“A dream doesn’t become reality through magic; it takes sweat, determination and hard work.”
Colin Powell

I see a lot a people every day give up on their dreams. It’s sad we have to fight for what you want. This world is not about “you” or “me,” it’s about us. Life is about the pure emotion that you feel in your stomach when you fear not finishing your purpose in life. What’s worse is not finishing or even trying to accomplish your dreams. When you want to give up or give in, think of one word: Love. “And above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins” 1 Peter 4:8.

What else is there to do when we have tried so many things throughout history? Hate, anger, and war does not push us any further than anything else we have tried. The greatest human need is to feel valued. When one doesn’t feel valued, they seek acceptance or validation, and at times it can be catastrophic if a human being seeks this acceptance in the wrong place or wrong way. As we grow, it is so important that we know that we are valued, loved, and have a secure place to call home. Parenting is a key component which to the development of a child. Nature versus nurture is one of the keys that will teach you to strengthen and help a young one bond to other human beings in a healthy and productive ways; these teachings start very early on. I believe an understanding of purpose and dreams should also start at an early age. Parents, it’s so important to teach your children to have dreams. Don’t wait until it’s too late! Don’t wait until they’re 18 or older, help them develop and explore what’s out there at a young age. Help your children go look under rocks to find what’s out there. The longer you wait the more you risk your children not figuring it out. A tool you can use as a parent and person to achieve this is to turn to scripture: “Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. Whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away.” 1 Corinthians 13: 4-8.
Remember to fight the eternal fight, and Never Give Up.

By Matthew L Cox

Christina Millan
PSR/Team Lead
Never Give Up Behavioral Health Services
3111 S. Valley View Blvd, STE G101
Las Vegas, NV 89102
Office: (702) 951-9751
Cell: (702) 426-3328

“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.” Robert Louis Stevenson

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On Sun, Nov 16, 2014 at 10:33 AM, Matt wrote:
I see a a lot a people everyday “Give Up” On there dreams. It’s sad we have to fight for them. This world is not about “you” or me it’s about us. The pure emotion that you feel in your stomach or the fear of not finishing your purpose in life. What’s worse? not finishing or even trying. So when you what to “give up and give in” thank of one word “Love” 1Peter 4:8 “And above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins.”

What Else is there we have tried so many other things throughout history hate anger and war has not got us any further. The greatest human need is to feel valued. So when one doesn’t feel valued they look for seeking acceptance or validation and at times it can be catastrophic if it’s human being is seeking that in the wrong way. As we grow up it is so important that we know that we are valued that we are loved that we have a secure place called home. Parenting is such a key to the extent of a child’s development. Nature versus nurture is one of the keys that will strengthen and help a young one bond to other human beings in a healthy and productive way this starts very early. Which I also believe understanding of purpose and dreams should start at an early age. Parents it’s so important to teach your children to have dreams to get help them understand what they want to do at a young age. Don’t wait till it’s too late don’t wait till they’re 18 or older help them develop them help them to explore help them go look under rocks to fine with their town is the longer you wait the more risk they have not figuring it out. The tool you can use as a parent and person to achieve this is the following:

1 Corinthians 13

4 Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up;

5 does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil;

6 does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth;

7 bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

8 Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away.

As remember to fight the internal fight and never give up.
By Matthew L Cox

Tribes By Seth Godin – Book Review (Leadership, Vision, Marketing, Business, Inspiration)
Tribes – Book Summary
In Tribes, Seth Godin defines a tribe as a group of people, who are connected to:

One another
A leader
An idea.

Seth Godin uses this definition as a framework to discuss various groups he has picked as examples of successful Tribes. The examples range from Mich Matthews who inspires a team at Microsoft, to Joel Spoelsky, the owner of a software service business, who also has a number of engineers that follow him via his blog, and Nathan Winograd who is on a mission to stop (or limit) the number of dogs put to sleep at animal shelters – one shelter and one city at a time.

The book is laid out in a series of division, but I would hesitate to call them chapters. Seth Godin jumps around quite a bit, but the subtitle highlights the message of this book: We Need You to Lead Us. Throughout the book Godin encourages readers to find their Tribe, step up, and lead.

