In my continuing education, I learned yesterday about a study done by some psychologists that have found that each day every individual has 60,000 thoughts-- that’s right 60,000 thoughts. Many, of course, are subconscious. Most subconscious thoughts have an origin from conscious thoughts. Now here’s the punch line on all of this, some of the thoughts obviously are negative and what has been determined is that negative thoughts have a heavier weight to them than positive thoughts; positive thoughts are lighter. Yes, they have a weight! I guess that’s why for years even everyday people have called it baggage.

The bottom line is this: you can’t afford anymore to give yourself the luxury of a negative thought. The price is too high. The weight they say is the cost of heart attacks, strokes, and more. Scientists point out once again that the people that live into their nineties and beyond are some of the most positive people.

(Here's something to think about; there are actually two words that make up the word disease…. Dis and ease. You decide if that might be a clue.)

"Thoughts really do become things.” Choose 'em wisely until we are gifted with another opportunity; make today and the rest of your life a power packed, love-filled passionate living masterpiece.

Coach J

Hello everyone ,

I just wanted to say Hi! I hear ya even when you aren’t talking to me. “How come you don’t send all of those exciting e-mails"? I make no excuses I’ve been shaky and it seems the last few times I have been apologizing for not sending them. I have been promoting a book lately in addition to writing another one.

And when I finally got into the habit of writing for myself everyday I got out of the habit of writing for you. But this is it I promise at least twice a week I will send a general e-mail to the group and post it to the blog, even if it’s just one line.

But as I think about that I invite you to check yourself have you added any good new habits lately? If you have, which I’m sure you have because you get that life is about growth love connection and contribution.

As you get excited and expand in your lives watch any areas that you may be neglecting  life is this big juggling a so stay aware and keep your hands moving.

So here we go with some tools to use, once again, because I’m sensitive I’m feeling another blast of negativity in the air again. Not with any of yall.(Thank God)

But to putting it frankly people are doing a lot of moaning, hating and drama creating to distract you from your goals and objectives. It’s time to say “no” actually and since I’m in rare form today, it’s time to say” hell no”.

You must guard the door to you mind or else you are going to get caught up in the conversation about what is this world coming to and what’s happening with this country it’s time to turn off the TV every night. You don’t really need to hear about everything that is bad going on cancel your newspaper tell your negative associates and friends to stop calling as much.

It’s not your business to do the Orange County Florida Sheriffs work to find Caylee Anthony. It’s not your job to even think about Casey Anthony and her issues.  Stop distracting yourself thinking about that balderdash. Stop hating on Sarah Palin and stop hating on Sarah Palin haters.

Stop worrying about so much stuff that doesn’t affect you directly, focus on you your family and the people you love. As you always hear me say don’t worry about what you don’t have concentrate on what you do have and how you can make it better.

Be happy where you are and with what you have while in pursuit of what you want. Go deep into gratitude because you will never be sad when you are truly 100 percent thankful.

We all in this country are rich very rich . Do you know that most of us live better than George Washington and let me tell you because as you know I’m from Washington, DC and have been to Mount Vernon many times and it’s a least a two square miles property. And yet we all live better than good old George by far.

Listen, do what you can with what you have don’t let people tell you what you can’t do, be prudent and wise don’t waste any of your time and or energy on the balderdash.

So right now not tomorrow now, go for it and make today and the rest of your life a thankful happy passionate love filled masterpiece.

Peace and love!

Coach J

                          Discovering your purpose and doing what you love!

I am just so happy about writing today’s blog! Why you may ask? Well it’s been a while since I wrote the last blog, and I feel good about taking the time to share a little of what I learned in my over twenty years of being a human behavior researcher. Today’s blog message is, I think offers you a very valuable component in creating a life of mastery, fulfillment  peace and happiness and many moments of joy and I am totally pumped about sharing it.

Discovering your purpose is one of the hardest things in life to do. By understanding your purpose which only comes from lots of thought and reflection you will be able to set the stage for a life that is rich, rewarding, and fulfilling. I know quite frankly for many you haven’t thought about that what your purpose is lately. And I sadly can say some have really never seriously ever asked the question of themselves at all. Let me get to the point, the point is we are all put here for a reason we are here to learn love grow and contribute to the betterment of others in some way. We are all here to make a difference in this world of some sort and to leave a legacy; we are here to create something that will out live us.

Many if not most of our life’s problems and challenges are due to use not living life with purpose or on purpose. When you are living on purpose and with a purpose you don’t have any time or energy for the dumbness and distractions that cause the drama.

Let me list a couple of well known people who I think live or lived on purpose:

Bill Gates changed the world became the richest man in the planet and is going to give most away.

Barbara Bush, the woman makes the man, right ladies! She has a husband who was president, two sons’ who became governors, and one son who became president. ( and some clowns thought she only baked cookies)

Nelson Mandela became famous political prisoner and used that popularity to later become president and revolutionize the system that caused him to be a political prisoner.

Thomas Edison he changed the world by never giving up on inventing the light bulb and other inventions.
You wouldn't even be reading this if not for the contributions he made to our world.

Albert Einstein the man whose theory’s changed the world.

Martin Luther King his dream lives on!
Others include Mother Teresa, Tony Robbins, John Kennedy, Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, Michael Jordon, Cal Ripken, Steven Spielberg and Spike Lee.

Think about the purpose of people like Beethoven, Mozart, and Bach there would be no rock and roll, country or hip hop with out the purpose for these men being realized. 

Now that I got your attention, what does that mean for me you may ask? Those examples are all famous and those people all did real big things! I got you! These people are used just for that, great examples to show with clarity what it looks life to see the realization and fulfillment of a life filled with purpose.

Let me offer you a few suggestions to help you define and develop a greater sense of purpose in your life. Here you are.
 
Here are a few things that can help lead you to develop a greater sense of understanding about what your purpose may be. Print these questions and when you have a few quiet moments give them some thought.

1) Look at your gifts and what you are good at and ask yourself, how your gifts are being used? Talents are gifts that are utilized enhanced and developed.
 
2) Ask yourself, what things have you done in the past that brought you the most personal pride joy and a sense of significance? 

3) What are things that you were excited about doing or becoming when you were younger but let the fire go out? Maybe for no real reason or because maybe some misinformed person in your life ridiculed you and or any combination of reasons your passion and excitement gradually extinguished.

4) What do you keep telling yourself you’d love to do?
 
Ask yourself a couple of questions like;
If money had nothing to do it what would you do for a living?
Would you do your current job for free?
What is your best talent or attribute and how is it being used?
What is the legacy that you want to leave?
What is the one big thing you would do if you knew you were guaranteed not to fail?
What have you always dreamed of becoming doing or having?
What made you happy when you were a kid?
What is something you would like to change in this world? What problems in the world would you like to help solve? How would you like to help others if you could?

I could give you a much longer list, but after asking those types of questions over and over again I’m sure you will discover what you true purpose is.

And then from there just apply the basics, decide, commit, plan, act, follow-though, and accomplish.

Finding or discovering and creating a purposeful life are not things that most people in our culture do. But it is something that most people wish badly at one time or another that they would do. So stop the wishing and find yourself, your true self, what are you here to do. And then, well you know "just do it".


Until next time as always make today and the rest of your life a purposeful masterpiece.
Peace, love passion and purpose!

Coach Joe

PS: There is a good book to assist you a little Victor Frankel “Man’s search for meaning”.

If you are Christian and you haven’t already read Rick Warren’s book “The purpose driven life” get it today!

               Passion Purpose and doing what you Love Part 1

Please first of all forgive me for not sending you many blogs lately, my excuse is the same, “that I’ve been busy”!

Now let’s “go there”, to the place where real life fulfillment is, in your passion purpose and loving everything you do in life.

It all starts with passion; passion is the one of fuels behind that transfer of energy to what ever you are doing that’s makes the difference between good and great.

I always like to tell people if your parents had no passion you would not be here. So even you started with passion, as we grow older and more challenged by life, if we are not careful we can loose our passion we can lose our flame, get to busy and forget what matters most. So for the next couple of entries I want to talk about keeping your inner fire burning bright.

