Develop these five abilities as part of your personal-development quest.
It's the ability to soak it up, like you're doing today. Be like a sponge. Don't miss anything. Don't miss the words. Don't miss the atmosphere. Don't miss the color. Don't miss the scenario. Don't miss what's going on.
Most people are just trying to get through the day. Be committed to learn to get from the day. Don't just get through it; get from it. Learn from it. Let the day teach you. Join the university of life. What a difference that will make in your future. Commit yourself to learning. Commit yourself to absorbing. Be like a sponge. Get it. Don't miss it.
A friend of mine is so gifted in this area. I think he has soaked up and remembers everything that's ever happened to him. He can tell you where he was as a teenager and what he did and what he said and what she said and how they felt and what color the sky was and what was going on that day.
Here's a good saying for you to jot down: "Wherever you are, be there!" Be there to absorb it. Be there to soak it up. Take pictures of your mind. Let your soul and heart take pictures. Get it. Capture it. Absorb it. The ability to get it is such an important ability to develop. Don't miss it. Don't be casual in getting it. Casualness leads to casualties.
The ability to respond means the ability to let life touch you. Don't let it kill you, but let it touch you. Let sad things make you sad. Let happy things make you happy. Give in to the emotion. Let the emotion strike you -- not just the words, and not just the image. Let the feelings strike you. Let the emotion strike you.
Our emotions need to be as educated as our intellect is. It's important to know how to feel. It's important to know how to respond. It's important to let life in, to let it touch you.
I'm the greatest guy in the world to take to the movies. I get into a good movie. I want a good movie to make me laugh, make me cry, scare me to death, teach me something, take me high, take me low. I don't want a movie just to leave me as I was when I came into the theater. I want it to touch me, to do something to me.
Reflect means go back over. Study it again. Go back through the cassettes one more time. Read the text one more time. But there's more to it than that. Go back over your day. As I put it, run the tapes again, so that the day locks in firmly.
Here are some good times to reflect:
One good time to reflect is at the end of the day. Take a few minutes at the end of the day to go back over it. Who did you see, what did they say, what happened and how did you feel? Reflect on what happened so that you capture that day. A day is a piece of the mosaic of your life. Number one, don't treat the day casually. Number two, get from the day. And then, number three, go back over the day so that it locks in. Lock in that experience -- the knowledge, the sights, the sounds, the panorama, the color, the emotion, the picture of the day -- so that it will serve you for the future.
Next, take a few hours at the end of the week to reflect. Go back over your Day-Timer. Go back over your calendar. Go back over your appointment book. Where did you go, who did you see, how did it feel, and what went on? Capture that week. A week is a pretty good chunk of time.
Next, take half a day at the end of the month to reflect. And do the same thing again. Go back over what you read. Go back over what you heard. Go back over what you saw. Go back over the feelings. Capture it so that it serves you.
Next, take a weekend at the end of the year to establish this year firmly in your consciousness, firmly in your experience bank, so that you have it, so that it never disappears.
Here's what's really powerful; learning to gather up the past and invest it in the future. Gather up today, and invest it in tomorrow. Gather up this week, and invest it in the next week. Gather up this year, and invest it in the next year. That's so much more powerful than hanging on for one more year, hanging in there, seeing what's going to happen.
Learn: study. Part of the personal-development quest is becoming better than you are, more valuable than you are, not only in terms of economics but also in terms of motherhood, in terms of fatherhood, in terms of being a better brother, a better colleague, in terms of making a better contribution to the family, to society, to the community, to the church, to the office, to the partnership. Work on yourself. Then you bring more value to the partnership, to the marriage, to the franchise, to the corporation, to the enterprise, to the community, to the nation.
Self-development; personal development. The best contribution you can make to someone else is self-development -- not self-sacrifice. Self-sacrifice only earns contempt. Self-development earns respect. Pity the mother who says, "I'm going to give up my life for my children." Self-sacrifice is not noble. Self-development, which is self-investment, is noble. If you work on yourself and become more valuable, think of what that will do for your friendships.