Another current running throughout the books is that tribes used to be more localized – however the web has changed all that. New technology and modes of communication such as blogs, online video publishing and social networking are making it easier to find and nurture geographically dispersed tribes.

Godin’s Tribes is not a how to manual – rather, he picks examples from society and then discusses Tribes in the context of “this is how it’s done”. The main themes running through the book are those of leadership and that anyone can do this – it’s just a matter of stepping up.

My Personal Review and Experience
I have read Tribes 6 or 7 times in the past year. Every year I read a number of books, and a handful of them turn out to be life changing – for me, Tribes is one of those books.

Tribes is a book I could not put down the first time I read it. Part of this may be my personal bias however – I had no idea what to expect when I first purchased the book, and was surprised to see the introduction open with an anecodate about Joel Spoelsky. I immediately felt connected to the book, because I consider myself a member of Joel Spoelsky’s tribe. Not only am I regular reader of his blog, I have used the software Fog Creek sells (Fogbugz), and for a long time was a subscriber to the StackOverflow podcast that Joel co-hosted with Jeff Atwood.

Some of the other examples also hit close to home, such as Gary Vaynerchuck, whose work and videos I have found inspirational and motivational. I am excited about reading Gary’s book, Crush It, when it comes out.

Ultimately, Tribes is a book about leadership and community, and I found it to be an inspirational read. I will pull out some quotes about leadership that I found especially inspirational, however much of what I got from the book was reading the stories spread over a number of pages. There weren’t necessarily bite size quotes or sound bites that jumped out at me, just those stories as a whole.

Hello, Leaders

I think when it comes to this area the biggest mistake I made in the last few years as a leader is not doing as they talked about when it comes to new hires. When a new team member comes onto the team it training making sure they are able to do the job along with checking their intelligence before you let them go and trust them 100%. Stephen Covey calls this smart trust.
Dave, talks about micromanage but he states make sure you train, train, train and train some more and if they don’t fit within the team values after all the time given. Cut them loose! This is where You learned to step up and make the quick decisions. When it comes to hiring, I have now learned to do it slowly and efficiently. it comes to hiring, I have now learned to do it slowly and efficiently. I

3 Leadership Mistakes to Avoid

By:https://www.entreleadership.com/authors/131

EntreLeadership Team July 11, 2014
Being a leader is a lot like writing a novel. Everyone thinks they can do it, but few excel. Fortunately, it is a skill that can be learned. And the most common way to gain that experience is by making big whopping mistakes. Earning a Ph.D. in mess-uppery is an essential part of your business education.

Just ask Dave. The lessons he teaches at EntreLeadership Master Series are culled from mistakes. “We screwed up, that screw up brought us pain, and we vowed to never get hit that way again,” he says. “Making mistakes and learning from them is crucial to winning.”

Less painful, Dave adds, is learning from the mistakes of others. So with that spirit in mind, here are a few of the most common leadership mistakes or problems along with solutions for fixing them.

Fear of Failure
A small amount of fear is a healthy thing, making you stop and think before making any decisions. As Dave says, it motivates you to leave the cave, kill something, and bring it home. But when it paralyzes you, it’s a huge problem.

The Solution: So how do you get over being scared? First, recognize that you are fearful and your concerns may be well founded. A decision could cause you to be sued or lose money, customers or team members, but you can’t let that possibility drive you. The best way to kick the fear right where it hurts most is to come up with a system to deal with it. Setting a deadline, gathering facts and options, and working out the worst-case scenario are just a few examples of the steps you can take to get over your fear.

The Quick Hire
One of the biggest mistakes business owners make is hiring too quickly simply because they desperately need someone. It does nothing but create more problems down the road. What’s more, you’ll probably go through the same hiring process just a few months later.

The Solution: Take whatever time is needed to find the perfect person for the job. Get the right people on the bus. At Dave’s, his people are run through the gauntlet before they are ever hired—including at least four interviews, a personality test and a meet-the-spouse session. The result of all that scrutiny is a company full of happy rock stars and an extremely low turnover rate.

“Nobody Does It Better” Syndrome
Yes, we know. It’s your baby and no one can treat it as well as you. But micromanaged employees will often just leave, simply because they won’t put up with it. In order for your team members to become stronger and grow, you have to let go.

