Good morning.
And welcome to morning cereal
Okay, good morning and
welcome to Wednesday.
Hopefully you have some
free time on this hump day
because today is
National Movie Theater Day.
Now I know my kids
are gonna wanna go watch
that new Minecraft movie.
Have you seen it yet?
I heard it's really good.
So I did not see that one coming.
Well, after that, maybe a picnic
with some English
muffins or something, right?
Why am I saying that?
You guessed it.
Today is also National Picnic Day
and National English Muffin Day.
Well, I saved the best
for last year though.
Don't forget to appreciate your admin
as well at work today.
It's Administrative Professionals Day.
Just a coincidence that it's also
National Lovers Day too?
I don't know.
I'm not gonna say.
Let's move on to one
of my favorite comedians
who is providing our quote
today about being educated.
John Oliver said,
quote, "The truth hurts,
"but ignorance is a never ending pain."
Well, today's news facts and
birthdays are for April 23rd.
We're gonna start back in 1984.
That's when the AIDS virus was identified
for the first time as the HTLV-3,
which is the Acquired
Immune Deficiency Syndrome.
Then on this day in
1985, the Coca-Cola Company,
they introduced New Coke.
Now, if you lived
through this like I did,
then you know why New
Coke isn't still around.
It wasn't good.
And apparently due to public outrage,
the previous version
of Coke was brought back
as Coca-Cola Classic less
than three months later.
What were they thinking?
Well, in 2005, the
very first YouTube video
was uploaded on this date by one of the
YouTube co-founders.
And it was a video of his
visit to the San Diego Zoo.
And one year later,
after he uploaded that,
the site had some 100
million videos on it.
Lastly, on this day in 2009,
gamma ray burst GRB090423,
it was observed for 10 seconds.
It is the most distant object of any kind
and is also the oldest
known object in the universe.
Now, I have no idea
what any of that means,
but I do think it's very, very cool.
Well, happy birthday to you.
Today is your birthday.
You share a birthday with actor
and I guess wrestler John Cena.
He's 48 years old today.
Comedian John Oliver.
He's 48, a great age I might add.
Well, the number one song
on this date back in 1987
was "I Knew You Were Awaiting For Me"
by Aretha Franklin and George Michael.
And this song was
originally supposed to be a solo song
for Tina Turner, but then Clive Davis,
he pitched that it should be
a duet with Aretha and George.
And the rest is history.
The song was number one for two weeks.
It won a Grammy for best R&B duet.
And the song also hit number two
on the adult contemporary charts.
Behind starships,
nothing's gonna stop us now.
Yeah, that feels right.
That's a better 80s song.
All right.
Well, some
self-improvement also feels right.
We are currently reading
through Stephen R. Covey's
"The Seven Habits of
Highly Effective People."
And yesterday we began
Covey's second chapter,
"The Seven Habits," an overview,
where Covey discussed how important
and influential habits are in our lives.
They essentially make up
what makes us effective
or ineffective.
And Covey acknowledges it
will take tremendous effort
to change deeply
embedded habitual tendencies,
like procrastination, impatience,
criticalness, and selfishness,
but taking the steps to do so
will reap real change and freedom.
So today we begin our first sub-chapter,
which is entitled "Habits Defined."
And Covey jumps right into it,
giving us our definition of habits.
And he defines habits as, quote,
"The intersection of knowledge, skill,
and desire," end quote.
Covey says that we have
to have all three of those,
knowledge, skill, and desire,
to make something a habit in our lives.
And here's why, knowledge is what to do,
and the why, right?
Then skill is how to do it.
And then lastly, desire is
having the want to do it.
We have to have all three.
You have to have the why,
you have to have the how,
and you have to have the want.
All three require effort to make a habit.
So Covey uses the example of someone
who doesn't know how to
listen and always does the talking.
Sound like anybody you know?
Well, Covey says this
person may not even know
that they need to learn to listen.
And even if that someone knows
that they need to listen better,
they may not have the skill to know how
to effectively listen to others.
And even knowing that one
needs to listen to others more
doesn't mean that they
want to listen more, right?
They must have a desire or, quote,
"It won't be a habit in their life.
Creating a habit requires
work in all three dimensions."
End quote.
So we're gonna need to prepare ourselves
because real change
is not an easy process
and it can be painful.
Quote, "It's change
that has to be motivated
by a higher purpose, by the
willingness to subordinate
what you think you want
now for what you want later."
End quote.
And Covey says that this idea, right?
This ability to
sacrifice what we want right now
for what we will eventually want,
he says that that
sacrifice can produce happiness.
And happiness is good, people.
So I'm gonna leave you with
that gold nugget here today,
but come back tomorrow
because we're gonna
start the next sub-chapter,
which is the maturity continuum.
Now that sounds like some
"MI6" or "James Bond" action movie,
so it's gonna be really good, I promise.
Well, thanks for joining us today.
Come back tomorrow and
have a fantastic day.
Don't forget to follow and subscribe to
the Morning Serial
podcast on the One Life
Live It channel.
You can find more episodes and videos by
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and at Shawningless.com, where you can
also follow our other
podcast, the Mr. and Mrs.
Inglis podcast and the
Life Happens podcast.
In these other podcasts, we'll dive
deeper into everyday issues,
self-improvement and
well-being, business and finance, and we
welcome special guests too.
So join us.
It'll be a good time, I promise.
Thanks again for listening.
Have a fantastic day and
we'll see you tomorrow.