Good morning. I went golfing a while ago with a friend who I know doesn’t earn a lot of money, yet he had a $500 golf set. His driver alone cost over $150. I asked him how many times a year he golfed and he said only once or twice. Once or twice! And yet he thinks he needs to have a top of the line golf set. I mean, come on, if you’re golfing once or twice a year I would think a decent $200 golf set would do just fine.

I have come across a number of people with this same trait. They think they need to have “The Best”. There is nothing inherently wrong with that except these are people that can’t pay their bills each month. Their money picture is all out of balance, meaning, in some areas they are lacking and other areas they have too much. Their house is falling apart or they can’t afford to pay their bills and yet they’ll go out and buy an item and it will be the top of the line or the biggest or the best and of course the most expensive. Read the rest of this entry »

I once heard a story about two brothers who lived in a small town in the country. The story goes that both of these brothers were caught stealing sheep. For their punishment they were branded on the forehead with the letters “ST,” for “Sheep Thief.”

One brother was so ashamed that he left the community. Everywhere he went he had to constantly explain the letters on his forehead. He remained bitter about the whole thing and always felt he had been treated unfairly. He eventually died a lonely man and was buried in an unknown grave.

His brother, on the other hand, stayed in the community and tried to win back his neighbors’ trust. He did everything he could to show the people of the town that he was a changed man. He volunteered for community service projects, helped his neighbors when he saw the need, and did all he could to become the kind of man that he knew he ought to be.

Many years later a visitor came to town. He asked a local resident about the strange letters on the old man’s forehead. The resident replied that he had forgotten exactly why the letters were there, but that he thought “ST” most likely was an abbreviation for the word “Saint.”

Like the brothers in this story, each of us makes mistakes in our lives – sometimes big ones and sometimes little ones. And like the brothers in this story we can choose what we do about the mistakes we make. We are the ones that decide how our mistakes are going to affect us.

May each of us choose the good path and become the person we know we ought to be so that perhaps someday we may be known as a “Saint” and not a “Sheep Thief.” Thank you.

Copyright © 2008 Garold N. Larson

Everything is this life has a price tag. It’s up to you to read it correctly and decide whether you want to invest in it or not. You are the one who does the buying and selling. There are no special bargains or half-off sales. You reap all the profit or loss. Nature never fails. It always has and always will reward you for your right choices and punish you for your wrong choices.

What I’m talking about are The Price Tags of Life. What this means is that everything we do, every habit that we have, every action we perform, has a price tag attached to it. If you think about it and examine your actions and habits closely you will discover what their price tags are. We need to examine the price tags of life and see what it really costs us to do the things that we do. After we count what it costs and add up what we gain and then strike a balance, we can see if we are coming out ahead or not. Read the rest of this entry »

Tragedy and misfortune strike people every day. We open the newspaper and read about terrible things that happen to others. We ourselves are not immune to having bad things happen in our lives. As bad as these things are, there is something even worse than the tragedy itself. It is self-pity.

You can see how this can happen. People get immersed in a horrible experience and their energy is sapped and their defenses are down and it becomes easy to fall into the trap of self-pity. They begin to dwell on their hurts and hardships, whether real or imagined, and begin to enjoy talking about them and sharing them with others.

Self-Pity a Luxury?

Why do I call it a luxury? The dictionary tells us that a luxury is something we indulge in, is something we enjoy, is costly and is not necessary. Self-pity fits that description perfectly. Read the rest of this entry »

Good morning! I want to talk about how strict or rigid should you be in keeping goals. For example, in my case I set a goal to go to bed each night at 10:30 p.m. How rigid should I be with that and should there be exceptions?

My answer to that is that there has to be exceptions at times but they should be few and far between.

For me last night was one of those exceptions. The only time there should be an exception is if there is a higher priority at play here that supersedes the lower one. For example, a higher priority would be my family and my relationships with my children. In this case it was attending a performance that my son was in.

