Tag Archives: Dave Chatmon

How LIFE Leadership Saved My Life

30 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by in Community and Leadership, Friendship, Inspirational, Legacy, LIFE Founders, LIFE Leadership, Relationships

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Sometimes a personal testimony is the most powerful form of belief we can offer people. I have been thinking about this topic for quite some time in anticipation to share how incredibly valuable my involvement with LIFE leadership has been over the years. I often get asked by critics that have known me a while why I am still involved with this company; somehow they still seem to think that this is just a business to me. I pray that this post clears up any confusion for those people.

Anyone who has been involved for any length of time (whether it was during company changes and transitions or the launch in 2011) would probably agree that it’s rather challenging to put into words the impact this organization can have on your life over time. In fact, it’s been such a challenge to formulate this piece of writing because the real blessings are so intangible and hard to express in written form.

I wanted to stay away from any sort of financial discussion because one of the misconceptions critics believe is that because LIFE leadership is a business, “money must be all they care about.” That couldn’t be further from the truth. While it is a very lucrative, successful company with hundreds and even thousands of members experiencing incredible financial success due to their influence in the lives of others, making money is certainly not the companies purpose. But, for those members who treat it and build it as a business they will achieve business results. But I digress. All you have to do is read Orrin Woodward’s highly popular blog or best-selling leadership books like The Leadership Train to understand the incredible business formula and system for LIFE leadership.

The idea behind this article was not to talk about a business but to talk about a purpose. I believe the purpose of LIFE Leadership was organically developed years ago when a group of men and women bonded their convictions through years of struggle trying to create a better life for themselves in less-fulfilling projects, eventually realizing that the real meaning of their struggle came from serving others and helping people grow.

Orrin recently tweeted, “A great life is the reward received when you give your life in service to others.”  Now that sounds like a worthy cause and purpose! But even still, I have to wonder if Orrin Woodward and Chris Brady planned to create a company 20 years ago that might otherwise save people’s lives in the future? It’s not like we have the cure for cancer here – our products are books, CD’s, meetings and people! How could that type of commodity actually save lives? And yet, it has.

Let me explain:

LIFE Leadership is built on a foundation of four important categories of development. Without these four components, a member will not experience the full value that someone like myself and many others have been able to experience over the years. Even the absence of one of these components can be detrimental to ones personal journey. Actually, because these are so important I thought that the most effective way to organize my writing would be to break down specifically through these categories how my involvement with LIFE Leadership has actually saved my life.

1) READ

LIFE booksBack in 2006 I picked up a book at a leadership convention titled The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren. I was young (about 20 years old), naive, a non-believer and very lost. No one had known at the time that I was struggling with an eating disorder, family challenges and other risky behaviors. I had always heard since day one of my involvement that reading was an important habit to develop if I ever wanted to be successful someday. I must admit, I was not a reader. In fact, it took me 2 years after getting involved to read a book from start to finish. This happened to be that book. The title of it caught my attention because at the time I had no sense of purpose. So what better way to discover something that was absent in my life than to gain wisdom from an author who may be able to help me. It did help me. In fact, I didn’t realize at the time that the first book I would ever read on my personal development journey would someday lead to my salvation in Jesus Christ.

Over the years I have read hundreds of books across multiple categories of personal and professional development genres. LIFE Leadership prides itself on delivering some of the best published content in the market so that people like myself can foster the necessary skills to develop internally so we can help other people externally. I could probably write a book just on the impact habitual reading has had on my life. It is one of the most powerful but under-utilized tools to success. In fact, it is so powerful that the information in books can actually save your life. I know it did for me.

2) Listen

CDs

Having always struggled with self-worth and control issues, I realized that the thoughts I constructed in my own mind were the most lethal form of self-destruction on my personal success journey. I knew that I would never become successful in anything if it was left up to my own thinking. I needed to change my thought process dramatically (not with the use of medication therapy, but through CD therapy). I became an audio-aholic listening to several CD’s a day just to keep myself out of my own head. Over the years that habit has created a hunger in me to want to share this information with everyone I meet. When people see stacks of audios in my front and back seats and in bins scattered everywhere throughout my car I am no longer embarrassed but proud of these resources. It is because of listening to these audios that I am still here today. In fact, my own bad thinking almost cost me my life; and listening was a direct path to saving it.

