This past Friday a great Oscar-winning actor, entrepreneur, philanthropist, activist and race car driver, Paul Newman died at the age of 83.
His great achievements showed him to be a man who was desperate for success.
At the age of 70 a large percentage of men and women consider themselves retired and some sadly simply spend their days in frivolity while waiting to die.
But not Paul Newman, he was still busy pursing new goals and achieving outstanding things such as winning the Daytona 24-Hours sports car endurance race at this age of 70 years. What drove him? A strong passion to succeed. He was desperate for success!
I am so thankful for the influence of my parents in my life. Dad would often say I am not retired, I am re-fired and I plan on living that way also!
A True Story
Last night @JPmicek sent the following quote over twitter: MOGULOGIC: You’ll never possess anything you desire until burning pursuit overwhelms the passivity of living without it.
This quote caused me to remember a story told by an elderly pastor in a village in Mexico.
This story although it was told by a preacher, can certainly be applied to any pursuit in life, and vividly describes the meaning of passion which certainly involves being desperate for something.
A young man in his late teens admired an older preacher whose life had touched multitudes in a very positive way.
This boy recognized that the preacher had something special that stood out from many others and he approached the elderly gentleman saying:
I Want What You Have.
The teenager pestered and pestered the gentleman wanting to know how to reach the level the success in life that he had reached.
So the elderly preacher decided to show this young man exactly how to achieve what he wanted. He told him: “ok, meet me here at 4.30am tomorrow morning and I will show you”. What? 4.30am!
What Is Going On?
However the teenager knew what he wanted, so he showed up at that hour the next morning. They set off for a long drive. The exercise seemed pointless to the young teenage lad, but he did not say anything.
Next thing they found themselves in a remote area way out in the country, by a river.
The older man seemed to take his time doing everything ever so slowly. Then finally he told the boy to get into the river. It was freezing cold!
A Freezing Cold Morning!
The boy politely obeyed and the elderly preacher put his firm hands on the boy’s head and pushed him under the water and held him there. The boy struggled of course, hard ut the preacher insisted on having him stay under water until he was fighting hafor his life.
What Did You Do That For?
Finally as the boy was struggling in great desperation the preacher let him go. Bewildered the boy screamed at the preacher “what did you do that for”?
Definition of Passion
The reply gave the key to the definition of passion. “When you want what you say you want as desperately as you wanted to breathe just now we’ll talk”
What a challenge! How desperately do you want to fulfill your dreams?
Are you desperate for success?
58 successful entrepreneurs were given 30 days to start again from scratch and recover their wealth, Could they do it? They had already reached success once.
Now with everything taken away from them could they recover in just 30 days? Were they really desperate for success? Read their stories here.
You Too Can Be A Champion!
September 28th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
I love the idea of being re-fired in lieu of retired! And I think Newman GOT that it isn’t about what you DO, it’s about WHO you ARE. You are a shining example of that, too, Jill! You are so good to help people in concrete ways.
Consider yourself hugged: {{{}}} (That’s a virtual hug)
-Connie
http://www.Twitter.com/motherconnie