We are born to be passionate we all have something or things we are very passionate about. We need to transfer and or allow our passion to flow into every part of our being and learn to eliminate people places and things that disrupt our passion.  Passion is the fuel that takes dreams and turns them into realities; it is the fuel that takes you from mediocrity to excellence.

So you might ask, where do I get passion from?  How do I you teach me to get more passion? Well, passion is something that can’t be taught it must be caught. You catch passion by doing what you love and loving what you do. You catch passion by thinking more about others than yourself and becoming committed to something and things that are bigger than you are.

You become passionate when you realize that everyday is a gift and that you are thankful for all the beauties that each unique day brings. Passion comes from taking the time to try to figure out what you life’s purpose is, and working toward pursuing it. Passion comes from just simply “don’t worry be happy”. Happiness is a choice and being happy is just taking the actions consistent with that choice for you. You can be happy and passionate right now, you just need to decide, commit and take action.

Passion comes from asking yourself what do I like or love to do and doing it. Sometimes we say I don’t know what I’d like to do, well if you don’t know what you like, and then think about what you don’t like or write it down and then think of the opposite, that’s probably what you’d like to do.

Have you asked yourself lately what am I called to do? What am I here to do? The answers to those questions are where your passion lies and each and every one of us are here to do, something to contribute to our world in a magnificent way.

 I always ask people what are you going to do with the time you have left on this planet, you have all those resources of you, now what are you going to do with it?

Step up your level of passion for life by doing more of the things you love, loving the things you do, and by finding your purpose and pursuing it. That’s life in a nutshell. Learn, grow, think, do, become better, make a difference, find you purpose pursue it, and give it all a way because you can’t take it any of it with you!
 

So let’s all bring back some more passion in our life’s by getting more in touch with our life’s purpose, loving the things we do, the people we touch. Let’s all get real excited and passionate about life again like a child. Let’s begin today knowing that we are more than enough. My final words are, just know that we are designed to win and to make a difference in the world, even if only in a small way, find things you love be more passionate and make today and the rest of your life your passionate “Masterpiece”.

Coach J

                                                       I am responsible for everything!

I was recently struck in the head with a renewed sense of awareness and focus, of the fact that I am responsible for everything. I had a reoccurring situation with somebody that always ended up with me cursing them out. That is basically out of character for me for a litany of reasons, the list is pretty long.

But this last time I decided I needed to be who I am which is a bigger person then I had been actively demonstrating in this situation. I decided to take responsibility for why I was cussing them out, and not what they where doing to “make me cuss” them out.

As soon as I stopped blaming them and acknowledging them for being stupid, I began to understand, who was really stupid. I was for walking into a wall that had a sign on it that said wall, expecting there was not a wall and getting mad when I found a wall.

When it comes to being responsible for everything, this is a concept I think sometimes totally gets lost in the society of lawsuits blame shame and who gets the credit that we live in today.

We have been trained unless, we have deliberately been trained otherwise to figure out ways that when something goes wrong it’s somebody else’s or something’s fault.

We see their or its fault, blame them or it, don’t change a thing, recreate the same situation, see the same faults, blame and don’t change a thing. The bad news with this thinking strategy is nothing changes. In a matter of time, because we learned zilch we will also get to repeat the situation and process. That’s just life you either learn from mistakes and adversities or you get to re-experience them.

When I say I am responsible for everything, I mean that in everything that I had a role in it. That I create my life, my reality, the quality of my life, and the quality of everything in it and everything that happens to me. Do you?

Now this is a very hard place to go to, this is a place only for the truly mature, this is a place that can hurt. But if you go to being totally responsible for everything in your life you are going to the place where you can create the life of your dreams and get rid of your current nightmares.

You see if you’re willing to own that in every mess that is around you, that you somehow created it, or allowed it, you are also realizing that if you have the power to mess it up, you also have the power to fix it up.

So many times in life especially when working with people when something goes wrong we want to blame, make somebody wrong, see their role that we totally miss the boat on the role we played, totally, blind as blind to what we did or didn't’t do in the situations that are adverse to us.

It’s easy to see what somebody else did but it’s hard to see what we did and even harder to see what we didn't do. I am responsible for everything means again, that somehow no matter what happens to me I am responsible, by something I did or did not do today or something I did or did not do yesterday. If not by my actions, then by the way I commutate with myself and the universe or by my dominant thoughts.