3) Associate

associateWhen I first got involved with the community building industry that has now become LIFE leadership, I completely fell in love with the people. There is just something different about hanging around with people who have a passion to grow personally and who want to make a difference. As hard as it is to believe, there are a lot of people in the world who don’t care about these things. I learned very early that who I hung around with would directly reflect the results I would have someday. I have always wanted to become like the people I respect so I have made it a priority in my life to surround myself with people like that. Even today, the association is my favorite part of all four of these components. Why? Because it’s about relationships. It’s about bonding. It’s about developing lifelong friendships. It’s about community.

Throughout this (already) two-year brain tumor battle if I didn’t have the LIFE leadership community I know for certain I would not be here today. Even through the most painful and challenging days I have looked forward to my Tuesday night meetings, monthly LIFE live seminars and quarterly leadership conventions. I believe having hope is about having something to look forward to even amidst the most difficult days of our lives. Not only do I have eternal hope in a life with Jesus someday but I have hope here on earth every time I get to associate with this incredible community of people. I always have something to look forward to. The relationships I have been able to foster among this organization has led me down paths medically I would have never had the opportunity to navigate. For those reasons alone, LIFE leadership has saved my life. However, all medical aside, the association has also allowed me to discover a purpose that I never knew existed – offering people hope (in a Savior) while pursuing real lasting friendships with other believers as we all journey toward Heaven together someday. To think, this crazy community and association of leaders is influencing people for Jesus – and saving lives for eternity!

4) Mentor

The final component and I could argue the most important! Since I was a freshman in high school (15 yrs old) I have been blessed to have a mentor – someone who has been able to guide me not only in basketball (at the time) but also in life. His name is Dave Chatmon and he is the direct reason I am involved with LIFE leadership today. He somehow convinced a very stubborn, shy but competitive girl to get involved in this industry at 18 years old that I would have never joined in a million years if it wasn’t for the trust I had in him. Today, I get to call him a business partner, a mentor and a friend.

baptismThe wonderful mentors I have been fortunate enough to work with over the years in this company are a true blessing from God – specifically speaking in regards to Dave Chatmon, George and Jill Guzzardo and Orrin and Laurie Woodward. There is absolutely no way I would still be here today if it wasn’t for these men and women and their servant hearts. Mentors help behind the scenes in ways that friends are not even qualified to do – they take on some of the heaviest loads of pressure in our lives but offer love, support and constructive direction towards better decision making in all aspects of our life. If you have a mentor, never ever take them for granted. Your mentors are some of the most selfless, loving and wise people you will ever meet. These mentors that I have mentioned above have directly, in their own specific way, saved my life and I am forever grateful for them every day of my life.

So there you have it. LIFE leadership may not the cure for cancer but it certainly is the cure for hopelessness. This is not just a business to me, this is my purpose – to lead people to truth and hope. It’s why I still do it. It’s why I will never quit until God calls me Home! It’s saved my life a countless number of times and I pray that it saves millions of lives (for Jesus) as we continue to share the message of leadership and truth across the world.

How has LIFE leadership affected your life? Feel free to share in the comments section below.

“It’s not just a business with a purpose, it’s a purpose… with a business.” Orrin Woodward

God Bless,

Kristen

 

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Don’t Foul Out!

17 Wednesday Jul 2013

Posted by in Community and Leadership, Friendship, Inspirational, LIFE Leadership

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“When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom.” Proverbs 11:2

Sports teach us so much about life. Because I was consumed by basketball for more than 18 years, it might be why I can find so many stories that relate to such broad topics. I always go through seasons of withdrawal as I remember how much I loved the game of basketball. I was reflecting on the days when I played summer AAU ball with my then coach Dave Chatmon and now LIFE mentor. Dave always made sure in the off-season of March to August that we received a lot of exposure in many tournaments all over the country. I remember the four years I played for him we played in more than 70 games each summer. That was more than triple the amount of games we would play in a normal school season with almost double the amount of playing time per player. Needless to say I had so many opportunities to learn, develop and grow as an athlete.

