Your Kiss is on My List

“My list of the best things in life”  includes music that puts a smile on your face and makes you feel good all over.  Like my Blog post “Don’t Worry Baby”, music is great therapy and hearing the Hall and Oates classic “Your Kiss is on My List” immediately brought me back to the early days of dating my wife ( 30 years of marriage, and 35 years of dating).  Not only did it bring me back to the early years of my relationship with my wife but it also made it clear to me that we are constantly creating our own experiences in life.  And what may seem a simple coincidence is actually much more.

Synchronicity is the experience of two or more events that are apparently causally unrelated occurring together in a meaningful manner.   Whether you call it Synchronicity or coincidence, I believe it all happens for a meaningful reason and it is up to you to figure out what the synchronicity in your life means.  So where am I going with Hall and Oates and Synchronicity ?  Well, something very interesting has been happening to me since I started writing this blog, meaningful and fulfilling synchronicity is started to appear daily, I am getting back into the zone where I was completely in control of my life and able to create things almost exactly as I wanted.  Miracles both large and small have started to happen but most importantly, friends, family and random people who have found my blog have started to have similar experiences.  I received an urgent text today from a business associate who has been reading my blogs who wanted to let me know what a great day she had and how everything was falling into place as she visualized it.  Now I know this particular person is very spiritual, has incredible faith, an awesome attitude and likes to read things like “The Secret” and similar works.  So she is understands the whole “knowing” thing that was the reason I started writing this blog in the first place.   What was really cool for me was that she created her day the way she always knew she could but she took the time to share her experience with me.   Her sharing of her experience today sent a positive shock through my body of knowing we can all create exactly the lives we want and that thought (good or bad) is contagious.  

Hall and Oates, what role do they play in today’s post ?  That’s another fun story I would like to share with you today because it is a great example of the incredible sychronicities in my life.   A few months back while searching Facebook for old friends, neighbors and business associates, I ran across Bren.  Bren or Brenda as I knew her back in the 60’s and 70’s was the cute Blonde from across the street in the neighborhood I grew up in.  Bren was a year younger than me but I had a crush on her during my entire elementary school experience.   Back then,  and I suppose at that age, you never hung around with girls in a grade below you and besides I never thought she had any interest in me.  But I always had that crush and anytime I had the chance to give her a ride on my Schwinn Apple Crate bike, I always was happy.   Well it turns out that Bren is a huge Hall and Oates fan, which was interesting because my wife when I started dating her in 1975  was also a huge Hall and Oates fan.  I have enjoyed Hall and Oates ever since my wife first played “She’s gone” for me from the “Abandoned Luncheonette” album.   So last week, I am checking out the news feed on Facebook and Bren posts that Hall and Oates are going to be in town and she wants to know who’s going with her ?.  I jokingly, immediately posted that I was going.  I really wanted to go but couldn’t justify spending the money at the moment.   So after posting my reply, I forgot about it, then late last week Bren sends me a message telling me that she has two extra tickets that my wife and I could have.   Wow,   I couldn’t believe the offer so I told Bren I just had to check with my wife to confirm.  Saturday rolls around and I tell my wife about Bren and the tickets, she was thrilled, so I immediately confirmed with Bren.  Now that was all incredible and fun but listen to this,  so my wife and I decide to go to a movie that afternoon, we decided to see “You Again” with Jamie Leigh Curtis.  Now, we decided to got to this movie just minutes after I confirmed with Bren about going with her to the Hall and Oates concert.  My wife and I really knew nothing about the movie except that Jamie Leigh Curtis  was in it.   So we are sitting in the  theater, eating a HUGE bucket of buttered popcorn when all of a sudden the couple in the movie are playing the Hall and Oates song “Your Kiss is on My List” on the radio, now that may seem like just a funny coincidence to you but to me it was synchronicity and a reminder to me that I played a role in the events that had just been created.  Even better, at the end of the movie and rolling into the credits, Hall and Oates and the cast of the movie sang “Your Kiss is on My List”.   While I always enjoyed that song, I never remembered the lyrics including the line “The Best Things in Life”, when I heard that, I knew the Universe was sending me yet another message about why happiness is the key to everything and when you know the outcome of your life, you can’t help but be happy.

You can have all of the Best Things In Life, you know you can, you just have to visualize your list of the best things and sit back and watch them show up.  I am adding something to my list of the best things in life, getting everyone to know they can create incredible experiences in their lives.  I know you can do it and I know that in my life, cancelling out the media has had a major impact and changed the way things are going for me.  I no longer listen to  or watch  any of the major news networks including my favorite Fox news, I don’t pay attention to the political nonsense going on in this country (I do intend to vote and I know my intuition will guide me to the right candidates),   I have turned off talk radio in favor of audio programs from Wayne Dyer, Mike Dooley and Joe Vitale.  Yes you could say I am brainwashing myself with positive, fulfilling and uplifting messages, and yes the brainwashing is working, I am washing out all the dirt and replacing it with clean new information.  I hope you will join me in creating incredible life experiences and if you get a chance, a text message, blog comment or email would be great, I love to hear about people and the great experiences they have created for themselves.  Get to work on your list of the “Best things in life” and make your life the best !

Related Articles

• The Hall and Oates revival (cbc.ca)
• Wandering the Aisles, Vol. 1: Hall & Oates for the Obsessed (popdose.com)

Neuschwanstein Castle is Calling Me !

Image via Wikipedia

I have never been abducted by aliens but I have been called by a 19th century castle in Germany, not once but many, many times.  Now I didn’t get a call on the phone but ever since I was very young I have had recurring thoughts that I had to go to this castle in Germany.  The only way I can describe this lifelong obsession is to compare it to what happened to Richard Dreyfuss in the movie “Close Encounters of the Third Kind“.  In the movie, Dreyfuss’s  character is drawn to Devil’s Tower in Wyoming, he draws pictures, he makes sculptures in his mashed potatoes and finally digs up his yard and builds a scale model of Devil’s Tower in his living room.  He finally gets in his old beat up station wagon and drives to Devils Tower where he evades the military and meets up with the visiting Alien space ship.   In my case I haven’t built sculptures in potatoes or ice cream nor have I built any scale models in my home of the castle, but I have had a strong feel my entire life that I had to go to Germany to visit Neuschwanstein Castle to find out what was going on.

Trying to figure out my obsession with this castle has been interesting, I know that this particular castle was the inspiration for Sleeping Beauty’s castle at Disneyland and it did appear in many vampire movies I watched as a kid but beyond that I always felt there was something deeper.   You may be able to tell by name (Braun) that I have some German blood in my family.  My Dad and his family are almost 100% German and have always been extremely proud of their German heritage.  So my first thought was maybe it’s the German blood drawing me to Bavaria and Neuschwanstein Castle which would be weird especially with the situation I have had with my father my entire life.

My Mother and Father were divorced when I was less than a year old, my Mother and Grandmother really raised me and even though my Father lived close by he never visited me or kept in contact with me.  In my late 20’s I contacted my father on the phone on several occasions and while I had a nice conversation with him I never was able to convince him to meet me for lunch or anything else.  It has been tough not having a Father but because he was in town, I always worked hard at everything hoping that some how he would hear about what I was doing and want to meet me.  When I played baseball, there was nothing I wanted to do more than play great so I could get my name in the paper.  My first year in College, my College baseball team made a swing through the south on a Spring Training trip, we played several games against much larger Colleges and it did extremely well, it was probably the best week of my Baseball career, I led the team in RBI’s and if I recall had the highest batting average during that trip.  The best thing was that our daily game summary appeared in the Minneapolis Tribune Newspaper.   I thought to myself that finally my Dad would read about me and want to meet me, but the phone never rang.   Later on in life I started a company called Braun Media Services in 1990 that did extremely well until it was sold to Zomax in 1995, again no call from my Dad even though positive stories about me and my company appeared in my local newspaper.   The telepathic calls from the castle continued on.

In 2004, I had the opportunity to travel with my wife to Austria on a ski training trip with my son.  My wife and I stayed at the same hotel as my son but planned on making day trips to nearby attractions.  All that I could think of was Neuschwanstein Castle, so on our first day we drove our rental car 3 hours and to Bavaria in Germany to see the castle.  I had no GPS system to guide me, no map only some rough instructions that didn’t make sense to me.  I don’t speak or read German but now I was on autopilot being guided by some force to the castle.  We didn’t get lost, we drove directly to the castle and my wife was amazed at how I found it without the benefit of any worldly guidance.  I never mentioned this to anyone before but as I drove, I had this strange feeling that I had been here and knew the countryside intimately, every turn, every field, every river and stream and the mountains and forest were all familiar to me.

Arriving at the castle a sense of “finally arriving” at where I was always supposed to be swept over me.  After purchasing our tour tickets and waiting our turn to enter the castle, I strangely started describing to my wife what we would find inside.  Once inside, I knew I had been here before (I had never been to Germany let alone this castle)I calmly described each room to my wife before we entered it and once inside it was exactly as I described.  Outside and further up the mountain in the woods is a bridge across an amazing 2,000 foot ravine that was built at the time of the castle, the walk to the bridge, the woods all seemed as familiar to me as my backyard in Crystal, Minnesota where I grew up.   I have no idea why all of this happened or why I knew this place so well even before I visited but the sense of peace and well-being I had when I was at the castle, in Bavaria and for that matter in Germany was unlike anything else.  These days not a day goes by that I don’t think about what I now call “My Castle” and Munich, I have the same feelings about the city of Munich and I continue to feel pulled to return especially at this time of the year.

Up until this year, the only fascinating thing about “My Castle” and Germany was how I was personally pulled and called by these places.  This spring something else happened that was amazing and had a strange connection to “My Castle”.  As I mentioned earlier my father has lived in the Minneapolis/St.Paul area my entire life, after he remarried he had another son and daughter (my half  brother and half sister) earlier this year, I connected with my sister on Facebook, we have developed a great relationship and she is the only connection I have to my father.  After a lot of emails and phone calls we finally got to meet when I invited her and her boyfriend to join me at a Minnesota Twins baseball game,  As we were talking, Germany came up and then “My Castle”,  I told about how I felt drawn to the castle and how I knew the place inside and out once I got there, she had this strange, stunned look on her face, and then she told me that she has had similar feelings and that her whole house is decorated with pictures of Neuschwanstein Castle.  Talk about mind-blowing, not only do I finally get to meet my sister, but a lifelong mystery of mine is now shared by my sister.  Some day I am going to figure this out, but the one thing I have grown more confident about is the messages in my head and my gut about how to proceed in life and how important it is to follow your gut instincts.  I would write more but I am getting a call.

Thinking Big in Broken Bow !

Image via Wikipedia

 

My first job after college and Broadcasting school was at KCNI Radio in Broken Bow, Nebraska.  I was so eager to start working in radio that I took the first job I was offered which just happened to mean I would have to move from the big city to tiny Broken Bow.  I was very excited about the job because I was going to get to do everything at this station, I was the morning announcer, the sales manager, the production manager, the chief engineer and weekend janitor.  I took on all these jobs for a whopping $ 400 per month plus 10% commission on every ad I could sell for the radio station.  On top of the jobs at the radio station, the local American Legion found out that I had played baseball in college and I was immediately recruited to coach the Broken Bow American Legion Baseball team which was a big deal for this town.   I don’t think I could have had a better situation, I not only was thrilled to be working in radio but coaching the Legion team gave me the opportunity to keep my baseball dream alive, I even took batting practice with the team to keep my hitting skills sharp. 

Living in Broken Bow was the first time I had ever lived away from home, but even though I was never able to find a nice place to live, everything was offset by my new career and the opportunity to coach the baseball team.  I was having so much fun that I didn’t even think about how little money I was making even though I was engaged and scheduled to be married in less than a year back in Minnesota.   My fiance and my mother would come to visit me once a month and my fiance made it very clear to me that there was no way she would ever move to Broken Bow, so I had a little situation on my hands and wasn’t quite sure what to do because even though I loved my job and coaching, my future wife meant even more to me. 

Because of my limited funds, I used to live on what ever was on sale at the grocery store, I remember eating nothing but baked beans for a week because they had been the feature item at the store.  Once a month though I would treat myself to an afternoon in Grand Island, which was the closest large city that had a McDonald’s, a movie theater and a mall.  My once a month afternoon treat consisted of going to lunch at McDonald’s (pretty great stuff when you are stuck in a town without McDonald’s), then I would go to the bargain matinée at the theater and finally would spend an hour or so at the book store at the mall looking at baseball books.  One day while looking through the baseball books I came across a book that had been misplaced with the baseball books, the book’s title was “The Magic of Thinking Big”, I remember looking at the book and telling myself I had to take my last $3 and purchase the book.  The Magic of Thinking Big was the first true personal development book I had ever purchased.   I took it back to Broken Bow that evening and I read it cover to cover, twice before going back to work on Monday morning.  This book opened my eyes to so many new possibilities that I had never thought of.  Before reading the book, I thought I would spend my entire life working for this little radio station in Broken Bow, after reading it I had made up my mind to improve my skills and find a way to get a better job in a more desirable location.  

Within weeks, I was actively Thinking Big and looking for a new opportunity, then I got the call from Brown Institute that a job had opened up in Belle Fourche, SD which was right on the edge of the Black Hills.  The job paid twice as much and in addition to my regular on-air duties I would also be the new color announcer for all of the High School and College basketball games broadcast by the station.  By the time you figured in my sports announcing duties, my salary was going to be more than 4 times what I was making in Broken Bow and on top of that my bride to be loved the Black Hills.  Let me give you a little time line, I started at the station in Broken Bow in May of 1979, in August fo 1979 I read the Magic of Thinking Big and by October 1, 1979 I had moved to Spearfish, SD, had a great new apartment just blocks from the campus of Black Hills State College and I was making almost 5 times as much working at a radio station filled with Brown graduates, including many from Minnesota, most in my age group and they all were either recently married or engaged.  It was a fun station, I was working with great people and my bride to be was thrilled with the idea of moving to Spearfish. 

I know that was kind of a silly little story but I hope what it illustrated is how important our mental programming is and how easy it is to do great things when you change your programming.  Like I said, I was totally content with my Broken Bow job because I didn’t know there was something better out there for me.  But once I read that book and started thinking Big,  incredible possibilities appeared almost by magic and my life improved dramatically in just a few months.  It really was from that point forward that I started investing almost every extra penny I had in books and tapes that would help me be more successful.  You know what ?  the stuff really works but you have to keep at it and make personal development a life long habit.   The mistake I made along the way was forgetting about my personal development once I achieved my biggest and most unbelievable goals.  When I stopped focusing on my personal development in 2001, it started a 9 year descent that ultimately took me to the bottom.  And it took hitting rock bottom for me to figure out why, but it is so clear to me now that I have been able to really dig in and refocus my efforts on my personal development habits.  In just the short time I have been really focused I have had some truly amazing opportunities appear magically, I have had money show up that was unexpected both in my mail box and also handed directly to me in a parking lot by a friend who for no reason whatsoever handed me $200 (2 clean ,crisp $100 bills) and told me to get some gas and take my wife to dinner.  The piece that is truly amazing is that this money started showing up when I started writing my life scripts on paper, praying for at least 20 minutes a day and listening to nothing but personal development CDs in my car (no talk radio to get me bummed out about the economy or our elected officials).  Thinking Big, focusing positive energy on what you want for your life and making prayer  a habit will yield some amazing results as long as you know in your heart that it works.  Knowing is the most important piece of the puzzle, it is not enough to merely believe you must “know” that your situation is going to improve and know that you are going to achieve all of your goals or something better. 

So whether you are in Broken Bow, Nebraska or Key West, Florida you can create the life you have always wanted, you just having to take the leap from “wanting” to “knowing”you can have it and amazing things will start to appear in you life. 

Credit Checks, Background Checks….and not necessarily the rest of the story

Image via Wikipedia

“Must be able to pass background check”  This phrase appears in almost every help wanted ad there is today.  Companies have gone crazy over doing complete background checks on job candidates and the companies doing the checking and investigating are making a lot of money in the process but do these background checks really tell the whole story or just give the employer a snapshot in time ?.   I am not exactly sure when all of these exhaustive background checks started, but I do know after personally hiring hundreds if not thousands of people in my 25 plus years of owning and managing companies that I really never learned much about any of the people I hired until they worked for me.   References never really accurately assessed whether a candidate would be a good employee, the only thing that ever worked for me were long interviews and a deep look into the soul of the person I was interviewing through direct eye contact.  I guess I hired on gut feel to be honest, but for the most part my gut feel served me well.   I had my first experience with a background check today as part of applying for a position and it made it very clear to me how damaging these reports can be without telling the whole story about someone.

This happens to be my story and while the message I want to deliver is how you can overcome any obstacle, some obstacles that are appearing for people today are not only unfair but unjust.  In my case, I feel like I have come to a place in my life where I can overcome any obstacle thrown in my path and the trick is looking for the good in every obstacle.  Here’s what happened to me, I have been trying to find any job I can to supplement my income and help me dig out of the financial hole I am in as result of my business failing.  I applied for almost 600 positions and emailed off over 100 resumes, I finally got a call back and an interview with a major  Gas and Convenience store chain.  The first interview not only went great it was a lot of fun and the company seemed like a great company with great pay and benefits.  I got a call back for a second interview which also went great and I was told that the HR department would be calling me to finalize everything so they could bring me on board.   While applying for this job I of course had to agree to the background check and requested that a copy of the report be sent to me.   At the first interview, I told the recruiter that my credit was horrible as a result of my business failure and the foreclosure of my home, she told me not to worry about it that while it would come up when talking to their HR people it would not have a bearing on their decision to hire me.  Let me stop here and mention what I think about the current FICO credit reports,   they only give you a snapshot in time of the most recent history, in my case I personally had perfect credit from the time I was 16 and got my first Daytons Department store credit card until age 47 when the economy tanked and my business failed.   So my credit report stinks because of the last two years, nothing in the credit report mentions my perfect credit for 31 years, my American Express Platinum card with no limit that was never paid late from 1983 until 2007,  the 20 plus cars I paid off early without a late payment, none of that history matters with today’s credit reporting system.   So you have excellent job candidates out there who are unable to get a job because their credit stinks because they lost a job or had some crisis that was no fault of their own.  Go figure, there is no justice in that system.   So that covers the credit check but what about the background check ?

The background check could be even worse than the credit check.  Here’s what happened to me, my background check came back today with an adverse action letter which means that something showed up on my criminal background check that I didn’t disclose in the application.   The application specifically asked if I had ever been arrested, which I never have, it then asked if I had been convicted of a crime with a side note that said if the conviction had been expunged you should answer no, so I answered no.  What the report showed was that I was charged and convicted of disorderly conduct in 2001 and the way it was worded on the report you would have to assume I was arrested and convicted.   But here’s the rest of the story, what actually happened;  on February 15, 2001  I was watching my son who was 11 at the time practice with his ski racing team.  I saw him get on the lift and also saw a gang of about 10 snowboarders follow him up the lift.  It took quite a while for my son to come down the hill but when he did, both of his ski poles were broken in half, he had holes in his ski jacket and he was crying, when I asked what happened he said the snowboarders ganged up on him, broke his poles and beat him up.  I immediately ran to the chalet to look for the security people but couldn’t find them anywhere, I then went to the car and got my son another set of ski poles.  When I returned to the ski run where my son was practicing, a group of snowboarders showed up at the same time as my son, my son immediately said “those are the guys”  I calmly looked over at the tallest one in the group, he was about 6’2″ to my 5’10” and with his helmet, goggles and size I figured he must be in his early 20’s.  I asked him why he had his gang beat up my son, his response was an expletive filled rant and threat that his gang was going to get me next, that was it I lost my temper and grabbed the guys jacket and told him never to threaten me of course then a bunch of other parents showed up and the event was quickly ended or so I thought, the next thing I know the snowboarder has called the police and I find out he is 17 not 22.  When the police arrived, I calmly told the police what happened and asked them what they were going to do to these kids for beating up my son, their response ” it’s your son’s word against these 12 kids” we have nothing to go on, but you sir can not touch a child !  So now I am the bad guy, well it turns out the police called the kids parents, they wanted nothing to do with the situation (bet it wasn’t the first time) and I was free to go and was told nothing would happen unless I got a letter in the mail from the county prosecutor.  So for the next 5 months I worried about the situation until the letter showed up charging me with assault and ordering me to appear at the Dakota county court.  This was so unbelievable, I didn’t know what to do so I hired an attorney who I had met at a baseball game (word of advice, don’t hire attorney’s you meet at baseball games, even if they have successfully defending pro athletes in DWI cases).  So the attorney and I show up at court (with my wallet several thousand dollar lighter)  My attorney has a closed-door session with the prosecutor and comes back to me and says that the prosecutor is a friend of his and that he has worked out a deal, all I have to do is plead guilty and they will charge me with disorderly conduct, give me a small fine and clear the record after 1 year.  But I am not guilty I proclaimed, the attorney said this is the best way to handle this, you can never win when there’s kid involved.   So while I disagreed, I just wanted it over, we proceeded to the court room and the judge said, I understand that deal has been reached, the prosecutor said yes and described the deal.  The judge then asked if the victim (the 17-year-old kid) was ok with the deal, here’s the mind-blowing part where I knew I had been had by everyone except the judge,  the prosecutor said, “Your honor I have attempted on at least 40 occasions to contact both the victim and his parents and neither one of them wanted anything more to do with this case, the Burnsville police have also attempted to contact the victim and his parents over 50 times and they had the same result.  So here I am pleading guilty to a crime I am not guilty of, would have easily been found innocent of, because the victim never would have shown up and the best buddy, the attorney and prosecutor both got what they wanted.   I was so upset, I asked the judge if I could tell my side of the story for the record, he allowed me to do so and gave me a look like he didn’t know why I agreed to the plea agreement.   Anyway, the deal was that after one year, this misdemeanor would be removed from record.   For years I was a ski racing official and had to undergo a background check each year before my officials license could be renewed, since I passed the background check without a problem every year, I assumed the court had removed everything from the record as I was told they would.  It wasn’t until today that I was reminded of that ugly incident and it may have cost me the opportunity for a job that I desperately need.  Injustice…only a part of the story and you tell me if this incident should affect my chances of getting a job.

