My friend Jeff is a serial entrepreneur.  He’s made and lost a few fortunes personally.  He even went bankrupt.  But he’s always been wealthy.  Even when when he didn’t have a penny.  And those in his orbit are wealthier for knowing him.

What is true wealth?  If you ask most people the automatic response goes to assets such as money in the bank, real estate, investments, business interests, stocks, bonds, and all manner of things one finds on a balance sheet.  These are financial assets.  If you pose the question more emphatically, like, “what is the most important asset you possess in this world?” the answer immediately flips to one’s family or health or community, church, neighbors, best friends; all things human and relational.  Then you add the intellectual assets including one’s education, experience, reputation, skills, business connections and competence.  These things all add up to what truly makes a human being wealthy.  This is a new way of defining a balance sheet, with financial assets, human assets, and intellectual assets.

My observation in Jeff’s case is realizing that he went bankrupt in the financial section of his “true wealth” balance sheet.  But he made it all back.  That is, the money and the house and the “stuff.”  His financial bankruptcy didn’t touch his other asset classes.  He was exceptionally wealthy in family, faith, friends, integrity, ambition, confidence, knowledge, reputation, business acumen, competence, trust, relationships, and on and on.

Most recently he was moved by the evils of sex trafficking, abuse, and slave trade of innocent young prepubescent girls used by lustful, greedy, despicable, soulless men.  His current business endeavor is providing jobs, resources, protection, and hope to these poor victims.

It’s a mission of compassion and giving.  It is fraught with risk, heartbreak, danger, and threats.  But the rewards are extreme; the smallest is financial.

So, how DO you teach an old dog new tricks?  Well, first the old dog has to WANT to learn the new tricks.  Even if it’s not his idea to learn a new trick, you can make it very appealing to him.  You have to find a way to make it a burning desire to learn the new trick and you have to really stick with it.  Over and over and over again, day in and day out without missing a beat.  This is SOOOO important.  You can’t miss a beat!  Consistency is absolutely required in training a dog (and kids…)  You miss one time and you’re back to square one.  Start over.  Maybe you can get back to where you were fairly quickly, but, even in the best of circumstances, you have ground to make up.  You’ve had a momentum break.  No way around it.  If you miss more than once, well, now you’ve got a problem because now it can turn into confusion.  Poor old dog isn’t real sure about what you want.  You were doing so well, making such great progress, and then – a miss.  Ooops.  Let’s get back on track… until we miss a second time.

“That much gathers more is true on every plane of existence and that loss leads to greater loss is equally true.”  (MKE Part One, Sentence One)                                                     “I will lose not a day from these readings for that day cannot be retrieved nor can I substitute another for it.”  (The Scroll Marked 1)

I made the blog comment in Week 1 that this is not my first exposure to either The Greatest Salesman in the World or Think and Grow Rich.  I have read them both more than once.  But, I never followed the recipe with discipline.  I’ve never had the structure imposed on me (nor the discipline to self-impose) to be committed and accountable to actually do it day in and day out without missing a beat.  HELLO!

I must admit, there has crept in a doubt here and there.  A question along the way of “is this just silly…?”  However, I must also admit, just 18 days in I can see that it truly is seeping into my “other mind;” that mysterious source which never sleeps.

I may be an old dog but I still have a burning desire and a HUGE purpose.

I have kept at it 100%.  I have missed not a day of these readings.  And I won’t.

Just this week I called an older, wiser friend to exuberate that it’s like watching a movie unfold before my very eyes and I’m in the movie.  The small-world coincidences, points of personal connection, and river-of-life confluence have been mindboggling, heart-warming, and very inspiring.

I remarked in a recent blogpost how much I have lived in my head my entire life.  (I’m not the hardcore engineer type, but certainly have an analytical bent.  My Navy vocational training was in advanced electronics and my BA is in Finance, so, yeah, I have that.)  But my strong suit is people and words. It’s just a lot safer living in my head!

I recognize that living from the heart is where it’s at, but man, that just scares the bejeezus out of me.  Growing up in legalism and being beat over the head with a Bible etched the message on my soul that I had damn well better toe the line because there’s an angry God out there just watching and waiting to crush me.  With such beliefs underpinning my worldview there was nothing to be gained by engaging and unleashing my heart.

Well, that all changed eventually, when I learned what a complete load of steaming crap I had been fed as a child.  I finally recognized that the Omnipotent, Omniscient, Omnipresent creator of life, created the universe.  And His capstone magnus opus was humans.  And for Him to have this insane animus for His highest creation didn’t really reconcile.  The only thing in line with nature and creation that does make sense is a benevolent creator who loves his creation and wants it to know and experience and grow and discover all the depths and breadth of ability and wonder and beauty and awe and love that the human life form is capable of.  (That said, we can’t ignore or dismiss the polar opposites of all these positives.  They are part of the grand design.)