The Solution: If you trust your team members, step back and let them fly, no matter how nervous it makes you. Stop micromanaging them and allow them to perform to their full potential. There is an exception to this rule, however. Dave says when someone first joins the team, they should be heavily micromanaged until they prove their competency and integrity. He calls it “training.”

The above mistakes are just a few of the most common. But there are many, many more you’ll discover on your own. Just remember: Never let mistakes hold you back. As playwright George Bernard Shaw once said, “A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.” So get out there, mess up and learn.

Network with other EntreLeaders, join Mastermind groups, take your team through EntreLeadership Master Series online, and much more by joining All Access. There is no contract, so you can cancel at any time. Try it for a month and see what you are missing. Sign Me Up!

– See more at: https://www.entreleadership.com/articles/3-leadership-mistakes-to-avoid_1?et_cid=3387585&et_rid=0&linkid=http%253a%252f%252fwww.entreleadership.com%252farticles%252f3-leadership-mistakes-to-avoid_1%2523sthash.GDmPpeIp.dpbs#sthash.sMjSolP0.dpuf

How I Tackle a Big Writing Project
By Leo Babauta

Writing something big is one of the things people tend to procrastinate on the most.

It doesn’t matter what the writing project might be: writing a novel, a non-fiction book, a long article, a thesis paper, a bunch of pages for a website. Whatever it is, the writer will find a way to procrastinate.

I count myself among those happy procrastinators. But in the last 7 years, I’ve managed to write a couple thousand of blog posts, a print book, about 10 ebooks, and numerous online courses, not to mention a couple of novel attempts totaling 200K words. I’ve figured out a thing or two that works.

To help my fellow procrastinators writers, I thought I’d share how I tackled an ebook I decided to write last week about Letting Go (I’m releasing it for free next week on my birthday, as a gift to you guys).

I wrote the book in two days last week, and edited it in another day this week.

Here’s what I did.

First, I defined and thought through my problem. I’ve been working through a process of letting go that actually helps with pretty much any problem, if you’re willing to do it. This is what I wanted to share with you guys, to help you through difficulties in your life, small and large. So I imagined my typical reader, and what his or her life might be like. I walked through a typical day, from waking up to work to socializing and taking care of responsibilities. What problems might someone like that face?

I tried to visualize how I’d deal with those problems, using the letting go method that’s been working for me. What steps would I take? What doubts and concerns would I have about the process? What would stop me from doing it? What would be helpful to know?

Then I started jotting down notes. After visualizing all of that, I had some ideas. Not organized, just random stuff. So I jotted notes down on paper, in a notebook, and also on a text document. No order, just get things down. I can organize later.

I kept thinking through all of this, for a few days. In the shower, while I was walking, while I meditated, during workouts, as I ate. It was foremost on my mind, and as I thought of ideas and problems, I’d jot them down.

Big step: I committed. I told an ebook designer that I’d have the manuscript to him by Wednesday, so that he’d have enough time to have it done by the end of the month. In my mind, I was now fully committed, instead of just thinking about doing it. This is a huge step, one of the most important. You have to watch your mind trying to get out of being committed, and don’t let it run.

Now that I was committed, I set aside big blocks of time to work on the book. I knew that I’d never get it done unless I made the time, so I canceled appointments, said no to meetings, did a bunch of work so my work schedule was clear. Marked off the writing blocks on my calendar.

Next I chunked out the writing. There’s no way to write 10,000 words at once. You can only write them one at a time, one sentence at a time, one paragraph at a time. And yet our minds think of the work as one big thing, one scary thing, and so we procrastinate. Writing a paragraph isn’t hard, but writing a book seems terrifying. So I try not to think of the entire project — there’s no way for me to actually tackle the project. A short chapter, or a section of that chapter — I can do that in one small chunk of work.

So I decided to keep the chapters very short (they’re more readable that way) and work on one short chapter at a time. Not think about the entire thing, just the one piece of work in front of me. Something doable, not scary. That seems obvious, but you’d be surprised how often we procrastinate because we’re thinking of the entire project.