Somewhere I had something to do with it period! I know it’s hard at first to see it, but after a while it becomes easy and you can see the way to change a lot of things that you “knew” (thought) were hopeless.

So the simple bottom line with rare exception is; where we are, how our life is, and what’s happening to us, at some level is usually our own doing.
 
Now that said there is a difference between being responsible for everything and blaming yourself for everything. Being responsible for everything is just seeing your role in things, then committing to correcting your role and then correcting your role.

We must remember that blaming people and things makes us victims. You can only become a victim by choice, the mature choice is to choose to be responsible, become a survivor and take action.

So many times we set our own traps and then miss them because we focus on what something or someone had to do with it, rather than what we had to do with it.

Remember that old saying “if it’s to be it’s up to me”!
That speaks to the power that lies in you that becomes hidden as long as you blame, find fault and make people wrong. You will never see your power to change something as long as you keep looking at somebody else to change.

Stop looking for it to change, and remember in order for it to change you must change it. It’s not it or them it’s you! If you don’t like something stop all that yakking and change it!

If you don’t like where you live do something about it!  If you don’t like where you work do something about it. If you don’t like the number in your savings account do something about that, don’t just blame high gas prices. Anything that you don’t like you have the power to take responsibility for changing it or at least changing how you deal, cope or respond to it.

Remember this, it’s not it, it’s you!  Stop dealing in it and start dealing in you!
You are responsible for everything!

Now with that, as a responsible for everything kind of person remember this, life it only happens once, so make today and the rest of your life a masterpiece.
JFP

Staying in the Game! Never, Never, ever Quit!

I’ve been told way too many times that way too many people give up on their goal, dream or objective inches or seconds away from success.

You may have heard or read the story of the “acres of diamonds”. The “acres of diamonds” is a story of an African gold miner that bought a farm and “tried” to mine for gold.

After a while like many of us instead of persisting and stepping up our game, we quit. He quit, after putting his life savings into the farm looking for diamonds.

He sold the farm for pennies on the dollar that he paid for it. Well the person he sold it to was much more committed and aware. You see a diamond in the rough doesn’t look like the diamonds that make women’s hands and necks look so beautiful. It looks like a dirty piece of charcoal.

The farmer saw the rocks that looked like charcoal and cursed at the dirty rocks he was finding. He got frustrated and sold out and became a malcontented drunk and was never heard of again.

Meanwhile back at the ranch the new owner had awareness of what diamonds look like in their rough form begin full scale mining and the story ends with that mine that one miner thought was worthless, turning out to be one of the richest diamond mines ever discovered.

Stop for a second and think about it how many times you have had a rich diamond mine that you walked away from or threw in the towel on.

How many opportunities have you quit on when victory was just around the corner? My answer for me is way too many! How about yours? I’ve learned from my own life and reflecting on the above story and others that many times victory is right around the corner whenever I feel like quitting.

I’m not talking about the lazy sensations that come when I don’t want to do something. I’m talking about the compelling sensations that I get, to throw in the towel after I’ve been committed and working on something for a while.

I’ve learned to read this as it’s time to persist and go though and I can’t tell you how many times success revealed itself right around the corner.

So what’s the point "Coach Joe"?

The point is the only way out is through. It is always darkest before the light. Next time you feel in body that you want to quit something that you have been working on and it is not working, don’t quit, stay in the game and press harder.
Work on getting better gain leverage by using your tools better.  Enlist the help of others. And most importantly stay in the game because you are almost there. Try it the next time you feel like quitting something. You only need to see this dynamic once to know it and own it. You’ve more than likely already seen it; you just may have forgotten it.

I bet you could right now list ten things that you just felt were hopeless but you hanged in there and then all of a sudden, wham, either you learned something, the market changed a helping hand showed up or you just began to see more than just dirty charcoal looking rocks you saw the diamonds among your acres.

So my final answer is don’t ever Quit, stop if you have to take a breath, regroup get help, pray, or whatever you do to recharge.

But stay in the game because whenever you feel like quitting that is a sign from the universe that you are almost there.

