Do you ever wonder why others are courageous in times of adversity and you aren’t? In this episode, Lori and Jimmy share three tactics that help them find the strength to move forward during times of adversity.
You will gain insight into:
- Why its important that you face your greatest fears to grow in courage.
- When you should do something that scares you!
- How to use positive self-talk to build your courage mindset.
- Why defining your Daily Big Three is vital to gaining courage against adversity.
- How to be a courageous leader for your team, family and community!
Podcast Transcript
LF:
Oh, good morning. Can you imagine? Can you just feel it? Yep. It’s that first rush of hot, warm, delicious coffee running through your brain, giving your brain a hug. Oh yes, it’s Monday and I’m caffeinated and I’m excited to be here on Live a Life By Design. Good morning everyone. It’s not your hostess with the mostest. I will not take that title, even though Jimmy gives it to me quite frequently. I’m Lori Few and we are so excited that you’re here with us this morning. We’re facing some difficult days in the United States of America. However you are dear subscribers and listeners to this podcast are some of the most fearless and courageous people, not just in the state, not in the nation, but on the planet. You understand that you must face your fears head on to overcome them ignoring or procrastinating on the largest fears in your life. Only give them more power over you. Today, Jimmy and I will share three tactics we utilize on a daily basis to maintain our courage to face the headwinds of life. Are you ready, Jimmy?
JW:
Lori, I am not caffeinated, as you know. I don’t drink that dark water, but I do hit the hot chocolate pretty hard. Hey, good morning everybody. This is Jimmy Weaves joining and she truly is the nicest hostess of the mostest. If there’s such a word I gotta tell you, Lori, I am gonna bear it all on this episode with I need refrain that I will remain fully clothed for throughout the episode,
LF:
But
JW:
Burying my soul today because I am talking about sharing a very personal challenge that I face often. Now, this is one of the scariest environments to overcome, and I face it with much fortitude, wisdom and patience as I can muster. Yes, I am talking about walking into the arena of potential death or at least bodily harm. And coming out the victor,
LF:
Wow, I can’t even imagine what you’ve been through or are still going through that would cause such overwhelming interpretation. Jimmy, what is it?
JW:
Lori? Many people listening to this show know that I am an eternal optimist. However, there comes a time that optimism must take a secondary role. And realism is staring you right in the face. This near catastrophic environment appears annually for me. Yes, I’m referring to Black Friday. Yes, my wife, as beautiful as she is, transforms into a consumer ninja warrior on that Friday after Thanksgiving in the United States. Wonder Woman would hold nothing on this lovely lady in the local mall.
LF:
No, wait a minute, come on. I thought you were gonna say something like prolific and profound. You mean it requires a great deal of courage to go shopping with your wife on Black Friday
JW:
And stamina. Don’t forget that. Stamina is key. Get there early, late. You know what I mean? On a, on a more serious note, folks, the first tactic that we develop greater courage in our lives and we hope in your life, is to follow the instructions of one of the most courageous women in recent history. You know her as the First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt. The first lady remarks some of the most important words to drive up a person’s level of courage. She simply said, Do one thing every day that scares you. What are you doing today that scares you? By facing those fears in life, you become more equipped, more powerful, and more confident to face other fears that may be holding you back from a life you desire. These fears can involve people, money, things, animal, whatever. It is vital that you become the commander of your mind because fear is simply a mental creation of your own doing. The Lake Zig Ziglar, one of my famous mentors I had seen three times in person and was left just astounded by how positive and powerful his words were. He quoted, Fear is nothing more than false evidence appearing real. You can control your future by controlling your mind. Gee, Lori, we’ve said that many times on these podcasts,
LF:
Many times.
JW:
So don’t allow fear to fester and grow in your mind, or it will become rooted so deeply that you must take even greater strength to overcome it.
LF:
So do you think that jig Ziegler’s parents, when they named him that, do you think that they automatically were like, We have a star. That’s just a, that’s an amazing name for a human being who’s gonna go out and change the world?