Then I procrastinated. No, I’m not immune to procrastination. It happens to me, inevitably. I put off the writing by working on other, more comfortable tasks. But I found several things that worked this time (and many other times):

I told a friend that I was procrastinating, and committed to getting to work on the book. I texted him later, as I successfully wrote the book, and that felt great.
I reminded myself of why I was writing it. It wasn’t for my vainglory, but to help people. I pictured the people I was trying to help, and visualized their pain, felt it in my chest. I could feel anger, frustration, sadness, grief. I knew this was something I wanted to help with, if at all possible. And so this was my intention in writing: to help people in pain. And this is a huge motivator.
I examined my fears. My fears were about failing, about not getting the book done, about not doing it well, about people not liking it. These were all rooted in ideals, fantasies. This is a process I was actually writing about in the book, so I used it on myself, and it worked. I let go of the ideals, and worked without expectations, trying to be in the moment as I wrote, being grateful for that moment.
I would watch my mind try to run. Fear still came up — fear of discomfort, of doing something hard. My mind wanted to go check social media or Hacker News or blogs I like to read. I saw my mind trying to run, but I didn’t let it. I stayed with the writing.
Once I got the ball rolling, it got much easier. I just had to write a single sentence. That’s all. That’s easy as hell. So I did, and once I did, the second sentence was tremendously easier. Then the third, even easier. The first chapter started to come, then other chapters came one after the other.

I worked in little bits, took breaks, worked again. I would sit down to write, and do it for 10-15 minutes. Maybe a bit longer if I was on a roll. Then get up, stretch, get some water, maybe clean or take care of some other household task. This allowed my mind to take a break. It got my blood circulating again, which is good for the brain. Then I’d sit down to write again. Repeat, over and over.

I worked for about five hours that first day, once I got the ball rolling, then 3-4 hours the next day, and wrote 10K words in that time.

It felt amazing.

I sent the draft to some friends. I asked them to read it over if they had time, and if they had any suggestions or found any typos, to let me know. If you send it to 10 friends, about 3-4 will get back to you with changes. That’s a good number.

I spent a day editing and revising, and wrote a new chapter based on the suggestion of one friend. I tend to put off the editing but I had a deadline of Wednesday, so that pushed me to get on top of it. I edited, revised, edited.

And sent the manuscript, triumphantly, to my ebook designer.

I can’t wait to share it with all of you next week.

POSTED: FRIDAY, APRIL 25, 2014

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As an entrepreneur who’s attending college, I am often approached by classmates who are seeking to start their own business. Some have great concepts, yet when I ask them what they’ve done to advance their ideas, the answer is usually nothing.

Anyone can start a business, regardless of his or her age. After growing my own companies and mingling with successful entrepreneurs, I’ve come to realize that most entrepreneurs share these are five common characteristics:

Related: Five Creativity Exercises to Find Your Passion

1. Passion. A startup founder is often driven by the quest for deeper purpose beyond the sheer mechanics of operating a business. My mission for my startup, Yes Man Watches, is to empower people to consider the most valuable asset in their lives: time. I rise early every morning because I don’t want to waste my day. If you have passion for your startup, this will drive you to turn your idea into a reality. Without that missing spark, you’ll lack the necessary motivation to put in all the early mornings and late nights to get your business off the ground.

2. Perseverance. Entrepreneurs need to be able to deal with obstacles. A business does not get built overnight, and turning your idea into a reality will take time. You’ll have to become accustomed to people saying no to you. What makes entrepreneurs great is having the perseverance to grow regardless of how many times they are shut down. When creating the supply chain for my startup, we screened two dozen watch manufacturers. After approaching through about 10, I became quite frustrated at hearing that my company’s patent-pending buckle couldn’t be made. Without perseverance, I would have given up.

Follow-up is key. People might present plenty of excuses for not getting back in touch with you. Yet if you show persist in trying to make things happen, you’ll probably succeed. For a Kickstarter campaign, I contacted dozens of writers at a single media outlet in the hopes of reaching one who might write about my company. Even though the conversion rate may be minuscule, it only takes one person to make a difference.

Related: Shoestring Budget? No Problem. Just Be Creative.

3. Resourcefulness. A vital ability for an entrepreneur is knowing how to make the most of what you have. Your assets as an entrepreneur will be limited, so use them to the fullest. Tapping into a network is key. When looking for a photographer, I reached out to the photography department at my university and the staff sent an email blast to students looking to build their portfolio. Within a week, I had professional-looking photos.