All this discovery and turnaround started about 20 years ago.  Thanks to the internet I discovered the facts about the big lie I grew up believing.  Slowly I was coaxed out of running and hiding from Angry God and met the one who set me free.  The more I get out of my head and connect to my heart, the more the wild river of coincidence and small world come together in ways that look like miracles.

I’ve lived most of my life in Oregon.  Birth and the first ten years were in Nebraska, but my parents and eight kids jumped on the Oregon Trail and never looked back.  I grew up skiing the volcanoes of the Cascade Mountain range; hiking and fishing the high lakes and endless rivers and streams, exploring the Oregon Coast, making hay in the summers and feeding it in the winters, riding horses, and building muscle cars. After high school I spent six years in the US Navy, which included extensive travels around Europe, Asia, and South America.  I then spent four years in college, which included international study in Latin America (Ecuador and Peru.)  My professional career started with a Fortune 50 company, which included a stint in London as a broker in Lloyd’s.  College years re-connected me with my beautiful brown-eyed girl from a rural Oregon community where we met when we were ages 12 and 14; now married 28 years.

We’ve now lived 20 years in Lake Oswego, Oregon where we raised three crazy, wonderful, bright, beautiful kids, all of whom are scholar athletes. Our oldest daughter, an All-American track athlete, competed four years at Duke; the second, a D1 women’s soccer goalie at Butler University, was on the Big East Championship team, now pours her heart into Athletes in Action at Oregon State; and our son is presently a pole vaulter and graphic design major at Northwest Nazarene.  What a trip!

I spend much of my time helping owners of well-established, thriving businesses plan and execute ownership transitions.  There’s nothing better than keeping a good business in business, maintaining good jobs for great employees so they can raise kids, pay mortgages, and contribute to the whole incredible economic machine.  I’m still happily growing and serving after all these years.  God, I love it so!

The world is filled with blue rectangles.  Who ever knew there were soooooo many blue rectangles?!  Just reminding me to serve others and do my chores (which, by the way, will never be done…)  Nevertheless, I do them with enTHOOOOsiasm!

I must say I am amazed at how quickly one’s mind can change.  I have done things absolutely by the recipe for a mere 10 days and have seen a huge number of really ridiculous bad habits (including smart-phone addiction, incessant podcast and radio listening, and a couple hours a day TV) just fall away.  A little structure, a little discipline, a little more focus, and a little less distraction.

I’m also amazed at finally connecting the simple dots of “as within, so without” which is so obvious.  Unless, of course, one lives entirely in one’s head.  Yes.  I have.  For decades.  Thought leads creation.  Nothing that is, was ever what it is, without first being formed by THOUGHT.

Can’t wait for tomorrow!  My picture is manifesting.  A day at a time.  Thank God! (and all of His helpers.)

When the student is ready the teacher will appear.

This is not my first round with these ideas. I’ve been exposed to the Napoleon Hill and Earl Nightingale and several others over the course of time. I have listened and worked diligently on implementing the ideas into my life, however, I would get distracted, and then fizzle, and then have another burst of intense intention and… the pattern repeats.

Why do I think this time will be different? I am hearing for the first time with my heart. In fact, it reminds me of the Bible verse about Mary that says she kept these things and pondered them in her heart. Me; I always kept these things and pondered them in my head!  Little wonder. I live in my head. I’m in love with ideas!  I’m also attracted to beautiful women, hot cars, shiny objects, and…squirrels!  I have always found these concepts fascinating, even rational, and have believed they should work, however, it has always been head knowledge.  So I was a literally stunned when I made the connection that the solar plexus is actually, really part of the brain. Or at least shares the common structure of neural ganglia. Same stuff. And actually resides in the very center of the body!  I have my entire life operated from my gut. My very best decisions have been intuitive – but – I’ve never given it its due.  My head has always gotten the credit.

Another equal or greater reason I believe now‘s the time is that my client of four or five years, in whom I have observed great positive changes. This guy was a nervous wreck, in therapy, and asking me to just get him out of his situation. Then he took this MKE course and he has just blossomed into a most competent, confident, effective CEO of a thriving, growing company.

I’m also very curious why I give such enthusiastic attention to this, foregoing normal distractions, giving it a priority more so than efforts, if put into client work, would yield fortunes.

These familiar-to-me concepts are being presented in the most credible fashion, and requiring a degree of commitment, that I believe is the only way deep, radical, truly transformational and lasting change could actually occur.

26 weeks. That’s a good run. I am already impressed in the most literal sense. I’m eager to have these impressions continue. Deeply.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton