Are You Treating Your Health, Life and Loved Ones as an Afterthought?

“None of us are going to get out of here alive, so please stop thinking of yourself as an afterthought.” – Anthony Hopkins I just got off my monthly phone call with a long-time friend.

Everyone who has ever met her says, even if they only met her for a few minutes in the hallway, “She made me feel I was the most important person in the world. She listened to every word I said and then said just the right thing to lift me up and move me forward.”

What some people don’t know is she has been dealing with Stage 4 cancer the last two years. She has many 9-on-the-scale-of-10 pain days and never knows which day might be her last.

As a result, she lives every day like it might be her last. That’s not being trite, it’s being true.

I asked her, “What do you wish people knew that you now know?”

“I wish they would emotionally put themselves at the end of their life. It would help them be more mindful about how they spend their time.”

“What do you mean?”

“Mindful means asking ourselves, 'Does this really matter? What will matter in the long run?' When we know we have a limited amount of time, we’re really careful about who we spend it with, what we spend it on.”

Following my call with her, I asked myself, “What am I NOT doing that, at the end of my days, I will wish I had?”

The answer came immediately.

I would wish I had initiated more outings where our whole family got together. I’ve been fortunate this last year to spend time with Tom, Patty and their kids in Boulder and Maui for Christmas, and with Andrew, Miki and Hiro in NY and LA … but it’s been two years since we’ve all been together.

That’s too long. I am the matriarch of our family. It is up to ME to initiate gatherings.

So, I sent them an email asking, “Who wants to run the Bolder Boulder 10K together?”

The Bolder Boulder is the second largest 10K in the country. Anyone can do it. competitive runners, walkers, babies in strollers, even corporate teams in costumes.

This will give us all something to train for, something to look forward to. It will be a wonderful “excuse” to get outside, get fit, and have fun while creating a celebratory and memorable experience.

I can hardly put into words how right this feels.

How about you?

Are you spending your time carefully or carelessly?

What priorities - health, loved ones, your life - are you treating as an “afterthought?”

If you project yourself emotionally to the end of your life, what will you wish you had done?

Why not put a date on the calendar and initiate it now?

Henry Miller said, "Life, as it is called, is for many of us one long postponement."

Are you floating through life, promising yourself you'll do more of what's important ... when you have more time, money or freedom?

Often, the things we wish we had done don't cost a thing. They just involve spending quality time with loved ones, doing things we enjoy, and looking around and appreciating what's right with our world.

And we can all do that, right here, right now if we make it a priority.

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Sam Horn, CEO of the Intrigue Agency, TEDx speaker, and author of POP!, Tongue Fu!, and Washington Post bestseller Got Your Attention? is on a mission to help people create a QUALITY life-work that adds value for all involved. This is excerpted from "SOMEDAY is Not a Day in the Week" (St. Martins Press, 2019)

Day Right Quote #62: May We Celebrate our Freedom(s) Today and Everyday

Hard to believe a year ago this July 4th weekend, I was driving through the Smoky Mountains listening to Garrison Keillor’s final show of A Prairie Home Companion, broadcast live from the Hollywood Bowl. President Obama called in to give Keillor a well-deserved shout-out for his forty-two years (!) of story-telling that has, as Obama put it, “made us all a little more humane.”

Barack Obama kept trying to focus the conversation on Keillor, Keillor kept turning it back to Obama. Keillor asked, “What are you looking forward to when you’re out of office?”

Obama laughed, “Getting in a car and going for a drive without the Secret Service.”

Exactly. Getting in a car and going where we want, when we want, with whom we want is the epitome of freedom. Yet many of us take it for granted.

As Abraham Maslow pointed out in his Hierarchy of Needs, “Satisfied needs are no longer motivators.”

In other words, once we have food, water, safety, freedom; we tend to overlook them. We don’t miss or appreciate them until they are challenged, until we lose them.

Freedom to is far too precious to take for granted.