JW:
So his real name actually is the surname. Ziegler the Zig, if you will, name is kind of a nickname for him. That’s not his actual name at birth. But I gotta tell you, he had to have a cool name because this man was just so prolific coming from a very poor family. He always took the story and he said, you know, he said back when I was raised down there in those depression days, he said, We didn’t have a lot to eat, He said, So I always ended up next door at my friend’s home. They had a maid and I knew they were rich cuz they had a maid and they had a maid cuz they had something to cook. And so I knew, so I knew to be over at their house at any mealtime would be a positive treat.
LF:
Well, it’s interesting with a name like that, you obviously have to be courageous because I’m sure some people teased and made fun of his name, but at the same time he had has had such a profound impact on you that I just, I dunno, interesting food for thought. This Monday morning, if you will
JW:
Tell you, I gotta tell you the Lord before we leave this when I saw him, I had the, the opportunity, I shook his hand once I saw him three times. But the line was so long to get to see him that they didn’t have enough time for everyone to get through the line, you know? And I could see he was wanting to stay and this was years ago when he was quite agent at the time, but he was wanting to stay. But his his managers handlers and those people were kinda like, Hey, you know, we, we we’ve gotta get you back to where you need to be or something like that. So it was pretty awesome. You know, I didn’t wash my hand for like two days.
LF:
I was gonna say, I knew it was coming. How did wait before you washed your,
LF:
But one of the best tactics that we’re gonna use for becoming more courageous is to practice mindfulness. You know, we talk a lot about mindfulness, positive self talk embeds in your mind, the powerful messages that you allow your brain to create your happy environment, if you will, several times each day. You have to check your mindfulness. It’s kind like checking your desk age, honestly, in your car, which I am guilty, I don’t look as much as I should until I see the little icon that says low fuel. So when I do it personally for mindfulness, I try to do a little bit better than I do with my regular car duties. So
JW:
You, you’re saying that you have gas quite a bit all day.
LF:
Oh, now come on.
JW:
Can you say it? Okay, I’m sorry. I misunderstood the analogy. My apologies, I’m just teasing. Please proceed, Miss Lori.
LF:
Listen, you never know how it’s gonna go around here. You just don’t. But we do need to become more mindful in those situations. So you check your vitals, your overall wellbeing, you’re conscious on your state of mind. Are you happy? Are you calm? If you are disengaged in life or focusing more on the negative news reported daily or other situations that affect your mental health, you’ll suffer in mindfulness. Ask yourself, who do I need to become instead of what do I need to become? The very fact that you are becoming someone bigger, better, and bolder will empower your capabilities to develop courage in your life.
JW:
Lori, that is powerful. So what you’re saying is we need to focus on what do we need to become instead of what do we need to do. So think about becoming something, it takes courage to become someone new. Let me give you a true story about a brilliant young man that I knew and he had a very secure career. Everything was going great with an international company. This young man was on his way to the top. And at the end of the day though, he had this deep down in his heart or in his gut even maybe this feeling like he was entrepreneurial in spirit and wanted to create something of great value for him, for himself, his family, for his friends, for whoever. And so this young man took a very successful career that had all these benefits, great opportunities and so forth, and chunked it and said, I am going to start my own business.
JW:
And yes, that young man that of brilliance in nature was me. And so it took a lot of courage because my wife said, Are you kidding me, we just built our new home in the Tulsa area. And I came home to her one day and I said, You know, I just think the Lord’s leading me to, to do something on my own. I just feel like I’ve got this yearning. And for lack of a better term, I wanted to try to do something. So I’ll never forget our first year in business back in the hometown where near both were of us were raised, I worked more hours, I worked 2,800 hours. Now the normal person would work 2080. I worked 2,800 hours. I tracked my time for a full year. And at the end of that year, we netted, netted. Mind you, in 1992, about $36,000. That was it.
LF:
I was 12 in 1992.
JW:
Yeah, appreciate you bringing that to our perspective. But anyway, see folks, you never know where this is going, right? I’m telling you, you never know where this is going. So, so my point I’m making is it took a lot of courage for me to do that. You know, I left a stable career that I had all, all the potential to, to really do well in and, and took it on my own and did even better in my opinion, cuz I got further faster and helped more people and did those things outside that box of being in corporate America. I’m not saying everyone needs to do that, but I say be true to yourself in your mindfulness, right?
