We trained hard. In the miserably cold winter, we would turn the gas heater up and rig it so it would not turn off. We wore multiple layers of sweats to train in. We punished our bodies beyond what modern wisdom would recommend. Until one day, one of our teammates became sick. Pneumonia set in and he died.

Our beloved coach resigned. He left coaching. He left the school. He faded away into obscurity, hiding behind the shame of blame. The team never recovered.

Everything changed that year. We couldn’t get our fight back.

The Bible gives us an example of a man who tried to run from the fight. Jacob grew up in a hostile fraternity. He wrestled with his brother, Esau. In the womb, nations wrestled. When the twins were delivered, Jacob grasped the heel of Esau. As a young man, Jacob couldn’t get the attention of his father. So, he began to manipulate his circumstances. With the help of his mother, he outwitted his brother for the right of first-born inheritance. He wrestled everyday to get somewhere and to be someone.

“And Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak.” Genesis 32:24

Jacob’s story is the account of man and you are in the same situation. You are alone and wrestling with God. God deals with man… alone. It is in the moments of isolation where you will find your fight. God won’t deal with you in the group sitting. He doesn’t address the fraternity, the team, the union, or societies; God wrestles one on one.

This is when you begin to dig deep into the issues of authenticity.

This is when you shake off your vanities and ideologies, and get down into the grasp of someone stronger and more powerful than you ever dreamed of getting a hold of.

When I was a young man, I found myself in a unique station in life. I had a beautiful wife, three young children, cars, clothes, and a cottage. I had reached a level of success that surprised me. And I was so, so… depressed.

There was no reason for it. It haunted me at night. The spirit of depression surrounded me. It was more than having a bad day — it was a cloud of darkness.

One night as I tossed and turned, I finally went outside, laid in a hammock, and looking up into the sky I prayed, “God can you please do something to help me?”

I wanted — craved — the soothing caress of a loving Father, but I got a surprise. God spoke to me saying, “Neil, get up. Get your fight back!”

Proverbs says, “Wounds from a friend can be trusted.” God wrestled with me. Pushed me. Challenged me. He fought with me that night. Every move I tried on Him, he countered with a more strategic blow.

It was simply awesome. I found myself intimate with God by wrestling with Him. I discovered His blessing that night. We are close. We wrestled.

Jacob said, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”

God comes to a man alone.
He comes to pick a fight.
God comes to push you until you respond.
He will challenge your manhood.

He will grab you, toss you around — playing, teasing, until you finally respond.

Until you finally grab Him and say, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”

I challenge you right now. Grab hold of God. Grab hold of His promises. Grab hold of the life you crave. Grab hold and don’t let go.

Following are six behaviors that increase self-esteem, enhance your self-confidence, and spur your motivation. You may recognize some of them as things you naturally do in your interactions with other people. But if you don’t, I suggest you motivate yourself to take some of these important steps immediately.

First, greet others with a smile and look them directly in the eye.

A smile and direct eye contact convey confidence born of self-respect. In the same way, answer the phone pleasantly whether at work or at home, and when placing a call, give your name before asking to speak to the party you want to reach. Leading with your name underscores that a person with self-respect is making the call.

Second, always show real appreciation for a gift or complement.

Don’t downplay or sidestep expressions of affection or honor from others. The ability to accept or receive is a universal mark of an individual with solid self-esteem.

Third, don’t brag.

It’s almost a paradox that genuine modesty is actually part of the capacity to gracefully receive compliments. People who brag about their own exploits or demand special attention are simply trying to build themselves up in the eyes of others — and that’s because they don’t perceive themselves as already worthy of respect.

Fourth, don’t make your problems the centerpiece of your conversation.

Talk positively about your life and the progress you’re trying to make. Be aware of any negative thinking, and take notice of how often you complain. When you hear yourself criticize someone — and this includes self-criticism — find a way to be helpful instead of critical.

Fifth, respond to difficult times or depressing moments by increasing your level of productive activity.

When your self-esteem is being challenged, don’t sit around and fall victim to “paralysis by analysis.” The late Malcolm Forbes said, “Vehicles in motion use their generators to charge their own batteries. Unless you happen to be a golf cart, you can’t recharge your battery when you’re parked in the garage!”

Sixth, choose to see mistakes and rejections as opportunities to learn.

View a failure as the conclusion of one performance, not the end of your entire career. Own up to your shortcomings, but refuse to see yourself as a failure. A failure may be something you have done — and it may even be something you’ll have to do again on the way to success — but a failure is definitely not something you are.

Even if you’re at a point where you’re feeling very negatively about yourself, be aware that you’re now ideally positioned to make rapid and dramatic improvement. A negative self-evaluation, if it’s honest and insightful, takes much more courage and character than the self-delusions that underlie arrogance and conceit.

I’ve seen the truth of this proven many times in my work with athletes. After an extremely poor performance, a team or an individual athlete often does much better the next time out, especially when the poor performance was so bad that there was simply no way to shirk responsibility for it.

Disappointment, defeat, and even apparent failure are in no way permanent conditions unless we choose to make them so. On the contrary, these undeniably painful experiences can be the solid foundation on which to build future success.

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Reproduced with permission from Denis Waitley’s Weekly Ezine.
To subscribe to Denis Waitley’s Weekly Ezine, go to www.deniswaitley.com
or send an email with Join in the subject to subscribe@deniswaitley.com
Copyright © 2005 Denis Waitley International. All rights reserved worldwide.

Essentially, the core values of tenure are academic freedom. It’s supposed to give teachers an incentive to stretch their thinking. However, we’ve discovered that without an element of risk, people do exactly the opposite. Instead of pushing the boundaries, many would say that tenured teachers seem more likely to coast or slack off. That seems particularly true when tenure is applied to high schools where the oversight is incredibly lax. California grants tenure after just two years in the classroom. New York waits for a total of three years. That means that after only 2 or 3 years, a teacher essentially has their job for life.

This makes is nearly impossible to get rid of bad teachers. LA Weekly reported that in the past decades, LA Unified spent $3.5 million trying to fire just seven teachers for poor classroom performance. The sad result was that just two were fired, two others were paid large settlements and one was reinstated. 32 other teachers were paid $50,000 each in secret just to leave without a fight. One administrator told me there are nearly 100 separate steps to complete for the district to fire a single teacher, and it often drags on for years. Sometimes the teacher sits at home for years with full pay waiting for the outcome. With policies like that, is there any wonder California is bankrupt and the schools are shameful?

Human nature being what it is, we tend to rest on our laurels. When the risk is removed, our drive is often removed as well. When it comes to tenure, what started out as well meaning, has gone horribly wrong – to the point that I believe the entire tenure system needs to be yanked.

I love teaching and have many friends who are great professors. Benefits are a wonderful thing, but whatever the job, when you remove all the risk, you also remove the edge that it takes to succeed. Just ask the Winter Olympic athletes. If a Gold Medal was a sure thing, they wouldn’t have spent so many years fighting the odds to become the great athletes we see today.

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Phil Cooke is a writer, speaker, filmmaker, & media consultant who’s work focuses on helping clients create platforms for influencing culture and getting their voice heard. Visit his blog, The Change Revolution, at www.philcooke.com.

By Denis Waitley

You are your most important critic. There is no opinion so vitally important to your well being as the opinion you have of yourself. As you read this you’re talking to yourself right now. “Let’s see if I understand what he means by that… How does that compare with my experiences? – I’ll make note of that – try that tomorrow – I already knew that…I already do that.”

I believe this self-talk, this psycholinguistics or language of the mind can be controlled to work for us, especially in the building of self-confidence and creativity. We’re all talking to ourselves every moment of our lives, except during certain portions of our sleeping cycle. We’re seldom even aware that we’re doing it. We all have a running commentary in our heads on events and our reactions to them.

• Be aware of the silent conversation you have with yourself. Are you a nurturing coach or a critic? Do you reinforce your own success or negate it? Are you comfortable saying to yourself, “That’s more like it”. “Now we’re in the groove.” “Things are working out well.” “I am reaching my financial goals.” “I’ll do it better next time.”
• When winners fail, they view it as a temporary inconvenience, a learning experience, an isolated event, and a stepping-stone instead of a stumbling block.
• When winners succeed, they reinforce that success, by feeling rewarded rather than guilty about the achievement and the applause.
• When winners are paid a compliment, they simply respond: “Thank you.” They accept value graciously when it is paid. They pay value in their conversations with themselves and with other people.

A mark of an individual with healthy self-esteem is the ability to spend time alone, without constantly needing other people around. Being comfortable and enjoying solitary time reveals inner peace and centering. People who constantly need stimulation or conversation with others are often a bit insecure and thus need to be propped up by the company of others.

• Always greet the people you meet with a smile. When introducing yourself in any new association, take the initiative to volunteer your own name first, clearly; and always extend your hand first, looking the person in the eyes when you speak.
• In your telephone communications at work or at home, answer the telephone pleasantly, immediately giving your own name to the caller, before you ask who’s calling. Whenever you initiate a call, always give your own name up front, before you ask for the party you want and before you state your business. Leading with your own name underscores that a person of value is making the call.
• Don’t brag. People who trumpet their exploits and shout for service are actually calling for help. The showoffs, braggarts and blowhards are desperate for attention.

Don’t tell your problems to people, unless they’re directly involved with the solutions. And don’t make excuses. Successful people seek those who look and sound like success. Always talk affirmatively about the progress you are trying to make.

As we said earlier, find successful role models after whom you can pattern yourself. When you meet a mastermind, become a master mime, and learn all you can about how he or she succeeded. This is especially true with things you fear. Find someone who has conquered what you fear and learn from him or her.

When you make a mistake in life, or get ridiculed or rejected, look at mistakes as detours on the road to success, and view ridicule as ignorance. After a rejection, take a look at your BAG.

• B is for Blessings.
  Things you are endowed with that you often take for granted like life itself, health, living in an abundant country, family, friends, career.
• A is for accomplishments.
  Think of the many things you are proud of that you have done so far.
• And G is for Goals.
  Think of your big dreams and plans for the future that motivate you.

If you took your BAG – blessings, accomplishments and goals – to a party, and spread them on the floor, in comparison to all your friends and the people you admire, you’d take your own bag home, realizing that you have as much going for yourself as anyone else. Always view rejection as part of one performance, not as a turndown of the performer.

And, enjoy those special meetings with yourself. Spend this Saturday doing something you really want to do. I don’t mean next month or someday. This Saturday enjoy being alive and being able to do it. You deserve it. There will never be another you. This Saturday will be spent. Why not spend at least one day a week on You!

Action Idea:

Go for one entire day and night without saying anything negative to yourself or to others. Make a game of it. If a friend or colleague catches you saying something negative, you must put a dollar in a drawer or container toward a dinner or evening out with that person. Do this for one month and see who has had to pay the most money toward the evening.

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Reproduced with permission from Denis Waitley’s Weekly Ezine. To subscribe to Denis Waitley’s Weekly Ezine, go to www.deniswaitley.com or send an email with Join in the subject to subscribe@deniswaitley.com Copyright © 2005 Denis Waitley International. All rights reserved worldwide.

Saved By The Bell

Keith Reed imparts important messages to the at-risk youths who work out in his gym.

She was falling. Fast. Smoking weed, drinking and hanging out with the wrong people. Cheyenne McKinney went from someone who was doing a lot at Booker T. Washington High School to someone who no one thought would graduate.

She had lost her motivation, her inspiration to do anything.

She lost her Pops. He died in April 2008 and she didn’t know what to do.

Then she took a second look at Orlando Hawkins. He had been a friend at Booker T., but had gotten in trouble and was arrested. But he found a way to stop falling out of a good life. He became a boxer.

Cheyenne McKinney takes a break between rounds at The Reed Foundation boxing gym in north Tulsa. “As soon as I met Coach Reed, it’s like, that’s the turning point in my life,” she says.

She wasn’t sure if it was going to work for her. Her mother certainly didn’t think so when she drove her daughter up to Keith Reed’s boxing gym near Apache Street and Cincinnati Avenue.

“I’m not letting you get out in this ghetto neighborhood,” McKinney recalls her mother saying. “Go ask that man who the boxing coach is.”

Soon they met the man inside the building. A thick-framed man, 6 feet tall, 275 pounds, with a gold-tooth speckled smile. He wasn’t like her Pops, a man she called “her heart.” But Cheyenne quickly found out Reed would serve a different role. She would eventually call him her savior.

“As soon as I met Coach Reed, it’s like, that’s the turning point in my life,” McKinney said.

Back then, almost two years ago, the Reed Foundation boxing gym in north Tulsa was rough.

“We just had a real raggedy building, you know, you could see the sky, the rain, it was terrible,” Reed said.

That wasn’t the way Reed remembered it. The building had been a boys club when Reed was a kid. In the early ’70s, it was thriving with athletic programs, and would eventually lead Reed to find himself and his passion.

“Without boxing, I could have been real hot-headed. Boxing cooled the head down because once you get into boxing, you realize you’re not the toughest person in the world,” Reed said. “There’s always somebody who’s tougher than you are.”

Boxing took Reed around the world as a teenager. He’s a Golden Glove winner who won third place in nationals when he was 17 years old. He has fought big names such as Sugar Ray Leonard.

Those experiences taught him to love his fellow man, he said. Now he spends four hours every night re-giving the gift that the boys club gave him.

Today, the Reed Foundation gym features two boxing rings, pro equipment, treadmills and about 60 members, including Cheyenne, someone who graduated her senior year with A’s and B’s and has her sights set on the Olympics in 2012.

It’s here that Reed takes at-risk youths and teaches them self-confidence and discipline through the sport of boxing.

“I just stick by him, and they call me ‘Little Reed,’ ” McKinney said.

“I asked my mom, like, ‘did you ever think boxing would be my turning point?’ ” McKinney said. “This could be my future. I never thought about it like that.”

Read more from this Tulsa World article at www.tulsaworld.com.

But those around Joseph start to call him Barnabas because they said, “This man is so encouraging! If encouragement were personified and had an offspring, he would look like Joseph.” (His name means ‘son of encouragement’.)

I think there are at least five things that must be built into the culture of a family, a church, or an organization in order for there to be this life-giving atmosphere of encouragement. As a leader, you need to be:

Affirming

Barnabas sought out unlikely people and projected the potential that he saw in them. No one believed in the Apostle Paul in his younger days as a believer. But Barnabas sought him out and invited him to be an Associate Pastor on his staff when he was leading the church in Antioch. No one believed in John Mark after his failure on the mission field. But Barnabas stuck with him.

Coaching

Barnabas did not just say, “Watch me do it.” He said, “Do it with me and I will help you improve.” Eventually, Paul surpasses Barnabas as the lead missionary, which shows incredible security and humility on the part of this man who was willing to invest in the success of another.

Blessing

This may be the most important ingredient. The choice to speak in faith and in grace. The choice NOT to respond to criticism with criticism, or insult with insult, but rather with blessing. A culture of encouragement involves selective speech. It is teaching people to speak honestly, yet to coat their words with kindness.

Experimenting

There was freedom under Barnabas’ leadership to fail. He took risks with the people he chose. He was pastoring a church in Antioch that was very unorthodox. There needed to be a leader full of grace in place for the church to grow and become the missionary-sending center of the New Testament era.

Releasing

Acts 13 gives us an account of the church that Barnabas was leading (Antioch) being willing to sow its very best leaders into Kingdom work. He leads his church into incredible generosity in what they chose to give.

Some organizational environments are TOXIC. Others are LIFE-GIVING. Most organizations are somewhere in between on the scale between TOXICITY and LIFE. But wherever your organization is right now, you can move it forward towards LIFE by making the five Barnabas-like choices above.

by Jeff Leake
Senior Pastor | Allison Park Church
Jeff has been married for 21 years to Melodie and is still hopelessly in love. They have five amazing kids (four boys and a girl) ages 9 to 18.
Visit Jeff’s Blog