stories - goals

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Your Dream Power

It was late October and my son, Danny and I stopped at our mailbox before we went to the local diner for some food. I handed the mail to Danny and he looked through during our less than mile drive. As we arrived at the diner he discovered the envelope that held his scholarship award. He said to me, “Mom, wouldn’t it be funny if this is a full scholarship?”

At the age of twelve Danny told me a phrase that I would hear many times during the next six years, “Mom, you don’t have to worry about me, I’m going to get you a scholarship.” At the time we had one daughter in college and another one ready to start upon graduation from high school and Danny realized the financial burden it had on our family. He was athletic and knew he wanted to play a sport in college. He just needed to decide which sport - football, basketball or baseball.

We sat in the car looking at the envelope from Piedmont College, a small Division III school in Georgia approximately 600 miles away. It was at a camp that previous July that we heard of this school for the very first time. In August, as the baseball coach started to recruit Danny we went to visit the school. We were told to expect a third to a half as a scholarship offer, and yet Danny had worked hard for six years and believed he would receive a full scholarship offer.

As he carefully began to open the envelope images flashed through my mind of all the difficulties and struggles he had overcome to arrive at this point. The day he was born he was airlifted to a major hospital with a collapsed lung to dealing with Juvenile Diabetes since age eight and multiple other issues. Then there was the disappointments of not getting on the baseball team he wanted or times others laughed at him and tried to discourage him as an athlete. Through all of this he kept a positive attitude and continued to achieve and accomplish goal after goal like clockwork always staying focused on the ultimate dream. And now he was holding that dream in his hand.

As he went through the papers in the envelope, he finally arrived at the one that stated his scholarship amount. Our eyes went from the award to each other as with smiles, laughter, and hugs he had indeed accomplished the ultimate dream. All the struggles, roadblocks, health issues, disappointments were no longer important. He had given his all putting consistent action behind his dream. He had not allowed the many obstacles to deter his effort. Yes, six plus years of hard work had paid off in a big way. Yet Danny did not do anything that any other child could not also accomplish.

The difference was Danny did not give up on his dream even when he was tested multiple times during the years. Danny believed in his dream and focused on the steps that were necessary to accomplish his goal. Far too often children and adults quit too soon. The road is always going to have bumps and potholes along the way. It may appear that some have a smooth road, but I guarantee you that is not the case and certainly not the case for Danny.

Courage - The Act And Art Of Facing What Is

Danny had many times that would have discouraged many children from continuing. He had so many obstacles to and situations to overcome. He found many times that when one opportunity for achievement did not come his way as expected another better one would open.

Danny thought he knew every piece in the puzzle and when those pieces did not fall in place, I would tell him, “Danny there is a reason this happened and eventually we will find the answer.” Make life an adventure and realize that you are not in control as much as you would like to believe.

A year ago, when Danny was a freshman in college, I asked him if he liked the school he was attending. I did not want him to think that he had to stay 600 miles away from home if he was not happy. He looked at me and told me how much he liked the area and the school and then he said something that showed his wisdom. He said, “I don’t know why I am here, but I feel like there is a reason that I was brought to this school. Eventually I will discover the reason.”

There is a greater Power out there that has the answers we do not. We must trust and have faith that the result we are looking for will come even though we may be discouraged at the moment. So often when we do not get what we want it is because there is something better coming our way. The most important thing you can do is to stay focused daily on your dream and build the image of what you want. That is Your Dream Power.

Patricia Stepler

Patricia has just released her first book, Your Dream Power. She has also created a program that goes along with the study of the book that is available to individuals and schools. The program relates Your Dream Power to stories of famous people, quotes, and interjected worksheets that help children internalize the teaching of the Power Messages. Be sure to go here now and get your copy and learn more about Patricia: www.yourdreampowerbook.com

Stories

I dream my life, then live my dream

Magazine

3900 Saturdays

The older I get, the more I enjoy Saturday morning. Perhaps it's the quiet solitude that comes with being the first to rise, or maybe it's the unbounded joy of not having to be at work. Either way, the first few hours of a Saturday morning are most enjoyable.

A few weeks ago, I was shuffling toward the garage with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and the morning paper in the other. What began as a typical Saturday morning turned into one of those lessons that life seems to hand you from time to time. Let me tell you about it:

I turned the dial up into the phone portion of the band on my ham radio in order to listen to a Saturday morning swap net. Along the way, I came across an older sounding chap, with a tremendous signal and a golden voice. You know the kind; he sounded like he should be in the broadcasting business. He was telling whomever he was talking with something about "a thousand marbles." I was intrigued and stopped to listen to what he had to say.

