Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 433 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

The Five Trails on Life’s Trek – Philosophy Part 3

Thank you for joining us for our 5 days per week wisdom and legacy podcast. This is Day 433 of our trek, and today is Philosophy Friday. Every Friday we ponder some of the basic truths and mysteries of life and how they can impact us in creating our living legacy.

Currently, we are in a multi-week trek as we explore the teachings from some of my virtual mentors, such as Jim Rohn, Zig Ziglar, and Earl Nightingale. The core of our current trek is based primarily on Jim Rohn’s book called The Five Major Pieces to the Life Puzzle. I have learned a considerable amount from reading and re-reading this book on my own trek of life, and I trust that it will benefit you also. Keeping with the continuity of Wisdom-Trek, I will be adapting it to The Five Trails on Life’s Trek.

We are broadcasting from our studio at Home2 in Charlotte, North Carolina. This evening we are having our daughter Janet and her husband Rowan over for dinner to assist them with tax planning for this year. What we have learned through the years as small business owners has given us the experience we need to be able to assist others with tax questions and planning.

This week has been a continuation of steady client work, and podcast related projects. It is sometimes hard to prioritize all the work that needs to be completed, which can lead to not being as effective as we would like. Our core values do help, but it is a struggle at times to make the progress that we plan on. Even when we do end up heading down a rabbit trail or become distracted from what our focus should be, our personal philosophy of life will help get us back on the trail and heading in the correct direction.

We all have a particular philosophy or worldview about life. It is what our integrity or value system is based on. This is why it is so important that we create a powerful personal philosophy that will drive us forward, even with the distractions and obstacles of life.

On our trek for today, we will continue on the first of five trails on life’s trek, which is the Philosophy Trail. Specifically, we want to continue our exploration of How to Develop a Powerful Personal Philosophy. If you have missed the past few Philosophy Friday treks, it would be good to go back and review them to get caught up on our progress so far.  We have a lot of ground to cover today, so let’s break camp and continue on the first trail of this extended trek as we cover…

The Five Trails on Life’s Trek –Philosophy Part 3

As a reminder, our overall extended trek will cover The Five Trails on Life’s Trek. Those five trails are:

1. Philosophy

2. Attitude

3. Activity

4. Results

5. Lifestyle

Last week on our hike you learned that to create a Powerful Personal Philosophy you must learn from your own past experiences and then from those trusted mentors that can guide you where you do not have experience. You must be willing to expand your horizons and break free of the shackles of an incorrect mindset that is holding you back. Today we want to start out by realizing that you must also be willing to:

· Learn From Other People’s Experience With Failure

You don’t have to experience everything in life yourself. Other people and their personal experiences offer untold opportunities for learning. Through the experiences of others, there are two valuable sources of information available; two attitudes of mind; two categories of those with similar experiences but with remarkably different results. You are exposed on a daily basis to representatives of both groups. Each group seeks its own audience, and each has an effect on those who choose to listen. You must understand that both sources are important. One serves as an example to be followed, the other as an example to be avoided, as a warning to be studied but not emulated.

First, you should be a student of failure. It is part of the world experience and part of the life experience. Why would you want to study the failures? To learn what not to do.

All experiences can serve as your teachers provided you learn from the information and invest its value into your life. There are those who teach that associations with people who have not done well with their lives and their opportunities should be avoided at all cost for fear that you will learn their poor habits and as a consequence, repeat their unfortunate mistakes. However, think about it in this manner, “Those who do not learn from the mistakes of the past are condemned to repeat them.” If you ignore the lessons of the past, from whatever the source, then you may become a victim of the process of trial and error. By ignoring the lessons of history, your own trials will inevitably try you, and your own errors will ultimately destroy you.

As you learn from the failures of others you must also be willing to:

· Learn From Other People’s Success

It is worth whatever time you must take and whatever you must invest to make a study of people who do well. Gather the ideas and the information from all of the available sources. Read the books. Attend the seminars. Invest time gathering the knowledge that success requires. Study the habits, the language, the manner of dress, and the discipline of those who have succeeded. Proverbs 15:22 tells us, “Plans go wrong for lack of advice; many advisers bring success.”

