Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 558 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Improve Yourself = Improve Your Results – Results

Thank you for joining us for our 5 days per week, wisdom and legacy podcast. This is Day 558 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 on an extended 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 have adapted it to The Five Trails on Life’s Trek.

We are broadcasting from our studio at The Big House in Marietta, Ohio. I have been able to be in the office all week and have enjoyed watching our pair of Red Shoulder Hawks as they arrived back to repair and prepare their nest for this year. They work hard to make sure the nest is ready for bringing new chicks into the world.

In addition to that, a few weeks ago we also had four large trees cut down by a professional tree service. To save costs, we requested that they just drop the trees and cut them into large sections. My plan for the weekend is to cut them into fireplace size logs. The diameter of the large sections will be a challenge, but it will provide a lot of firewood for the next few winters. Since I usually work 10-12 hours a day in front of the computer, I look forward to being outside performing physical labor as I have the opportunity. The more that I expand my skillset, the better person I am become overall.

We are continuing on our extended trek focusing on our 4^th trail which is The Trail of Results. Specifically, we will explore how better results are produced by becoming a better person. 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 fourth trail of this extended trek as we cover…

The Five Trails on Life’s Trek – Results Part 4

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

1. Philosophy
2. Attitude
3. Activity
4. Results
5. Lifestyle

1. Better Results Come From Being a Better Person

You first become and then you attract. You grow personally, and then you advance materially. Unfortunately, the vast majority of people seem to have the plan reversed. Their philosophy is “If I had more money, I would be a better person.” That is not the way life is designed to work. You cannot harvest a crop unless you first plant and then nurture it. Having more money or things doesn’t make you more, it merely magnifies what you already are. Those who cannot save a few pennies out of meager earnings will never be able to save dollars out of future fortunes. The same discipline it takes to put a few coins in a jar every week is the same discipline it takes to open a savings account or manage a large investment portfolio.

The conversation about your intended progress will only take you so far and promises about your future will only buy you a little time. Promises must soon be matched by performance. If your results do not appear in a reasonable amount of time, you run the risk of losing the trust of others in addition to your own self-respect. You may find that those who once believed you no longer do, and you will one day be left only with your well-intentioned, but unfulfilled pronouncements.

A loss of this magnitude is worth preventing. It is on the day when you discover your losses that you will taste the bitter pill of neglect. It is on that day when you will finally experience the agonizing consequences of self-delusion, procrastination, and unkempt promises.

Will you read the books, make the plans, make good use of your time, invest a portion of all that you earn, polish your current skills, attend classes to develop new skills, and get around better people to improve your chances for success? Will you tell the truth, improve your ability to communicate, use your journals, and give careful attention to all the virtues that success requires? Or will you be content to let the time slip through your fingers like grains of sand while you slowly lose self-confidence, the respect of others, and perhaps even the few possessions and valuable relationships that your past efforts have managed to attract into your life? Will you go on sitting idly by while your dreams diminish to memories as hope gives way to remorse? Surely not.

2. The Future Rewards Are Always There Waiting For You

As certainly as you once dreamed, you can dream again. As surely as you once believed, you can believe again. No matter where you are right now, you still have the ability to change it all.

The journey toward success is a journey of a thousand steps, and it begins with a single book or a single promise finally kept. It begins with the awakening of your sleeping spirit brought on by dreams of all that could be.

Any day you choose, you can stand up and take that first step on a journey that can lead you to a new and better way of life. You must not expect the results merely because you have begun the activity, but with continued effort and certain steps surely come to your future rewards. As we are told in Galatians 6:7-9, “Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant. Those who live only to satisfy their own sinful nature will harvest decay and death from that sinful nature. But those who live to please the Spirit will harvest everlasting life from the Spirit. So let’s not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up.”

We are deliberately taking our trek slowly on The Five Trails on Life’s Trek as we continue our hike today on the Trail of Results. Today you learned to harvest better results, then we must be continually planting better seeds of improvement into our lives. That is to say, you must become more valuable as a person and more valuable to others. To achieve better results in your life, you must plant the seeds of self-development. This concept is rooted in the basic fundamentals of the law of planting and harvesting. The law of planting and harvesting is always in force, just like the law of gravity.

Next Philosophy Friday we will explore The Value of New Skills. So join us next Friday for these additional insights. I know you will find these insights interesting and profitable in living a rich and satisfying life.

Our next trek is on Monday, and we will continue our series called The Tools in Gramps’ Backpack as we equip you with the tools needed to impact the lives of others. 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.

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!