Team photo in the gym Hawaii 2003 (1)Anyone who understands the game of basketball (or any team sport for that matter) knows that there are certain rules that can limit your ability to perform like you want to. Fouling happens to be one of those rules, and I was a master at it. In basketball, you are only allowed five fouls per game and if you exceed that number you are then benched for the rest of the game. There was one tournament in particular we played down in Indiana. I believe we only had five players for that entire tournament which meant we had no back up subs for any of the games. And these tournaments are set up in bracket format – many of which were elimination brackets – meaning we could play anywhere from 3-6 games in a weekend depending how far we made it in the bracket. Nevertheless, it was risky only going down with five players in the middle of July when it was sweltering hot – we could have probably used a sub or two. When we arrived at the tournament, we were not prepared for the competition we were about to face. The little Kenosha Wildcats strutting in with our point guard standing at 5’5″ and our center at 5’11”. I still to this day don’t know what Indiana feeds their athletes, all I know is every time we played down there, the athletes were always bigger, stronger and faster than any girls I have ever seen. It was not uncommon to have our 5’5″ point guard defending a 5’10” point guard and our 5’11 center defending a 6’4″ center. We just never seemed to match up well!

Fast forward through the weekend and somehow we managed to make it to the championship game which was game #5. I remember everyone being exhausted but we were so determined to win that we somehow managed to find more energy to play the last game. We fought the entire way for every point, every steal, every defensive stop, every block and every rebound and we got to a point where the game was so close that the lead changed almost every possession. With only a few minutes left on the clock (in the lead) our center fouled out. That left us with four players on the court. Dave reminded me that I was also sitting at four fouls so I had to be careful not to commit my fifth foul. If you have ever played basketball under complete exhaustion then you would know sometimes you can’t control yourreferree movements. Going up for a rebound with only moments left on the clock, now down by just a couple points, I must have hip checked someone and the whistle blew. FOUL!! I couldn’t believe it – I was so angry with myself. The very thing I knew I shouldn’t do I did anyways. We were left with three players on the court, only seconds left and we were competing against five on the floor. We had lost the lead and the game.

At the time I had very little emotional intelligence. My selfish attitude is embarrassing to think about looking back but I remember not speaking the entire rest of the day or the entire drive home. And on top of that, I refused to accept my 2nd place medal because I believed that my mistake costed us the game. It was as if the 2nd place medal represented failure because I knew we were meant to win that tournament. The entire ride home I remember thinking about all the times I had been reminded about being in ‘foul trouble.’ How many times I had heard my coaches tell me, “Kristen, you are too aggressive, you have to learn how to control your body better.” How many games I was benched at half time because I had already gotten three fouls and needed to make sure I was still available for the rest of the game. I knew the mistakes I was making, I just wasn’t changing anything in order to fix the mistakes.

There are so many times in life when the time is running out, we are sitting at four fouls and our coach is telling us, “now don’t foul out!” We work hard, we play to win and then we make the same mistakes over and over and kick ourselves later because we never learned from our mistakes. For example: finances – all the bills are paid, there is money left in the checking account, we are putting away 10% in the savings every month and we are finally in the green. Happy to finally get the finances in order we are tempted by the Cadillac dealership on the way home from work one day so we stop in to check out the new cars in stock. The salesmen tells us that you can get this brand new… for no money down, great interest rate, cash back, great monthly payment etc and we walk away with a brand new car we can’t afford. It’s no different than getting a speeding ticket (when we know we shouldn’t be speeding), running late to things (when we know we should just leave earlier), preparing much sooner for projects (when we know procrastination only makes us more stressed and anxious), etc. There are so many examples I could share that relate to my basketball scenario. So why is it that we continue to make the same mistakes over and over again without learning or changing? We know we have the power to do it and we always know the outcome when the lesson is learned. I believe it’s a matter of intentional practice and changing our thinking in order to overcome these setbacks. Orrin Woodward says, “lesson repeated until lesson learned.”

LIFE founder Chris Brady recently wrote an article titled: Don’t Waste Your Failures that deepens this concept so much more. Success isn’t so much about not making mistakes, we will always continue to make mistakes but unless we are learning from them we will never grow. My mentor and LIFE founder George Guzzardo says, “True learning is a growth experience that often times requires a different perspective about failure.”

And I believe Rafiki, the wise monkey in the Lion King said it best to Simba, “You can either run from your mistakes, or learn from your mistakes.”

I pray for the wisdom to learn from my mistakes and bless others along the way on the journey.

“For the righteous falls seven times and rises again, but the wicked stumble in times of calamity.” Proverbs 24:16

God Bless,

Kristen

Letting Go: A Testimony of Faith

19 Tuesday Feb 2013

Posted by in Faith, Inspirational, Legacy, Love, Relationships

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We all have secrets/baggage; things in our life we prefer not to talk about. It may be attached to guilt, shame or pride and that’s why we choose to keep it hidden. We are afraid of what people might think if they only knew. I feel like sometimes we hold onto baggage like a security blanket that we never want to get rid of. The truth is, I have a big piece of baggage that I have kept a secret for a while and I am finally ready to let it go. Many prayers were said before I made the decision to write this so I pray that it inspires you to let go of some of the baggage you carry in your life.

Recently I have been studying the book of Matthew (again). It simply summarizes Christ’s birth, His walk on earth and His death and resurrection and gives us scriptural evidence through narrative history, parables and sermons proving that Jesus is our healer, our protector and our Savior.

Ironically, one of the first books of the bible I was encouraged to study when I first began my spiritual walk was Matthew. God certainly has a sense of humor as He sends me back around to study the very book that saved me only a handful of years ago. Let me explain:

When I was in 8th grade I remember sitting at the lunch table at school with my friends, staring at my bag of food, frustrated with a situation that had happened at home that morning. Situations seemed to happen a lot at that time. I was angry and I didn’t know how to handle those feelings. I believe it was the angriest I had ever been up to that point in my life. I remember getting up, throwing my lunch in the trash and sitting in a bathroom stall waiting for my next class to start. I went about my day, quiet and distant, went to basketball practice and went home still angry not understanding why I couldn’t let go of this feeling.

It was a subtle change at first. I would ‘forget’ my lunch at home, lie about not having money and tell people I just wasn’t hungry. I was 14 years old, no one even had a clue… not even me! I was a perfectionist, an extreme-ist and always had been;  strived to get straight A’s, worked out extra hard to be the best athlete in whatever sport I played and always tried to please everyone! It was a sickness that had led to my sickness.

I was really good at hiding it too. Like I said, I didn’t really know that what I was doing was wrong but I was smart enough to know that I loved the way it made me feel. I was in complete control over ME! I made it through 8th grade and no one knew my secret. At the time I was living with my mom during the week and my dad took us on the weekends and I was a master at telling stories. So even they didn’t have a clue. Victory!! I started at a new controlHS where I made new friends, had new coaches and new teachers. By about mid-freshman year I knew exactly what I was doing and I had mastered my problem… although I didn’t admit it was a problem of course. I joined the swim team in the fall, basketball in the winter and softball in the spring. The following year I joined the cross country team, basketball team and the track team. And from April through August each year I was playing AAU basketball. I was active every chance I could get. I appeared to be a happy, motivated, hard working kid that loved life. This went on for two more years without anyone knowing (at least I was never confronted during this time). Then the summer going into my junior year of high school I hit a breaking point. I had torn my ACL for the first time in a summer league basketball game going up for a lay-up. I was ‘out of commission’ due to surgery and rehab that summer and my little problem grew worse and worse. At the time, basketball was my passion, my emotional escape and my life. I was determined to get back on the court as quickly as possible and I knew I made a lot of people angry with my ‘rushed’ recovery because I came back way too soon. I was pretty stubborn to say the least. And because of how I was destroying my body, I was not physically strong enough to come back yet. If you have ever had an injury that stopped you from doing something that you love, you know what it feels like. I only had control over one thing at the time – and it was the only thing that kept me going. It was around then when people started to recognize something wasn’t right and that maybe they should say something. Due to some family struggles, I had been spending a lot of time sleeping at my best friend Jessica’s house. I remember sitting in their living room with Jess and my AAU basketball coach (at the time) and mentor today Dave Chatmon (Jess’s dad) and I knew something was up. They were the first to confront me and I remember getting up and leaving, denying everything and being so angry with the both of them. Anytime the conversation came up from them I avoided it. And it wasn’t until I was sitting in my HS Varsity coaches training office (a few months later) the day before a big game that it hit me. They ALL knew! They told me, “Kristen, we know you have an eating disorder and that you have been starving yourself. And you need to get help!” My secret was out and I didn’t know what to do. I feared the worst and the worst happened. I was told that I would be sitting out of every game and every practice until I got healthy. I was told I needed to see a psychologist, a counselor and a nutritionist before I could get back on the court again. In that moment I had lost all strength. Every emotion I had let dwell inside of me for years came out in the form of tears. They were now in control of MY life.

Have you ever been told you have to do something in order to get something that you want so you do it just to please them but later it comes back to bite you in the butt? Well that’s exactly what happened. I followed protocol, ‘admitted’ I had a problem, ‘fixed’ the problem and a couple months later (just before the season had ended) I was allowed to practice and play again. Although you and I both know, nothing had been fixed… they only put a band-aid over the problem to cover the wound by making me do things I was not ready to do.

