Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 141 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom.

Life is About Creating Your Opportunity

Thank you for joining us for our 7 day a week, 7 minutes of wisdom podcast. This is Day 141 of our Trek. Yesterday we explored the nuggets of wisdom “A Time for Action and A Time to be Fruitful.”  I have learned these concepts from Jim Rohn, one of my virtual mentors, and we applied Wisdom-Trek logic to the nuggets that we discovered. We will continue on this trail of nugget exploration today in order to find the wisdom of creating your opportunity and why success is important. If you have any of your own observations, comments, or questions as we explore these nuggets of wisdom, please share them on the comment section of our daily journal pages.

We are recording our podcast from our studio at The Big House in Marietta, Ohio, and by the time this episode airs, we will be back in Charlotte for the week. After a busy day Saturday working on our leaf harvest, on Sunday we were able to celebrate our grandson Gideon’s 6^th birthday. It was a great day, and we are so glad to be able to be there. Afterward, we headed back to Charlotte for a busy week of activities before we head back to Marietta on Friday of this week.

For today, let us enjoy the beautiful changing leaves on our hike as we seek additional nuggets of wisdom that will help us on our trek of life. As we travel through life, we need the keen sense of ability and shrewdness to take ordinary or even sub-par situations and create opportunities from them. It is important to our overall success. We need to seize the day and the opportunities while they are available. As the Apostle Paul wrote in his letter to the church in Ephesus in chapter 5 verses 15 through 17, “Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.”

So let’s first look at the wisdom nugget of:

Creating Your Opportunity

An enterprising person is one who comes across a pile of scrap metal and sees the making of a wonderful sculpture. An innovative person is one who drives through an old decrepit part of town and sees a new housing development. An ingenious person is one who sees opportunity in all areas of life.

To be resourceful is to keep your eyes open and your mind active. It’s to be skilled enough, confident enough, creative enough, and disciplined enough to seize opportunities that present themselves,regardless of the economy or other external situations.

A person with an enterprising attitude says, “Find out what you can before action is taken.” Do your homework. Do the research. Be prepared. Be resourceful. Do all you can in preparation for what is yet to come.

Enterprising people always see the future in the present. Enterprising people always find a way to take advantage of a situation, not be burdened by it. And, enterprising people aren’t lazy. They don’t wait for opportunities to come to them. They create the opportunities. Enterprise means always finding a way to keep yourself actively working toward your ambition.

Enterprise is two things. The first is creativity. You need creativity to see what’s out there and to shape it to your advantage. You need creativity to look at the world a little differently. You need creativity to take a different approach and to be different.

What goes hand-in-hand with the creativity of enterprise? The courage to be creative is the second requirement. You need courage to see things differently, courage to go against the crowd, courage to take a different approach, courage to stand alone if you have to, and courage to choose activity over inactivity.

And lastly, being enterprising doesn’t just relate to the ability to make money. Being enterprising also means feeling good enough about yourself, having enough self-worth to want to seek advantages and opportunities that will make a difference in your future and the future of others. By doing so, you will increase your confidence, your courage, your creativity and your self-worth, as well as your enterprising nature.

The next nugget of wisdom we want to explore today is:

Success IS Everything

Someone once said to me that success isn’t everything, and I think I know what they really meant. I believe they really meant that money wasn’t everything, and I certainly agree with that. But, I do believe that success IS everything.

First, you need to succeed to survive. We must take the seasons and learn how to use them with the seed, the soil, and the rain of opportunity to learn how to sustain ourselves and our family. But, second is to then succeed to flourish in every part of your life. A good question to ask mature people is “If you could do better, should you?” And, I think almost everybody would answer the question in the positive.

If you could improve your health, shouldn’t you do that? If you could learn more, shouldn’t you do that? If you could earn more and share more, shouldn’t you do that? If you could improve your relationships and spirituality, shouldn’t you do that? And, I think that is what success is really all about. It is not just a destination that is set for everybody to try and go for. It is like Zig said, “Improving in every area of your life to see if you can’t with satisfaction at the end of the day, week, month and year and say ‘I have made excellent progress this year, for myself, for my family, for my business, my career and my health.’” I think everybody recognizes that kind of success is legitimate and something we should all strive for.

The concept of success and reward is woven throughout the Scriptures. It is usually tied to working hard and obeying God. Both of these attributes are attributes that we have control over, so the ability for success is within our control. Joshua 1:8 says, “Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.”

Proverbs 2:6-8 reminds, “For the Lord gives wisdom;
from his mouth come knowledge and understanding.
⁷ He holds success in store for the upright,
he is a shield to those whose walk is blameless,
⁸ for he guards the course of the just
and protects the way of his faithful ones.”

Ecclesiastes 10:10 states, “If the ax is dull and its edge unsharpened, more strength is needed, but skill will bring success.”

While we will never be completely successful in all areas of life, we can strive toward being more successful. It is in the striving to be a little bit better today than yesterday, in our speech, our language, our health, and in everything we can possibility think of that we find success.

So yes, in my opinion, it is good to succeed!

On our Trek today, our wisdom nuggets taught us that we are responsible for creating our opportunities by being enterprising, resourceful, creative, and courageous. We also learned that when we have the proper concept of success, we should pursue it in everything that we do. As we continue on our trail, come along with us tomorrow for another day of our Wisdom-Trek, Creating a Legacy, and we will search for more of these precious wisdom nuggets that are more valuable than silver.

That will finish our podcast for today. Remember to listen to your daily dose of wisdom on Wisdom-Trek.com, or subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher, SoundCloud, Spreaker, or YouTube so the episodes will be downloaded to you automatically each day. Please share Wisdom-Trek with your family and friends through email, Facebook, Twitter, or in person so they can come along with us each day.

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 each day.

As we take this Trek 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 tomorrow!