Category Archives: Life Lessons

Life Lessons, Solomons Wisdom

There is no guarantee of Tomorrow. Don’t Wait to Enjoy Your Life

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We’ve talked with each other about this subject in the past, but I was re-reading a passage today in Ecclesiastes that was so powerful I had to share it with you. Understand this – we are all going to die. Yes, it’s a shame, but it’s also the truth. And the sooner we accept the fact that our time in this world is but a breath before we are gone, the sooner we can understand that NOW is the time to LIVE – not just to get by or hope for better things at some point in the future, but to live with PASSION in THIS moment. The title of this article may be a cliche but that’s ok – so long as you get the message – tomorrow is NOT a certainty, the only thing you know for sure is that you are alive, right here, right now – so make the most of it and DO WHAT YOU LOVE.

embrace-the-challenge

Here is the quote from King Solomon that I wanted to share with you…

(Eccl 9:1-10) And Solomon said, “So I reflected on all this and concluded that…all [men] share a common destiny — the righteous and the wicked, the good and the bad…The same destiny overtakes all. The hearts of men are full of madness while they live, and afterward they join the dead. Anyone who is living has hope…For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing, and even the memory of them is forgotten. Their love, their hate, their jealousy will all vanish; never again will they have a part in anything that happens under the sun.

Therefore, go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your win with a joyful heart, for it is NOW that God favors what you do. Enjoy life…all your meaningless days. For this is your lot in life…Whatever your hand finds to do, DO IT NOW WITH ALL YOUR PASSION, for in the grave, there is [nothing]…”

I realize that reading like is a bit like a kick in the gut, but hopefully this kind of straight talk will reach you where it counts and get you to TAKE ACTION to pursue your passions. God has blessed you with ability and dreams. Use those gifts to make your life and the lives of those you love better. Live the best life you can right now.

 

Life Lessons, Solomons Wisdom

What is your Daily Bread?

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Lately I’ve been finding new ways to think about what Jesus meant when he spoke to his disciples in Matthew 6:11 and “Give us this day our daily bread…” Since the wisdom gained from this pondering has added some enjoyment to my life, I thought I’d share it with you and see if it can help you too.

dailybread

Certainly the obvious answer to the question, ‘what is Daily Bread?’ is that it’s simply the food we need for our sustenance, without which we wouldn’t survive very long. But is there something more to the story? Can the concept of “Daily Bread” help us appreciate our lives and all that God has provided to us beyond just the basic concept of food? I believe so.

For me, Daily Bread has actually come to mean spending time with my family — being totally engaged with them and truly enjoying life in the present (and precious) moments that we share together each day. On those days that I am able to enjoy Daily Bread with my family, I find myself intensely happier and more satisfied with life. On those days that, for whatever reason, I am not able to connect with my family (whether that be because of work obligations, illness, etc), I find myself unfulfilled. That’s why when I say the Lord’s prayer now, when I get to the part about Daily Bread, I visualize my family (ok to be specific I actually visualize us sitting at the table eating an enjoyable meal together so the concept of food is still there – haha). I earnestly pray for this God’s favor in granting me the opportunity to enjoy this Daily Bread each day and I am grateful when the prayer turns into a reality.

I wonder – what is YOUR Daily Bread? Is it similar to mine or do you have another ‘want’ that makes you happy?

Did you know that the Book of Proverbs also addresses this topic? Chapter 30: 8-9 states “Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise I may have too much and disown you and say “Who is the Lord?” OR I may become poor and steal and so dishonor your name.” I often think about the wisdom of these words and the perspective it provides on the scale of importance between the quest for money vs. the need for daily bread.

maslows_hierarchy_of_needsThere’s one final piece to the puzzle that I find interesting and it comes from the psychologist Abraham Maslow who gave us his famous “Hierarchy of Needs” shown here. One could make the argument that wherever you are currently at on Maslow’s pyramid of needs fulfillment, perhaps that is what you would consider to be your Daily Bread? If that’s true, it’s possible I am right in the middle where the relationship needs sit and given the importance of my family to my happiness I may well remain there my entire life. However I tend to think there is room for the concept of Daily Bread to encompass more than just one level of the needs pyramid.

What do you think? Where on the pyramid is your most important Daily Bread right now? Do you think it changes over time?

Thanks for visiting with me today. I hope you enjoyed the discussion.

 

 

 

Life Lessons, Solomons Wisdom

Is PERFECTION Your ENEMY?

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Wouldn’t it be great if whatever we desired to achieve we could do perfectly?