"Well, Tom, it sure sounds like you're busy with your job. I'm sure they pay you well but it's a shame you have to be away from home and your family so much. Hard to believe a young fellow should have to work sixty or seventy hours a week to make ends meet. It's too bad you missed your daughter's dance recital," he continued; "Let me tell you something that has helped me keep my own priorities." And that's when he began to explain his theory of a "thousand marbles."

"You see, I sat down one day and did a little arithmetic. The average person lives about seventy-five years. I know, some live more and some live less, but on average, folks live about seventy-five years.

Now then, I multiplied 75 times 52 and I came up with 3,900, which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has in their entire lifetime. Now, stick with me, Tom, I'm getting to the important part.

It took me until I was fifty-five years old to think about all this in any detail," he went on, "and by that time I had lived through over twenty-eight hundred Saturdays. I got to thinking that if I lived to be seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them left to enjoy. So I went to a toy store and bought every single marble they had. I ended up having to visit three toy stores to round up 1,000 marbles. I took them home and put them inside a large, clear plastic container right here in the shack next to my gear.

Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out and thrown it away. I found that by watching the marbles diminish, I focused more on the really important things in life.

There's nothing like watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight.

Now let me tell you one last thing before I sign off with you and take my lovely wife out for breakfast. This morning, I took the very last marble out of the container. I figure that if I make it until next Saturday then I have been given a little extra time. And the one thing we can all use is a little more time.
It was nice to meet you Tom. I hope you spend more time with your family, and I hope to meet you again here on the band. This is a 75 year old man, K9NZQ, clear and going QRT, good morning!"

You could have heard a pin drop on the band when this fellow signed off. I guess he gave us all a lot to think about. I had planned to work on the antenna that morning, and then I was going to meet up with a few hams to work on the next club newsletter.

Instead, I went upstairs and woke my wife up with a kiss. "C'mon honey, I'm taking you and the kids to breakfast."

"What brought this on?" she asked with a smile.

"Oh, nothing special, it's just been a long time since we spent a Saturday together with the kids. And hey, can we stop at a toy store while we're out? I need to buy some marbles."

What I love about stories is that they can speak to our soul. This is only one of many great stories in my book, Charging the Human Battery...50 Ways to Motivate Yourself. Sometimes, our greatest challenge is getting inside our own heads to determine...what makes us tick? That's what this book is all about!

Stories

A Lifetime of Planning Pays Off

"You gotta be crazy!" That's what Lee Dunham's friends told him back in 1971 when he gave up a secure job as a police officer and invested his life savings in the notoriously risky restaurant business. This particular restaurant was more than just risky, it was downright dangerous. It was the first McDonald's franchise in the city of New York - smack in the middle of crime-ridden Harlem.

Lee had always had plans. When other kids were playing ball in the empty lots of Brooklyn, Lee was playing entrepreneur, collecting milk bottles and returning them to grocery stores for the deposits. He had his own shoeshine stand and worked delivering newspapers and groceries. Early on, he promised his mother that one day she would never again have to wash other people's clothes for a living. He was going to start his own business and support her. "Hush your mouth and do your homework," she told him. She knew that no member of the Dunham family had ever risen above the level of laborer, let alone owned a business. "There's no way you're going to open your own business," his mother told him repeatedly.

Years passed, but Lee's penchant for dreaming and planning did not. After high school, he joined the Air Force, where his goal of one day owning a family restaurant began to take shape. He enrolled in the Air Force food service school and became such an accomplished cook he was promoted to the officers' dining hall.

When he left the Air Force, he worked for four years in several restaurants, including one in the famed Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York. Lee longed to start his own restaurant but felt he lacked the business skills to be successful. He signed up for business school and took classes at night while he applied and was hired to be a police officer.

For fifteen years he worked full-time as a police officer. In his off-hours, he worked part-time as a carpenter and continued to attend business school. "I saved every penny I earned as a police officer," he recalled. "For ten years, I didn't spend one dime - there were no movies, no vacations, no trips to the ballpark. There were only work and study and my lifelong dream of owning my own business." By 1971, Lee had saved $42,000, and it was time for him to make his vision a reality.

Lee wanted to open an upscale restaurant in Brooklyn. With a business plan in hand, he set out to seek financing. The banks refused him. Unable to get funding to open an independent restaurant, Lee turned to franchising and filled out numerous applications. McDonald's offered him a franchise, with one stipulation: Lee had to set up a McDonald's in the inner-city, the first to be located there. McDonald's wanted to find out if its type of fast-food restaurant could be successful in the inner city. It seemed that Lee might be the right person to operate that first restaurant.

To get the franchise, Lee would have to invest his life savings and borrow $150,000 more. Everything for which he'd worked and sacrificed all those years would be on the line - a very thin line if he believed his friends. Lee spent many sleepless nights before making his decision. In the end, he put his faith in the years of preparation he'd invested - the dreaming, planning, studying and saving - and signed on the dotted line to operate the first inner-city McDonald's in the United States.

The first few months were a disaster. Gang fights, gunfire, and other violent incidents plagued his restaurant and scared customers away. Inside, employees stole his food and cash, and his safe was broken into routinely. To make matters worse, Lee couldn't get any help from McDonald's headquarters; the company's representatives were too afraid to venture into the ghetto. Lee was on his own.

Although he had been robbed of his merchandise, his profits, and his confidence, Lee was not going to be robbed of his dream. Lee fell back on what he had always believed in - preparation and planning.

Lee put together a strategy. First, he sent a strong message to the neighborhood thugs that McDonald's wasn't going to be their turf. To make his ultimatum stick, he needed to offer an alternative to crime and violence. In the eyes of those kids, Lee saw the same look of helplessness he had seen in his own family. He knew that there was hope and opportunity in that neighborhood and he was going to prove it to the kids. He decided to serve more than meals to his community - he would serve solutions.

Lee spoke openly with gang members, challenging them to rebuild their lives. Then he did what some might say was unthinkable: he hired gang members and put them to work. He tightened up his operation and conducted spot checks on cashiers to weed out thieves. Lee improved working conditions and once a week he offered his employees classes in customer service and management. He encouraged them to develop personal and professional goals. He always stressed two things: his restaurant offered a way out of a dead-end life and the faster and more efficiently the employees served the customers, the more lucrative that way would be.

In the community, Lee sponsored athletic teams and scholarships to get kids off the streets and into community centers and schools. The New York inner-city restaurant became McDonald's most profitable franchise worldwide, earning more than $1.5 million a year. Company representatives who wouldn't set foot in Harlem months earlier now flocked to Lee's doors, eager to learn how he did it. To Lee, the answer was simple: "Serve the customers, the employees, and the community."

Today, Lee Dunham owns nine restaurants, employs 435 people, and serves thousands of meals every day. It's been many years since his mother had to take in wash to pay the bills. More importantly, Lee paved the way for thousands of African-American entrepreneurs who are working to make their dreams a reality, helping their communities, and serving up hope.

All this was possible because a little boy understood the need to dream, to plan, and to prepare for the future. In doing so, he changed his life and the lives of others.

Author: Cynthia Kersey
Excerpted/Adapted from Unstoppable
Copyright 1988 by Cynthia Kersey, www.unstoppable.net

Stories

Don’t Hope, Friend…Decide!

While waiting to pick up a friend at the airport in Portland, Oregon, I had one of those life changing experiences that you hear other people talk about. You know, the kind that sneaks up on you unexpectedly? Well, this one occurred a mere two feet away from me!

Straining to locate my friend among the passengers deplaning through the jetway, I noticed a man coming toward me carrying two light bags. He stopped right next to me to greet his family.

First, he motioned to his youngest son (maybe six years old) as he laid down his bags. They gave each other a long, and movingly loving hug. As they separated enough to look in each other's face, I heard the father say, "It's so good to see you, son. I missed you so much!" His son smiled somewhat shyly, diverted his eyes, and replied softly, "Me too, Dad!"

Then the man stood up, gazed in the eyes of his oldest son (maybe 9 or 10) and while cupping his son's face in his hands he said, "You're already quite the young man. I love you very much Zach!" They too hugged a most loving, tender hug. His son said nothing. No reply was necessary

While this was happening, a baby girl (perhaps one or one and a half) was squirming excitedly in her mother's arms, never once taking her little eyes off the wonderful sight of her returning father. The man said, "Hi babygirl!" as he gently took the child from her mother. He quickly kissed her face all over and then held her close to his chest while rocking her from side to side. The little girl instantly relaxed and simply laid her head on his shoulder and remained motionless in total pure contentment.

After several moments, he handed his daughter to his oldest son and declared, "I've saved the best for last!" and proceeded to give his wife the longest, most passionate kiss I ever remember seeing. He gazed into her eyes for several seconds and then silently mouthed, "I love you so much!" They stared into each other's eyes, beaming big smiles at one another, while holding both hands. For an instant, they reminded me of newlyweds but I knew by the age of their kids that they couldn't be. I puzzled about it for a moment, then realized how totally engrossed I was in the wonderful display of unconditional love not more than an arm's length away from me. I suddenly felt uncomfortable, as if I were invading something sacred, but was amazed to hear my own voice nervously ask, "Wow! How long have you two been married?"

