3 posts tagged “life”
Short post today. It's a holiday weekend with no kids!!! And while I will be working on my sites each day (that is important), there are other important parts of life.
A little story...
When Harmon Killebrew, who used to play for the Minnesota Twins, was a kid he was out playing catch with his father one night. It was getting late and his Mom yelled out that it was time for them to come inside and that they were ruining the grass. His Dad responded that they weren't done yet,and besides, they weren't in the business of raising grass, they were in the business of raising kids.
That story has always meant something to me. It shows that it is important to recognize your priorities in life and to spend time on them. Sometimes we lose sight of the really important things because we just get caught up.
Building my business is important, very important to me, but at the end of my life what really is important is the relationships I've built with my family and friends. That is why I am building a business in the first place.
Have a great holiday.
I will comment on everyone's blog as you update them.
Steve Chambers
I like to collect wisdom and life lessons. When I was in the military I heard the following story:
There was an Army infantry training exercise taking place in Fort Benning, Georgia involving US Army Rangers. There was a visiting German NCO (Non-Commissioned Officer) who was there in an exchange program who was participating in the exercise. This NCO had seen extensive action in WWII, obviously fighting for the German side.
At the beginning of the exercise each soldier was issued a set amount of ammunition. At the conclusion of the exercise they had to turn in any unspent ammo. None of the American soldiers had any ammo to return, they had shot it all off during the exercise.
The German NCO however, turned in all his ammo except for three rounds. The supply people couldn't believe it. "Why did you only shoot three times?" they asked him. "I only saw three targets.", he responded. You can guess what happened to the three targets he did see.
Most people go through life shooting off what ammo they have without a clear target. They often make a lot of noise and generate a lot of activity that has no purpose or direction. If we are not careful, we can shoot everything we have just to have the fun of hearing the noise and the perception that we are making a difference.
My Dad could rattle off sports statistics of players from all the major sports all the way back to the 1940's. It gave his life purpose and he enjoyed it, but in the end he was shooting off his ammo at things he couldn't see and that were basically meaningless in the grand scheme of things.
To be effective we need to husband our ammunition so that we are ready for the opportunities of life when they appear. I define ammo in this sense as time, energy and effort. We each only have so much of it. Opportunities arise like targets do. We need to be sure we are shooting at the targets that really matter. We need to focus on generating light, and not just creating heat.
No, I'm not talking about lawyers this time. Yesterday we had a shark attack off Solana Beach. My daughter was nearby, although not in the water and I frequent that beach (although the water is still too cold for me, I like it above 60 degrees and it's hovering at a bone chilling 59 deg.). It was, I believe, San Diego County's first known fatal shark attack.
The shark was estimated to be 12' - 16' and had a 22" wide bite pattern. The victim was swimming in a group training for a triathlon and was hit from below. It took off both legs cleanly at mid-thigh and while they were able to drag him to the beach he bled out within minutes and died. It was sad.
The shark is believed to be a Great White. As is typical in a Great White attack there was one hit and he was gone. I have read that Great Whites don't normally attack humans and that most attacks are a mistake. The shark mistakes the swimmer for a seal and after the initial strike, once the shark realizes you are not a seal, the shark usually leaves. That seemed to be the case here.
The problem is that the first strike leaves the victim pretty mangled and ripped up.
Shark attacks freak me out. I have lived near the beach all my life, swimming almost every day of my life that the weather was nice and I have had several encounters with sharks both when I was in the water and when I was thankfully out of it. I've seen some nasty stuff and some big, scary fish.
So, will I stay out of the water this weekend? The weather is forecast to be in the high 80's both days. I live two blocks form the beach and the water sis supposed to be warming up. The shark attack was about 30 miles away, a distance the shark could cover in about 15-20 minutes. We have seals off our coast.
I will probably still spend some time in the water, trusting in the low probability that I will be attacked.
That's really what life is about isn't it? Taking risks. We can't live our life too careful or afraid to take risks. Where is the living in that. The victim yesterday was a retired Veterinarian in his mid-60's training for a triathlon. He was enjoying and living his life, probably never really thinking, as he approached the water, of the possibility that his life was about to end. That's the way we should all live our life. Doing what we love right up to the very end. Because it could end any minute now, no matter how low the probability.