One of the great sources of wisdom from those who have done well can be found in the many quote books that are available in bookstores or online. Just by reading the words of what the greatest among us (past and present) have had to say, we can come to a better understanding of the thoughts that guided the lives of those who were great enough, persuasive enough, influential enough, and successful enough to be quoted.

To assist you in your quest for success, I have created and published a searchable database of over 10,000 quotes that I have collected for many years. If you would like access to my database of inspirational quotes, the link is available on the main page of Wisdom-Trek.com. At this point, there is no charge for the use of this resource, but you do have to sign up online to access the quotes so we can assist you if you need it and to keep you informed of enhancements to the program. This quote database can be a treasure to help you along your trek. As Proverbs 1:3 mentions, “Their purpose is to teach people to live disciplined and successful lives, to help them do what is right, just, and fair.”

In addition to learning from other people’s failures and successes you also need to learn how to:

· Capitalize On The Power Of Positive Influence

You should be in constant search of people you can admire and respect. People after whom you can pattern part of your own behavior. Much of who and what you are at this very moment is a composite of the many people who have influenced you over the years. When you were younger, your idols were often superheroes, storybook characters, movie stars, sports players, and famous musicians. For a while, you may have even walked, dressed and even tried to talk like your heroes. As you grew older and your own unique personality began to develop, your emulation of others became less apparent. But the influence was there nonetheless.

Regardless of your age or circumstances, you are never beyond the reach of influence. The key is to find unique human beings whose personalities and achievements stimulate, fascinate, and inspire you, and then strive to assimilate their best qualities. Proverbs 18:15 encourages us to be continually learning, “Intelligent people are always ready to learn. Their ears are open for knowledge.”

Great projects are always built from a pattern or blueprint. In this lifetime there is no greater project than the deliberate development of your own life. Therefore, you need a “blueprint,” something or someone to look at and pattern yourself after — if you want to make change and progress. Your Life Plan Blueprint which is on the resources page of Wisdom-Trek.com can assist you in this aspect.

You are continually being influenced by someone. Since this influence will determine to some extent the direction of your life, it is far better to deliberately choose the people you will permit to influence you than to allow the power of the wrong influence to weave its effect on you without your knowledge or conscious choice. Within time, as the student, you may even exceed your teachers. As Isaac Newton said, “If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants.”

We are deliberately taking our trek slowly as we ponder How to Develop a Powerful Personal Philosophy on our continued hike up the Trail of Philosophy today. This is not an easy hike to make. It requires absorbing new information that may challenge your current philosophy. It will require learning from the failures and successes of others as well as capitalizing on the power of positive influence from those who are your heroes and mentors.

Next week on Philosophy Friday, we will explore how to become a good observer, a good listener, and much more in your pursuit of a powerful personal philosophy. Make sure to join us for the continuation of our trek on the Trail of Philosophy next Friday. I know you will find these insights interesting and profitable in living a rich and satisfying life.

Our next trek will be Motivation Monday when we explore more trails of how to get and stay motivated to bring value to your world. So encourage your friends and family to join us, and then come along on Monday for another day of our Wisdom-Trek, Creating a Legacy.

That will finish our trek for today. As you enjoy your daily dose of wisdom, we ask you to help us grow Wisdom-Trek by sharing with your family and friends through email, Facebook, Twitter, or in person inviting them to come along with us each day. If you would like to listen to any of the past daily treks, they are available at Wisdom-Trek.com.

Don’t forget to subscribe to Wisdom-Trek, so each trek will be downloaded to you automatically. I would also appreciate it if you would rate and review us on iTunes or Google Play so that others will find out about Wisdom-Trek and join us.

Thank you for allowing me to be your guide, mentor, and most of all your friend as I serve you in through this Wisdom-Trek podcast and journal.

As we take this trek of life together, let us always:

1. Live Abundantly (Fully)
2. Love Unconditionally
3. Listen Intentionally
4. Learn Continuously
5. Lend to others Generously
6. Lead with Integrity
7. Leave a Living Legacy Each Day

This is Guthrie Chamberlain reminding you to Keep Moving Forward, Enjoy Your Journey, and Create a Great Day Every Day! See you on Monday!