This was brought home by an incident that happened years ago during a Christmas holiday vacation in California’s Yosemite Valley.

We were staying at a family lodge that featured snowshoeing and sledding. We lived in Maui at the time, so playing in the snow was a big draw for Tom and Andrew. What we hadn’t counted on was a blizzard that kept us inside. No worries, there was ping pong so we were happy campers.

One night during dinner, the manager confided he was concerned about a couple who were supposed to check in that day but still hadn’t arrived. This was before cell phones so the manager didn’t know if they’d gotten lost or what.

Suddenly, the door blew open and in walked the couple. We gathered round to find out what had happened.

Yes, they’d gotten lost, but here’s the part that made a lasting impression on me ... they hadn't panicked because they were in the United States.

They said they had grown up in Russia. If they wanted to travel internally, they had to give authorities their itinerary. If they didn’t arrive at each checkpoint by a certain time, they came under suspicion and could be interrogated, even arrested. The couple told us they hadn't worried about losing their way to the lodge because they were in America, they had enough food, water and blankets, and they knew they’d be safe until someone rescued them. At least they didn’t have to worry about being tossed in jail.

Their story had an enduring impact on me. I promised to never again take my freedom of movement for granted.

I was reminded of this vow, in an unexpected way, a week after hearing Obama reveal how much he was looking forward to his regained freedom of movement.

I was was navigating some dark steps in a hotel parking lot and took what I thought was the last step, except it wasn't. I fell head-first and crashed into a car, ribs-first.

Ouch! I sat there, stunned in a state of shock. I decided to get up and “walk it off.” That had always been my strategy. If I was playing tennis and twisted my ankle, I found that if I sat down, that injury set in. But if I walked around, my body would somehow, miraculously, heal itself.

So, I walked around until I felt like I was “myself” again. I was okay until the next morning when I couldn’t get out of bed. My whole side ached. Any sudden movement brought a gasp of pain.

I googled my symptoms and self-diagnosed that I had bruised or cracked ribs. (Side note: Yes, I know doctors hate it when we self-diagnose via the internet.)

WEB-MD said that if I did go to the ER, they’d probably take x-rays to see if I was in danger of puncturing a lung, but otherwise they wouldn’t even “tape me up,” as physicians now feel that's an outdated practice that hurts more than it helps. They would, maybe, give me pain meds and advise me to “take it easy” and the ribs would eventually knit on their own.

Hmm. I was flying to Hawaii that day. Perhaps this was naive, but I decided I could "take it easy" in the islands. As long as I sat still or walked without swinging my arms, it didn't hurt too much. It was only when I needed to bend, turn my torso or lift anything (e.g., a carry-on suitcase) that my body quickly reminded me, "DON'T do that!"

I arrived safe (but not so sound) and checked into the beautiful Andaz Resort and Spa, a truly lovely hotel but it is modern which means everything is low. Low beds. Low couches. Low chairs. I remember looking at the bed and wondering how I was ever going to get in it, much less out of it.

I thought, “I know. I’ll go for a walk on the beach path.” I had spent hundreds of happy hours on that path with friends and family when we lived in the area and while I served as Executive Director of the Maui Writers Conference.

Good idea in theory, not so much in practice. Five minutes into my walk, I knew it was a mistake. The narrow, up, down, winding path was crowded with runners, speed walkers and baby strollers, which meant I was dodging someone or something every other minute. Not an option. I headed back to the hotel, feeling like a wimp.

So, what happened? I became a spectator. The next ten days, I sat and looked at the ocean - and didn’t even go in. I watched people swim, scuba, snuba, paddle-board, body-board, kayak and sail - and didn’t get up from my chair.

And you know what I learned? It is a very slippery slope between being a participant in life vs. a spectator. I’ve been active most my life, but here I was sitting on the sidelines watching, not doing.

Thank heaven my ribs healed and I was able to get out of inertia and back in motion. I was once again able to actively appreciate and enjoy my freedom of movement.