So where is the good in this ?  Well, I have to say that God and the Universe always has a plan and I have to believe that the reason this happened today is that there is a bigger plan for me and that I am not supposed to spend my time working at a convenience store.   The thing is, when things like this happen to you, it is not always apparent why but I guarantee the reason will be revealed to you and you will find that things always happen for a reason.  So I could be furious, I could stay up all night thinking about this but instead I am waiting for something even better to come along and the sign that this happened for all the right reasons.  Joe Vitale is a guru of mine and he says when you are focusing on dreams or writing your life scripts and discussing goals you should always say “my goal is to achieve this or something better”.  The other thing you have to thing about is the old saying, when one door closes another one opens.   Today instead of getting upset about a setback look at it as being just a step closer to achieving what you really want in life, the last door that needs to close before that ultimate door opens.   You are in charge of writing the rest of the story, don’t leave it up to anyone else.

E-5…Life Lessons from the Baseball Diamond

E-5  (Error Third Base) the last thing you want to see on the scoreboard in a tight game and your name penciled in as the 3rd Baseman.  Throughout my life I  have always processed the events in my life by what I learned playing baseball.  To the uninformed I know that sounds crazy but as I have grown older and really started to pay attention to everything, it was my baseball experience that helped me succeed in life, helped me to not give up and today it is helping me deal with the last three years of my life that have been filled with obstacles and crisis.

Last night I was at beautiful Target Field, the new home of the Minnesota Twins and enjoyed a great Twins win but more importantly observed the fan reaction to errors made by the Twins Shortstop and the Twins Second Baseman.  My son in particular was ripping both players and talking about how lousy they were and that we shouldn’t bring them back next year.  Being older and wiser, I thought to myself all of the good things these two players had done this season and for that matter over their careers and I also thought about how either one of these players could be the hero in tomorrows game.  Baseball is a game where you can fail 70% of the time and be called a superstar and earn $25 million per year.  It is also a game where one minute you can be the goat and the next minute you can be the hero.

Before yesterdays game, I spent about an hour on the phone with a close friend and business associate who has stuck by my side and helped me get through some very difficult times both personally and financially.  This particular friend has stuck in there and helped me even when everyone else has given up, but his patience has been tested on a regular basis as it has taken me much longer to get things turned around than I had expected.  On the call he told me that everyone else that knew me that he had spoken with no longer believed me or trusted me.  Hearing that was awful, a crushing blow to me on a day when I actually had made some substantial progress on a number of fronts.  This was particularly tough for me to hear because for 47 plus years I had a reputation for being incredibly honest, having the highest integrity and being the one person in the world that could be trusted beyond a doubt.  Everyone’s perception of me changed when my business failed and my personal financial situation hit the crisis level. Now I never changed, personally I think I have conducted myself through this crisis with honesty and integrity but people don’t see the honesty and integrity when you can’t pay them back when promised or when a Nationally known personality whose products you have developed appears on Oprah and the big sales rush from the Oprah appearance never happens.  Wayne Dyer says that you must be able to proceed “independent of the good opinion of others” and he is exactly right.

So back to Lessons from the Baseball Diamond, so two things happened after that call yesterday with my friend and business associate, first I was more motivated than ever to hit the Grand Slam and un-do all of the damage that has been done over the past three years and I thought about all the errors I made as an infielder playing baseball and how I was able to overcome every one of them by using them to motivate me to work hard (and have my coach Ted Leuer hit me even more ground balls)and to redeem myself in a clutch situation in another game.  You know it always worked for me and watching the Twins this year and watching the media and the fans attack virtually every player on the team at one time or another including Twins Superstar Joe Mauer it has taught me and reminded me to proceed toward my goals confidently and quietly without worrying about what people think or say.

Along the same lines, you always hear about how easy it is to kick people while they are down or go after the people at the top, if you step back and observe you will see how true this is.  People for whatever reason love to kick people while they are down, when a closer for a baseball team blows a save the fans and the media go nuts, so much so it amazing these guys can come right back and strike out the side the next day.  More baseball talk…so the Twins traded for a new closer in July his name was Matt Capps, from the minute we got him my son didn’t believe in him and didn’t trust him, I didn’t know much about Matt Capps but when I saw him run to the mound and pitch to that first batter, I liked what I saw, he looked confident and he went right after the batter and got a save.  The next day he was the goat and lost the save and I think the game and my son all but gave up on him.  Matt Capps never gave up on himself and he continues to battle and be himself every chance he is given.

So many people that don’t understand the game of baseball can’t figure out why I am so in love with the game, but to me it’s not just entertainment, it’s life unfolding before your eyes.  Now I am sure there are lessons in football, hockey and basketball but I don’t think it is the same.  Many people say Baseball is too slow to watch, but that is exactly what makes it much more than a game, in between every pitch you have the opportunity to think about what just happened, think about what is going to happen and in my case think about what each pitch represents in life.  Crazy ? right ?  I don’t think so as the other thing that I think is more true of baseball than any other game is the people and personalities it produces.  I have had the opportunity to meet many of my heros from the game including Brooks Robinson #5 whose number I always wore through High School and College, Harmon Killebrew, Rod Carew, Danny Thompson, Torri Hunter, Jerry Kindall and many others, they all were and are incredible people off the field as well as on. 

Lesson #1 from the Diamond, don’t let life’s errors or the fans comments get to you, those same people will love and adore you like no one else when you get the clutch hit or break out of the slump.  And the more upset those fans are, it just means they are that much more passionate about you and your success.  Use those errors and slumps as lessons and know that if you are in slump now, you are probably due for the big hit at any time.

The Monster of Phantom Lake and other ways to Chase your Dreams Now !

How do you know what your real dream is for your life ?  And once you know, why do you keep putting off chasing your dream now ?  Sometimes we put off chasing our dreams because it is easier not to chase your dreams.  Big dreams for your life can be scary and most people are just plain afraid to take the leap.  Most people never chase their dreams and at some point really regret it.  As I have become of student of people, dreams, goals, faith and miracles, I have observed that most people don’t chase their dreams unless there is a life changing event, a death of a close friend or family member, a financial loss, a financial gain and many other major life events.