"Been together fourteen years total, married twelve of those," he replied without breaking his gaze from his lovely wife's face. "Well then, how long have you been away?" I asked. The man finally looked at me, still beaming his joyous smile and told me, "Two whole days!"

Two days?! I was stunned! I was certain by the intensity of the greeting I just witnessed that he'd been gone for at least several weeks, if not months, and I know my expression betrayed me. So I said almost offhandedly, hoping to end my intrusion with some semblance of grace (and to get back to searching for my friend), "I hope my marriage is still that passionate after twelve years!"

The man suddenly stopped smiling. He looked me straight in the eye, and with an intensity that burned right into my soul, he told me something that left me a different person. He told me, "Don't hope friend...decide." Then he flashed me his wonderful smile again, shook my hand and said, "God bless!" With that, he and his family turned and energetically strode away together

I was still watching that exceptional man and his special family walk just out of sight when my friend came up to me and asked, "What'cha looking at?" Without hesitating, and with a curious sense of certainty, I replied, "My future!"

Michael D. Hargrove

Stories

A Dream World

"I look at that family, that car, that house and that job and I think, what a dream..."

I confess that years ago I gazed longingly at luxury cars. I dreamed of owning one, brand didn't matter, I wasn't picky, any one would do. I continued living in this dream world until one day I came to a simple yet powerful realization...that at one point in time a luxury car was a dream for the person who now drives it. With few exceptions, he or she didn't always have the skill or education to earn the money to buy that lavish ride. It was a dream for them...one that came to fruition through hard work and focus. I guess one could say that today, they are living a dream world?

Over time I thought more about 'living a dream world' and bringing dreams to reality, until finally I arrived at a staggering yet unmistakable conclusion that it is all a dream. In the past I glanced at a Lexus or Mercedes and thought that person is 'living in a dream world.' Over time I have expanded my thoughts to conclude that everything we see, use, consume or have is a result of a dream...let me explain.

The technology in the computer I type on at this very moment was a dream of many scientists years ago. The computer that now sits on my desk was made by a company that just a few short years ago called a garage their world wide corporate headquarters. What began as a dream of an energetic entrepreneur is now a worldwide fortune 500 company. The parts and assembly for this computer are the careful work of many hands, people who thought they would probably not be assembling computers for a living. Yet, this work lets them foster their dreams of providing a nice living for their family, an education, a new television, a daughter's wedding or a car for their teenager.

This computer now rests on my desk, one that I dreamed of having in a study that I imagined years ago. I call my study 'the room of knowing.' Its walls are lined with articles I have published, book jackets from books I have written and some awards that I have won, accomplishments I only dreamed of years ago. It is called 'the room of knowing' because I now know I can accomplish my dreams if I set my mind to it, this room reminds me of that. It could also be called the 'room of dreams,' after all, that's where it all started. I guess one could say that as I type...I am working in a dream world, a world of my dreams (the study) and others (the computer)...

As I drive to work this morning, I realize that I can run through the same 'dream' drill with my car. It was made by a company that started small...a dream. Engineers with a vision (or dream) designed it. Workers who are working a dream job because it provides for and creates their dreams assembled it. I can run the same dream drill with the STOP sign at the intersection by my home. It was put there by a crew who dreamed of working outside. In a subdivision that was a dream of a developer. Ordered by local, county and state laws, laws passed by people who dreamed of serving their community and country. The sign is in Cole County, Missouri, one of 50 states that make our great country, a country that began in the hopes, hearts and dreams of our forefathers.

I could run through the same dream thought process as I pass the local McDonalds restaurant, my CPA's office, the public library or the state capital. I could do the same with the water at my tap or the road I drive on or the Green Tea that I quietly sip but that would be redundant, you get the point, each and everything around us is part of a dream that has reached fruition. This reality proves dreams do come true. That anything we touch, have, hold or use is a result of the hopes, energies and imaginations of the ones who create it...it is part of a dream world. Focus on 'a dream world' for just five minutes today and you will realize an appreciation, astonishment and empowerment that you have not felt before...you will literally be opening your eyes, for a first time, in a dream.
"I look at that family, that car, that house and that job and I think, what a dream..."

Matt Forck
Matt Forck is a dad, husband, writer and speaker. Matt has published numerous articles on a variety of topics, and has authored several books. You may check out Matt's books or reach him through his web site: www.thecallproject.org