This video is a MUST see. It is just over 2 1/2 minutes long and will BLOW YOU AWAY.
If you didn’t catch my last blog post on Four Years. Go. – Click Here to read it now. You can also visit FourYearsGo.Org for more information.
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Ray's Blog
Posted on February 05th, 2010 in Homepage, Ray's Blog
I just came back from the Transformational Leadership Council meeting in Puerto Rico, and it was an awesome learning and life altering event for me. I wish I could tell you everything but it would take pages. So I will let you in on one critically important thing presented by Lynne Twist that touched me and it will be with me forever – the awakening to the real importance of the work of transformation my peers and me, and you, have been up to all these years and will be into the future. It is a matter of the extinction or extension of the human species and earth as we know it. The time is NOW! Learn and get involved at www.FourYearsgo.org.
“Fouryears.Go.” Is a global campaign to galvanize an “urgency coalition” of thousands of organizations and millions of individuals to work in concert for a better world. It is a campaign to create a movement that brings forth a world surge of energy, enthusiasm and action to launch humanity on a sustainable, just and fulfilling trajectory by February 14, 2014.
“Four years” because this is the time period humanity can not afford to go beyond without facing an unacceptable risk of irreversible negative systemic change and because this next four years presents a unique opportunity in history where the anchor points and ideologies of the old world have come loose and are dying and a new common ground is ripe to be born. Ands “Go” because we must start now. There is time to act but no time to waste.
“Fouryears.Go” is a campaign initially being created and shepherded by a coalition of organizations and individuals led by Wieden & Kennedy (the largest independent advertising agency in the world and creators of Nike’s “Just do it” swoosh and Lance Armstrong’s “Live Strong” yellow bracelet campaign), The Pachamama Alliance, P:5Y (a global movement to create a peaceful world), and The 2020 Fund.
The basic premises of the campaign are that:
- Our planet is fast approaching some ecological tipping points that if passed, could lead to irreversible downward spiral that would alter life as we know it for all future generations.
- We already possess all the technology and all the well thought out solutions required to resolve the ecological, social and economic crises confronting us. (As Al Gore points out in his new book “Our Choice” his research into solutions around the globe has convinced him that we have the tools to solve three climate crises and we only face one).
- In resolving these crises lies the possibility of an evolutionary leap that could free humanity from the curses of alienation and injustice and provide a grounded new vision for our future.
- All that is missing is a universal sense of urgency and a collective will to act.
The purpose of the Fouryears.Go campaign is to provide that collective will. Fouryears.Go will be a special kind of climate change campaign, a campaign to change the climate of people’s thinking, a campaign to cause a positive tipping point in unleashing our collective will, and to do it soon, to do it in the next four years.
And out of that unleashing of collective will, a surge of energy and enthusiasm and activism will infuse a wide array of global projects and initiatives such that by February 14, 2014 the predictable future for humanity, the most likely case scenario that any professional scenario planning organization would forecast, will be one of environmental sustainability, spiritual fulfillment, and social justice.
Projected overall outcomes:
Hundreds of millions of people (15% of humanity) will have listed in the campaign. Over a million organizations (a combination of NGOs, business entities, governments or governmental entities, and academic research think-tanks) will have joined the campaign. Tens of millions of volunteers and hundreds of millions of dollars of funding will have been generated in support of projects and initiatives around the globe aligned with the Fouryears.Go objectives.
How the campaign will work:
Using the internet and social media networks and creative content from Wieden & Kennedy initially (but later from additional media specialists who enroll in the campaign), individuals and organizations will be attracted to Fouryears.Go website where they will experience a compelling enrollment message and be invited to become a part of the campaign. The website will be designed to appeal broadly irrespective of age, gender or particular areas of interest or work (environment, war, food crisis, climate, gender, oceans, etc.)
For more details and updates, sign up NOW at www.FourYearsGo.org and tell everyone!
