Discipline Yourself—It’s Time To Become Who You’re Meant To Be Motivational Speech
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It's not the economy that's going to determine your next six years. It's your philosophy about labor and about activity and about miracle and soil and seed and sunshine and rain and the economy and the banks and the money and the companies and the schools and what's going on. It's your philosophy, your attitude, and then your ability to take action. All of that we call the process of life change, miracle work.

The objective of life is not to rest. The objective of life is to act. Think of more disciplines. Think of more ways and means in which to use your own wisdom and your own philosophy and use your own attitude, your own faith, your own courage, your own commitment, your own desires, your own excitement. Invest it, invest it, invest it, invest it in discipline so that it's not wasted. The smallest of discipline, thereby transform your life.

Join the 5%, join the 10%, join the 3%. We can learn to do the most incredible things. All we need to do is take the time to do it. So it's not a matter of capacity. It's a matter of judgment. It's a matter of excitement. It's a matter of will. And it's a matter of wanting too bad enough. So it's pretty exciting to know that any day you wish, you can change your life. Any day you pick out, you can make major changes.

it doesn't ever have to be the same again. And that's exciting. Knowing that intellectually and personally, you can actually do the things that will make major changes in your life. Happiness is not something you postpone. Happiness is not something off in the future. Happiness is something you design. You've got to get the word. Happiness is something you design. Happiness is a study. Happiness is a practice. Happiness is an art. It's not an accident. It's an art.

And anybody that wants to can study, practice the art of happy living. But here's how you get a miracle going for your life. Number one, do what you can. Get a list of the stuff you could do and you haven't done, postpone and start cleaning that up. You can't start at a better place for personal change. It'll affect your bank account, affect your future, affect your income, affect everything. You can't start a better place.

Life change process than cleaning up what you should be doing promise yourself You'll read the books until your skills change. You'll go to seminars until you get a handle on it You'll listen to it until it makes sense

You'll go for it until you understand it. You'll practice it until you develop the skill. Never give up until, however long that is. Step by step, piece by piece, book by book, word by word, apple by apple, walk around the block, walk around the block, go for it. Don't miss the chance to grow and resolve that you'll pay the price until you learn, change, grow, become. Then you'll discover some of life's best treasures when you pay that price.

Let me give you the best of ancient script. Here's what it says. Whatever your hands find to do, do it with all your might, do it with all your strength and do it with all your power. Don't wish for a better wind. The key is to wish for the wisdom to set a better sail. Utilize whatever wind that blows to take you where you want to go.

That is the philosophy of success I picked up at the age of 25 and it revolutionized my whole life. Here's what I found. I found it was easy. I was a millionaire at the age of 31 and I found it wasn't difficult at all. Now, here's my definition of easy. Something I could do. I figure if it's something you can do, it's easy. But here's a little qualification. I worked hard at it.

I made sure my disciplines were in line. I made sure my habits were good. I made sure I did all that I could. I found something that I could do, but I worked hard at it. I got up early and stayed up late and worked hard from age 25 to 31. But what I did was easy, meaning it was something I could do

Well, Mr. Ron, you say if it was so easy, why during those six years didn't those other people around you get rich? Here's why. It's also easy not to do. How else would you describe it? It's easy to keep doing the things that don't work. It's easy to keep the bad habits. It's easy not to develop the disciplines. It's easy not to. So why did I get rich and they didn't?

It all comes down to a philosophical phrase: "The things that are easy to do are also easy not to do." That's the difference between success and failure, between daydreams and ambitions. Here's the key formula for success: a few disciplines practiced every day.

Those disciplines have to be well thought out. What should you spend your time doing? You don't want to waste your time on things that aren't going to matter. But a few simple disciplines can change your whole economic future. A few simple disciplines can change your future with your family, your business, your enterprise, your career. Success is a few simple habits, good habits repeated every day. Here's the formula for failure. Errors in judgment repeated every day.

All you've got to do is have a few errors in your judgment and repeat them every day. And I'm telling you, they'll spin out of control in 10 years. You'll end up driving what you don't want to drive. You'll be wearing what you don't want to wear. You'll be living where you don't want to live. You'll be earning what you don't want to earn. A few errors every day, a few bad habits can be disastrous.

It's easy to repeat an error in judgment because failure doesn't fall at the end of the first day. Bad habits don't show their horrible results at the end of the first day or the first week or even the first month. It's easy to get fooled. If disaster occurred at the end of the first week, we'd change our philosophy right away. But the slide downward is subtle. You get you a little off course and you keep drifting until all of a sudden you're caught way off course.

You've got the choice right now of one of two easies, easy to do or easy not to do. I can tell you in one sentence how I got rich by the time I was 31. I did not neglect to do the easy things I could do for six years. That's the key. I found something easy I could do that led to fortune and I did not neglect to do it.

The major reason for not having more of what you want in America. More health, more money, more power, more influence, more everything. The major reason is simple neglect. If you don't take care of neglect, it becomes an infection and then it becomes a disease.

So, if you're in the habit of not doing it, get in the habit of doing it. Do all it takes and before you know it, success will be yours for the having. Where do you go for your intellectual feast? Pity the man who has a favorite restaurant but not a favorite author. He's picked out a favorite place to feed his body, but he doesn't have a favorite place to feed his mind. One way to feed your mind and educate your philosophy is through the writings of influential people.

Maybe you can't meet the person, but you can read his or her books. Churchill is gone, but we still have his books. Aristotle is gone, but we still have his ideas. Search libraries for books and programs. Search magazines. Search documentaries. They are full of opportunities for intellectual feasting.

In addition to reading and listening, you also need a chance to do some talking and sharing. I have some people in my life who help me with important life questions, who assist me in refining my own philosophy, weighing my values and pondering questions about success and lifestyle.

We all need association with people of substance to provide influence concerning major issues such as society, money, enterprise, family, government, love, friendship, culture, taste, opportunity, and community. Philosophy is mostly influenced by ideas and ideas are mostly influenced by education. And education is mostly influenced by the people with whom we associate.

One of the great fortunes of my life was to be around Mr. Shouf those five years. During that time, he shared with me at dinner, during airline flights, at business conferences, in private conversations, in groups. He gave me many ideas that enabled me to make small daily adjustments in my philosophy and activities. Those daily changes, some very slight but very important.

soon added up to weighty sums. Big part of the lesson was having Mr. Shouf repeat the ideas over and over. You just can't hear the fundamentals of life philosophy too often. They are the greatest form of nutrition, the building blocks for a well-developed mind.

It's easy when you finally find yourself in a good job to stop pursuing mental development. Have you heard about the accelerated learning curve? From birth up until the time we were about 18, our learning curve is dramatic and our capacity to learn during this period is just staggering. We learn a tremendous amount very fast. We learn language, culture, history, science, mathematics, everything. For some people, the accelerated learning process will continue on.

But for most it levels off when they get their first job. If there are no more exams to take, if there's no demand to get out paper and pencil, why read any more books? Of course, you will learn some things by experience. Just getting out there, sometimes doing it wrong and sometimes doing it right. You will learn. But can you imagine what would happen if you kept up an accelerated learning curve all the rest of your life? Can you imagine what you could learn to do? The skills you could develop, the capacities you could have,

So, here's what I'm asking you to do. Be that unusual person who keeps up his learning curve. Making the most of your life is not usual. It's unusual. You need to develop some unusual habits to earn the outstanding rewards. A friend of mine said, "Standard education will get you standard results." You want a lot more than standard results. You need to become a lot more than a standard person.

Become a student of good ideas wherever they can be found. Always be on the lookout for a good idea. A business idea, a product idea, a service idea, an idea for personal improvement. Every new idea will help to refine your philosophy. Your philosophy will guide your life and your life will unfold with distinction and pleasure. One of the keys to making the most of ideas is

developing the ability to reflect. Reflect means to go back over, to study again. Go back over your notes, go back over your thoughts and go back over your day. There are some particularly good times to reflect. One is at the end of the day. Take a few minutes to go back over the day. Whom did you see? What did they say? What happened? How did you feel? What went on?

By answering those questions, you capture the day. Every day represents a piece of the mosaic of your life. You need to capture the experience, the knowledge, the sights, the sounds, the panorama, the color and the emotion so it will serve you well for the future. Don't miss a day. Then take a few hours at the end of the week to reflect. Go back over your calendar. Go back over your appointment book. Ask yourself the same questions. Where did you go? Whom did you see? How did it feel?

What went on? Capture that week. A week is a fairly substantial chunk of time. Next, take half a day at the end of the month to reflect. Follow the same process. Go back over what you read. Go back over what you heard. Go back over what you saw. Go back over your feelings and capture them so that they serve you.

Finally, take a weekend at the end of the year to establish the year firmly in your consciousness so that it never disappears. The Old Testament describes a unique scenario that unfolded according to the law. At that time, people worked for nine years and the tenth year was a sabbatical. The tenth year was probably used for relaxing, replenishing, getting in shape physically. We would call it a change of pace in modern society. But that was not the only objective for the tenth year.

I'm sure that in ancient days, sabbaticals were used to go over the previous nine years to see what went right and what went wrong, what worked well and what didn't work well. People would ask themselves, how did I grow? What did I learn? How did I change? What do I have now after nine years that I didn't have at the beginning? That time for reflection is what makes a sabbatical so effective and meaningful.

At times, you'll want to reflect with somebody else. A husband and wife can reflect on the past year together. Parents can reflect with their children. Colleagues can reflect with each other. But you've also got to learn to reflect by yourself. Solitude is a powerful force. We all need to find some occasions to shut out the rest of the world for a while. I've got a motorhome and a motorcycle. That's how I find solitude.

I head for the mountains and ride the trails where there are very few human beings. Or I go out into the desert somewhere. It's my time to get away. When you live a very public life, you treasure solitude.

When I have a chance to reflect alone, I go back over my life, go back over my skills, go back over my experiences. There are some things you need to do alone, such as ponder, think, wonder, read, study and absorb new ideas. Decide how you can become better this year than you were last year. Enjoy your solitude. Life is full of experiences, touching and seeing and looking and doing and acting.

But you're going to lose the lessons of those experiences if you don't take the time to reflect. We can all learn to gather up the past and invest in the future. Gather up today and invest it into tomorrow. Gather up this week and invest it in the next week. Gather up this year and invest it in the next year. Many people simply hang on one more year. They are just hanging in there, seeing what's going to happen.

I am asking you to choose a different path to learn, study, and reflect. This is a major part of personal development. The quest to become better than you are now. Tax day is always a pain. Next year could be a nightmare. If Congress fails to extend Trump's tax cuts, middle-class families will get hit with a huge tax increase. That means less money for groceries, less money to pay your mortgage, less money for school supplies, and less money for family vacations.

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