LF:
And I agree, absolutely. And I think it takes courage to make those financial decisions in your personal and professional life, you know, that that could turn out to be a complete flop. Honestly, I am the type of person that I, I work on having a lot of courage because I’m not a risk taker. And I kind of feel that like those two things are synonymous. If you, if you take a risk, you have to have courage and that risk because you have to commit, you have to believe in it. And when we talk about becoming, you know, you talk about it in a professional sense. And I think about it from my experience in a, in a personal sense. I tried to become who I thought I needed to be. I, several years ago decided to step away from one of the things I had been involved in for a number of years and was very, very, very passionate about as a volunteer because I thought I needed to commit to my family and my son.
LF:
And what I learned about myself through that process is I missed it even more. I was missing a part of who I was supposed to be that I had lost. And so when we talk about becoming, you know, just because we feel obligated to do things or commit or change, you don’t have to give up something that you really, really love. And you know, we talk a lot about like growing up and young adults, that if you love something and you let it go, it’ll come back to you if it’s meant to be. And I found myself two years later basically just begging and saying, Okay, I’ve tried to give it up. I can’t, I can’t, I’m, I’m unhappy, I’m unfulfilled. I have got to get back in the groove of doing what I absolutely am passionate about. And so I did that and I have not regretted it at all, and I have made time to try to find that balance. Turns out my 13 year old doesn’t need me as much as I thought he did, which is kind of sad, but not sad in the same sense that I’m great, that he’s learning to be independent. But it gave me back my sense of purpose. And I don’t ever wanna lose that
JW:
Until you got to your son missing you. I really thought you said you’d given up coffee for two years, folks, I cannot see her doing that. But
LF:
I can’t give, I can’t give coffee for two.
JW:
You know, I, the courageous thing that you’re doing is the fact that you’re given trueness to yourself. And, and I always ask people, I say, you know, why do you think you’re on the planet? And, and, you know, get some of these terse answers like, well, to, to make money to feed my family or I’m here just to, you know, enjoy each day or whatever. But really, if you think about it introspectively, look at what you are here on this planet to accomplish. And the two most important days of your life will be determining that. Now, there was a gentleman that wrote some great books. One I loved as a kid was Tom Sawyer, Who, who wrote the book? You recall?
LF:
Mm.
JW:
Mark Twang. That was his pin name, pin name Mark Twang, right? Samuel Clemons is his actual name. Not that I’m a geek and digress, but anyway,
LF:
But another cool name though. Good, good job on his parents.
JW:
You know, Twain, Can you believe that? What a name, right? That’s cool too. He picked a good stage name. So in terms of what he said were the two most important days of your life. What do you think the first one was, Lori,
LF:
The day you’re born
JW:
Absolutely wouldn’t be here without that day, right? So it has to be one of the most important days. What do you think the second day is?
LF:
The day you die
JW:
Close. But no
LF:
No, I was stabbing in the dark on that one, honestly.
JW:
Everyone says that. But the second most important day of your life is, if birth was the most important, what was the second?
LF:
Finding your purpose.
JW:
When you learn the reason why, why? Same thing when you learn the reason why. So that really struck home to me. So there’s this process we call the blueprinting process that I’m having our entire team at Compass Capital Management go through the process now, not to share it with me, but to themselves find what their purpose is and for why they’re on the planet. And it’s really quite eye-opening what you discover about yourself. So when you’re talking about self-talk and, and checking in for your mindfulness, keep in mind too that your values will drive your mindfulness, right? So what do I mean by that, Lori, about your values driving mindfulness?
LF:
Well, I, I mean, I think it’s a testament to who you’re personally and, and what you value in yourself and what you’re willing to accept and what you’re willing to tolerate. Because in those things, when you keep those true to yourself, those impact your mindset.
