Good morning.
And welcome to your morning cereal.
All right, well, good morning. It's the
first day of 2025, January 1st.
Hope you guys had a great night last
night. I'm not sure if you
stayed up the whole night or not.
I know in my family we've got some young
ones, so we haven't always
stayed up till a 12-hour time,
but we definitely made it up to watch the
New Year's ball drop in New York. So,
happy New Year to you guys. Hope you're
having a great day, great
morning this morning as well.
I just love how the New Year makes you
feel like there's a new start
and a new chance to have the
best year of your life, right? Doing all
these things that you
wanted to do. Well, you can,
and this is the year you can do it in.
And if not, you can
definitely watch some really good
football in the coming days and weeks.
But seriously, happy New
Year to you. I really do
hope you and your family have a great
year ahead. You're already off to a great
start because you're
joining us here on Morning Serial. Okay,
well, let's jump into the
first quotes of the year.
One fun, nostalgic quote, and then a
second quote to tease our book review
later in the episode.
Now, I really hope one of the quotes will
speak to you and
kickstart your day in a positive
direction. As usual, I really hope one of
the quotes will speak to
you and kickstart your day
in a positive direction. All right,
here's the first quote.
Quote, "Don't you just love the New
Year? You get to start all over.
Everybody gets a second chance." End
quote. Well, that's basically
what I was just saying. So yes,
Lieutenant Dan from Forrest Gump, I do
love the New Year's.
It always does feel like a fresh start.
Okay, and today's teaser
quote from the book review is,
"I consider my ability to arouse
enthusiasm among my people the greatest
asset I possess." And as
usual, we'll unpack that here in a minute
during the book review
segment. But first, let's jump
into our usual dose of historic and
nostalgic facts from this day in history.
Okay, today's news facts
are for January 1st. Okay, we're going to
start way back today in
1710. That's when a Parisian
merchant named Jean Marius obtained a
five-year royal privilege for his
invention of a folding
umbrella. It was the first one in Europe.
However, the origin of the
umbrella was in China over
3,500 years ago. Okay, jumping up to
1863, Abraham Lincoln signed the
Emancipation Proclamation
that freed slaves in the US Confederate
States. Then in 1892,
Ellis Island opened up as a US
immigration inspection station. It would
go on to be the gateway into the US for
more than 12 million
people. In 1896, German physicist Wilhelm
Rötgen, I know I'm saying that one
wrong, Wilhelm Röntgen
announces his discovery of x-rays,
although he actually made
the discovery on November 8th
with an x-ray of his wife's hand. Then in
1902, the very first
Rose Bowl game was played at
Tournament Park in Pasadena, California.
Although it wasn't much of a game,
Michigan beat Stanford
49 to 0. The Rose Bowl would eventually
become an annual event in
1916. Okay, in 1942, the 26 allied
countries from World War II, they
declared themselves the
United Nations. In 1995, the
World Trade Organization was formally
established. It's the only organization
dealing with the rules
of trade between nations. And then
lastly, on this day in 2002, the Euro,
the monetary unit of the
European Union, was introduced with the
issuance of both currency and
coins. I cannot believe that
was 23 years ago. All right, well, moving
on to birthdays, happy
birthday if today is your birthday.
This is kind of a rare birthday,
especially if you are
competing to be the first baby of the
new year. Well, it's another shortlist
today, but you share a
birthday with a famous classical
German composer Johann Christian Bach. He
was born in 1782. J. Edgar
Hoover, he was born in 1895.
As the director of the FBI from 1924 to
1972, Hoover was
responsible for building out the
Federal Bureau of Investigation. And then
lastly, my grandfather Bill
Knight, who passed away years
ago, he was born on this date in 1931. We
still miss you, Papa.
Okay, well, you know, I love
reaching back into the 80s and the 90s
and 2000s for that nostalgic music.
Unfortunately, I've come
to find out I cannot play that music for
you. So I'm gonna sing it to
you. Just kidding. I'd lose
all the listeners I have at this point if
I did that. But I still do
love music from that time.
It's some of the greatest music of all
time, I think. So I still
want to highlight it. Okay,
the number one song on this date in 1988
was Every Rose Has Its
Thorn by Poison. Apparently,
the inspiration for the song was a phone
call by Brett Michaels,
who's the lead singer of Poison.
Brett called his girlfriend and heard
another man's voice in the background.
Praisably, for all the
80s hair band fans out there, this was
Poison's only number one
hit in the US on the Billboard
Hot 100. I'm actually really surprised
they didn't have any other
hits that were number one. And if
you're watching this on the YouTube
channel, take a look at that
hair. How was that ever cool?
How was that ever in? Anyways, finally,
the number one movie
also in 1988 was Rain Man,
starring Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman.
And interestingly,
three weeks into shooting,
Hoffman wanted out of the movie.
Apparently, he wasn't doing too badly.
The role earned him his
second best actor Academy Award. All
right, well, let's move on to some
enlightenment here in the
book review segment of Morning Serial.
This is where we take a few
moments to reflect on lessons
learned from the current book we're
reading. And currently, we're reading
through Dale Carnegie's
How to Win Friends and Influence People.
It's a timeless book that
is consistently on all the
must read lists. And it's packed with
rock solid advice and actions
for all of us to use and build
healthy foundational concepts to live by.
