What? You don’t see the happy times?
But they are right there!
Right there inside you.
Oh, I see. You have something that is keeping you from seeing and feeling and living the sparkling clear and happy times that are struggling to rise up from the depths of your soul.
I see that you are worried.
That’s the problem.
Worry is the cork that keeps the champagne of happiness from spraying a smile on your face and a sparkle in your eye and joy into your heart
If you will allow me, I will try to do for you what Julius Rosenwald and Thomas Jefferson did for me.
Julius Rosenwald was an immensely successful businessman who used his money – all of it – to help people rise above their circumstances and experience the wonders of the world in which they lived.
This is what Julius Rosenwald wrote to me 100 years ago:
“Early in my business career I learned the folly of worrying about anything. I have always worked as hard as I could, but when a thing went wrong and could not be righted, I dismissed it from my mind.”
Friend, when a thing goes wrong and cannot be righted, dismiss it from your mind.
An army of people surround us whose only job is to make us fearful and afraid. You must not allow these people to capture your attention.
Journalists have been shouting deceptive and inflammatory headlines at us since the days of the American Revolution.
But the journalists and podcasters of today have discovered new ways of shouting. Emails and websites and Youtube and cable and streaming services promise, pledge and swear to keep us highly informed and deeply unhappy. They feed our worries like stokers feeding firewood into the boilers of steam trains.
They want us to ride on their rails of steel so that they can take us where they want us to go.
Don’t ride their train. Jump off of it. Thomas Jefferson did.
He said,
“I do not take a single newspaper, nor read one a month, and I feel myself infinitely the happier for it.”
He went on to say,
“Advertisements contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper. The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.”
Thomas Jefferson avoided the news and said he was infinitely the happier for it.
You should do it, too.
Julius Rosenwald and Thomas Jefferson discovered that Jesus was telling the truth in Matthew chapter six when he said,
“Do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”
Don’t worry.
Be happy.
Roy H. Williams
David Ackert is making his list and checking it twice — but he’s no Santa Claus. The gifts David brings are powerful insights for professionals who want to grow. David Ackert challenges the long-held belief that success depends on building a massive network of connections. In his view, quantity is a distraction. The thing to do is cultivate a small, curated list of at least 9 not more than 30 “high-value” relationships with people who have the ability to help you reach your goals. Send everyone else a Christmas card.
Rotbart goes roving with David Ackert this week, at MondayMorningRadio.com