Personally, I have always loved movies, growing up at the Terrace Theater in Robbinsdale, Minnesota where my mother worked as a cashier.  I spent probably a third of my first 12 years of life at the Terrace developing my love of the movies.  I always wanted to be in the movie business whether it was owning my own theater or making my own films. As my career in the computer software manufacturing business progressed, my dream of the movie business slowly faded and my new dream became wanting to build a theater in my home.  One dream that ultimately did come true for me was building that home theater, it had real movie theater seats with cup holders and a commercial popcorn popper, I even had a ticket window at the entrance to the theater.  My favorite movies have always been the low budgent sci-fi and horror films of the late 50’s and early 60’s.  I grew up watching these films and couldn’t get enough of them.

A few years ago, I decided to get out of the software manufacturing business and start distributing and producing my own DVDs and Movies.  Yes, I took the leap and jumped into the pursuit of one of my dreams, I started out producing fitness and cooking videos and later got into movies.  I really wanted to find some of those old sci-fi and horror movies that I could either acquire the rights to or find titles that had slipped into public domain status.  One day a film showed up on my desk called “The Monster of Phantom Lake“, it was actually a new film, produced by a local filmmaker by the name of Christopher Mihm.  This film was exactly what I was looking for, it was a re-creation of those films I loved from the late 50’s and early 60’s.  

After receiving the film, I tracked down Mr. Mihm and met him for lunch at a Chinese restaurant to discuss how I could distribute his film for him.  When I met with Mr. Mihm, I was so impressed with his passion for his film and more importantly the story that led him to start making films. Mr. Mihm shared with me that while he was growing up his father loved the films of the 50’s and 60’s and the two of them would spend hours watching those films.  In the year 2000,  Mr. Mihm’s father passed away but Chris never forgot about those films and how much he and his dad enjoyed them.  He began to have thoughts about making films like those himself and finally in 2005  he made his first film, “The Monster of Phantom Lake”.  Chris had finally taken the leap and started a full on pursuit of his dream.  Chris and I ended up putting a deal together for me to distribute his film and the next films he made including, “It Came From Another World” and “Cave Women on Mars”.   I don’t think I ever enjoyed anything more than being involved with Chris and being a part of the production of “Cave Women on Mars”.  We worked together for a couple years, until my company was decimated and destroyed by the economy and the changing of technology from physical DVDs to downloads.  After Chris and I parted ways, Chris kept making films and recently released “Destination Outer Space”  which is a film we had talked about making a few years ago.  It really was a great film and with each film Chris produces, I am more and more impressed.

So now you know a little about Chris Mihm and his pursuit of his dream of making movies.  But the real story is still what it takes to pursue your dream and be successful.  Personally I have had alot of dreams and pursued many of them but ultimately wasn’t as passionate as I should have been which told me most of these dreams were not my ultimate dreams and in my case were probably substitutes.  I had the chance to have lunch with Chris the other day and what I learned from Chris over a one hour Chinese lunch was the missing secret to pursuing a dream successfully. You see Chris is so passionate about his films that it is his whole life and he has successfully integrated his family into his films and his film business.   The thing that impresses me most about Chris is his attention to the details, whether it is editing his films, creating his websites, writing and performing music or selling his DVDs at a Science Fiction conference.  Chris knows his films are fun and that his fans will enjoy them, he has done such an incredible job of a building a fan base and has a business plan for life for his films.   In trying to describe Chris to you, one of the pictures that popped into my mind was that of the one mand band, you know one of those guys on the street in New York playing about 10 different musical instruments simultaneously.  He really does every thing for his business and films, something that is a miracle in itself.  I think the true test of whether the dream you are pursuing is your ultimate dream is in doing it all yourself, like Chris has. 

I wonder how many people have dreams that they are putting off pursuing.  If I have learned anything in the last 50 years it’s that having a dream and pursuing it should be at the top of your list.  This is kind of funny advice considering I am not yet pursuing my ultimate dream, I may be doing bits and pieces of that ultimate dream but I have yet to throw myself head over tail all into the pursuit of my ultimate dream.  I think a few more visits to the Chinese restaurant to meet with my friend Chris may be what it takes to push me over the edge.

Life Changers (Real Life Angels)

What is an Angel ?  I believe Angels are real and can take many forms including human form, those “human” Angels probably don’t even realize they are Angels.  It may be that describing certain people as Angels is not accurate, may be they should be called “Life Changers”, whether they are Angels or Life Changers, I believe they have all been sent by God to guide us and lead us to live the life that God has planned for us.  I have been blessed with an abundance of “Life Changers” showing up at critical times through out my life.  And without hesitation, I can tell you who they are, how I felt in their presence and what they have meant to my life.   I know that “Life Changers’ show up in everyone’s lives but I am not sure everyone is quite as aware of these “Life Changers” and that of course is the trick.  I am not sure what it is, but I have always been blessed with an awareness of the people that come into my life.  Whether I am looking for these people or I just recognize them when they show I couldn’t tell you but I am thankful for each and every one of these people that have showed up and changed my life.

The funny thing about these real life Angels or Life Changers is that they can touch you for a lifetime by just being in your life for a brief moment in time.  In the summer of 1974, I was fortunate enough to be able to attend the Rich Rollins Baseball camp in Rochester, Minnesota.  Back when I was 14, baseball was pretty much my life and there was nothing I loved more than spending a couple weeks at Baseball camp in Rochester.  Each week, a guest instructor would show up at the camp and spend a couple hours with us in very small groups.  I had the chance to meet and get to know Rod Carew and carry on a friendship with him through out High School until he was traded to the Angels.  I also met several other major league players and developed friendships with them that were very cool for a 14 year kid who loved baseball.  One day, my first “Life Changer” showed up, he drove up in a silver, Lincoln Mark IV which was a really fancy car back then, when he emerged from the car, he had huge smile on his face and his body almost glowed.   His name was Danny Thompson and he was the Minnesota Twins Shortstop this was special for me because I played shortstop at the time and I was really looking forward to working with him for an hour or two.  When he walked over and sat down on the grass with me and the other players, something was different, I felt different, I felt like I was in the presence of someone or something incredible.   Now remember, I had similar meetings with Rod Carew and major leaguers that were much more famous than Danny and while I was impressed and nervous to meet them it was completely different with Danny.  Unlike the other players that visited, Danny spent almost 6 hours with us each day he visited, the other players spent an hour or two.  When Danny looked you in the eye and smiled and told you that you could be a major league player, you knew he meant it.  I learned alot about playing shortstop from those meetings with Danny but it was what I learned after Danny had left that convinced me Danny was super human, a life changer, an Angel.  About a week after the last time Danny spent the day with us, I was back home reading the newspaper and there was an article about Danny Thompson and the time he was spending at the Mayo Clinic while the Twins were in town.  It turns out Danny had leukemia which at that time was almost always fatal.  The article talked about how after a Twins night game Danny would drive himself the next morning to the Mayo Clinic for treatment, spend the whole day in Rochester and then drive back to the Twin Cities to start at shortstop for the Twins.  The article never mentioned our baseball camp and none of the coaches or Danny ever mentioned the Mayo Clinic, his leukemia or treatments or anything else to us at camp.  I was dumbfounded after reading the article, how could he spend the whole day with us out in the hot sun and have more life in him than all of us.  The truth was that Danny Thompson was totally focused on touching the lives of others without concern for himself.  To this day, the lessons that Danny Thompson taught me have stuck with me.  Danny played with leukemia for three seasons after being diagnosed, in June of 1976 he was traded to the Texas Rangers, on September 29th, 1976  Danny played his last major league game at shortstop at Metropolitan Stadium against the Minnesota Twins, he went 1-3.  On October 2nd, he pinch hit for his last major league appearance and just two months later at the Mayo Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Danny passed away.  Danny had obstacles that very few of us could ever imagine, yet the only thing that could stop him from serving others by his example was death.  Danny Thompson may have been the Angel that opened my eyes and heart to look for these special Life Changing people that show up in our lives.

In the fall of 1974, I started my first year of High School at Cooper High School in New Hope, MN, fresh off a summer of baseball camp, I had my sites set on the coming spring and the baseball season.  In Minnesota, we always started Baseball practice early in March in our gym because the baseball field usually was covered with snow until the first week of April.  On the first day of practice we were introduced to the coaching staff which included a student teacher named Ted Leuer, Ted was a graduate of Cooper and a former athlete who had stood out in all the major sports, Football, Basketball and Baseball, I remember him being somewhat of a legend.  Like Danny Thompson, Ted always had a big smile on his face and any time I was around him I would get that same feeling I did when I was with Danny, that this was someone special sent to teach me some very special lessons that would stick with me forever.  Of all the coaches we had that year, Ted was the hardest worker and the one coach who never asked for any help with anything.  I am not sure what it was but I felt like Ted had taken a special interest in me, I overheard him one time telling another coach that fundamentally I was a very good player.  I don’t make a habit of listening to conversations, this just happened to be a chance thing and Ted had no idea I was around, but having the Cooper legend, Ted Leuer tell another coach I was good player was an incredible confidence booster for me and it made me work harder than ever.  As the season progressed, Ted worked with me very hard to improve my fielding skils and he took time just about every day to stay with me after the regular practice had ended to him me ground balls until I couldn’t stand up, not once did Ted tell me it was time to quit because he was tired, it was always me telling Ted it was time to quit because I was too tired to continue.  Ted and I had always had great conversations about baseball and when I found out Ted would be coaching our Summer Legion Baseball team I was ecstatic.  for the next 3 summers, Ted spent hours upon hours hitting me ground balls after the regular practice until I couldn’t stand up any longer.  Ted was amazing whether it was an encouraging statement about my play or getting on me for making a mental error on the field, I could always count on Ted to keep me pointed in the right direction.   Before each game, Ted would hit infield practice to our team and I  remember standing out on the field at 3rd base looking into our opponents dugout and thinking how lucky I was to have a coach like Ted.  I know he was an inspiration to everyone that ever came in contact with him but I remember thinking that  they just get to get inspired today by Ted, I get him everyday.  After College and Broadcasting School, I entered the real world and like everyone else I was faced with many obstacles along the way but I beat those obstacles with the lessons I had learned on the Baseball Field from Ted Leuer.  Anytime I was faced with an obstacle, I would think to myself this is nothing, look at the obstacles Ted has overcome and I would breeze through those obstacles and be on to the next.  Over the years, the one thing that people say to me that kind of bothers me is “how can you be so happy and positive when you have this big problem”, it bothered me because I felt like they were saying I should be upset and feel bad, but how can you possibly feel bad when you have examples for your life like Danny Thompson and Ted Leuer ?  Both of these guys proved to me that anything is possible and that there is nothing you can’t deal with positively.    Ted went on to a successful career in logistics and after years of trying to find him, I recently reconnected with him through linkedin.com and look forward to having dinner with him and his wife sometime soon.   Let me share something amazing with you, Ted had a tragic accident that would have had a negative impact on 100% of the people if they had to go through the same thing.  I am not going to tell you about Ted’s accident or the obstacles he faced because Ted did such a good job of overcoming them that I don’t think any of his players or people who saw him on a regular baiss ever saw Ted’s obstacles, because he could do more than 99.9% of the people out there.  Ted is another super human, life changer, Angel that appeared in my life, didn’t see any obstacles in his life and set a great example for a high school 3rd baseman that has stuck with me my entire life.

I have thre more life changers to tell you about but there stories are dramtically different than Ted and Danny.  These three people touched my life in a different way, the first, Harmon Killebrew, the Hall of Fame Home Run Hitter for the Minnesota Twins and the second Bill Olson, everybody’s best friend at Cooper High School and Val Wessel, my best friends father in law.  Harmon is an incredible human being, being in his presence again gives you the feeling of being with someone other worldly.  Harmon is gentle, caring and is totally focused on others which is unnusual for someone who has accomplished as much as Harmon has.  He has set a great example for how to deal with great success and give back to others.  There is much more I could tell you about Harmon and someday I will but I just wanted to give him a brief mention because he is an important piece of the life changers in my life. 

Bill Olson was everybody’s best friend at Cooper High School form 1974 to 1977, he had a big impact on the life of everyone he touched.  I mention him today because he was a life changer and Angel for me.  Bill and I, spent a lot of time together and I hope to write more about Bill on another day.

Yesterday, I attended the funeral for Val Wessel, Val was the father of my best friends wife, Jessica.  Val lived a full and succesful life and was 77 when he passed away.  I only met Val a few times, but for some reason, I always thought about him because he also had that aura like Ted, Danny and Harmon.  When my friend Pat called me with the news of Val’s passing, it sent a shock through my body that I have only felt a few times in my life.  At the funeral yesterday, Val’s daughter, Jessica (Pat’s wife) spoke about her father and his life that was totally committed to others.  She talked about him telling her and her brother to call him anytime they needed help no matter what time of day or night and no matter what the situation was.  Jessica also shared many stories about her Dad that further illustrated what kind of man and father Val Wessel was.  Jessica reminding me as she spoke of her father of all the things I used to do for my kids before I got caught up in the troubles that my business caused for me.   It hit me hard that Val was the example of the father I always wanted to be for my kids and that I had selfishly put dealing with my business and financial issues ahead of being a good father.  Val Wessel was a super human, life changer, Angel to his family, his friends and to me personally, I know the example he set and the reminders I have received will stay with me for the rest of my life.  Thank you Val for reminding me of what is really important.

Marcus and the Amazing Honey Stick for just 25 Cents…..

Coincidences ?  I don’t think so.  Daily life is so amazing, especially when you are paying attention and testing what I will call the natural laws.  These natural laws include the law of attraction, practice makes perfect and many more but they really come from things you probably heard your parents or grandparents talk about when you were growing up.  I think most people probably never give some of these ideas and quotes a second thought, but I guess I was a good listener and took them all to heart.

This morning I was thinking about what Joe Vitale said in his book “The Attractor Factor” something to the effect that he has changed his mindset to believe that the more he spends, the more he receives.  Now that sounds kind of irresponsible and maybe just like plain wishful thinking but it reminded me of something that actually happens to me on a regular basis.  To illustrate, I would like to share with you the amazing but true story of Marcus and the Honey stick.

