Take Off What You Are Wearing !

I love what I do.  I love having the opportunity to work with individuals; finding out who and what they were created to be.  The downside of what I do is the first hand witnessing of the emotional wounds people allow others to inflict on them.  Much like many of the remarkable people I work with, for too long I allowed people to label me.  Nothing is worse than when we allow another to put a label on us - saying what we can or can not do or who we are or are not.  There are times when the label may be positive, such as words of encouragement.  However, the negative labels do the damage.  The worst part about it is you can not stop them and you can not prevent them.  

A newspaper editor once told a man named Walt Disney he wasn’t creative enough, that he lacked in imagination.  An acting teacher once told a young girl by the name of Lucille Ball that she didn’t have any acting skills; it was best she try a different profession.  Winston Churchill was held back in the sixth grade because he wasn’t smart enough.  Well, we know all know how Disney, Lucille Ball, and Churchill turned out! The common denominator in the triumphs and victories of these individuals was the ability to remove the negative label.

Before heading out on the Professional Bowlers Tour in 1997, more people than I choose to remember told me I would fail.  I was told I wasn’t good enough and there wasn’t any chance I could “compete”.  Those were the labels people attempted to put on me.  I was already insecure, but at the time I did not realize it’s just how the enemy works - keeping you from reaching your highest potential.  Discouragement, intimidation - the words become like seeds and if you dwell on them they will take root.  Winning on the professional level helped hush those critics!  Then came the labels of addict and junkie.  Once again I had to work hard at removing the negative labels and it has never been easy.  The thoughts play over and over again in your mind like a skipping record.  “You don’t have what it takes.”  Getting the label off is much like taking a Clinton/Gore bumper sticker off a car today.  You peel it, you need water, soap, and it still never wants to come off.  Finally I removed the label and was able to put new ones on.  My favorite is “I can do all things”.

Wrong labels will keep you from living the life you are meant to live.  You are not who others say you are, you are who YOU say you are.  People will always say you aren’t good enough, too old, too many faults.  Do not live another day allowing someone else to define who you are.  I have worked with so many individuals who wear the labels others have given them and love their life accordingly.  They become who someone says they are, when the truth is they are strong, talented, and valuable!

What labels are holding you back?  Maybe a teacher, coach, loved one, or even a parent spoke something to you.   Now is the time to remove the label.  Others do not control your destiny - you do!  Stop giving vindication to the comments.  It simply is not the truth and once you realize this, the label will no longer have an affect.  The only way anyone can limit you is if you wear the label.  So many people continue to wear labels such as divorced and live with the thought they will never find anyone.  Or the label of overweight and live with the thought they will never be in shape.  So many have listened to someone label them as addict and live with the thought they will never break the disease.  You will become the label you wear - it is inevitable.  It is why so many people struggle with addiction because they wear the label of addict.  If you think you are an addict, you have already lost the fight!  Change the label to you are clean, you are in recovery.  Do not live another day wearing a label someone else put on you, write your own label.  Just because someone spoke it over you does not mean it is the truth.  You have the right gifts, the right personality, the right skin color.  You are not an accident.  You were made perfect by your Creator to do what it is you were meant to do!  You were not created as just one of the six billion people on Earth or created just to be average.  Your smile, your gift…..all of it was made for your destiny.  Nobody else can offer what you offer!  If you continue to think you are just average, you will live an average life.  If you are going to be all you were meant to be, the first thing you must do is remove the label.  Nothing that has happened to you or spoken to you should keep you from your destiny.  No matter what mistakes or situations you have been in, shake off the self-pity, quit dwelling on what mom, dad, or your cynical husband, or wife has said to you.  People can call you whatever they like.  You are not what people call you, you are only what you answer to.  Remove the label and watch the bondages disappear!

Stay hungry!

Dream a little dream with me........to a better tomorrow

This has been an entry that I have been looking forward to writing, I will waste no time with a fancy intro.

If you are like me, the feeling of not getting to where you want or wanted to be in life has at some point arisen in your thoughts.  Where you are right now in life is a result of what your plan was a year ago.  The only chance you have at getting to a different place begins with changing the way you think.  It is a choice that is all yours.  You have the choice to change the way your mind looks at circumstances, the choice to control your thoughts.  Different thinking patterns will change your future.  Changing “there is no way I can handle this” or “I can’t do this” to “I will find a way” will have a tremendous affect on where you are one year from now.