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Posted on January 08th, 2010 in Ray Rants, Ray's Blog
What I learned from 2009
The year 2009 was exciting and rewarding, even though somewhat challenging. I learned a lot – so much in fact, it is very hard to put it all in a few lines. So I will just give a few points which I will carry over in 2010. Here are a few ideas, listed as “Do’s” and “Don’t” for you to ponder and implement as well.
Do’s
- Invest in yourself. Take personal development courses to further your growth. It may be the most valuable asset you build. It would be crazy not to do this, given that you generate your own future.
- Have faith, be patient, be strong, keep focused, be ready. “Between your dream and its fulfillment you’ll be tested”.
- Give what’s wanted and requested rather than giving your pet issue or what you think someone needs. This is the secret to practically all successful business endeavors.
- See and speak the positive. With the space you have around you, fill it with the things you want rather than the things you don’t want
- Make more money than you spend. You never know when you will need to reconcile your affairs, and you want to be ahead rather than behind in the game.
Don’ts
- Don’t listen to bullshit or buy it. Trust your instincts. Question all those who call themselves masters. Do their professional peers agree they are.
- Don’t let people coach you if they don’t have experience and success in that area. If you want to play tennis, get a tennis pro with the most experience in tennis, not a cyclist.
- Don’t give up just because you are challenged or because something is tough. Don’t be cynical; give life a chance again and again.
- Don’t be too reasonable about your dreams. Being too reasonable can lead to mediocrity.
- Welcome life’s many opportunities, but say YES and commit to only those you are willing to complete. It’s OK to say NO. Making too many commitments is to be committed to none. Incompletes lead to unfinished business and baggage you don’t need.
More power to you in the year 2010, ahead. And remember your point of power is in the here and now. For more details on living positively, powerfully, and heroically click here to order The ANSWER To Absolutely Everything DVD and you’ll get several FREE CDs to choose from. And don’t forget to check out my newest CD: The Game of Life and How To Win It. Blessings to you, and share this blog memo with friends and family.
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Posted on December 18th, 2009 in Guest Bloggers, Ray's Blog
Written on Christmas Eve in the year 1513 by Fra Giovanni. As beautiful as it is timeless, but then…truth is eternal. While it is titled: “A Letter to the Most Illustrious the Contessina Allagia degli Aldobrandeschi,” Most simply refer to it as “A Letter to a Friend.”
A Letter to a Friend“I salute you. I am your friend, and my love for you goes deep. There is nothing I can give you which you have not. But there is much, very much, that, while I cannot give it, you can take. No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in it today. Take heaven! No peace lies in the future which is not hidden in this present little instant. Take peace! The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it, yet within our reach, is joy. There is radiance and glory in darkness, could we but see. And to see, we have only to look. I beseech you to look! Life is so generous a giver. But we, judging its gifts by their covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the covering, and you will find beneath it a living splendor, woven of love by wisdom, with power. Welcome it, grasp it, and you touch the angel’s hand that brings it to you. Everything we call a trial, a sorrow or a duty, believe me, that angel’s hand is there. The gift is there and the wonder of an overshadowing presence. Your joys, too, be not content with them as joys. They, too, conceal diviner gifts. Life is so full of meaning and purpose, so full of beauty beneath its covering, that you will find earth but cloaks your heaven. Courage then to claim it; that is all! But courage you have, and the knowledge that we are pilgrims together, wending through unknown country home. And so, at this time, I greet you, not quite as the world sends greetings, but with profound esteem and with the prayer that for you, now and forever, the day breaks and shadows flee away.” |
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You may be interested in this blog about growing up with Michael Jackson and all the Jackson Kids, written by my nephew, Milbert Brown. Click Here to visit his blog.
- Ray
2300 Jackson Street By Milbert Brown
Quickly I ran out to play, under the puffy white clouds that hung neatly in the clear sky—a few miles from Lake Michigan waves.
Keeping watch was Mama, hawking me as I anxiously waited to get dirty with Joe and Katie Jackson’s kids.
My squeals of delight punctuated the summer air as I played for hours with the large family that lived across the street. Their petite home rested on the street named in honor of U.S. President Andrew Jackson in Gary, Indiana. It was only a short rock glide from my great-Aunt Esther’s house.
Tall and shapely, she was my favorite. She had cocoa skin and an empowering voice that vacillated between the conversation of royalty and the ferociousness of a bobcat during heated debates.
If there were even a hint that she was losing an argument, she would simply end it with “it’s a long story.” Her rich oral fables brought comfort to neighbors and guests, who were welcome to sigh, laugh and lie about the activities of the day.
Indelibly etched in my heart are Esther’s narratives with feelings that reflect the aspirations and hopes shared by my working-class family, the Jacksons, and thousands of others in Gary.
The house she shared with her husband, Turner, was where I grew, learned about life and witnessed the tumultuous rise of the world’s most famous musical family, the Jackson Five-my childhood playmates.
I was very young when I played with Michael—so all that remains are flashes of memory, largely obscured by the mist of time. We were only old as recharged car batteries-about 2 or 3 years old.
Years before Michael, the boy who would be King, whose talent engulfed the world and forever altering the course of musical history—-his grandfather, Samuel Jackson was a morning fixture sipping black coffee in Aunt Esther’s kitchen.
When the Jackson brothers were still performing on the “chitlin’ circuit,” they often played at Sonny’s Den, a neighborhood juke joint on 12th and Grant Street. I lived about a block away, but I was still too young to even walk pass the spot.
The emotions from those long-ago days at 2300 Jackson Street have unearthed stories of my family’s relationship with the Jackson family.
The eldest Jackson, Rebbie, and my older cousin, Faye often practiced jump-rope routines on the warm neighborhood sidewalk.
One evening, Jackie Jackson or “Jackie Boy” as he was called back then, was caught drinking gin by his Mama, Katie. Jeffery, Esther’s son was usually with Jackie Boy during his episodes of backyard mischief.
My Uncle Ike’s love interest was Michael’s aunt, Lula Jackson. Their relationship produced a baby boy, Wendell, who is my cousin—and “The King of Pop’s first cousin.
Many years have gone by since those times at Aunt Esther’s. But, I will always treasure the moments on Jackson Street and our family’s enduring love. Most of all, I hold close the memories of wrestling in the grass with the Jackson kids.
Milbert O. Brown, Jr., a Gary, Indiana native, is the online editor of “The Brown Report” and a freelance writer-photographer based in the Baltimore-Washington, DC corridor. 2009 Copyright by Milbert O. Brown, Jr.
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Posted on September 24th, 2009 in Ray Rants, Ray's Blog
Amazing Comments in 1955 -- Only 54 Years Ago!
‘I’ll tell you one thing, if things keep going the way they are, it’s going to be impossible to buy a week’s groceries for $10.00.
‘Have you seen the new cars coming out next year? It won’t be long before $1, 000.00 will only buy a used one.
‘If cigarettes keep going up in price, I’m going to quit. 20 cents a pack is ridiculous.
‘Did you hear the post office is thinking about charging 7 cents just to mail a letter
‘If they raise the minimum wage to $1.00, nobody will be able to hire outside help at the store.
‘When I first started driving, who would have thought gas would someday cost 25 cents a gallon. Guess we’d be better off leaving the car in the garage..
‘I’m afraid to send my kids to the movies any more Ever since they let Clark Gable get by with saying DAMN in GONE WITH THE WIND, it seems every new movie has either HELL or DAMN in it.
‘I read the other day where some scientist thinks it’s possible to put a man on the moon by the end of the century. They even have some fellows they call astronauts preparing for it down in Texas .
‘Did you see where some baseball player just signed a contract for $50,000 a year just to play ball? It wouldn’t surprise me if someday they’ll be making more than the President.
‘I never thought I’d see the day all our kitchen appliances would be electric.. They are even making electric typewriters now.
‘It’s too bad things are so tough nowadays. I see where a few married women are having to work to make ends meet.
‘It won’t be long before young couples are going to have to hire someone to watch their kids so they can both work.
‘I’m afraid the Volkswagen car is going to open the door to a whole lot of foreign business.
‘Thank goodness I won’t live to see the day when the Government takes half our income in taxes. I sometimes wonder if we are electing the best people to government..
‘The drive-in restaurant is convenient in nice weather, but I seriously doubt they will ever catch on.
‘There is no sense going on short trips anymore for a weekend, it costs nearly $2.00 a night to stay in a hotel.
‘No one can afford to be sick anymore, at $15.00 a day in the hospital, it’s too rich for my blood.’
‘If they think I’ll pay 30 cents for a hair cut, forget it.’
Know any friends who would get a kick out of these, pass this on! Be sure and send it to your kids and grand kids too!
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Dr. Ray Blanchard
Almost everyone has had a situation where they thought they were at the end of the rope or in the jaws of failure, and managed to pull out a victory. Some people only did it once or twice, and they might have chalked it up to luck. They felt relieved and swore to never get themselves in those situations again. They perceived it as a threat. Then there are other people who put themselves in high risk situations as a matter of habit, like an addiction. They live off the adrenalin rush that comes from living on the edge. They need the juice of doing the almost impossible to give life meaning. They live from challenge.
Still, there are people who have stared down adversity numerous times but do not see it as threat nor as a need for challenge. They live from vigor, knowing there may be obstacles when they go for their dreams. They see the opportunity in the situation. In the heat of the moment they go to their next level of genius and find solutions to life’s real problems.
Threat, Challenge, or Opportunity! We have come from all three positions at different times in life. But on which would you make your life stand? Which allows you to be most focused, most often, and is most sustainable?
To live from threat is to live from fear and intimidation. This will ruin your will and destroy your morale over time. It leads you to live life “playing not to lose”. Then you lose. To live from challenge as an ongoing practice is to develop a habit that could lead to emptiness. What happens when there is no challenge? You may be high when in challenge, but the problem with this is that all the other times may be lows. Swinging from highs to lows creates too many mood swings and moments of meaninglessness. Not such a good way to run your life, your company, or anything else.
The other possibility is to operate from “Opportunity”. That is to take every situation as it is, to be present-centered, and in the quick of the moment, to look for the opportunity it poses. This requires you to keep discipline of your mind and not letting yourself go to fear and intimidation and generate a vibration that will only bring forth a matching result. You would be focused in the present, and look for ways to turn any issue into creative new possibilities. If you make this a practice, it will become ingrained into your psyche and behaviors, and it will serve you well in the midst of pressure in all walks of life. This is what athletes and other accomplished superstars do on a more regular basis than the average person. They have done it over and over again, until it becomes their modus operandi, which we call mental strength and clear intention. It is the winner’s edge, and it comes from within. And with practice.
Operating from opportunity, having faith, and knowing that tomorrow is a new day is the kind of optimism that will always make a way. Here are a few thoughts and tips to live by:
1. Be health conscious and take action to make sure you have balanced energy. This gives you a stable foundation and helps you concentrate and focus in present time.
2. Keep your emotions in check and have the presence of mind to not go into negative reaction in the situation. By keeping a positive attitude you generate a powerful vibration that attracts positive energies towards you and allows you to be clear on what works.
3. Reframe a troublesome situation and see the glass as half full rather than half empty. This allows you to see possibilities instead of defeatisms, which give you personal power and energy. That is the cure to depression and it gives you light and lifts you up.
4. Practice gratitude. Live in love rather than fear. Look at each moment as a privilege and be thankful for being alive and in a position to have such opportunities to grow and bring out the best of what you have to offer. In this, you find your true self. Look for the good in people and the situation rather than the disappointments and regrets, which keeps you going forward rather than backwards.
5. Build a solid foundation for your life around a selfless purpose, or something that inspires you and elevates your passion. Always play a game larger than just for yourself, so you have a greater reason for performing at a higher level. It makes life more meaningful and crystallizes your dedication. Be a positive maniac on a mission. It makes you a forced in nature, and it is the “true joy of life”. It makes you do the extraordinary and the miraculous.