When I was growing up my Mother always would tell me how important it was to give to others whether it was an offering at Church, or a tip to the person who waited on you at a restaurant or payment to the kid that mowed your lawn or shoveled the snow in your driveway.    She would always follow that up by saying that my Grandfather was always generous in his giving and always said that the more you give, the more that will come back to you.  I have always tried to live by this principle whether it was tipping waiters at restaurants or paying people that did work for me, but I never thought about whether anything was coming back to me until I had a chance request for 25 cents from Marcus.

Marcus was a member of the Buck Hill Ski team here in Minnesota and was a teammate of my kids Jake and Kylie.  When my kids were younger, I spent a lot of time at their ski practices, ski camps and races.   I think it was the fall of 2002, we were at the Buck Hill Ski Racing camp at Winter Park, Colorado and I had made my way from the hotel to the day lodge to watch the kids practice.  While sitting at a table looking out the window I felt a tap on my shoulder, I turned around and there stood Marcus who had just come in from outside, once he got my attention, he said “Mr. Braun could I have 25 cents to buy a Honey Stick”, after asking Marcus what a Honey Stick was(a straw filled with Honey), I gave him a quarter and didn’t think much of it at the time.  Later that day, I was walking back to my hotel room and as I walked I saw something shiny in the snow, I reached down and there it was a shiny quarter, I picked it up and put in my pocket.  When I got back to the hotel,  I walked to my room and then reached in my pocket for the key, as I pulled the key from my pocket it fell on the floor and there laying next my key was another quarter.  Now I am thinking this is just an interesting coincidence it couldn’t be the universe rewarding me for giving Marcus a quarter for the honey stick and you are probably thinking the same thing as well.   The next morning I got up early and drove to Denver to catch my flight back to Minneapolis.  At the airport, they finally started boarding the plane and as I looked for my seat I spotted a seat with a quarter sitting right in the middle of it, I thought to myself “no way”, then I looked at my boarding pass and sure enough, the seat with the quarter was mine.  So for the quarter I gave Marcus the day before for his honey stick, I now had 3 quarters in my pocket to replace it.   At this point, I sensed this might be more than a coincidence so I set out to test it again, a few weeks later I was at a ski race and I was ready, sitting in the lodge I was waiting for Marcus to stroll by.  The minute I saw Marcus, I waved him over, reached in my pocket and gave him 2 quarters and told him to buy himself a couple Honey Sticks, Marcus was quick to inform me that they didn’t have Honey Sticks at this particular ski area and tried to give the quarters back but I insisted he keep them and suggested that maybe he wanted to use them to play a video game (Marcus loved the video games).  As the day progressed, I kept my eyes open for signs that this principle might actually work and sure enough almost $2 in quarters appeared in very strange places that day and over the following week I must have found another $3 or $ 4 in quarters.  My ritual with Marcus continued for about 7 years until he graduated from High School and went off to College.

My story of Marcus and the Honey Stick has always stuck with me, most notably about a year after the first time I experienced this phenomena I was at my office and had an employee who without fail would ask to borrow $5 just about everyday for lunch from somebody in the company.  One day, he asked me and just as I was about to say I couldn’t help him, I caught myself and said to myself this is the Marcus deal just at a higher level, I then reached in my pocket pulled out a five dollar bill and told him to keep it, it was his and he didn’t have to pay me back.  He immediately said “No, I just want to borrow it, I will pay you back tomorrow” but I insisted that he keep it and told him that it would come back to me without him having to do anything.   Well that caused a stir with him and he asked me what I was talking about, so I told him the story of Marcus and the Honey Stick, he started laughing so hard I couldn’t believe it, I really think he thought I had completely lost it.   Later that same day, we had a customer in for a meeting and this same employee was part of the meeting, as we were walking with the customer to the conference room, the employee starts telling the customer about Marcus and the Honey Stick and how I had given him $5 for lunch.  Everybody, including myself had a nice chuckle and walked into the conference room, because of the commotion, I decided to sit at different place in the conference room than I normally sit and as I pulled the chair out, I looked down and there on the chair was a twenty dollar bill (really, this is a true story), I picked it up and showed to the employee and said “see, it works” and then I was accused of planting the 20 and much worse but I had nothing to do with it.  Over the following days, I started finding one and five dollar bills in very stange places and I was more convinced than ever that when you give, you always get more in return.

This is a true story and I am convinced this will work for everyone but you have to “Know” it will work for you and it can take other forms. My Wife for example, hates casinos but always has done well at every casino we have ever visited and she very seldom gambles, she just always finds Twenty and One Hundred Dollar bills laying on the floor.   Why does this work for her ?  because she “knows” it will !  I always hear her telling people that she always finds money on the floor at casinos, between telling other people and thinking this way, she has convinced herself that she always finds money and she always does.    What can you convince yourself of today ? Jesus said in Mark 11, 24 “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it is yours” .  I believe that prayer is much more than kneeling beside your bed and folding your hands, it also includes your thoughts as well.  So have good thoughts, ask for what you want and believe you “have” received it and then sit back and watch it show up.  Really !

The Power of Collective Energy

People uniting for a common cause and focused on the same outcome can create amazing results.  I have always been fascinated by the studies done on the power of prayer that prove the effectiveness of prayer especially in the case of praying for someone that is sick.   When I was growing up my Great Grandmother and my Grandmother lived with me and my Mom, all of them were very involved in our Church and I was constantly hearing about the prayer chain and who was being added to it.  I never really understood what the prayer chain was or why so many people, invested so much time in that activity.  Later in life I started to figure it out after I purchased an audio cassette program recorded by a man named Dr. Larry Dossey who was a medical doctor who recognized in his practice that the outcomes of surgery recovery for his patients was much better when someone was praying for them.  He set out to prove his observations and did a study where he had a group of people pray for half of his patients without their knowledge.  The “data” proved that the outcome for those that were prayed for was significantly better than those who had not had the group pray for them.

Consider this paragraph from Dr. Dossey’s biography:

An education steeped in traditional Western medicine did not prepare Dr. Dossey for patients who were blessed with “miracle cures,” remissions that clinical medicine could not explain. “Almost all physicians possess a lavish list of strange happenings unexplainable by normal science,” says Dr. Dossey. “A tally of these events would demonstrate, I am convinced, that medical science not only has not had the last word, it has hardly had the first word on how the world works, especially when the mind is involved.

