Good morning.
And welcome to morning cereal
Okay, good morning and welcome to Monday.
Well, I hope you had
a great weekend. Now,
I had a great one. I spent most of the
weekend in Austin with my oldest son. We
had some soccer showcases and we just had
a really good time, but it's always
nice to come home. And as usual, now that
it's Monday, we're hitting the ground
running, right? But this Monday, the
clock is ticking even a
bit faster, for some of
you maybe, and that's because it's
biological clock day. So in the event
that applies to you, you had better get
working on it. Well, today is also global
pay-it-forward day. Now, I paid for a
stranger's tank of gas last week, so just
in case someone's looking to pay that one
forward, I'll be at 7-11 on Highway 14
tomorrow. So if you're in the area or,
well, you know, you get the hint. And
lastly, it's National Superhero Day. So
celebrate your
favorite superhero. There's
so many of them to pick from, but I'm
just gonna tell you who mine is. Mine's
always been and it always will be
Superman, right? So with that in mind,
today's quote is about taking action and
trusting in the
outcome. And the quote is,
"Sometimes you have to take a leap of
faith first. The trust part comes later."
You know who said that? It probably
sounds familiar to you because you've
seen the movie, but that was Superman and
it's very apropos on this National
Superhero Day. Well, today's news facts
and birthdays are for April 28th and
we're gonna start back in 1937. That's
when the first commercial flight across
the Pacific was operated by Pan Am. Then
we're gonna move up to 1988 and if
you're watching here on YouTube, look at
this picture over my right shoulder.
That's Aloha Airlines Flight 243 and you
might remember seeing this on the news,
but miraculously this flight landed after
losing the roof on a 35-minute
fight from Hilo to Honolulu when an
18-foot section of the fuselage just
tore off. That would be crazy scary. Just
look at that picture. And finally on this
date back in 2003, here's an old name but
a goodie, Andre Agassi. He recaptured the
world number one ranking and in doing so
at the time he became the oldest top
ranked male in history. He was just 33
years old in 13 days. Now that record was
broken in 2024 when Novak Djokovic was
ranked number one and he was 36 years
old in 321 days. And then finally on this
date also in 2003, Apple launched the
iTunes Store and in 2010, seven years
later, the store sold its 20 billionth
song. Now I still use the iTunes Store
but I've been told that that's showing
my age now. I still feel like I should
own my music. I don't
know. I guess that's
just old school. Well happy birthday to
you. Today is your birthday. You share
a birthday with actress Jessica Alba.
She's 44, actress Penelope Cruz. She's 51
today and colorful golfer John Daly. He's
59 today and comedian Jay Leno. He's 75.
And the number one song in this date back
in 1984 was Against All Odds. Take a
look at me now by Phil Collins. Now if
you're a regular morning serial listener
then you know how much of a huge fan I am
of Phil Collins. And this is just
another great song from Phil. This song
won the Grammy for best pop vocal
performance in 1985 but perhaps more
importantly it also helped me through
some heartbreaking breakups in junior
high and high school. Phil was always
there for me and this was his first of
his seven number one hits. Many of which
like I said helped me through many a
heartache. Great songs. Alright well no
heartbreak in our book review. That's
because we are reading Stephen R. Covey's
The Seven Habits of Highly Effective
People. And we are in Covey's second
chapter The Seven Habits in Overview
where Covey is discussing how important
and influential habits are in our lives
with habits defined as quote the
intersection of knowledge, skill, and
desire. And these habits are on a
maturity continuum and they consist of
growing from dependence to independence
to interdependence. And layered on top of
that respectively growing from the
paradigms of you taking care of me versus
I can take care of me versus we can do
it together. Right? So today we're gonna
finish up Covey's sub chapter The
Maturity Continuum. And recall on Friday
Covey was pointing out that in this
natural growth of maturity continuum from
independence to interdependence
that quote interdependence is far more
mature and more advanced concept end
quote. In fact Covey believes people that
are still in the dependent stage all
about themselves and blaming others that
they aren't mature enough quote they
don't have the character or own enough of
themselves end quote to choose on
their own to become interdependent. So
Covey says interdependent people have
the opportunity to share themselves
deeply and meaningfully with others and
in doing so they have access to the vast
resources and potential of other human
beings. And because a person or we need
to be masters of ourselves before we can
move into interdependence the first three
habits that Covey will cover later in
this book those habits deal with the
concept of self mastery. Now these are
the habits that lead to quote private
victories and if you recall Covey said
that private victories precede public
victories so these must come first. And
once we master our independence only then
do we have the right quote
foundation for effective interdependence
end quote and it is at that time now
where our inner character base now is
prepared for quote personality oriented
public victories. So those would be
things like teamwork cooperation and
communication which are Covey's fourth
fifth and sixth habits. So what Covey is
saying is that the first second and third
habits lead to our private victories
and then we're ready for our fourth fifth
and sixth habits which lead to our
public victories. So Covey here is quick
to note that you don't have to move into
the forest or to isolate or become a monk
to perfect habits one two and three
before you can move on to habits four
five and six but he wants you to more
understand that this is a sequence that
this growth process is most effective
and quote in harmony with the natural
laws of growth end quote. So what about
the seventh habit right the name of the
book is seven habits. Well that habit is
renewal quote a regular balanced renewal
of the four basic dimensions of
life end quote. So what Covey is saying
is that the seventh habit embodies all
the other habits by keeping them top of
mind by practicing them routinely and
continuing to improve them constantly on
a quote progressively higher plane end
quote. This process is not like math once
you learn it you know it right this
process is more like stretching if you
stop stretching you lose flexibility so
you need to keep on stretching. The
seventh habit helps keep us flexible so
it keeps the other habits prioritized and
effective in our lives. All right nice
work that was a long subchapter laying
some serious foundations for what is to
come and tomorrow we're gonna start a
short subchapter entitled effectiveness
defined. So don't forget on this Monday
to fight for truth justice and the
American way that was another Superman
quote for you if you didn't catch it.
Anyways thanks for joining us today come
back tomorrow and have a fantastic day.
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It'll be a good time, I promise.
Thanks again for listening.
Have a fantastic day and
we'll see you tomorrow.