How about you? Is freedom a satisfied need? Are you taking it for granted - or using it before you lose it?

Moshe Dayan said, “Freedom is the oxygen of the soul.”

Freedom is more than that. Freedom in all its many forms - freedom from fear, freedom of speech, freedom to work for a living, freedom to pursue happiness, freedom of movement - is one of the great blessings of our life.

John F. Kennedy said, “As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.”

This July 4th weekend, may we not just SAY we appreciate our freedom (s), may we get outside and SHOW we understand what a gift it is to go where we please, do what we please, say what we please, when we please, with whom we please.

Day Right Quote #58: Quit Watering Dead Flowers

What a joy visiting Hawaii's famous Talk Story Bookstore, meeting owners Ed and Cynthia Justus and hearing their surprising secrets to building a successful life and business in an out-of-the-way location. Here are a few take-aways from my interview with them. The #1 Prerequisite for a Profitable Retail Business is NOT Location, Location, Location - It’s Clarity, Clarity, Clarity

Their bookstore is on the least-visited major island and in a town of less than 3000 people. Yet they have been one of Hawaii’s Top 50 Fastest-Growing businesses for the past five years. TripAdvisor says they’re THE #1 visitor destination on Kauai.

How can this be? In one word …CLARITY. Clarity is the new location. Clarity about who they are. What they want. What they don’t want. And they stay true to those priorities. Which means gently and firmly enforcing their rules.

For example, you’ve heard “There’s no crying in baseball?” Well, there are no thongs in bookstores. At least not in THEIR bookstore. The twenty-something who walked in wearing her version of an itsy-bitsy, teeny-weenie yellow polka-dot bikini was asked to honor their posted sign, “No shoes, no shirt, no shorts, no service.”

The woman who told them she was going to leave her kids in the store while she went shopping across the street? Nope. “This is a bookstore, not a babysitting service.”

PAVE THE PATHS

Ed and Cynthia didn’t have a background in the book biz and didn’t plan on buying a bookstore. They visited Kauai on their honeymoon and liked it so much, they decided to take a leap of faith and stay. How did they make money from the first day they put their sign up, when they had no experience in the industry?

Ed says, “Amazon’s website taught us everything we needed to know about book-selling. Instead of us trying to figure out which books to stock and what to charge, we simply followed the favorites. Why re-create the wheel? Their site told us the most popular books in each genre and the going price for gently-used books.”

I said, “That’s brilliant. There’s an urban legend called ‘Pave the Paths’ which recommends that instead of prematurely installing sidewalks at public places (e.g., colleges and county buildings), it's smarter to wait and find out where people naturally walk and then put the sidewalks there.

That’s what you did. Instead of stocking what you hoped might sell, you 'booked the beloveds' and bought proven ever-greens that have a track record of always being in demand."

Don’t follow The Rules; Follow Your Values

For example, the “rules” say a brick and mortar store has to have a cash register, right? The problem is, cash registers lock you into one location, often in a front corner of your store. What if you have a customer in back who can’t find what they want? If there’s no one around to answer their question, they often leave and don't come back.

Ed and Cyndi don’t have a cash register; they have cash belts. Wearing a cash belt around their waist gives them freedom to wander the store and connect with their customers. While I was there, they greeted every single person who walked in the store. One was always out on the floor, asking people if they were looking for something in particular and then pointing out recommended authors in their preferred genre.

The trend of many bookstores is to offer coffee to attract customers. Well, they tried that and you know what they learned? Coffee sells coffee. Books sell books.

Another “rule” of retail businesses is you need to diversity if you want to grow. So, they added an art gallery with works from local artists. A restaurant. Book clubs. Internet service. Chairs so people could sit.

Guess what they discovered? Those extra services took lots of extra time and effort, created a lot of problems they didn't want or need ... and didn’t boost profits. In fact, Cyndi said, “We found that for every chair we took away, we added an extra $1000 of income. People who sit and read books for free for hours often walk out without buying any books."