During the next few years I had only minor struggles with my ED. I was so focused on college, playing basketball year round, working and trying to get a fresh start in my life that I managed to escape from my little secret for a while and get my life in order. I had bought a house, started a business, my basketball career was going well, I finally picked a profession (after changing my major 3 times) that I wanted to get a degree in. Life seemed to be going well!

Let me remind you that during this time I had no clue who Jesus Christ was. I had never picked up a bible, rarely attended a church and didn’t have any spiritual mentors in my life.

Around my junior year of college so many things were happening. I was working full time on 3rd shift from 8pm until 8am 3-4 nights a week, I was going to school full time from 9am-3pm with some night classes, I was playing college basketball where our practices went from 4pm-6/7pm every day and games 2 nights a week and on weekends and then I was having to go back into work after practices. I was also making strong attempts to build a business. There were multiple days on end where I wouldn’t sleep at all. I’m sure I shaved off of few years of my life during that time. On top of that my grandpa was dying, my mom was going through major personal struggles, my dad’s alcoholism was at it’s worst and I didn’t know how to handle any of it anymore. I had lost control of the life I had neatly put back into order just a few years back.

me and jess '07But this time I knew EXACTLY what I was doing. No one that had met me in college knew my past so I knew it wouldn’t be hard to hide it. I had more freedom and privacy than I ever did in HS, I was so busy I barely had time to even think about eating so I knew it wouldn’t be hard for me fight through the physical pain. I had lost a lot of friends because I never had time to spend with them so I wasn’t worried about my friend’s finding out. Before I knew it I had done more damage in 10-12 months than I did in 3.5 years. I dropped 45 lbs in a matter of a couple months (mostly muscle) because I was in pretty good shape back then and working out a lot, I had less than 10% body fat (which is very low for females) and plateaued for a while and experienced every physical and mental health symptom a person with an eating disorder experiences.

This time however, the changes appeared so drastically and I felt so horrible that even I was me and lynds 08scared. I confided in one friend during college of my battle and told no one else. I was never confronted by anyone during that year and looking back I know it was for the better. That friend was the first person who started talking to me about God. I was 21 years old and someone finally had the courage to ask me if I believed in Jesus Christ. I don’t remember the exact words she told me but I do remember how I felt after we talked. I wanted this to end, I wanted to be healthy and I wanted to live. I bought my first bible that next year but had no clue how to read it. It was so frustrating. I wanted some passage to jump out at me and slap me in the face while giving me a warm hug at the same time but none of that happened and none of it made sense.

It was around then when I attended another LIFE leadership convention and I was walking through the tool room and found the book, The Purpose Driven Life, by Rick Warren on the ‘discounted books’ table. I bought it and didn’t tell anyone because I was so embarrassed of my ignorance; or probably just too prideful. At the bottom of the cover it read, “What on earth am I here for?” Exactly the question I had been asking myself for years. I was sure this was the book that would help me start my faith walk. At the time I was so obsessed with working out that once basketball season ended I would go to the cardio center on campus and spend hours burning more and more calories. Except after I bought this book I wanted to be more productive with my reading so I figured out how to walk on a steep incline and read at the same time where I would walk for 2-3 hours a day reading this book. It completely drew me in and started to answer a lot of questions I had never understood.

I was recommended through the LIFE training system to subscribe to the AGO faith CD’s, that too started to put more pieces of the puzzle together. During this entire process I was slowly recovering from my eating disorder and I didn’t even recognize the changes that were happening. My excessive exercising turned into a normal workout routine, I slowly started to forget to weigh myself each day (which that was my controlled accountability at the time) and I didn’t worry as much about every calorie I was consuming. It too was a subtle change, but this time in the right direction. I knew God had a grip on me I just hadn’t yet surrendered to Him.

crossThe friend that I had confided in sent me a text with the verse from Matthew 11:28-30. I read it, “Come to me all you who are weary and overburdened and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” In this verse Jesus says, “Come to Me.” It’s God’s invitation. I will make your life easier. I will lighten your load. You will have relief. You will have release. You will have rest. You will have rejuvenation. Give Me control and care of your life and watch what I do. Life will get so much easier and less stressful.

