Ripple Rewind: Cheryl Ladd Strikes Again

I couldn't sleep this morning. I was not feeling well (which totally bites because it is a Friday) and decided to get up. I thought what I needed was to go for a run; get the juices flowing and clear my head. Well that didn't work and I barely lasted a mile. I was feeling pretty puny.

I decided to cut my run short and head home. I quietly turned on the television downstairs hoping to kill a little time until I could go upstairs and grab a shower and head out for the day. As I sat there in the darkness of the morning television glow, trying desperately not to wake the sleeping family which slumbered peacefully upstairs - it happened. Another Cheryl Ladd "Yes I am getting older commercial."

Like a young Greek man who's stumbled upon Medusa I was instantly turned to stone. My hand refused to respond to the command to shut the horror off. The commercial sucked me in and played with heart like a like a rubber ball attached to a wooden paddle. The cruelty of those marketers. The horrible reality of my once hot love affair with Cheryl Ladd reopened like a festering wound that refuses to heal.

If I felt bad before....I began to feel much worse now.

Relive the death of the Cheryl Ladd fantasy as shared in my BLOG post in January 2007. Click Here to read more.

There's not enough chicken soup in the world to squelch the pain that had almost been forgotten and healed. So sad. I am quite certain therapy may be needed this go around.

Ripple On and have a great weekend!

Connecting As A Task To Be Managed

One of the biggest excuses I hear from business people as to their inability to get out and meet new people (connect) is the lack of time. We all have busy lives. Personal pressures, professional obligations and a litany of other things which demand our time, energy and attention. At the end end the day who has time to get out and meet new people?

Its a problem even I struggle with. I receive nearly 400 emails per day. I have more phone calls than I can possibly count. I am directly responsible for three companies and a new start-up and have a family to boot. It would be easy to throw my hands up and say, "I'm simply too busy!"

And I would be doing myself a huge disservice.

Connecting with new people and taking the time to strengthen connections with those people you want and need to know better is one of the most most important things I think I do on a daily basis. It's critical to my present and future success and I suspect yours as well.

Getting out and connecting with new people is something I have had to literally force myself to schedule into my day. Whether it be scheduling an early morning coffee or breakfast with a new contact or dedicating a space of time after lunch to simply pick up the phone and have a check in conversation with someone I've recently met. I literally have to manage the "effort" as a task on my very overgrown To Do List. However when I have it committed to paper and it stares me in the face every day, it becomes easier to plug through and just do it. Before long it doesn't end up feeling like a task at all. It becomes something I actually look forward to each day. Without a doubt it breaks up the monotony of the other less exciting or not so stimulating tasks I must complete during a given day.

Try scheduling blocks of time today to get out there and connect. Give it a try won't you? You'll be glad you did!

Ripple On!!!

Randy Pausch My Hero

Last year I discovered someone who has become one of my all-time greatest heroes. His name is Professor Randy Pausch. Randy Pausch at the time had become an Internet celebrity for giving an inspirational Last Lecture for the students and faculty of Carnegie Mellon University which had been shown on YouTube.com countless times. This young, vibrant man with so many incredible antedotal lessons on living was actually dying at the time. He had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

I had discovered the Last Lecture from one of those countless email trails that people forward on and on. I rarely open those due to the enormous amount of email I get but for some reason this particular one caught my attention so I watched. I watched it over and over again - riveted by what I was seeing, what I was learning and what I was hearing. I found myself at the time both inspired and scared; I hadn't been living life to its fullest...not even close.

Last October I was sitting in a hotel room waiting to go down to deliver one of the biggest speeches I had ever given up to that point and flipped the channel over to Oprah. As luck would have it Randy Pausch was giving a modified version of his last lecture. I found myself sitting in a hotel room alone, crying my eyes out and wishing that I could trade just a few years of my life for his. This amazing husband and father of three deserves so much more than what life has dealt him. After the show I went down and modified my remarks to an audience of executives to honor the lessons Randy had shared and taught me. I think to date it is still one of the best performances I have given.

I became incredibly inspired by this man who was dying but possessed an insatiable appetite for living. Longing to know more about this man I read everything I could find; his various bios, BLOGS and countless interviews. I found myself logging onto to his website and checking his health updates regularly. For Father's Day my wife and kids gave me his book The Last Lecture - which has to be one of the best gifts I have ever received for Father's Day.

When Kathy emailed on Friday that he had passed I felt as if someone had just taken my knees out from under me. I wanted to go home, crawl into bed and just cry. I didn't want anyone at the office see me as I suspect the wrong word would have easily brought me to tears. I walked around the building a few times and composed myself and tried to go on with my day. It wasn't easy.

I found myself hugging my boys a little tighter this weekend. I found myself looking at my wife and appreciating her a little more for what she does for us all. I found myself thinking of Randy and how hard and difficult it has to be to leave such a loving family. I found myself replaying so many of the lessons Randy shared in his lectures, his writings and his just plain being. I found my sadness was somehow transformed into inspiration and a desire to live.

Thanks Randy...another lesson you taught me.

My friends, we could all be so lucky as to have a hero such as Randy Pausch. A man that truly inspired countless Americans to remember that life is not only fragile but oftentimes is short -though never any less valuable. Live. Have fun. Dream. Inspire.

Go take on your Monday and say a prayer for those three heart-broken kids and a grieving wife. Then say another Prayer for Randy - and tell him you will do a better job of honoring your life and really living it to its fullest.

God's Speed Randy Pausch. God's speed.

Ripple On!!!