And it takes, I think, these disciplines, these abilities, to acquire those gifts, those skills, that value, so that we bring more. We bring more to the next week, we bring more to the next month and we bring more to the next year when we absorb, respond and reflect!
Take action. Don't be hasty if haste isn't required. But don't lose much time. The time to act is when the idea is hot and the emotion is strong.
Someone will say to me, "Mr. Rohn, I'd like to have a library like yours." If you feel strong about that, you have to get the first book, and then get the second book, before the feeling passes and before the idea gets dim. Take action pronto. If you don't take immediate action, here's what happens. We call it the law of diminishing intent. We intend to when the idea strikes us. We intend to when the emotion is high. But if we don't translate that into action fairly soon, the intent starts to diminish. And a month from now, it's weak. A year from now, it's gone.
So act. Set up a discipline when the emotions are high and the idea is strong and clear and powerful.
Now, here's the positive side. Every new discipline affects the rest of your disciplines. That's why action is so important. The least action, the smallest action -- take it. Because when you start accomplishing and the value starts to return from that one action, it will inspire you to do the next one and the next one and the next one. When you start walking around the block, that will inspire you to get an apple. When you get an apple, that will inspire you to get a book. When you get a book, that will inspire you to keep a journal. When you keep a journal, that will inspire you to grow, to develop some skills. All disciplines affect each other. Every lack of discipline affects the rest. Every new discipline affects the rest. The key is to diminish the lack and set up the new. And you've started a whole new life process.
Pass something along to someone else. If you pick up a good idea today, pass it along. Don't keep it to yourself. Pass it along. Pass along a book. Say, "Hey, I found a book that really helped me. I found a book that got me thinking. I found a book that changed my health. I found a book that inspired me." Pass it along.
Here's what's exciting about sharing. If you share an idea with 10 people, each of them gets to hear it once, but you get to hear it 10 times. So it's probably going to do more for you than it is for them. But everybody wins. When somebody shares, everybody wins.
Share your ideas. Share your experiences. Share your knowledge. You an receive just as much pleasure as I do -- giving this seminar is one of my joys in life. When I give a seminar like this, I make the best investment I can in terms of words and spirit and heart and soul and time and energy. I don't have to work this hard. But I gladly work this hard. Why? I want the returns. Your words touch my life. That's heavy-weight stuff. You can't buy it with money. But I'm telling you that you can get the same sort of return by recommending a book to someone. Somebody will read that book, and then he'll read another one, and he'll read another one, and he'll come to you someday and say, "You got me started. That book you recommended turned my lights on, turned my mind around, got me thinking, got me pondering, and I've been on track every since."
You can get just as much praise as I do if you'll share. Share with your children. Share with your colleagues. Share with everybody who comes within your sphere.
Share.
Now, here's something else that sharing does. It not only helps the person you share with, but it also makes you bigger than you are.
Now, why should you want your capacity to grow? For a very self-interested reason: to hold more of the next experience.
Some people sitting in this audience will get more out of this seminar than others will. If you haven't been into expanding your capacity lately, you might not get much from this seminar. But if you've been into expanding your capacity and you've been sharing, if you've been doing all this stuff, there's no telling what all this could mean to you today--this chance to grow, change, develop, absorb, take in. I'm asking you to expand and grow so you can hold more during the next experience.
Some people can't be very happy. You could pour out happiness on the whole world, and some people wouldn't be very happy. Why? They're not big enough. If you're small--small in comprehension, small in the ability to think and wonder, small in appreciation--you don't get much, no matter how much is poured out. Prosperity could be poured out on the whole country, and some people wouldn't get much wiser. Now, some people aren't going to get much because they turned their cup upside down. You couldn't put anything in it.
Learn to share. It's a glorious, glorious experience.
* What big idea have you had on your mind lately? What is the first thing you must do to begin sharing it with the world?