6. Always pay attention to the things you did well and celebrate your contributions. It is so easy for a few missteps to cast a shadow of criticism over your accomplishments. There will always be cynics to help you demean yourself if you let them. Don’t listen to the detractors. Surround yourself with people who will remind you of the beauty of your accomplishments and the difference you make. Then keep on doing what average people say can’t be done. Remember your gift, and know that when you use it, it grows. If you don’t use it, you lose it.
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Posted on July 08th, 2009 in Ray Rants, Ray's Blog
(Unknown)
As I was cleaning out my files the other day, I came across a story I just love. A very well known scientist who had achieved remarkable medical breakthroughs, was being interviewed by a journalist who asked him what he thought made him different from the other scientists all of whom were equally brilliant, well trained and experienced, yet who didn’t have the same success as he. The reporter asked, “How was it that he was the one who consistently made medical breakthroughs?”
The scientist thought for a moment and responded that he thought it all went back to when he was a very small child. One day he was trying to take a bottle of milk from the refrigerator and his little hands lost his grip and the entire contents poured out on to the floor. Instead of his mother getting mad at him, she instead said, “Oh my, what a wonderful mess you have made! I can’t remember when I ever saw such a huge puddle of milk! Now that it’s done, would you like to play in it before we clean it up?”
And so instead of feeling horrible about the “mistake” he had made, the little boy experienced the “catastrophe” as something positive. After a short while, his mother then said, “Now when we make a mess like this, eventually we have to clean it up so what would you like to use, a towel, a mop or a sponge?”
After they had cleaned it up, his mother said, “Now what we have here is a failed experiment of how to take a big bottle of milk out of the refrigerator with two little hands. So now let’s go outside and fill up the bottle with water and let’s experiment and see if you can figure out how to carry it without dropping it.” And so they did.
What a great lesson. The scientist learned at that moment that mistakes were a natural part of the learning process and that you should never be afraid of making mistakes. Later in life he transferred that awareness to his experiments and while other scientists were spending time being careful to never fail or were justifying their mistakes, he was busy doing more experiments never worrying about getting them “right”. These continuous experiments eventually led to extraordinary medical breakthroughs that saved thousands of lives.
(Oh, to have just one more chance to parent…)
(Or do life again… or to live my dreams… DO IT NOW!)
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Posted on June 23rd, 2009 in Ray Rants, Ray's Blog
“With money you can buy a house,
but not a home.
With money you can buy a clock,
but not time.
With money you can buy a bed,
but not sleep.
With money you can buy a book,
but not knowledge.
With money you can see a doctor,
but not good health.
Click to continue reading “Chinese Proverb: “About Money and Sharing””
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First realization: If you want to get lots of results be a Great Inviter! Invite a LOT!
The more people you invite, the greater the chances are you will have a full house, or have the results you desire. Invite a lot, but do a proper invitation that works.
Use the ANOLOGY of INVITING TO A PARTY. You need to think about “who” you want at your party to have it work. You need to be clear you really want them there, and make it clear to them, without forcing them.
1. CLEAR INTENTION — TO GET THE RESULT
Get clear that you want to pack the house, get the results.
2. HEARTFELT — COMMUNICATION FROM THE HEART
So the invitation is not a casual invite but it is sincere. Don’t say “stop by if you can.” Say “I REALLY WANT you here with me and for me/us, because it means a hell of a lot to me/us!”
3. PRIDE – TAKE PRIDE IN YOUR ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Let them in on your experience. Tell your own story with pride! Show them what it was like for YOU, so they might see how it can also be for THEM. Don’t keep yourself a secret; don’t cheat them.
4. “SHOW & TELL”
Tell them DETAILS. Like a party, tell them the who, what, where, when, how, why…
Who else will be there…What it’s about and what to wear…Where it will be held…When it is and when it starts…How to get there and how to be there to fit the occasion… Why you doing it, why it is important, and why them (your POWERFUL WHY).
5. WILLING TO HEAR “NO” – to get the authentic “YES”!
Give them space. Don’t twist their arm and force them. They need to feel free, and need wiggle room. A “yes” is not authentic unless there was room for “no”, and they chose on their own, voluntarily.
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