Life it only happens once just like today, so make today and the rest of you life a Masterpiece!
JFP

Life Mastery Part 6                           Emotional Mastery 1

Today I want to just get to the point, today is about passion. Passion (PASS-I-ON),

Passion is what ignites the fire, it’s what gets you going it’s what keeps you moving and what gets you restarted when you fall or feel overwhelmed.

Passion is the reason we all are here today, somebody got passionate hopefully two people or there would be no you today.

Starting to get the point, without passion nothing happens. Many of us need to get back in touch with the things that cause us to be passionate, the good things of course.

Remember the passion you had when you first learned to ride a bike, you never cared about how many times you fell down or how bruised your legs got. You just wanted to be able to ride like the other kids in the neighborhood. And when you finally could ride you thought you were the …

That’s the kind of passion I’m talking about and bringing that to every area of your life.

I’m not talking about being some kind of crazy lunatic; I’m talking about wherever you are, stepping up your level of passion your excitement about your life and everything you do.

When you step up the passion excitement and enthusiasm, watch your power, belief, confidence and desire to take new actions grow, stick around and watch your bottom line outcome grow as well.

There’s one thing for sure that all people that are successful and fulfilled share. They are all passionate about what they do and everything they do. With passion comes excellence with excellence comes more than average rewards and recognition. Speaking of average, average really just boils down to the worst of the best and the best of the worst and I know you are much bigger than that.

So let’s go get passionate get excited! You can make all your dreams come true once you define them and strategically plan them out.

Smile laugh jump dance sing shout clap say “yes I can” a couple of times and live passionately today and everyday.

Life it only happens once just like today so make today and the rest of your life a masterpiece.
JFP

                                            Life Mastery Part 5

Moving right along, I know the other day I promised to discuss the topic of mental clutter. Now in a way if I were you I would say “what is that, mental clutter”?   But not really, because you are reading this Blog, I you understand know how a clogged mind works. I know you can understand the comparison using a human body. Think about it how well would your body work if it never cleaned itself out, and got all “clogged up”. How would you feel being all backed up, would you feel a little tight?

The same thing happens when we don’t have clear minds, except fortunately it doesn’t feel as bad. So since we don’t have all day and I can’t give you all the secrets in the short about of time here, let me list some ways in no particular order without my commentary, on how to remove your mental clutter, also known as “stuff” among other names.

Stop thinking negative!

Stop taking to your self in any negative way, also stop taking to others negatively.

Sort you thoughts out on paper; use a journal, a planner, or just a legal pad.
Pray!
Think.
Meditate.
Exercise.
Take responsibility and control.
Use common sense.
Become a better Life Manager, you are the CEO of your life!
Develop greater self awareness and become proactive.
Don’t watch as much TV.
Reduce exposure to negative people.
Plan you activities well
Get yourself organized.
Get rid of the stuff you don’t need anywhere and everywhere.
Make out a budget.
Stop arguing with people.
“Don’t worry be happy”!
Forgive everybody!
Apologize!
Care!
Take an effective action!
Believe in yourself.
Learn something advance your knowing and understanding.
Communicate with someone who speaks to your best.

These are just a few things that you can start with to remove mental clutter from your life, I challenge you to add to that list and pursue removing any and all things that are contributing to your mental clutter. So until next time do something great today. Life it only happens once, make today and the rest of your life a masterpiece!
JFP

                                                 Life Mastery Part 4 - De-clutter/Get organized

One of the most important first steps I like to help people take in my coaching practice is to develop some type of organization in their life.  

The reason is very simple your life is a multi faceted continuous endeavor, that without planning and organization it can become a nightmare.  

As we discussed before Life Mastery is about running your life like a well run business, and that you are the CEO of this well run business called your life. So having disorganization and clutter around your business is not the way you are going to soar to your highest levels of achievement. 

The main reason I am encouraging you to de-clutter is that clutter is a waste of your valuable time and more importantly your valuable energy which are the core sources of any achievement. When you can’t find something you want when you don't know where something is when you don't know what to do next. It's clutter. Clutter causes frustration and undue stress.

Don’t you find sifting thurough stuff over and over again, just a little frustrating and sometimes a lot stressing? You may be able to eliminate 25% or more of the stresses in your life by just getting organized. 