It was in that moment that I had given Him control. It was one of the few times in my life up to that point that I found peace. I thought, “if what my friend, the Bible, these CD’s and that book say is true, then I should have nothing to worry about. God has it under control.” The recovery process was so natural that the healing took place with very little discomfort. It seems like it would be almost impossible looking back. I had no support except for one friend who knew what was going on, I had no professional help and I was still living a crazy lifestyle. But it certainly wasn’t impossible with God! I wasn’t angry with anyone, I never had to see another counselor, psychologist or nutritionist to ‘fix’ my problem, all I needed was Christ in my life. He has the power to heal all things!

Just like any addiction, a piece of it always stays with you. In the years since I have been tempted many times due to circumstances that would trigger my ‘control’ meter. I would let my control meter grab me for a week or two and then Jesus would save me again. He always has my back, He always saves me from myself and my poor thinking.

And it wasn’t too much longer after that I was mentoring with LIFE founder George Guzzardo. He knew that I was starting my spiritual walk and helped in the process of understanding scripture and how to read the bible. The time came where he asked me if I had committed my life to Christ in the form of baptism, and if I was ready to do that? I knew I was ready, George didn’t know my story at the time but I knew what Christ was doing in my life and it was no accident. Baptism was the perfect beginning of my journey because when I make a commitment, I keep my commitment. I was blessed to be baptized by two amazing men of faith – Orrin Woodward and George Guzzardo. A moment I will never forget.

My journey is still only just beginning. I have so much to learn and so many people to serve. But the reason I share this is because as I was going through the book of Matthew again, I found that passage that my friend had texted me that led to my salvation. If it wasn’t for my eating disorder, I may have never found a reason to surrender my life to Christ. And if it wasn’t for Christ I may have never recovered from my disorder. We are all led to Him in different ways. So I want to leave you with a couple questions:

  1. What baggage are you carrying around that is separating you from a deeper relationship with Christ?
  2. What secrets are you keeping from others that need to be revealed?
  3. Do you believe in the power of healing?

There are very few people in my life who know this testimony. In fact, if I didn’t think it had the potential to convict at least one person, I probably would not have shared it (it is way too personal for my own comfort). But I have received so much confirmation recently that it would have been selfish of me not to finally reveal it. We all have something that’s hidden deep inside us that we are afraid to let go of; that warm security blanket that we’ve been carrying around for years. It’s time to leave it at the cross; because God is in control and He is the ONLY one who will save you from yourself.

Many blessings on your journey,

Kristen

Who Is Feeding Your Elephant?

27 Wednesday Jun 2012

Posted by in Inspirational, LIFE Leadership

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“Being realistic is the most commonly traveled road to mediocrity.” These words are shared by one of my favorite actors, Will Smith. At last night’s challenge group we discussed chapter 4 in Orrin Woodward’s ‘Resolved’ book discussing how to align our conscious (ant) mind with our subconscious (elephant) mind towards our vision. The ant and the elephant parable says that the conscious mind stimulates only 2,000 neurons while the subconscious mind stimulates 4 billion neurons. Both our ant and elephant needs to be fed… our ant thinks in words and our elephant thinks through images, but it is up to us if we are the ones feeding it. Sadly, because of the media – TV and advertisements, most people have lost control of their elephant, allowing someone else to program it. In chapter 4, Orrin closes with the story of Will Smith and how Smith’s example is inspiring because his ant and elephant are aligned better than any other actor in Hollywood. Even with overwhelming set backs in his life, Will Smith has 14 films that have grossed over 130 million dollars per movie. This is almost unheard of in his profession. And it is because he decided at 16 years of age that he was going to program his elephant mind.

Take a look at this video where Will Smith shares some of his wisdom and secrets to his success:

“Skill is only developed through hours and hours of beating on your craft.”

“Talent requires bettering yourself every single day.”

“You don’t start out building a wall; you say, ‘I am going to lay this brick as perfectly as a brick can be laid’ and you do that every single day and soon you will have a wall.”

“If you are not making someone else’s life better, than you are wasting your time.”

“You really have to focus with all of your fiber, all of your heart and all of your creativity.”

“You can’t be scared to die for truth.”

Will Smith is an incredible example of someone who’s ant and elephant are aligned in common purpose towards his dreams. Every time I hear and read about the ant and the elephant it takes me back to my high school AAU basketball days. My coach at the time, Dave Chatmon, and now mentor in the-life-business has always had his ant and elephant aligned; even before he knew that there was such a thing.