The rules say a retail business needs an inventory system. Ed said, “Why? We mostly stock one copy of each book. Why spend a lot of time logging in and tracking single sales? Plus, we handle every purchase so we know what’s selling and what’s not.”

The Secret to Loving Your Life and Work? Stop Watering Dead Plants

As we talked, it was clear to me that one of the reasons they’ve been so successful is they QUIT doing things that didn’t work; that didn’t make money; and that didn’t bring them joy. This frees up time and money for business activities that contribute to their quality of life instead of compromise it.

They quit the belief that bigger is better. They've built and sustained a successful business because they've honored their belief, "If we don't love it; we don't do it. If it doesn't add personal and professional value, we drop it."

Chip Away Everything That is NOT David

I told them, “There’s a (perhaps apocryphal) story about Michelangelo who said, when asked how he creating his masterpiece sculpture, ‘It’s easy. I just chipped away everything that wasn’t David.’"

I smiled and said, "You have ‘David’d your business and life. You have chipped away everything that isn’t congruent with your values and vision. As a result, the light is on in your eyes and you’re successful for all the right reasons.”

So, what surprising lessons did I take away from my time with Ed and Cyndi?

* CLARIFY your values, vision, priorities and policies and STAY TRUE to them.

* Quit watering dead plants and DAVID your life and business.

* Gently and firmly ENFORCE RULES to protect what’s important to you.

When we do the above, we build a successful life, business and career where the light is on in our eyes - and things just keep getting better and better – for all the right reasons.

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Sam Horn, Intrigue Expert, is on a mission to help people create quality projects that add value for all involved. Her work - including her TEDx talk - and books POP!, IDEApreneur, Tongue Fu! and Got Your Attention? have been featured in NY Times, Forbes, Fast Company and presented to NASA, National Geographic, Capital One, YPO. Want Sam to share her inspiring insights on how to create a successful life and career at your next convention? Contact Cheri@IntrigueAgency.com

Day Right Quote #57: The Meaning of Life is to Find Your Gift, the Purpose of Life is to Give It Away

Such wisdom from Pablo Picasso, "The meaning of life is to find your gift, the purpose of life is to give it away." Have you found your gift? What is that? How are you giving it away?

A friend gave the commencement address at her alma mater. Some of the grads took the stage and with a flourish opened their gowns to reveal they were wearing t-shires underneath that said, "I DON'T KNOW."

Hah. The perfect answer for students who DON'T KNOW what they're going to do with their degree, career, life.

Many know they want to be happy. They just don't know how to do that.

The thing is, as Leo Rosten said, "The purpose of life isn't to be happy; it's to matter, to feel it has made some difference we have lived at all."

Please understand, I'm not saying it's not important to be happy. It is. It's just not WHY we're here.

We're here to make a difference - and one of the surest ways to do that is to identify our gifts and gift them back.

Are you not clear what your gifts are? Want a short-cut to finding out?

What puts the light on in your eyes? Is it singing, dancing, playing a musical instrument or sport?

Is it fixing something, growing something, building something?

Do you have a knack for words, for language, for stories?

What do people admire about you and say, "I wish I could do that" ... yet it comes "naturally, easily" to you?

What do you love to do? Look forward to with eagerness and anticipation?

What brings you joy? Makes you feel purposeful, that you're making a positive difference?

Those are all your GIFTS.

Now, figure out how you can TEACH THAT TO OTHERS or DO THAT FOR OTHERS.

Wrapping your career around your gifts is the surest way to expand your impact - for good.

Don't keep your gifts to yourself. That puts an unnecessary ceiling on their value.

Sharing your gifts is a way to set your SerenDestiny in motion.

Giving away your gifts is a way to scale your service and become wealthy in what matters.

Gifting your gifts creates a "rising tide" ripple effect where more people benefit from what you do well.

And isn't that what we all want?

P.S. If you'd like specific ways to do this, check out my book IDEApreneur.