JW:
Absolutely. So do you think I can truly be happy in this world if I’m not truthfully to myself? In other words, if I’m not living who I really am, but, or I’m living someone else’s life, you know, and I always tell people, Hey, when you read a great book or you see someone like a Zig Zigler speak, I gotta be honest with you, I didn’t do this right. I became more of a follower than a learner. You know, you just go, man, if I could just emulate what he does, how he speaks, how he dresses, who he’s, who he is as a person, if I could emulate that, then Jimmy would be the next Zig Ziglar. And that’s just not how it works, right? So our really true pinnacle of success is gonna come when Lori f looks deeper inside her, her own being and says, I know why I’m on the planet and you pursue that highest calling, is my opinion. So this tactic is a very good one, Lori.
JW:
So this last tactic Lori and I are sharing is one that I use every week and every day to keep me focused on the important aspects of life. And I like to say I am the person I hope that taught this acronym to Miss Lori Few, my co-host, with great value to me, because I know when you, when she looked at me real funny the day I introduced her to it. But anyway, yep. Even though these big, this tactic requires great courage on a weekly and almost daily basis, it is vital you do this. So I focus on my big three goals and tasks for the week and the day. And these are what Lori, what do I call ’em?
LF:
Be Hs
JW:
B ags. Yes. What
LF:
I really thought, I really thought that it was really a bad four letter word. The first time you introduced it to me. I almost didn’t believe you. I was like, Come again. What, what did you say? I
JW:
Think, you know, you said what? You know, Mike, you, you know my character better than that. I would not a language word , even in the
LF:
M . And, and that’s why I had to take a second, I had to take a second. Just a beat. But big hairy, audacious goals.
JW:
I love that. And you know, these require me to be more than I previously was yesterday, Lori. So I can accomplish even greater things today. Right? Now, when people say I accomplish great things, let me tell you what is great, great is you comparing your performance yourself yesterday to your new self today. Did it go positive or negative? If it went positive, that is a big, big deal. It is easy to grow in smaller steps than trying to take giant ones, right? I tell people all I wanna do is improve in my capability as well as my mentality. 1% per day. If I do that, how many days in most years? 365. That is a lot of improvement, right?
LF:
That is a lot. 365 and packing that into your, I mean, we talk about numbers a lot, but if you think about it 1%, that’s, that’s, so we probably spend more time sending a text message than 1% of our effort. So if we could really focus that it would be so impactful.
JW:
Oh, I spend way more that, Cause I don’t like to do that type of where you call abbreviation than doing the special words. I have to spell a mouse, so it takes me, that’s just part of my OCD of writing. I’m sorry. But you know, when, when you set your mind, Lord, to tackling a bigger goal than you have ever accomplished in your past, you must have courage to see it through. It’s easy to put on paper. It is most challenging to put into action, right? This is where the growth in your life really flourishes. I know some people that have gotten caught up in their day to day world and they’re just running circles with no real positive growth. And they seem to me to be pretty miserable. They feel like their career’s not where they want it to be. Their family’s not accomplishing the goals it had set. They’re, they’re living in the life of just mediocrity when they have such greatness to accomplish. You see that, that we were engineered for success and endowed with the seeds of greatness. But we all must do what all seeds do. What is that? Lori?
LF:
Grow,
JW:
Grow. And Lori does something for me. She always comes up with great sayings and she said, when she’s in a time of difficulty in those parts of life, she says, You learn to not just go through it, but grow through it. You learn more about it, right?
LF:
Absolutely.
JW:
To leave a legacy of accomplishment in life, you must have been uncomfortable for a number of years in life. Many of my mentors started life with literally nothing, only to become so courageous. They left millions to make the world a better place for those in the future.
LF:
So this week’s challenge, Are you ready? It’s to implement these three tactics in your life and to place and to find a place of discomfort so that you can reach your potential. So as we always say, go ahead and-
Both:
Live your life by design.
JW:
You know, one day we’re, this is episode 185, we’re gonna get that down one day. But I always feel like if I had the talent of the Jackson Five, they never said anything unless it was in unison, right? Hey, see you next week.