This was pretty exciting for me to discover that focused thought, energy and prayer could have a positive effect on the physical world we live in.  Now the reason I chose this subject for my blog today was because I was at Target Field, the home of the Minnesota Twins last night and experienced the collision of the power of the collective energy of 40,000 plus people and living in the moment.  The energy at the stadium last night was completely different than anything I had felt all season, the fans didn’t leave their seats the entire game even though it was a week night game and went into extra innings.  There was this strange feeling that everyone was really focused on the game and not the beautiful weather or the view of the Minneapolis skyline.  The Twins entered the ninth ining, winning by a run and within  seconds the Chicago White Sox evened the score with a home run.  In the tenth inning, the White Sox scored another run and took a one run lead.  In the bottom of the tenth, I swear you could feel the mental energy of 40,000 people in the air, Delmon Young led off for the Twins and drove the first pitch he saw into center field for a single.  Then Jim Thome stepped to the plate, it was surreal, like a dream, I even had flashbacks to the feelings I experienced at the Metrodome during the 1987 and 1991 World Series.   Jim Thome took a mighty swing at the first pitch thrown to him and missed, now with one strike on him, the crowd was totally focused on one thing, Jim Thome, on the next pitch, time stopped, I could hear the ball hit the bat so clearly that it was amazing, I was propelled high out of my seat, with both of my hands stretched toward the sky as the ball hit by Jim Thome sailed 445 feet onto the plaza beyond right field.  If you haven’t experienced a moment like this you are missing out on  one of the joys of the universe.   Jim Thome didn’t hit that home run to win the game by himself, the mind energy of Mr. Thome and 41,000 plus at Target field and maybe a hundred thousand fans listening on radio and watching on TV hit that home run.  I give the power of Collective energy the credit for that home run just as I believe the same was true of the Twins World Series victories in 87 and 91, in both years they lost every game they played on the road in the World Series, but when they were home the collective energy created the magical wins that made them World Series Champions.

Collective Energy is incredibly powerful, as is your own focused mental energy.  Collective energy is also contagious and right now I beleive we need an epidemic of Collective Energy to get this Country back on track.  We don’t need politicians to do this but rather, we need to start doing this ourselves by focusing our personal thoughts on positive outcomes for those in need and for ourselves when we are faced with obstacles.  I have often thought that if there was a way to take the multi-level marketing model (Amway and others) and turn it into a method for collectively using mental energy to fix the world we might not be in the condition we are right now.   No money would change hands but the person at the top of the pyramid would share these principles with two people who each would share the principles with two people an so on, leading to a large network of positive, collective energy practitioners.  It’s just a thought but after being reminded last night about the power of collective energy, I thought it was a thought that needed to shared.

And another word about Dr. Dossey,  he comes at everything from a scientific approach and using real data to back up his studies and theories regarding the power of  our minds.  It is just one more piece of material that helped me move from being a believer to KNOWING that I can create the events in my life. So be careful what you pray for.

You can find out more about Dr. Dossey at www.dosseydossey.com

Breaking free from my addiction….

When I was in Junior High School there was nothing I wanted to do more than make the 9th grade baseball team.  I loved baseball and played it just about everyday at the field behind Thorson Elementary School on the border of Crystal and New Hope, Minnesota.  When it came time for the coach to pick the team I missed the cut by 1 person but ended up being added to the team when another guy got kicked off the team.  So I spent the year being treated like I was the guy that shouldn’t have been on the team but made it because of somebody elses misfortune.  When school got out that year, I made up mind that I was going to find a way to make the High School team  the following year without being the last guy.  While paging through the Sporting News classified ads I came across an ad for a letter called “Show the Coach”,  I call it a letter because that is exactly what was sent to me when I mailed in my $2 to get the letter.  “Show the Coach” was a blueprint for how to make the team and much more, the principles I learned in that letter helped me succeed at many things I did in my business career as well.

“Show the Coach” was written by a guy who had been a lifelong minor league baseball player and later went on to be a “Baseball Clown” that performed at Minor league and major league stadiums.   One of the guidelines for showing the coach was to take care of yourself and not drink alcohol or soda.  I was so committed to following this blue print that I went through all of High School never drinking any alcohol or soda, all I drank was milk, water and orange juice.  This was really the start of a discipline that I have carried with me most of my life.  All through College, Broadcasting School and my first year in the radio business I never touched a drop of alcohol.  Things changed when I got my second radio job and moved to Spearfish, South Dakota.   I was on the air for 5 hours a day as a disc jockey.  All of the DJs drank bottomless cups of coffee and were chain smokers, for my part I stayed a way from coffee and cigarettes but I would drink a six pack of Mountain Dew on each shift.   I also drank a little beer when the sports director and I would be out doing play by play for a basketball game.  At that time they had drive thru windows at the liquor store, so on the way back from every game the sports director would drive thru and get a six pack for us to share.   That pretty much was the extent of my serious alcohol drinking period.  After I left Spearfish, and for the next 29 years up until today, about the only drinks I have are on vacation and they all have those little umbrellas in them or occasionally a lime in a bottle of Corona.

It was very interesting during those 29 years to be a non-drinker.  I can’t tell you how many times I would be at dinner or lunch with someone who had ordered a drink when I didn’t that would look at me very seriously and say ” you don’t drink ?” or “why don’t you drink?” as if I was a recovering alcoholic.  Many times it was recovering alcoholics that asked me the question.  To this day I am convinced that many people that asked me those questions were convinced that I was a recovering alcoholic.  I still think it’s funny and for that matter empowering when you can tell someone that you don’t drink because you never got started because you cared too much about your High School and College Baseball career.

I turn 51 years old this week and after all those years of feeling that I was so strong that I could never get addicted to anything, I have to admit that I did develop an addiction a little over 10 years ago that I finally realized had a huge hold on me and was negatively affecting my life.  I am serious about this and this isn’t a joke,  I have many friends who have been through recovery and I don’t want them to think I am making light of their situation by what I am about to say.  About two weeks ago, I was thinking about what I was doing in the late 90’s that made everything go right, I was in fantastic physical condition, I was focused and KNEW everything was going to fall my way and I was not addicted to anything.  So what had changed in the last 10 years ?  primarily I wasn’t the confident, knowing person I had been when I achieved my greatest levels of success, I was 45 pounds heavier and I had developed an addiction that I believe caused the weight gain and attitude change.  For the last 10 years, I was addicted to Diet Mountain Dew which I think was as bad or worse than alcohol or drugs.  As I look back, my day revolved around Diet Mountain Dew, it was the first drink I had the morning and I usually drank the equivalent of 2 six packs per day.  I was thrilled when the SuperAmerica gas station chain announced their Mountain Dew club which gave you every 7th, 20 ounce Mountain Dew free when you purchased six.  I hate to admit it but I was averaging 5 free Mountain Dews per week.   Diet Mountain Dew had a hold on me and it affected everything I did, I haven’t slept well in 10 years, I gained a ton of weight, my memory isn’t what it used to be and I couldn’t do anything without having my diet Mountain Dew.  I truly was addicted if in no other way than I couldn’t break free of it’s hold on me.

So two weeks ago, I gave it up and started an intensive course to focus on the things that led to my success and knowing in the 90’s.  The Diet Dew is gone, the weight is leaving as well and my creativity and memory is back.  I am sleeping better and I know I am in for a big change that is going to lead to the next 10 years being better than ever.  Addictions of any kind can hold you back from achieving great things, it doesn’t matter if that addiction is drugs, video games, soda, food, sex , alcohol or whatever, addictions will hold you back and destroy the life you really deserve to have.

Look closely at your life, are you addicted to something ?  it doesn’t have to be obvious or for that matter one of the usual addictions.  Freeing yourself from your addictions will allow you to move to the next level, you can become someone who KNOWS not just believes that they can do amazing things.