One major realization that I would like you to make is: you can do or have anything you want.  I repeat, you can do or have anything you want.  So many of us have been told “you can’t do this” or “you won’t be able to do that.”  If you are like me, you were told repeatedly that you were not good enough to do anything.  Forget all of that – it does not matter or mean a thing.  A good majority of the time it was only from someone who hated themselves or they were so miserable in their life, they wanted you to be where they are.  Unfortunately this includes loved ones.  This is one of the main reasons why it is imperative to surround yourself with positive and influential people.  Being around negative people can wreak havoc in your life and destroy the chances of you realizing your full potential.  Stay away from them!  My first stint in rehab, a counselor told me that out of all the patients, he knew I would be the first to fail.  I listened to him and did fail.  Thank God I eventually worked with someone who helped me see life in a different way.  If someone does tell you something negative, thank them for their unwanted opinion and move on!

In this entry we are only going to focus on the first step to realizing your ultimate everything and that first step is visualization.  Don’t make worry as to the “how’s”, just do the visualizing.  When done correctly, the "how" will make itself known (don’t say "how" am I going to go back to school or "how" am I going to own my own business, etc.).  From the time I can earliest remember, I wanted to bowl and be a star on the Professional Bowlers Tour.  Once I read a baby book comment that described a four year old Anthony that threw across the room any birthday present that wasn’t bowling related.  It was my first and only dream.  When the car accident was followed by the pain med addiction, the dream was taken away and life was meaningless to me.  Getting a taste of that dream only made it worse.  For ten years I danced with the devil.  Year after year I was in the same place because the only thing that played in my mind was that I couldn’t get clean, or I didn’t have the strength or know how to do it.  Even worse, I let myself think I wasn’t good enough to do anything else and I deserved what I was going through.  Once I made the commitment to get clean and was given the proper tools to begin life anew, I was able to make some sense of life again and found myself slowly beginning to have aspirations come to the surface.  With the help of some great people, I was able to change “there is no way I can get clean” into “I will be drug free” and “there is no way I can be a student again” turned into “I will be a college graduate.”  You see, there is always a way.  The way may not be easy, but it does exist.  When I think back five to six year ago, so many obstacles jumped in the way, but I made a promise to myself to never again say “no way” and to never again think I wasn’t deserving of whatever I wanted.  I left the last rehab facility with only the shirt on my back and the smallest piece of dignity.  However, I had a dream again and it led me to where I am now.  A very influential person in my life once shared a piece of paper with me that had the following on it:

·         After Fred Astaire’s first screen test with MGM, the talent director wrote the following memo: “Can’t act, can’t sing.  Slightly bald….can dance a little.”  Fred Astaire kept this memo and eventually framed and hung it above the fireplace in his Beverly Hills home.

·         Winston Churchill failed the sixth grade.  He was defeated in every election for public office until he became Prime Minister at age 62.

·         Thomas Edison’s teacher once wrote on his report card that he was “too stupid to learn anything.”  He was fired from jobs for being non-productive and had 1,000 unsuccessful attempts at inventing the light bulb.  When asked what it was like to fail 1,000 times, he replied, “I didn’t.  The light bulb was an invention with 1,001 steps.”

·         Abraham Lincoln failed as a businessman, a lawyer, was defeated for six different attempts at public office, and went bankrupt.  In 1858, he wrote a friend, “I am now the most miserable man living.”  He would become president just a few years later.

·         Babe Ruth hit 714 home runs, but struck out 1,330 times in his career.  Some say winners make the most errors.

·         Walt Disney was fired by a newspaper editor because he felt Disney lacked in imagination and had not one good idea.  Walt went bankrupt several times before he built Disneyland.  The city of Anaheim (home of Disneyland) even rejected the proposed park on grounds that it would attract “riffraff”.  One interesting note: Walt wouldn’t hire Charles Schultz (Peanuts creator).  Schultz had every cartoon rejected by his high school yearbook and local paper.

You will never be a failure unless you give up.  Sure you will have temporary setbacks that everyone experiences.  Chalk them up as life lessons.  For successful people, failure is the fuel to do more.  As you read this, I am working on the dream that has been with me since the day I left rehab (the last one (:  ).  Have most turned away their ear? I could list them.  Have doors been shut? Many.  But, I have visualized it and will not take no for an answer.  The rest of the regimen is worked on each day.  I won’t be one of those people who give up just before it was about to happen.  And never again will I give satisfaction to the people who said I couldn't do it - I urge you to do the same.

In the following posts, I will help you map out the basic steps to realizing your dream.  I dare you to do this with me.  I dare you to yearn for what you were meant to be!  As Mama Cass once sang, I want you to “dream a little dream for me.”  Begin now.  Start writing and do it now.  Channel the mind of a child.  Don’t worry about the categories or how you will accomplish any of it.  Just write it out.  We will work on the rest in the next post.  Just do it!  This could be the start of something big!

Go Well.....Anthony

Please feel free to add comments or you can personally email me.  I look forward to hearing from you.