Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 508 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

New and Better Sources of Influence – Attitude

Thank you for joining us for our 5 days per week wisdom and legacy podcast. This is Day 508 of our trek, and today is Philosophy Friday. Every Friday we will 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 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 The Big House in Marietta, Ohio. This is the final podcast for 2016, and as we reflect on this past year, we realize that we have covered a lot of territory on our daily treks. The question is, did we trek well, and what areas do we need to improve as we start 2017? There are some uncertainties in what direction we will head in, both from a personal and business perspective, but we are confident that if we live each day well, then the weeks, months, and the entire year will also be lived well. Our Wisdom-Trek is about taking one step at a time and living our legacy well every day so that our life of legacy will be one that will impact the lives of others for generations to come.

As we ponder this concept today, we are completing our trek on the Trail of Attitude. We need to realize our need and continually seek out new and better sources of influence so that our attitude will determine our outcome. 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 second trail of this extended trek as we cover…

The Five Trails on Life’s Trek – Attitude Part 8

As a reminder, our overall extended trek will cover these five trails:

1. Philosophy

2. Attitude

3. Activity

4. Results

5. Lifestyle

1. New and Better Sources of Influence

Sources of new information and ideas are within your reach and can have a dramatic impact on your attitude. The information that success requires can come from a variety of sources. The information is all around you if you will just begin the search.

Even if you cannot get around the right people in person, you can always have access to them through their spoken or written words. There is a wealth of information and inspiration available to you through audio books, printed books, podcasts, YouTube, online training courses, and other streaming media. These resources give you new insights into goal-setting, attitude development, time management, leadership skills, financial management and a multitude of important subjects.

By listening to these new voices of inspiration as you drive to and from work, exercise, and a myriad of other activities you can find that new seeds of progress will enter your mind causing you to think new and more constructive thoughts. The voices from these resources will bring value to your life and should replace the time you would usually spend listening to mindless chatter on TV or radio.

To be effective, these resources must repeatedly be used. These messages must be listened to again and again to give these new voices time to influence you. Repetition is the mother of skill.

2. Attitude Is Everything

The process of change begins within you. You have tremendous potential. I am convinced that you desire good results from your efforts. You must be willing to work hard and to invest the resources of time and money that success and happiness demand.

You have the ability to put your unique human potential into action and to acquire the desired result. The one thing that determines the level of your potential, which produces the intensity of your activity, and that predicts the quality of the result you receive, is your attitude.

Attitude determines how much of the future you are allowed to see. It decides the size of your dreams and influences your determination when you are faced with new challenges. No other person on earth has dominion over your attitude. People can affect your attitude by teaching you poor thinking habits or unintentionally misinforming you or providing you with negative sources of influence, but no one can control your attitude unless you voluntarily surrender that control.

No one else “makes you angry.” You make yourself angry when you surrender control of your attitude. What someone else may have done is irrelevant. You choose, not others. They merely put your attitude to the test. If you select a volatile attitude by becoming hostile, angry, jealous, or suspicious, then you have failed the test. If you condemn yourself by believing that you are unworthy, then again, you have failed the test.

If you care at all about yourself, then you must accept full responsibility for your own feelings. You must learn to guard against those feelings that have the capacity to lead your attitude down the wrong path and to strengthen those feelings that can lead you confidently into a better future.

If you want to receive the rewards the future holds in trust for you, then you must exercise the most important choice given to you by maintaining total dominion over your attitude. Your attitude is an asset, a treasure of great value, which must be protected accordingly. Beware of the vandals and thieves in your circle of influencers who would injure your positive attitude or seek to steal it away.

Your attitudes start with your thoughts. To maintain a proper attitude, you need to maintain proper thoughts. Philippians 4:8-9 tells us how we can do this, “And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you.”

Having the right attitude is one of the basics that success requires. The combination of a sound personal philosophy and a positive attitude about yourself and the world around you gives you an inner strength and a firm resolve that influences all other areas of your existence, including the third piece of the life puzzle that we will examine starting next Friday.

We are deliberately taking our trek slowly on The Five Trails on Life’s Trek as we finish our hike on the Trail of Attitude. Today we learned that we continually need new and better sources of influence and that our attitude determines our level of success.

Next Philosophy Friday we begin on the Trail of Activity and explore the truth that our level of our activity directly impacts our success. Join us next Friday for additional insights. I know you will find these insights interesting and profitable in living a rich and satisfying life.

Our next trek will be Motivation Monday where we explore a motivation nugget that will 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.

If you would like to listen to any of the past daily treks or read the associated journals, they are all available at Wisdom-Trek.com.

Thank you for allowing me to be your guide, mentor, and most of all your friend as I serve you through the 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!