It’s a nice thought, but unfortunately it’s rarely our reality. Yet, all too often we hold ourselves to unrealistic expectations. Tell me if this sounds like you — how many times have you said, “if I can’t do it perfectly, then I’m not going to do it at all.” I will admit that I’ve been guilty of this more times than I can count and I’ll bet that you have been too.

HOWEVER there’s a big problem with perfection – it’s possible that your desire for perfection is holding you back from accomplishing your goals and achieving some truly great things in life.

perfection

King Solomon recognized the dangers of trying to be perfect and/or to wait for external events to be ‘just right.’ Consider the following words of wisdom…

(Eccl 11:3-4) “If clouds are full of water, they pour rain…Whether a tree falls to the south or to the north, in the place where it falls, there it will lie. Whoever watches the wind will not plant; whoever looks at the clouds will not reap.” (Don’t wait for things to be perfect, just get started and make the best of it).

(Prov 22:13) “The sluggard says there is a lion outside! or I will be murdered in the streets!” (You can always come up with an excuse, how about instead coming up with a reason to get moving?).

(Prov 14:23) “Hard work leads to profit, but mere talk only to poverty.” (Work brings results, talking doesn’t pay the bills).

(Eccl 5:7) “Much dreaming and many words are meaningless. therefore stand in awe of ACTION.” (You’ll never turn your dreams into a reality if you don’t take action).

What it is you want to achieve, don’t wait – DO SOMETHING to move forward today. The longer you wait the get started on your dreams, the farther away they will become – until eventually they may just fade away forever. But that doesn’t have to be you – because you have the power to do anything you set your mind to… all you have to do is GET STARTED.

Fear-of-FailureFor more on this topic, be sure to read…

Fail Your Way to Success, where you’ll read about specific examples of famous people like Michael Jordan, Thomas Edison, and may more who didn’t let perfection stop them from being great.

 

Life Lessons, Solomons Wisdom

Time and Chance Happen to The Best of Them – that includes YOU too

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Welcome back, friends. We’ve been talking a lot lately about the importance of focusing our efforts on enjoying the present. We’ve talked about Turning the Simple into the Extraordinary, that NOW is the time to ENJOY LIFE, and that wise old Solomon commanded us to Eat, Drink, and Be Merry.

As much as we might like to hope and plan for a better tomorrow, the only thing that is certain is that we are alive right now – after that, there are no guarantees. Certainly, we can and should do our best to put ourselves and our families in a position where the future looks bright, but it’s important to understand that, in spite of our best efforts, things can go wrong. In the Book of Ecclesiastes, Solomon delivered one of my all time favorite observations about this when he said (Eccl 9:11)…

“The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all.”

agonydefeat

The best teams in sports don’t always win (sometimes the ball just bounces the ‘wrong’ way) – that’s why they play the games, right?

The best person for the job doesn’t always get it (sometimes the position is really already “filled” by the boss’s choice and job is only posted for HR compliance purposes).

And the sometimes you suffer from a streak of just downright bad luck.

That’s life.

That’s why it’s all the more important to really take the time ENJOY your life when things are going well! 

In the article called No Winter that Lasts Forever, we talked about the ‘seasons’ of life – and about how experiencing the bad times makes us appreciate the good times all the more. The takeaway for us all is to recognize that we don’t really know when those bad times are coming and we may not have much power to stop them. But one thing we do have power over is doing our best to make the most of TODAY – I hope you’ll do just that.

 

 

Life Lessons

Turning the Simple into the Extraordinary

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goodfriendsgoodwineWe’ve been talking recently about trying to make a concerted effort to live in the present moment and to take time to enjoy our lives while we are living them. This past weekend, I had the chance to go to dinner at a friend’s house, little knowing that the meal would end up being one of the Top 5 Best Dinners I’d ever had in my life!

The meal itself was not unique – steak, potatoes, salad, some veggies, and a few drinks – the same types of things we’ve all had countless times over. So why was this meal so much better? Because of the PASSION of the host. I knew going in that my friend Ben was a bit of a connoisseur of fine food and wine, so I was already expecting a nice meal. He told us in advance that he was buying some special steaks with premium cuts and numerous types of fine wines, so this added to the appeal. However, I tempered my expectations because this was after all ‘just’ a dinner at a friend’s house, not a 5-star restaurant, and I knew Ben wasn’t a professional chef so going in I was simply expecting a nice evening with good company.

