Good morning.
And welcome to morning cereal
Okay, good morning and welcome to Monday.
I hope you had a
restful and relaxing weekend,
and believe it or not,
the next weekend we enjoy
will be in the month of March.
Now, I know time goes by
faster as you get older,
but I feel like 2025 has
shifted into sixth gear.
This year is flying by,
but let's not get ahead of ourselves.
We still have five days left
and arguably the best month of the year.
I'm not sure if anyone
is actually debating that,
but I'm just putting it out there.
Okay, grab some salsa
over lunch or dinner
because today is
National Tortilla Chip Day.
Let's go ahead and double
dip into our two quotes today.
One fun nostalgic quote,
and then a second quote
to tease our book review
later in the episode.
Hopefully one of these
quotes will speak to you
and kickstart your day and your week
in a positive direction.
The first quote is from David Lee Roth.
He's the original singer
of the rock band Van Halen.
And this quote kind of cracks me up
because it has some real truth to it.
Here's what Roth said.
Quote, "The problem with self-improvement
"is knowing when to quit."
End quote.
There's a lot of truth to that.
Some people can really go
overboard with self-improvement,
but let me assure you,
that is not the case
here on Morning Cereal.
We are knocking it out of the park
on our very healthy self-improvement.
Okay, today's teaser
quote from the book review is,
quote, "Takes the wisdom
and the patience of angels
"to transform the bristling
negative into an affirmative."
End quote.
And as usual, we'll unpack
that here in just a few moments,
but first let's jump
into our usual dose of fun
and historic facts
from this day in history.
Today's news facts of
birthdays are for February 24th.
We're starting way back in 1868.
That's when US President Andrew Johnson,
he was impeached on this day
by the US House of Representatives.
And he was impeached because of his
lenient reconstruction
of policies regarding the
South after the Civil War.
And that angered radical
Republicans in Congress.
Then in 1955, that's when Steve Jobs,
the co-founder of Apple,
the charismatic pioneer of
the personal computer era,
he was born.
In 1988, the US Supreme
Court defended the right
for public figures to be satirized.
And in 1991, US ground operations
began in the Persian Gulf War.
More than a month after an air attack,
the war was launched against Iraq
to free Iraqi occupied Kuwait.
Then in 2014, and I didn't
hear about this at the time,
but apparently a 4.4
billion year old crystal
was discovered and it was thought to be
the oldest known
fragment from the Earth's crust.
And lastly, if you were
flipping through the TV guide
on this date back in
1995 during prime time,
you would have been
able to choose some shows
like The Wonder Years
or Doogie Howser M.D.,
Home Improvement,
Coach, or Unsolved Mysteries.
There's a bit of nostalgia for you.
Well, happy birthday if
today's your birthday.
You share a birthday with
the shortest list thus far.
You share a birthday with
only Floyd Mayweather Jr.
He's 48 years old today.
Well, the number one
movie on this date in 1991
was Sleeping with the
Enemy, starring Julia Roberts,
when she became the youngest actress
to earn a seven figure
fee for a single movie.
The movie is about a
battered wife who fakes her death
to escape her abusive husband,
but he eventually tracks her down
as she attempts to build a
new life and a new identity.
I remember it being a pretty good movie.
Then the number one song
on this date back in 1984
was Jump by Van Halen.
I overused the word classic
when talking about these songs
that I grew up with, and
this one is no different.
It's a classic 80s rock song
with some serious synthesizer in it.
Love it.
Apparently, Jump remains Van
Halen's most successful single,
and I did not believe
this when I read it,
but Van Halen only had one number one hit
on the Billboard Hot 100.
Other songs like Why
Can't This Be Love and Panama
and When It's Love and Right Now,
can't believe none of
those hit number one.
So pull your old CDs out
and listen to some of
those classic songs.
Let's move on to some personal growth now
and some
self-improvement that is definitely not
over the line 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
in all the must read lists,
and it's packed with rock
solid advice and actions
for us all to use and build healthy
foundational concepts
to live by.
Well, last week we finished
up chapter four of part three,
which was entitled A Drop of Honey.
And Carnegie suggested
that we avoid the fight.