Let me just explain what it was about. My soon-to-be 17-year-old son is a member of the local high school marching band. He plays the sousaphone. (Yes, that’s him in the center of the photo.) I thought it was called a tuba but apparently a tuba is played sitting down such as in a concert. A sousaphone is simply a version of the tuba used by marching bands. Anyway, my son and his band have worked extremely hard on their performance. For those of you who have never been involved with marching bands, they actually have competitions where many marching bands get together and compete. Each band puts on a performance that includes a number of elements. They have judges who judge the competition and they give awards at the end. This is a huge event that begins in the early afternoon and goes on until after 10:00 at night. Read the rest of this entry »

Millions of people all over the world struggle with addictions every day. There are many kinds of addictions such as drugs, alcohol, smoking, pornography, or food. In this article I share a simple concept that can help in dealing with addictions.

Fire Analogy

When I was a kid I liked to play with matches. It was fun. I loved to watch things burn. But as you know, playing with matches can be very dangerous. Maybe it wasn’t a coincidence that my family had two homes burn down during my growing up years. (I have solid alibis!)

I like to compare addictions to fire. Think about a match. You can strike a match and how hard is it to put out a match? One little puff of your breath and you can blow it out. No problem. Another match lights, puff, blow it out. No problem. However, when you let a fire go, it can quickly rage out of control where there is nothing you can do about it. At that point you’re basically lost, it’s out of control, and it’s beyond anything you can do about it.

I know about this concept personally. Let me share with you two stories from my life. Read the rest of this entry »

I want to talk a little bit about the power of decisions. When you think about any change that you’ve ever made in your life, didn’t it really happen the moment you made a decision? Now sometimes we say, “Oh it’s hard to change, it took me forever to change.” Usually what takes forever is getting yourself to the point of deciding. It’s the “getting ready to get ready to change” that’s takes so long. You really didn’t make any changes until you decided to change.

So you can say today, “That’s it! I’m done. I’m never going to do that again” or “this is the way I’m going to be from now on.” It’s the power of a decision. No change was ever made in anybody’s life without first deciding. Once you make a decision then you can move forward. A lot of times you say, “Oh it’s so hard to change, it’s so hard to do this, it’s so hard to do that” but really it’s not hard because you’re really not doing it yet, you’re really not making any effort until you decide.

The decision – when things begin to happen

Once you have made that decision, things start to happen in your life. Making that one single decision, saying from this point on, from this time, this minute, this second, I am going in that direction. I am no longer going in the direction I was going. I have turned my life. I am headed in a new direction and everything I do and everything I say and everything I feel is different. This gets you on the road. You won’t totally change your life in a day but you will be amazed at how quickly you move in that direction. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s a sad day in my community. A funeral is being held today for a young man who was well known and loved by many people. His name is Scott Nye. He was 15 years old. Last Friday he was electrocuted after he climbed a power line tower. This hits close to home for me because that power line tower is within sight of the trail that I hike every morning. So is his home. I didn’t know him personally but many teenagers that I know knew him. He will be missed by many.

My message today is simple. Be careful of Snap Decisions.

What is a snap decision? It is simply one of those quick decisions we make without thinking. We make them all the time and for the most part things turn out okay. But I’m sure you can think of some snap decisions you have made in your life that you wish you hadn’t. I can think of several in my life that if I could go back in time I would certainly do things differently.

Because of a snap decision made by Scott, he is no longer with us. Now his family and friends grieve for his loss and struggle with trying to understand why these things happen.

It was almost exactly one year ago that another snap decision was made that affected our community. It was made by the girl next door. Her name is Julia Anderson. She is my daughter Kimberly’s best friend.

Julia and her friend Holly were crossing the highway that is directly behind our home. They were going to a volleyball game at the local church. The two crossed the southbound lanes safely and stopped on the raised median, waiting for traffic to clear. They saw a minivan coming and thought it was going to make a left turn. It wasn’t. As Julia stepped out onto the highway she was struck by the minivan. A simple snap decision and her life hung by a thread.

She suffered head injuries, two broken legs and a torn heart valve. She was rushed to the hospital and into emergency surgery to repair her heart. It has been a long year of recovery for her and I’m glad to report she is doing remarkably well today. Again, a snap decision with major consequences.

As we go about our lives, let us be aware of and be careful of the Snap Decisions we sometimes make. Stop and think it through. Think twice about what you are doing. What may seem like a small decision could have lifelong consequences for you or even cut your life short.

Master Yourself, Master Your Life

Thank you.

Copyright © 2008 Garold N. Larson