What I didn’t know is that, when it comes to food, drink, and friends, Ben lives by the very code we’ve been talking about lately – he takes the time to “Be Present” and he puts his heart and soul into creating special moments! Anyone can buy high end ingredients, but if you don’t take the time to learn the craft of what to do with them, you’ll end up with a meal that is most likely good, but not great. What made this occasion so special was the passion Ben put into it – every dish had something special about it – made so because of him. There were the shitake mushrooms and Chinese broccoli which he served with abalone sauce, the various bottles of wine which each had a personal story attached to them as to why their were special, a honey pepper spread for crackers for which Ben freshly-smoked some cherry sea salt, and of those course fine cuts of meat – in the case of the steaks, Ben had procured 3 weberkettledifferent dry-aged cuts (a bone-in filet, a bone-in ribeye, and even a little seen 50-day aged tomahawk cut), he’d seasoned the meat with just some salt and pepper, and then cooked them all on a simple charcoal grille. Now I could have taken those same cuts and put them on the high end grille in my outdoor kitchen that probably costs 30-40 times the simple Weber Kettle which Ben used and I guarantee you my steaks would have paled in comparison. Don’t get me wrong, I love to cook and I’m usually pretty proud of the steaks I can produce, but I’d never made anything like Ben’s because I’d never cooked with the passion that he did! Furthermore, I’ve eaten at more high-end steakhouses than I can remember, I’ve had all different kinds of wet and dry aged cuts, and while I’ve had some truly spectacular meals in my day, I can honestly say that I’ve never had a steak as good as the ones Ben served this weekend – perhaps the best way I can explain it is that the steaks were so good, pretty much everybody at the table even at the FAT – not just a little bit of the fat, but ALL of it. I realize that may sound gross (it certainly isn’t healthy) but it was simply so good that it was like eating steak butter. And it all goes back to the effort Ben put into everything. In addition, not only did Ben cook our meal, but he also served it all as well – explaining that, to him, his friends are his family and it was important to him to make sure we felt at home and could focus our sole attention on the food and the company. In fact, he specifically said he wanted us to BE PRESENT for the meal (the very life lesson I’ve been writing about on this blog recently!). After dinner, we spent relaxing in lounge chairs that surrounded his homemade fire pit, and chatting with he and his fiancé, and by the time it was over, somehow 6 hours had flown by!

wine-bwWhat’s the takeaway?

It was humbling to witness someone who put forth so much effort to make his friends feel special, not because he owed us anything, but just because he wanted us to FEEL ALIVE. It was inspiring to see what’s possible, when you live with passion. And it was amazing to be able to live in the moment for a truly special meal with good friends. Thank you, Ben and Darlene.

This experience brought to life so many of the life lessons I’ve been writing about on this blog. Here are a few…

NOW is the time to ENJOY LIFE

Solomon Commands you to Eat, Drink, and Be Merry

Don’t Just Get By, LIVE WITH PASSION

And, Choose Happiness Over Money.

 

Life Lessons

NOW is the time to ENJOY LIFE

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Today’s lesson is part of a little series I’m writing about the importance of making a conscious effort to enjoy your life NOW. Not tomorrow, today. Not later today, but this very moment!

It’s been said a million different ways always but the old cliche is true – there is no guarantee of tomorrow; the only thing we can count on is that we are alive right now. With this in mind, if we want to live the best life possible, then we must focus our attention on enjoying our lives as we are living them. All too often we put off our happiness until some unknown future period (later today, next week, next month, next year!?!) while we fill our lives in the present with the worries of the world that we allow to control our time – little grasping that the sands of our lives are falling away, never to be recovered.

Putting things in perspectiveslowdownenjoylife

Perhaps one cause for our failure to get more enjoyment out of life is that we sometimes think that in order to have fun, we must experience a life event on a grand scale – such as an expensive vacation, celebrating the completion a major goal in life, attending a big party, etc. While these are certainly events to be enjoyed, they sometimes are associated with self-induced, pressure-packed planning that takes our focus away from living to the fullest today and shifts our hopes towards a delayed, future joy. That could be a problem.

Have you ever asked yourself – “What can I do to just enjoy today?”

There are so many simple joys in life that can provide you pleasure, peace, and fulfillment. If you will but LIVE in THIS moment and BE PRESENT here and now.

How many days have you gone through life without paying attention? How many days/months/years have your wasted your today’s while you think about tomorrow? Stop letting your life trickle away. Make the commitment to yourself to enjoy it TODAY.

Things You Can Do Today to Be Present

Some that come to mind to me include: spending time with your family/friends, cooking a nice meal, meditating (both relaxation and active types), reading a good book, playing/listening to music, walking your dog, painting/drawing, etc. etc.