We avoid the argument
and avoid telling people
outright that they are wrong.
Carnegie suggests instead
that when we have a difficult discussion,
that we should take the high road
and take a more friendly,
sympathetic, appreciative approach
that will win in the end.
And he ended the chapter
with a fable that says,
"Gentleness and
friendliness were always stronger
than fury and force."
Chapter four was
entitled A Drop of Honey,
and Carnegie's principle number four was,
"Begin in a friendly way."
Which brings us to today,
and we begin chapter five,
which is entitled The Secret of Socrates.
And right away, Carnegie
gives us direction saying,
"In talking with people,
don't begin by discussing
the things on which you differ.
Begin by emphasizing
and keep on emphasizing
the things on which you agree."
End quote.
Carnegie wants our
focus in these discussions
to be on the method of
getting to an outcome,
not the purpose of
getting to that outcome.
And as such, Carnegie's
method of emphasizing things
that you agree upon will get
the other person saying yes.
And then you should aim to get more yeses
from the other person,
but try to avoid having them say no.
There is actually a lot of
science behind this technique
of conjuring up a handful of yeses
at the beginning of a conversation.
And skillful speakers know that.
Again, if you've been with us
throughout the review of this book,
you know how material
people's sense of importance is.
Everything we are is
ultimately wrapped up
in a feeling of importance.
And when a person says no,
that no is attached
again to a person's beliefs,
and it's attached to their self-pride,
which is wrapped up in that no.
And it is very difficult to get someone
to change their mind
once they've got that flag in the ground.
Even if they know they are wrong,
the ego makes it very
difficult to change.
Carnegie even cites the body's
physiological responses
to taking a no stance,
and how that changes to
a more accepting attitude
with yeses or an acceptance early on.
Carnegie's point is that it
is of the highest importance
if you want to influence
someone in your direction
to get the conversation started
in the affirmative direction.
Start with something
you both can agree on
using this quote, yes, yes technique.
Okay, Carnegie story time.
A banker was determined
to take a new approach
on how to get some of his clients
to give him all the
information required by the bank
when opening new accounts.
And historically, some
clients would push back
saying the information wasn't necessary
and they didn't want to give it.
And historically, the banker would quote,
show them by flouting
bank rules and regulations
and giving them the ultimatum
that either they give the information
or they don't open the account.
The banker was ashamed
that he had acted in this way.
So he tried the yes, yes technique
on the next hesitant client.
And this time the
banker agreed with the client
that the information wasn't necessary.
But then the banker asked
that wouldn't it be nice
that the bank knew
who the next of kin was
in the event of the client's death
so the bank could
transfer the money to them?
And the client answered, yes, of course.
And the banker continued saying,
well, wouldn't it be a good idea then
for the client to give him
that name of the next of kin
so the bank could carry
out the client's wishes
quote, without error or delay.
And again, a yes from the client,
which led to a
softening of the client's mood
as he realized that the
asks for the information
was for his sake and it benefited him.
Now we're gonna finish
this chapter tomorrow.
And I know some of you are saying,
Sean, the name of this
chapter is the secret of Socrates.
And we haven't even
mentioned Socrates even once.
We aren't even in the
same millennia as Socrates.
Well, tomorrow we will, I promise.
But for today,
Carnegie is introducing to us
the yes, yes technique.
So as you look to
implement some of these techniques
in your real life,
look to get some yeses,
look for that common
ground with the other person.
You gotta get the ball
rolling in a positive direction
because starting from a
no, Carnegie says quote,
takes the wisdom and
the patience of angels
to transform the bristling
negative into an affirmative.
End quote.
Okay, we have a Monday and
a whole week ahead of us.
And if that seems a bit
daunting this morning,
remember, inch by inch, life's a cinch.
Yard by yard, life is hard.
Again, it rhymes, so it has to be right.
Well, thanks again for joining us today.
Join us again tomorrow
when we actually do talk
about Socrates 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 visiting our YouTube
channel and the website
at Sean English and at SeanEnglish.com,
where you can also
follow our other podcast,
the Mr. and Mrs. English podcast
and the Life Happens podcast.
And these other podcasts will dive deeper
into everyday issues,
self-improvement and wellbeing,
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.