All right, we're still in chapter two,
which is entitled The
Big Secret of Dealing with People. And
Carnegie has us contemplating
basic human needs and desires,
and specifically the desire to be
important, which the road to achieve this
feeling of importance
can take each of us down different
pathways, both healthy and not so
healthy. And lastly,
we discussed the power each of us holds
to just simply and freely
give someone else honest
appreciation in order to give them a
feeling of importance. And in
doing so freely gifting them
that most coveted desire of feeling
important. So as we pick it up
in chapter two, Carnegie tells
a story about why Andrew Carnegie, who
was an early 20th century
steel magnet, paid Charles Schwab
$1 million per year salary in 1921, when
there was no income tax and
$50 per week was considered
well off. Quick side note here, Dale
Carnegie, the author of this
book, How to Win Friends and
Influence People was in fact not related
at all to Andrew Carnegie.
But he was successful in his
own right, especially after he changed
the spelling of his last name to end in
IE instead of a Y to
match Andrew Carnegie spelling, a little
bit of marketing genius
there as well. Okay, so Andrew
Carnegie paid Charles Schwab $1 million
per year to be the first
president in the newly formed United
States Steel Company in 1921. Now Schwab
was just 38 years old. And the twist in
the story here is that
Charles Schwab did not have any
experience in the steel industry. It
wasn't because he was a genius
or because he was the foremost leader in
steel manufacturing.
Andrew Carnegie paid Schwab more
than $3,000 per day in 1921. Why? Well,
Charles Schwab said it was
because of his ability to deal
with people. Our author Dale Carnegie
asked Schwab how he did it in an
interview. What was his secret
to dealing with people? And Dale Carnegie
says Schwab's answer should
be cast in bronze and hung
in every school and memorized in schools
instead of conjugating Latin verbs. Not
sure we still do that,
at least I never did it. But Dale
Carnegie felt Schwab's answer to his
secret with dealing with
people would transform people's lives if
we would only live by them.
And I'll read what Schwab's
answer was. "I consider my ability to
arouse enthusiasm among my
people the greatest asset
I possess. And the way to develop the
best that is in a person is by
appreciation and encouragement."
And he continues, "There is nothing else
that so kills the ambitions
of a person as criticism from
superiors. I never criticize anyone. I
believe in giving a person
incentive to work. So I am
anxious to praise but loathe to find
fault. If I like anything, I
am hearty in my approbation
and lavish in my praise." So this calls
back to Carnegie's principle
number one. Don't criticize,
condemn, or complain. And it combines it
with praising people,
making them feel important.
But the key component that Carnegie calls
out here is how Charles
Schwab treated people and
he gained greatly from it. But Carnegie
asks if that's how average
people treat other people
by arousing enthusiasm, giving
appreciation,
encouragement, giving praise instead of
criticism. Carnegie would suggest this is
not how average people treat
others. In fact, he believes
it's the exact opposite in most cases. If
we don't like something,
usually we make that known.
And I'd like not to think that in life we
are so quick to point
out things that are wrong,
or bad, or not right, and so many times
we aren't pointing out
the things that are right,
or good, and positive. We have to
consider that if we are leaving a wake of
negativity in the path
of those we deal with on a daily basis,
be it at work or in social
circles, whatever it may be,
we are surely not setting the table to
win friends and
influence people. Schwab went on
to say that in all his time he was "yet
to find the person, however great or
exalted his station,
who did not better work and put forth
greater effort under a spirit of approval
than he would ever do under a spirit of
criticism." Schwab also pointed to this
as one of the reasons
for the phenomenal success of Andrew
Carnegie. And that was
because Andrew Carnegie praised
others both privately and publicly. You
know, it's funny, this point makes me
think of conversations
I've heard, and maybe you're similar, but
sometimes we hear through the grapevine
that a family member
or friend has said something nice about
us, and we find ourselves
thinking why we didn't know they
felt that way. Wouldn't it be nice if
that person just let us know they felt
that way? If they told
us personally? Wouldn't that make us feel
even better, feel important? But
switching perspectives
here, we can challenge ourselves to do
the same, giving praise to others
publicly and privately.
Not only does that make them feel proud
and important, but it
also raises our standing in
their eyes, as someone who is in their
corner, who cares about them. I'll leave
you with this today.
Andrew Carnegie wanted so badly to praise
those around him that he
wrote an epitaph for himself
saying, "Here lies one who knew how to
get around him, people who
were cleverer than himself."
Okay, we're still in chapter two
tomorrow, and we'll continue discussing
just how much we crave
appreciation. Well, it's January 1st, and
you have the hope of a
full new year ahead of you,
and some good football too. So go out
there, tell someone you appreciate them,
it will make both of
you feel better. This is going to be a
fantastic year, but let's just
start with having a fantastic
day. We'll see you tomorrow. And don't
forget to follow and subscribe to the
Morning Serial Podcast,
and The Life Happens Live Balance
channel. You can find more episodes and
videos by visiting our
YouTube channel at Shawningless, or our
website at at
Shawningless.com, where you can also follow
our other podcasts that are coming in
January. That's when our first Mr. and
Mrs. English podcast,
and The Life Happens podcast will air. So
join us on those other podcasts as well.
Thanks again for listening, and have a
fantastic day. We'll see you tomorrow.