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"We are never defined by our past...we are only prepared by it."- Alexander Phiri, Milton Keynes, England

Alex and I share many common life experiences; when we have our "almost weekly" phone conversations, it's both encouraging and challenging. Kindred hearts and spirits...we're separated by the Atlantic, but united by a bond of brotherhood like no other. Some time ago, we were discussing the past: its ability to render impotent even the most viable dreams and its uncanny maneuvers against creativity. It was then that Alex said: "You know, Sid, we are never defined by our past...we are only prepared by it." He went on to share how every single act, situation, and thought from my past is the eclectic education I needed to function effectively in my present.

I wonder, then...

...at what point does the past become a preparatory tool?

Friends, I believe that it is when we choose - when we become bold enough to face our past and declare it our "Future...

"Our world is changing faster than ever before, and the importance of learning is growing even faster. Any significant improvement in life...is based on learning."
– Samuel Daniel, Earl of Southampton

More often than not, I find myself in the middle of discussions about the past. A while back, I met with a friend who was sorely disappointed by the actions of someone close. The results of those actions were far-reaching, and were also causing much present grief. I could not help but think how this was a potent situation for growth - after all, I thought, what could be a greater impetus for higher level living and thinking than learning [in the words of the title of Dr. Seligman's book] "what you can change and what you can't"?

"The knowledge of the difference between what we can change and what we must accept in ourselves is the beginning of real change," says Dr. Martin P. Seligman. It worries me, this lack of appreciation for who we are. That is, our inability to change some...

"The greatest works of admiration, and all the fair examples of renown, out of distress and misery are grown."
– Samuel Daniel, Earl of Southampton

A while back I was having an online conversation with one of my college buddies, I was asked how I was doing. I responded "well" and added a "smiley face" to my post. At that, he asked if that was genuine joy or if I was "hysterically smiling in the face of adversity" - this, of course, prompted me to LOL. Oops...I mean...that prompted me to laugh out loud (really loud). We’ve been friends for about five years now and he's come to know me as the boy who pops an optimism pill as much as Dr. House (on Fox's former hit show "House") pops pain killers. Needless to say, in this instance, I was simply genuinely overjoyed; but that phrase prompted a thought process that led to what you are now reading...

Taunting, I have found, can be an effective tool to discourage and, in essence, disarm one's enemies. While my opponents during a...

"In the confrontation between the stream and the rock, the stream always wins - not through strength, but by perseverence."
- H. Jackson Brown, Jr., Author of "Life's Little Instruction Book"

I have always wondered about people who stop just short of their goal...those who give up when a little more would have turned the battle. I am not one to judge; simply pointing out a simple observation – we tend to give up too quickly!

I recently discovered something about myself: I have no desire to run a marathon...for any reasons. I can give a plethora of excuses, but it all boils down to this simple fact: I. Have. No. Desire. There are, however, other things I wish to accomplish in life - things I greatly desire to see through. For those, I will put my head down, like a Tour de France cyclist, and fight a strong headwind towards the finish line.
When it comes to fighting through adversity, we must put our heads down and keep "cycling" - for some, it's...

 ...the only way out, is through!!

I woke up this morning thinking about the challenges I have faced in the last ten years. As I prepared my decaf Chai Tea, I considered my response to every storm that has come in the last 120 months: death, loss, pain, betrayal, financial tornadoes...

I decided to take inventory because I was concerned about my progress; I wondered if I had grown at all. I wondered whether I was responding to every storm in the same way and asked myself if I was avoiding the storms again...

Unlike the physical storms that Mother Nature orchestrates, the "storms of growth" cannot be avoided. For those who feel they have successfully avoided them, they become repetitive patterns in their lives until the lessons are learned...

The "storms of growth," I have found, must not only be faced head on, they must be traversed through. 

I was speechless as I thought about how the only way I would grow ("survive") after the storm was to go through it - not try to...

"To courageously shoulder the responsibility of one's mistakes is character." - a fortune cookie

There's something especially humbling about failure; a quality that insufficiency evokes in us. It is at these failure turns, twists, and forks in the road that we discover our inadequacy, where we become fully acquainted with our fragility and develop a heightened awareness of our mortality. The manner in which we view ourselves and the world around us changes in the blink of an eye. We are touched in a way that morphs us into individuals with a deeper sense of purpose and a singular focus - to live life fully and wholly.

I once said to my 'Introduction to Speech Communication' students years ago, that "it is the most liberating thing to not have to be perfect". When we recognize that mistakes are inevitable - that they are part of the learning process - we become less averse to making them. And, when we do, we boldly and courageously shoulder the outcomes; knowing that we have mastered...

"How we handle our tough times stays with us for a long time..." - Max Lucado in "Facing Your Giants"

I have often wondered what makes an individual great. If you're like me, visions flash before you of individuals you have come to deeply honor and respect. There is an "epitomic" view we each have of what a great individual looks like. We each have what is called an Implicit Personality Theory (IPT) about people; that is, our own sets of hypotheses about what people are like. Armed with our IPTs, we envision what these Champions of Life look like and set our lives against that mold and standard.

The common thread, for the Champions of my world, is tied very closely to how they each handle(d) tough times. That is, what they did when:

• They stumbled...over and over again
• They lost things and people important to them
• They encouraged themselves when discouraged by failure
• They were disappointed and betrayed by others
• The machinery of life simply would not cooperate in their favor

"Mailo" - Yesterday...or Tommorow

Nyanja, like many of the other 60 plus languages of Zambia, is an interesting language. For most who speak only one language, the intricacies of meaning can be lost because they have only one referent. For those who are bi or multi lingual, language is something to behold. As I thought about what to write this week, I was brought back to our propensity for living in the past...

I know...we've talked about this before, but after working with someone who is fiercely fighting a daunting and haunting past, I thought it prudent to address it again. In Nyanja, the same word is used to refer to yesterday and tomorrow. In order for one to know which it refers to, one would need to pay particular attention to the discussion. 

I find that this attentiveness is the same in that which we are to overcome daunting and haunting pasts...

If you're like many of us, stress and hardships have affected you in some small or significant way – whether...