4. Open-Mindedness. As an entrepreneur, you may think you’ve zeroed in on a business plan, but you’ll need to learn to take in the opinions of others. Then if it appears that your plan won’t work, then adjust. As Mark Cuban once said, “Follow the green, not the dream.” If your dream startup won’t make you any money, you may need to change your focus. When my friend Morgan Schwanke started OnMyBlock, he originally wanted to focus solely on a social platform for college students to find off-campus housing. He now concentrates his startup on every aspect of renting an off-campus space; it provides tenant listings to landlords and facilitates the making of rent payments.

Related: 50 Signs You Might Be an Entrepreneur

5. Spongelike nature. Being an entrepreneur involves a learning process. If you’re not willing to learn, think about leaving the startup world. You need to be able to soak in everything and anything you can, just like a sponge. The more you learn, the better. A saying I’m fond of is “One who knows all the answers has not been asked all the questions.” When starting Yes Man Watches, I honestly didn’t know anything about watchmaking. I looked up everything I could and soaked in all the information. Now I know quite a bit about watches, from the types of stainless steel used to make the watch case and the variety of battery powering the watch movements.

Entrepreneurship is much more than a 9-to-5 job. I don’t breathe without thinking about progressing my business aspirations. If you have an idea you’d like to turn into a reality, go for it. You’ll never know the outcome if you don’t try.

Related: Clocking It: Time Management That Rocks

KIRKUS REVIEW

A guide to taking the bad feedback with the good and learning from what we’re told.

As Harvard Law School lecturers Stone and Heen (co-authors: Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most, 1999) note early on, there have been countless books on the management side of the feedback equation: how to be a good boss and effective leader, delivering feedback to employees that hits every nail on the head. While it’s often a shell game to drive employees to be better while also not burning them out, surprisingly little attention has been focused on being an effective recipient of feedback. Enter Stone and Heen with a well-rounded consideration of “the science and art of receiving feedback well.” As they write, both of those disciplines are required to receive feedback in productive ways—not only in the workplace, but in personal life as well. The authors examine therapy and neurology as two of the avenues through which we can locate and address the blocks to feedback; thoughts can cause emotions, emotions can cause thoughts, and feedback from someone in a position of authority can trigger the fight-or-flight response. For their purposes, the authors equate emotions with feelings, and one of the responses is to dismantle the distortions that come from the feedback filtering through our emotions. The applications of just this idea itself are wide-ranging, and the authors do an excellent job of constraining the applications to feedback usefulness while also exploring some of the other ways we can define what “feedback” consists of in our lives.

With a culture increasingly focused on the individual and the self, this book on developing the ability to accept and utilize the input of others constructively deserves a wide readership.

Identifying STS

Supervisors and organizational leaders in child-serving systems may utilize a variety of assessment strategies to help them identify and address secondary traumatic stress affecting staff members.

The most widely used approaches are informal self-assessment strategies, usually employed in conjunction with formal or informal education for the worker on the impact of secondary traumatic stress. These self-assessment tools, administered in the form of questionnaires, checklists, or scales, help characterize the individual’s trauma history, emotional relationship with work and the work environment, and symptoms or experiences that may be associated with traumatic stress.

Supervisors might also assess secondary stress as part of a reflective supervision model. This type of supervision fosters professional and personal development within the context of a supervisory relationship. It is attentive to the emotional content of the work at hand and to the professional’s responses as they affect interactions with clients. The reflective model promotes greater awareness of the impact of indirect trauma exposure, and it can provide a structure for screening for emerging signs of secondary traumatic stress. Moreover, because the model supports consistent attention to secondary stress, it gives supervisors and managers an ongoing opportunity to develop policy and procedures for stress-related issues as they arise.

Formal assessment of secondary traumatic stress and the related conditions of burnout, compassion fatigue, and compassion satisfaction is often conducted through use of the Professional Quality of Life Measure (ProQOL). This questionnaire has been adapted to measure symptoms and behaviors reflective of secondary stress. The ProQOL can be used at regular intervals to track changes over time, especially when strategies for prevention or intervention are being tried.