows what else!

I also couldn’t help but think about the many people who claim that you have to ENGROSS yourself in your work or field of interest – to the exclusion of just about everything else.  Benjamin Franklin is proof that you can (and should) have as many interests as possible.  No wonder Franklin had such a busy social life, imagine how interesting he must have been!

Have you ever been around people who seem to have one train of thought? Each conversation with them seems like the one you’ve had before. One of my daughters once had a friend like that – the conversations were brief and they revolved around the same subject, the individual’s work.  F-U-N!  I told her to do everything in her power to give this friend more interests – drag him to movies, force books into his hands, turn him onto sports, take him to different events and places of interest… basically OPEN up his world because his enclosed one isn’t very interesting.

I’m surrounded by a lot of fascinating people in my life, thanks be to God. A few days ago I was walking with my youngest daughter and I believe we covered 8 different subjects within 30 minutes.  We talked about Angels, canning pickles, Donald Trump, making money with blogs, Albert Pujols, robins, PETA, and… oh yea!… sushi.  We didn’t exactly solve any of the world’s problems, but (like Pujols) we covered a lot of bases and had some very lively conversations.

We’ve always tried very hard to make sure that our daughters look at the world through a wide lens.  We’ve exposed them to many different types of music, books, and experiences.  As a family, we always traveled a great deal and made sure that our girls paid close attention to each place they visited. I’d often tell them, “Take it all in.”  Even today, they love to go different places, see different things and “take it all in.”  I’ve gone overboard sometimes, I’m sure.  In fact, whenever they got into a rut of listening to one type of music or reading one genre of books, I’d always insist they branched out and gave the rest a chance!

One of the things that made me commit to raising my daughters to view the world as a wide open field was an experience I once had with one of their little girlfriends.  This little girl stayed with us a few days and I was floored by how little she knew.  She was a bright little girl but by sheltering her, her parents had put a heavy shade over her light.  When my girls would try to talk to her about something they were studying in home school, she’d crinkle her nose and say she didn’t know anything about it.  When she didn’t know what an Underground Railroad was, two of my daughters wrote her off while the third ran to a shelf, retrieved a few books and began explaining it to her.

When my girls were really young and they were learning something new in  history, we’d use their Barbie dolls to “act out” the story.  I wasn’t surprised when, after getting the books she needed, my daughter ran to the back of the house and brought a box full of Barbies. The history lesson was about to begin!

It’s perfectly understandable for a young child to have a fairly limited knowledge – after all, they can only do so much to take the heavy shade off of their light.  However, when it comes to adults, they’re fresh out of excuses.  Seriously, is there anything more painful than trying to carry on a conversation with someone who has only one or two things they know anything about?  The only thing I can think of that’s worse is the individual who is so self-obsessed that not only are they the only thing they can talk about, they’re the only thing they want to talk about.

It reminds me of a line in an Emily Dickinson poem, Not knowing when the Dawn will come, I open every Door.. Open all the doors you can and let in as much life-giving light as you possibly can.

I’m sure you see it coming, so I might as well roll with it…  Stay interesting my friends.

Make each moment more interesting!

~ Joi

** For those of you who haven’t seen the commercial I’ve referenced here, you probably think I fell out of my tree and hit ever limb on the way down. I apologize for that!  If you search for “the most interesting man in the world dos equis” on YouTube you’ll see that I’m still in my tree. Maybe not on the top limb… but that’s another story.

How to Achieve Your Goals

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The vision must be followed by the venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps – we must step up the stairs. – Vance Havner

My husband, Michael, has been in the building industry for many years. He sells bricks, blocks, mortar, and other constructional materials, so he visits job sites regularly. I love to ride along with him and see what it looks like when a store, house, hospital, school (or whatever) is more of a VISION than a VISUAL.  It never ceases to amaze me how returning to the same dirty, cluttered, and genuinely unimpressive-looking location months later can take on a whole different meaning.

The architect has a clear vision of what the end result will look like. Even an architect years ago who envisioned an elementary school in New Albany, Indiana had a clear vision. It was a checkered, whack-a-doodle kind of vision, but a vision nonetheless. When my husband showed me the building, he asked what I thought. I said it was probably the biggest eye sore I’d ever had the pleasure of seeing. He laughed and said he felt the same way but that the architect was so delighted he was beside himself.

Yay, him!

When it comes to self improvement, resolutions, and self growth goals, we’re a lot like architects. We have a clear vision of what the “end result” will look like and, more importantly, feel like.  (More about feelings later.)

If we want to lose weight, we envision ourselves in the same size of Levi’s we wore in college. We think of how amazing it will feel to have better mobility and to look in the mirror without hating the golden arches with a cruel, unChristian hatred.

If we want to make more money, we envision ourselves in a new UK Wildcat’s blue Ford Edge, making a joyful trek from Starbucks to Target to the Mall and back to Starbucks (say hello to my personal vision).

If someone wants to learn to control their temper, they may envision themselves smiling and remaining calm while dealing with every nut job in the county.

You get the idea. No matter what the end goal is, we have a clear vision of it. Oddly enough, there are a lot of well-meaning, usually high-pitched men and women who’d lead you to believe that having this vision, alone, will bring good things your way.

H-o-g-w-a-s-h.

That’s akin to telling an architect, “Stand in the field and attract the building to you. The universe wants you to have the building.” I don’t know who the universe is, but even God expects us to earn the things we want.

Anything worth having has to be built. One brick at a time. Is it fun? Not always – but it is necessary. One of the problems we run into is feelings and emotions.

Make no mistake about it, we are governed to a great extent by feelings.

Some of us (my hands in the air) more so than others. That’s one of the reasons we have trouble “staying on course” while trying to achieve goals or adhere to resolutions. Eating a cream-filled, chocolate-covered doughnut feels better than NOT eating a a cream-filled, chocolate-covered doughnut (did I mention that the hand in the air has chocolate on it?).

Obviously, this makes it vital to focus on the end result. We HAVE to picture – throughout the day – ourselves at the finish line, whether we’re in a smaller size Levi’s, in a Ford Edge, or lying on a beach in Hawaii.

Picturing ourselves there won’t transport us there. What it will do is motivate us to stay on track…. and not just any track. The track that WILL lead us where we want to go.

Motivation is when your dreams put on work clothes. – Author Unknown

All of this SOUNDS lovely, doesn’t it? It SOUNDS pie in the sky amazing. We read or hear words like the ones above and we get so motivated and inspired that we can hardly sit still. Unfortunately, there is a rub. A rub so powerful that it knocks the majority of people clean off the track.

It’s the rub of instant gratification. If you work from home like I do, you know how hard it can be to fight the urge to just get up from the computer and…

  • watch a cooking show
  • take a walk
  • play with the cat
  • raid the fridge
  • go to Starbucks
  • read a book
  • feed the birds
  • stare out the window
  • play solitaire
  • stroll through the house and make sure the layout’s the same as it was an hour ago

… basically do anything BUT work.   Unfortunately there is instant gratification in slacking off.  However, giving in a couple of times makes it far too easy to give in more times.  After a while, everything you’re working toward moves further and further away from you. You look around and you ARE now where you WERE then and the only thing around you is your “slack.”  The tv shows and the wasted trips say, “Hey, you still have us!”

Somehow, it’s just not what you’d envisioned, right? There’s an old saying, Always do what you’ve always done and you’ll always have what you’ve always had!

What does a construction crew do when they have a building to erect?  They keep going back each day until the job’s done. It doesn’t matter if they’re tired, it doesn’t matter if they’d rather be home watching tv.  They have a job to do and they keep at it until the job is complete.  One brick at a time.  One day at a time. One victory at a time.

It’s the same way with resolutions, self improvement, and goals.  We have to earn what it is we desire.  We have to show up, show up, show up, and show up again – until the job is done. It doesn’t matter if we’re tired, it doesn’t matter if we’d rather be doing (or eating) anything else.  We have to put on our proverbial hard hat and work our butts off if we want to build the future we want.

It is NOT going to build itself.  The premise is lovely, but then again so is the premise of a Tooth Fairy.

Remember to take pride and pleasure in each small victory.  If you drive right past a hamburger joint and choose Subway instead – revel in the victory! If you stay at your desk and work a whole hour longer than you expected to, celebrate the victory with a pat on the back!  It’s these small victories that lead to the finish line.   Do you watch college basketball or football?  Many teams will take certain games for granted during the season and lose a game they should have won.  They lose focus and a much less talented, but hungrier, team gets the best of them.  It may seem like a small deal at the time to most people – but those of us who follow the sports regularly know that every game counts in the home stretch.  When you’re playing for the championship, losing games you SHOULD have won count against you in the worst way.

Often, it keeps the best teams on the sidelines watching less talented teams play for the championship title.

It’s a natural law: You receive as much as you give. – Paul Karasik

It doesn’t matter if it’s sports or self growth:  Each victory counts.  Each victory is huge.  Each loss counts.  Each loss is costly.

Whatever your goal is, I hope with all that’s within me that you reach it.  I know you can – IF you keep your focus.  Focus on what it is you want and where it is you want to be.  Focus on this image daily – throughout the day.  But don’t for a second think that visualizing it is equal to realizing it.  You have to work for it.  You have to fight for it.  You have to approach each day with the mindset that you WILL rack up as many victories as you possibly can and avert any potential chocolate doughnuts losses.

When it comes to success, attract isn’t the keyword, action is.  You have to take action – and not just once.  You have to be ready to take continuous action.  The more action you take, the more progress you make.

Victory after victory after victory….

Do this and you’ll build a masterpiece that’ll knock your darn socks off.

Everything you want is out there waiting for you to ask. Everything you want also wants you. But you have to take action to get it. – Jack Canfield