Lifelong Learning and Why You Need to Embrace It

Welcome back to “New Man, New Woman, New Week!”  Oh, Baby!  I’m ready to bring it today.  I am fired up because you know what we’re talking about?  Commitment to lifelong learning.  I learned this lesson from one of my mentors, John Gordon–unbelievable author, unbelievable speaker.  He’s had a huge influence on my life, and that’s a valuable lesson I learned from him.  Commit to being a lifelong learner.  That’s how we continue to grow.

Now here’s one of the things that’s kind of fun for me, right?  We get to be together every single Monday, and, okay, it’s true, I’ve written four books; I’ve spent thousands of hours researching successful people and things that can make you successful.  I do the research.  I read the books.  I spend all this time.  Why do I partly do that?  So that you don’t have to; so that in four or five minutes every single Monday, we can light that fire, I can share lessons, and you can have fun on your journey.  But here’s the deal, sometimes you do have to take some time to do your learning, to find the things that you enjoy.  So one of the questions that I receive all the time is, “Okay, you’ve written four books, but what do you read?”  So I thought it would be kind of fun to share with you a few books that I think could make a significant difference in your life.

So here we go.  The first one, from my mentor, who’s really the reason I’m filming this video, “Lifelong Learning,” John Gordon.  He wrote a book called, Training Camp.  Now he wrote and international best seller, New York Times, Wall Street Times best seller, The Energy Buzz, but Training Camp, that’s one of my favorites.  You know, being a guy who has the opportunity to do performance coaching with guys in the NFL and on the PGA Tour, I like the little sports flair that Training Camp has.  I think it’s a great book.  It’s got very valuable lessons, and it’s told in the form of a fable, so you can kind of go on this journey with this player and this coach relationship.  Even if you don’t like sports, it’s an amazing book.

How about another one from another one of my mentors?  Jason Selk.  10-Minute Toughness.  And he also has a book, Executive Toughness.  I’ve read both; incredible books on what it takes to be successful in life, like that mental journey.  One of the first rules in sports psychology is that for an athlete to perform at his highest level, that athlete cannot just rely on physical ability alone, they also have to couple that with the mental, the mental side of what it takes to drive being successful, and that really stems to one of the quotes that I love, right, that we always share, and you can Tweet this later if you want, right, just make sure you tag me @ContinuedFight, okay, “Your success is not just about changing your habits, it’s about changing the way that you think.”  10-Minute Toughness, Executive Toughness, man, those books will get your fired up on your journey.

Another author that I love?  Robin Sharma.  Now I’d put Robin in one of these categories.  I’ve never met him, but that’s a mentor.  I’ve never met him, but he’s one of my mentors; I look up to him.  Two of his books:  The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari and Discover Your Destiny, amazing books for you on your journey.  See that’s what it’s about; it’s about continuing to learn, continuing to challenge yourself.  What more can you learn in your life?  Try those books.  Try other books, right?  We all have those books that have been given to us and it just sits on a shelf for a long time.  It happened to me one time with a dear friend of mine, John O’Leary.  His parents, Dennis and Susan O’Leary wrote a book called, Overwhelming Odds, about his unbelievable fight from being burned on 99% of his body when he was 9 years old, given a half percent chance of making it through the first night, and what John did was, and it’s told through this story, is he believed in himself.  And when he gave me a copy of that book for the first time, I’ve done what so many of us do.  I put it on a bookshelf; it was there for about six months.  And John and I were having coffee, and we’re having coffee and he says, “How did you like the book?” And I said, “Uh-oh,” and I had to look at him and say, “John, I haven’t read it yet.”  I said, “I’m sorry, it’s been on the bookshelf.”  And I went home that night, I cracked open that book after I went to bed.  I had a flashlight in the bed because my wife had already gone to sleep.  I read the book cover to cover.  I was up until 2 o’clock in the morning.

So why am I sharing that with you?  Because part of the story is to tell you don’t wait to commit to being a lifelong learner.  Do it now.  All these great books, all these great authors, things that you know you need to do to commit to being a lifelong learner, choose to do them now!  Go read those great books, but the bottom line–here’s the big theme of today–commit to taking action as you become a lifelong learner in your life.  Not for me, not for any of these other authors, but do it for you because of what it will mean for you on your journey, because that’s what this is all about.

New Man, New Woman, New Week every single Monday!  You know what it’s about–it’s about YOU!  It’s about your success journey, you giving it your all in your life.  I’m fired up to be with you next Monday.  Until then, go do great things.

Lifelong Learning!! Episode 17 Volume 1