When I was 17 going into my junior year of high school, my AAU Kenosha Wildcats basketball team had the opportunity to play in a world tournament in Maui, Hawaii. Dave had signed us up for it over a year in advance so that we could spend that year fundraising for the trip. We started out with a team of 10 participating in the trip but as time got closer 4 of the players backed out so we only ended up having 6 eligible players. I had been coming from Australia where I spent 3 weeks playing in tournaments down there and was changing planes in LA to fly straight to Maui. We knew it would be tough going down there with only 6 players because all these other teams had a full roster where they would basically beat us through sheer numbers on the bench. But we didn’t allow that to stop us from going. We ended up staying for 2 weeks where the first week we stayed at a YMCA camp that had a gym and small cabins that our team could stay at for no fee because Dave had connections with the owner of the property. I remember clearly we had been practicing in the gym and everyone was kind of emotional and tired. It was very hot those particular weeks so the combination of the heat and our disbelief that we could handle playing in all those games with teams like Walt Disney, Palos Verdes and some international teams, really got the best of us. So Dave, in his cunning way of turning lemons into lemonade told us all to go grab our pillows in the middle of practice. I knew he had been getting frustrated with us but why would we need our pillows? He told us to meet him down by the ocean front in 5 minutes. So we did, all sweaty and moody with pillows in hand.

We first had to get into a circle and he basically spent time attempting to motivate us through sometimes harsh words so that we would remember the reason why we were there. Just as girls sometimes do, it only made us more frustrated. Then, what he did next is what I feel a perfect representation of the ant and elephant aligned in common vision. He had us all lay back on the ground with our eyes facing the sky and our head rested on our pillow. He told us to close our eyes and stay quiet and to clear our minds. Then he began to walk around our little circle telling a story (as close as I can remember).

“There is this small basketball team from Kenosha, WI that signed up to play in a world tournament in Maui. They have been playing together for three years and have over 200 competitive games under their belt together. They don’t have much height, much size or even much speed but what they do have is a lot of talent and a hunger to win. They play basketball because it’s their passion. When they signed up for this tournament they thought their coach was crazy. They didn’t know how they would come up with the $20,000 it would cost to send everyone down there for two weeks and they certainly didn’t think they could even qualify to play with some of the other talented teams. They doubted themselves often but they believed in their coach and their team. This little Kenosha team had never been talked about even locally and had lost a lot of games before they started winning. But once they started to believe in themselves it didn’t matter who their opponent was, they would fight for every win and soon became the team to beat in many tournaments. Now this team is in Maui, Hawaii with only 6 players preparing to play some of the best AAU teams in the world. This was their dream. All the effort and pain it took to get to this moment was worth it because they were finally there. They are walking into their first game of the tournament ready to play. They fight for every point and every breath of air and win the first game, the 2nd and every game there forward. They win the tournament and become champions. When they arrive home they drive through the city and see billboards with their team picture showing world champions in Maui, Hawaii. Everything they had worked so hard for was respected for all to see. That little underdog team from Kenosha, WI were tournament champions.”

And then he had all of us raise both our hands into the air (eyes still closed) as he passed out a picture to each of us that was laminated. And when he told us to open our eyes we saw the billboard with the Kenosha Wildcats as world champions.

Talk about feeding the elephant! From that point forward our subconscious kept going back to what it would be like as underdogs to win the entire tournament and have our team picture on one of the billboards in Kenosha. I don’t think that image ever escaped us throughout the rest of the trip because with over 20 teams participating we managed to win 3rd place in the entire tournament. While it would have been nice to say we were champions, I truly believe that we became champions before the tournament even started because we played our hearts out that next weekend and accomplished something that we never thought we could.

That is what the ant and the elephant is all about. Visualizing what success looks like in your life, aligning your conscious and subconscious mind in unison to accomplish something great. Training yourself to see it so clearly that the victory has already taken place in your mind, it’s only a matter of time that it actually happens. What the mental fitness challenge (MFC) and the-life-business is designed to do is filter out all the garbage that is fed to us that is training our ant and elephant and provide proper nourishment through information that will get our elephants charging towards our dreams. It’s taking control of the programming of our subconscious mind. If you haven’t read Orrin Woodward’s Resolved book, I would do so immediately as your elephant depends on it.

What stories do you have that explain the concept of the ant and the elephant? I look forward to your feedback!

Blessings,

Kristen