Some people have lived full of clutter for years and just don’t know where to start. I say to them just start somewhere, start with one closet by putting one thing on a hanger. Then draw out mentally or better yet on paper a system to clean the closet break it down to simple steps you can do one step at a time.  

Next, move on to the rest of the room using the same piece by piece step by step process. Then just repeat the process in the rest of the rooms. Give yourself some type of reward for your accomplishments allong the way, usually the reward is built in.

Being able to “see and smell again” in your own house or office is usally enough of a reward for me thats a "living reward"  It is very important that you live and work in an organized clutter-free zone. We live in a world that is full of distractions there is absolutely no need for you to be a source of additional distractions. 

You just can’t be sloppy at anything anymore; you can’t live sloppy, look sloppy, or be sloppy period. Sloppy is a lifestyle if you have any of it get rid of it today. Do what you have to, stay up late to get rid of it, get up early hire somebody, if your money challenged trade with somebody.  

Just do it!  Live in peace, in a clutter free zone. Next time we meet we’ll talk about mental-clutter. Remember it is your life and it only happens once, so make it great starting by de-cluttering and making today a masterpiece!

JFP

                                                            Life mastery part 3

As I stated last time we met Life Mastery is a continuous never ending process. It never stops; success is a never ending journey through a set of pre-determined goals.

Fulfillment is the same, it never ends. Living a life of happiness balance and prosperity, as you define it is a never ending process.

That’s why at Reaching Peak we have a motto “Always Learning Always growing”. That’s the reality of the life process. The sooner we get that in our minds, bodies, and souls the sooner we will experience the benefits of living “Life Mastery”.

So today as we learn and grow I want to talk one of the most important components of Life Mastery. It’s called language. What you say to yourself and others has a tremendous affect on what your life is like and where you end up. Let’s me show you how it works, this is the flow of outcomes.

A thought becomes what you say to yourself, what you say to yourself then becomes a enhanced thought, that thought becomes an action, that action becomes what you do repetitively, better know as a habit, that habit develops your character and you character shapes your destiny.

So it starts with how you talk to yourself your inner dialog as I like to call it. Words have the power to lift us up or to pull us down and crush us. We must develop a power vocabulary that we never turn off. We must remove all disempowering language of any kind from our vocabulary, now!

It would be too easy for you if I listed every kind of empowering word and every kind of disempowering word. But I’ll list a few to get you started.

Words to get rid of today
I’ll try      before you even started you’ve given yourself an excuse “I tried”    what you want a medal?  Life don’t give a half of a hoot about you trying it cares about you doing

Maybe   
Where’s the certainty?

Can’t    
You will never know what you can and cannot do unless you give it your all 100 times seek help from others and learn from each attempt.

Failure there is no such thing as failure; you succeed in everything you do. You just may have not gotten the result you wanted. If you succeed in messing something up, you have enough power to mess it up, that same power can be used if directed properly fix it and make it better.

So called failure is just feedback to tell you the way you are doing something isn’t working, the simple math here is do something different and get a different result and keep attempting until you get the result you want. Why do most people walk? Because they didn’t let falling down stop them from persisting.

Words as phrases to add
I will, I can, I’m great, I’ll find a way, I’m certain, I’m committed.

Examples of small but positive and empowering word shifts.

Problem to challenge
Stressed to busy
Nervous to energized
Rejected to misunderstood
I hate to I prefer.

And the list goes on and on we can do an all day seminar for two weeks and just barely scratch the surface on the power of words.

I challenge you to simply do the hard work easy work and watch your language. I mean how hard is it to pay attention to what you say and make sure it is consistent with what you want for your life?

Watch what you say to yourself and what you say to others. Do this, notice the language difference from the most successful and happy person you know. Compare that to the most unsuccessful person you know. There is a big difference and that should give you all the clues you need if you don’t think language is important. It’s everything and ever word matters.

Why do you think the President has people that write his speeches for him, because every single word matters? There are words that could cause a lot of trouble and they want to avoid that.

So starting today, and for the rest of your life I challenge you to watch your language.

And watch your passion, empowerment, commitment, and successes grow. Until next time, do something great today do something that matters. Make today your masterpiece.
JFP