But the key to being able to enjoy any of these activities is that you must give them your FULL ATTENTION. By doing this you’ll be enjoying your life as you live it. The more ‘moments of being present’ that you can string together like these, the more you will start to live a fuller life without having to wait for a major life event to take place to do so. As they say, never put off for tomorrow what you can do today, right? So stop waiting for life to come to you and START LIVING!

Want to Know More on This Topic?

For another perspective on this topic, consider another article in this series: Don’t Just Get By, LIVE WITH PASSION!

ToIndeedBe-DPS

And, Solomon Commands You to Eat, Drink, and Be Merry

 

Life Lessons, Solomons Wisdom

Solomon Commands You to Eat, Drink, and Be Merry

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We’ve been talking about the importance of enjoying life in some recent posts and specifically about how critical it is for us to make a concerted effort to BE PRESENT IN THIS MOMENT in order to get the most out of our lives. 

King Solomon echoed this wisdom quite a bit in the Book of Ecclesiastes.

Consider the following:

Eccl 5:18-19 “I realized that it is good and proper for a man to eat and drink, and to find satisfaction in his time under the sun during the few days of life God has given him…When God gives a man wealth and possessions, and enables him to enjoy them, to accept his lot, and to be happy in his work – this is a gift of God. Such a man seldom reflects on the days of his life because God keeps him occupied eatdrinkwith gladness of heart.”

Eccl 8:15 “I commend the enjoyment of life, because there is nothing better for a person under the sun than to eat and drink and be glad. Then joy will accompany them in their toil all the days of the life God has given them under the sun.”

Eccl 11:7 “Light is sweet, and it pleases the eyes to see the sun. However many years anyone may live, let them enjoy them all.”

As usual, there’s more to Solomon’s wisdom on this topic than just the few quotes I pulled out for your review today. I encourage you to read Ecclesiastes in full if you have not already. It’s a short book and an easy read and the wisdom within those pages can change your life.

So what’s the bottom line for today?

Eat, Drink, and be Merry – and do all of those things TODAY!

 

For more on this topic…

Take a look at the following articles:

Now is the time to enjoy life

Don’t just get by, LIVE with passion!

 

 

Life Lessons, Solomons Wisdom

Being Disciplined Now Can Lead to Good Things Later — IF You Learn from it

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Nobody likes to get in trouble and be disciplined for it, but if things are not going your way right now it’s possible that you’re experiencing the consequences of some poor choices you’ve made in the past. The discipline you’re experiencing could be coming from a parent, a friend, a teacher, or even the Lord himself, but rather than grumble against the person who is trying to help you or curse your own fate, instead recognize that you are being taught a valuable lesson, one that can give you some much needed wisdom and end up making your life better.

King Solomon wrote about the transformative power of discipline numerous times throughout Proverbs. Here are a few of my favorite quotes:

Prov 3:11-12 – “Do not despise the Lord’s discipline…because the Lord discipline those he loves as a father does for the son he delights in.”

Prov 12:1 – “Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates correction is a fool.”

Prov 15:32 – “He who ignores discipline despises only himself, but whoever heeds correction gains understanding.”

Prov 17:10 – “A rebuke makes an impression on a man of discernment, more than a 100 lashes do on the back of a fool.”

discipline-father

These are just a few tips from Solomon but I think you get the picture. Understand that if the person disciplining you didn’t love you they wouldn’t care enough to teach you anything – in that case you might end up continuing to make bad choices and go down a path to destructive life, but because the person disciplining you does love you, they’re trying to help you to lead a better life in the long run. The key to using discipline to your advantage is that you have pay attention to the lesson you are being taught so you can break the cycle of whatever bad decisions are causing all your problems. If you accept the discipline you are being taught, it will keep you from making the same poor choices in the future and instead put you on a NEW path, one in which your wise choices will lead to POSITIVE consequences (and who doesn’t love positive consequences?!?).

So you see, it’s really a case of the old cliche – you can learn your lesson the easy way or you can learn it the hard way. Which are you going to choose?

DON’T WAIT, USE THIS WISDOM RIGHT NOW…

To get the most out of today’s wisdom, ask yourself some questions:

  1. Am I being disciplined right now?
  2. What can I learn from this discipline to stop suffering now?
  3. What can I learn from this lesson to make my life better going forward?
  4. How can I thank the person who is trying to help me?
  5. How can I use this lesson to help someone else?

 

Life Lessons, Solomons Wisdom

The Purpose of Proverbs – To Help YOU Make the World a Better Place

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The Book of Proverbs in The Bible is regarded by many to be one of the greatest wellsprings of practical knowledge ever collected by humanity. Many people (myself included) have used Proverbs to make their lives better by using the wisdom within the books. But do you know WHY Solomon wrote Proverbs in the first place?

Actually the answer to this is provided by the king himself right at the beginning of the book. Notice Prov 1:2-4, where Solomon explains that the book is “for attaining wisdom and discipline, for understanding words of insight; for acquiring a disciplined and prudent life, doing what is right and just and fair, for giving prudence to the simple, knowledge and discretion to the young…” 

worldhands

That’s a pretty clear message that Solomon was not just trying to collect a book of a bunch of witty sayings, but instead had a more powerful, world-changing vision in mind. Personally I believe that we should keep this quote in mind while we read through Proverbs because these are worthy goals to remain aware of. After all, not only do we want to acquire wisdom and understanding and use this knowledge to live a disciplined and prudent life for ourselves and our own benefit, but imagine what can happen when we follow the rest of the directions — we can ALSO make the world a better place by DOING what is good and by GIVING knowledge to others (teaching the simple to be make better choices, sharing wisdom/guidance with the younger generation).

As you can see, when we truly understanding wisdom realize that using wisdom requires doing ALL of these things and when we do that, everybody wins.

How will YOU use your wisdom to help someone today?

 

Life Lessons, Solomons Wisdom

Where do you find Wisdom?

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Wisdom – everybody wants it, because it can give you an advantage in life, yet few know where to find it. That’s a problem for most – but it doesn’t have to be a problem for you any longer.

Why? Because the answer is simple – Wisdom is everywhere…if you only LISTEN.

WisdomPhone

It may sound crazy and overly simplified and perhaps if it was just Michael telling you this you might well dismiss the notion, but these are not my words, they are the words of King Solomon – the wisest man who ever lived. The concept of simplifying the process of finding wisdom was so important to Solomon that he wrote not one but TWO books on the subject – Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. Both of these biblical books are filled with Solomon’s thoughts on the topic. For today’s lesson I’m going to pick out just a few of his quotes.

  1. LISTENING: “Listen and add to your learning” (This is a quote from Prov 1:5, but the concept of ‘listening” was so critical that Solomon repeated this direction in Prov 1:9, P4:1, P5:1, and P8:33)
  2. WHERE IS WISDOM? “Wisdom calls aloud in the streets, she raises her voice in the public square.” (Everywhere you look you can learn something, everyone you meet can teach you something, if you are willing to listen). For similar quotes check out Prov 8:1-11 and Prov 9:3-6. In addition, notice that Wisdom ‘dwells with prudence’ (Prov 8:12) and ‘walks in the way of righteousness’ (Prov 8:20) so if the more you model these behaviors in your life the most you’ll be exposed to sources of valuable knowledge.  If you are wondering where does Wisdom come from — Solomon answered this for us as well (Prov 2:6) “The Lord gives wisdom and from his mouth come understanding.”  
  3. ADVICE: “Wisdom is found by those who take advice” (Prov 13:10). Despite being considered the wisest man of his day, Solomon was a big proponent of taking advice. In addition to this quote, he talked about advice in Prov 11:14, Prov 12:15, Prov 13:1, Prov 15:31, and Prov 13:20 where he said “He who WALKS WITH THE WISE grows wise” (this speaks to the power of finding a mentor). But the best quote of all on the power of advice may be this (Prov 19:20) “listen to advice and accept instruction and in the end you will be wise” – that’s something all of us can do!
  4. PARENTS: “Keep your father’s commands and do not forsake your mother’s teaching. Bind them upon your heart forever, fasten them to your neck. When you walk they will guide you, when you sleep they will watch over you; when you awake they will speak to you” (Prov 6:20-22). Solomon wrote often about the wisdom available right in your own house from your parents – if you will simply listen, learn, and remember it. Proverbs is filled with similar quotes – how many can you find?
  5. FOCUS: “a discerning man keeps wisdom in view, but a fool’s eyes wander to the ends of the earth” (Prov 17:24). Once you find wisdom, it’s important to maintain a focus on that teaching, apply what you learned, AND continue to try to get more of it. As Solomon noted in Prov 2:2-5 “Turn your ear to wisdom…call out for insight…cry aloud for understanding…look for wisdom as for silver, search for it as for hidden treasure…and find the knowledge of God.” And just when you think you might know it all, remember this warning from Prov 26:12 “Do you see a man wise in his own eyes? there is more hope for a fool than for him.”

Never stop learning.

The good news is that there is more wisdom in the world than you will ever know so you’ll never run out. Best of all, Wisdom is waiting for you everywhere — if you only take the time to listen!