A Bright Spot

When I started my first business back in 1980, I was laser focused on making the business a success. I worked crazy long hours and thought about work every waking moment. I thought all I had to do was work super hard by myself and I would be a huge success. After a while I realized my life sucked and the business wasn’t even close to becoming a success. Fortunately, after about a year, a light bulb went on, and I realized that trying to do everything by myself wasn’t the formula for success or happiness. I also realized at the same time that “one” really is the loneliest number.

That was an important lesson for me to learn at a young age, but it can be an easy one to forget. Fortunately, I’ve had multiple reminders over the years that two heads are better than one, and that sometimes multiple heads are better than two. In fact, I had three reminders this week.

1. I was called out on Monday as a lighting consultant for a project at the Dana Point Harbor. They put in a new sign, but the single LED spotlight installed created a glaring bright spot on the front of the sign. The solution was to use two fixtures instead of one and mount them at opposing angles.

2. I was also called out last week to help with illuminating the new marquee on the front of The Barclay Theatre at UCI. Five new LED fixtures were installed, but they created bright spots on the sign with dark shadows in between, which was not a good look. The answer was to add two more fixtures and space all seven of them closer together to even out the illumination.

3. Lastly, my name was drawn out of a hat last week to play in the Coto Charity Golf Classic. As the lucky winner, I was able to bring my wife along as a teammate. When we arrived, we discovered we were paired with a dapper 74-year-old gentleman, who previously starred in Broadway Musicals and who also sung the Star-Spangled Banner at Dodger Stadium for 32 years in a row. Our fourth team member was an 80-year-old who co-created the “Chicken Soup” books as well as his own publishing company. So you might think that three old dudes and a woman would have no chance at winning a Golf Tournament. Okay, so you’d be right. But there were a couple of bright spots. Our “singer” at one time had an 8 index and could still drive the ball long and straight. Our “author” might have had a handicapped flag on his cart, but his short game around the greens wasn’t handicapped at all. And my wife had the round of her life, driving the ball farther than any of us old guys on several holes and dropping a 35-foot putt for a birdie on the 4^th hole. My point is, if I had played by myself, I would have shot 14 over par. With the help of a few friends, we shot a very respectable 4 over par.  

And that got me thinking… If you’re looking for a bright spot in life, maybe all you have to do is shine on a light on those people closest to you!

So powerful is the light of unity that it can illuminate the whole earth.

~ Baha’ullah

Time to Think

Two months ago, I was diagnosed with a small area of skin cancer on my chest.  This happened because I am the idiot who lives at the beach who forgets to use sunscreen most of the time. Fortunately, it’s not the kind that will kill me, but it is the kind that requires treatment 5 days a week for 6 weeks, and it’s kind of painful and a whole lot annoying. It’s also a reminder that life is fragile, and time is our most precious commodity, which got me thinking how fast time goes by… or does it?

For a while now I’ve made it a habit to give a daily prayer of thanks every morning. It’s usually just a short and simple prayer of gratitude for being given another day. But it’s also a fact that someday I’m not going to wake up, so I’m pretty darn thankful for each day that I do and figure it can’t hurt to express it. Saturday morning, as I finished up with my final skin treatment, my morning moment of contemplation and prayer got me thinking about how I use the time I am given each day, and whether or not I am I using it wisely?

That question was still rolling around in my head when I got ready for bed that night. So I took my wife’s hands, placed them in mine, and offered up a different type of prayer. Instead of short and simple, I took the time to give specific and detailed thanks for every single thing that happened on Saturday. I gave thanks for the way the sun rose over the beautiful blue ocean outside my window when I got up at the crack of dawn, for getting to play golf with an old friend and make a new friend at the same time, for the great breakfast my wife cooked for me when I got home, for the nice text message I got from one of my children, for getting to visit a sick friend in the hospital and brighten his day, for getting some work done on my computer, for being able to afford 3 large pizzas at Costco, for taking said pizzas to a family poker game at my Father-in-Law’s house, for getting to play cards and laugh with 10 members of my immediate family, for making it home safely after being a big loser in said poker game, for getting to watch a Little League game on TV, and so much more. By the time I was done, I realized that a typical day in my life may seem short, but in reality, I am involved in dozens and dozens of wonderful and interesting things that happen every single day.

Does time really go by too fast? Maybe, maybe not. If we take time to think about all the things that are happening in our daily lives… as they are happening… those small and simple moments can remind us just how awesome life really is.

How long a minute is, depends on 

which side of the bathroom door you’re on.

~ Zall’s Second Law 

Competitive by Nature

Competition is a fact of life, but is it a good thing? From the very moment we’re born we are competing for something… on some level… somewhere. Competition is never ending so we can either be intimidated by it or embrace it, but the one thing we can’t do is ignore it.

I never got to play a competitive sport or even a team sport like Little League when I was a child growing up. But I do remember the feeling of competition in school. The competition to get good grades, to be the first in line at the cafeteria, to fit in with the “in crowd”, and so much more. Most of the time I wasn’t comfortable with the whole concept of competition, but I accepted it like it was a necessary evil. Like I said, you can’t ignore it.

Later in life I had the chance to play competitive baseball on a Men’s Senior Baseball League team. I discovered that I loved being part of a team that was striving to achieve a goal. The feeling you get when you lose sucks, but the feeling of triumphant victory you get when you and your teammates play well together is an adrenalin rush that is hard to find anywhere else. Bonding with teammates, practicing together, traveling to out of town tournaments together, all of it add up to magic moments that will last a lifetime.

I’m not saying that competition is always fun and always easy, it’s not. I have vivid memories of my legs shaking and my stomach churning when it was my turn to bat in the final moments of a championship ball game. Sometimes I was so scared of failing, and so scared of letting my teammates down, that I wanted to quit the team and stay home. But overcoming that fear was in a way, its own kind of triumphant victory. Never quit on your team and never quit on yourself... and you’ll discover one of the most important life lessons you can ever learn.

Nowadays, I’m not able to play competitive baseball anymore due to a balky back. But I discovered that I can still play golf, so I’ve gotten serious about it and I’m striving (competing!) to get to a single digit handicap. I discovered that golf is extremely challenging in its own way and although most of the time you’re competing against yourself, it is fun once in a while to challenge a buddy to a friendly match. Recently, one of my closest friends challenged me to a hotly contested “match play” event and it really got my competitive juices flowing. I fought hard to win, but ultimately lost the match. However, what my friend said to me after closing me out actually made me feel like I was still a winner. He said, “When I compete against other people, I’m always hoping for them to blow it. But when I compete against you, I can't bring myself to root against you.” Competition is something we cannot ignore, but true friendship is something we can always embrace!

I am too positive to be doubtful, 

too optimistic to be fearful, 

and too determined to be defeated.

~ Jack Nicklaus