January 16th, 2012
You were not sent here to live an ordinary life. You were not sent here to just make it through unscathed. It would be like using a powerful computer to hold the door open. You were meant to create answers. You were meant to go into the diamond mine and figure out how to get the diamonds and not waste a whole life sitting at the entrance waiting for someone in the mine to throw you a tiny diamond.
However your life has been up until now, what matters is what you do today and tomorrow. Between right now and the end of your life you can rewrite your legacy. If there are wonderful things in your past you can highlight and build upon them. If your past is a little murky you can make the rest of your days so brilliant that the murkiness will be obliterated.
This is it. This is exactly the moment that the rest of your life starts. This is wet clay, a blank canvass, the first page of a new journal. Some day in the future you will look back at this week and either pass right over it or you will look back at this week and say “That was the week that I started.”
Two questions will surface if you decide to start. First, “What do I start?” The answer is; take a step toward who you dream of being. Second, “What if I fail again?” The answer is; this time you can’t fail.
There is no second chance on any yesterday. There is only a limited amount of first chances on the days in front of you. This one, right now, begs you to begin. Smile to yourself, commit and begin. A future you will be very happy that you did.
(C) 2012 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
May 3rd, 2010
If you are old enough to read this, you have probably failed more times than you can remember. You’ve made humbling mistakes both large and small. You’ve searched for and probably found a place, a level where chances of failing or making another mistake are now minimized and you reside there. The only problem with this is that it sucks!
Your life was never meant to be entirely predictable. You were not blessed with your reflexes and your accumulated knowledge and your experiences so that you could hide from life. It’s time to live bigger! It’s time to expand. There’s been enough contracting in your life. This is all about you. No one else has to change. This is about you saying YES! to life. This is about you dreaming again.
Grab some paper and a pen and write down some dreams. If you don’t have any, make them up. The bigger the better. Make them wilder and more outlandish than they have ever been. Put it all in there. After an hour or two on that piece of paper there will be a key that opens up the door to your bigger life. Will there be more failures and mistakes? You betcha! But there will also be thrills and celebrations and that amazing feeling that you are alive and anything is possible. Start thinking possibilities. Go have some fun! If you’ve lost the map to fun just do something in a different way and fun will show up. You know that you are ready.
©2010 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
March 22nd, 2010
Every one of us is looking for that secret additive, that one thing that if we add it to our life, our life breaks out in joy and possibilities that would rival the finale of any fireworks show on July fourth.We read books, listen to CDs, watch videos, attend seminars, quiz those who we think have found it and we plod onward, becoming more and more serious and a bit frustrated too until one day, by the Grace of God, there it is and our life lights up. It usually shows up in a quote but it can also come as a flash of inspiration. However it comes, you know without a doubt that EVERYTHING is now possible. Your dreams, your plans, your goals, suddenly you know that you can make them happen. What is this secret ingredient?
Ralph Waldo Emerson pointed it out when he wrote “Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.” Walter Chrysler said “The real secret of success is enthusiasm”. Oliver Wendell Holmes made it clear “It’s faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes a life worth living”. There’s your secret additive!
We believe that we will have enthusiasm when we find something to be joyful about. Of course we will but if we don’t have it long before that we will never get to joyful! Look at those places in your life that have stagnated. Is there enthusiasm anywhere to be found in those places? Of course not that’s why they stagnated.
You don’t have to go out and find enthusiasm. You are the sole creator of your enthusiasm. If it is lacking it’s only because you are not producing it. Henry Ford stated it perfectly. “You can do anything if you have enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is the yeast that makes your hopes rise to the stars. With it, there is accomplishments. Without it there are only alibis.” The secret additive is sustained enthusiasm under any and all circumstances. BOOM! There go the fireworks!
©2010 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
March 9th, 2010
Climbing to the top of the mountain or crossing a high bridge or trail, every experienced guide has exactly the same advice. “Don’t look down! Look straight ahead!”. They say this because they know that if you start looking down you stand a very good chance of going down.
Our vision, where we are looking, is what determines where we are going. Fate can bring some heavy winds and some treacherous patches but by focusing on where we want to be, we keep going, we keep striving and we make it.
We may say that we want to get somewhere specific but where are we looking? Are we looking at what could go wrong? Are we looking at what other people might think or say? Are we looking at others who didn’t make it and were ridiculed? If we are looking at any of these, that’s where we are going!
It doesn’t matter what we planned or what we have invested. It only matters that our goal and our vision are in sync. It only matters that we are looking straight ahead to where we are going and that we have a burning desire to get there.
Where we have been has absolutely no bearing on where we want to go. What is behind us may have strengthened or weakened us but the next step forward is all about now and not then.
Look straight ahead and take a step today no matter how tiny and you are on your way.
©2010 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
December 30th, 2009
The New Year beckons to you. “What can I bring to you in these next twelve months?” it says expectantly.
“Oh, just a good year with no unpleasant surprises,” you say.
The New Year has heard it all before but is still shocked. “All you ever dreamed and all you ever imagined I can give you,” it says.
“Thanks but things are alright now and I don’t want to upset anything,” you say.
“Things are always changing. Let me change them in the direction you want,” it says.
“Oh no, no changes thank you. I’ve had enough changes to last a lifetime,” you say. “Just keep everything the way it is thank you. If you want to do something how about a vacation to that place we always go?”
“Why not something different, someplace different?”
“Oh no, you’re just looking for trouble when you get away from the tried and true,” you say.
“I can’t promise you a year without changes. I can’t get you closer to your dreams because you haven’t told me them. I can’t make this year any different. It will just be random again,” it says.
“Perfect!” you say. The New Year walks away, an unopened bag of treasures and adventures over its shoulder.
You walk into the other room and say “What do you want to do?” and the other person says for the umpteenth time “I don’t know. What do you want to do?”
Dream and plan and set some goals and the above conversation is a fable. Do nothing and it’s your life. Choose wisely.