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Good morning, and welcome to Morning Cereal!
Pull up a stool, grab your favorite cereal, and let’s kick-start your day with a spoonful of inspiration, nostalgia and personal growth. Join your host, Shaen Inglis, as he highlights the music, movies, and moments that made the 80s, 90s, and 2000s unforgettable—kind of like digging for toy at the bottom of the cereal box. Each episode, Shaen also reviews a chapter or so from top wellness books, offering practical insights to help you set a positive tone for your day. Start your mornings right—no cartoons required!
Follow and subscribe to the Morning Cereal podcast and visit our Life Happens, Live Balanced channel and our website at shaeninglis.com to check out and follow our other podcasts. You can also follow Shaen @ShaenInglis on Instagram, YouTube, etc. Feel free to share the Morning Cereal with someone who could use a little fun and motivation to start their day right.
Good morning, and welcome to Morning Cereal—the podcast that’s here to kick-start your day with some inspiration, some nostalgia, and hopefully a spoonful of positivity! I’m your HOST, Shaen Inglis and every morning, we highlight a few nostalgic moments to bring a smile to your face, but additionally we’ll share a little wisdom from some of the top wellness books just to set the tone and direction for you to have a fantastic day.
Well good morning again and welcome to December. Today is Monday, December 2nd, hard to believe it. I hope you were able to spend some time with friends and family over the Thanksgiving Holiday…and if you’re like me, I always hit the pause button on my attempt to eat healthy and watch my portions of thanksgiving, so I ate too much, but totally worth.
[TODAY’S QUOTE]
• Alright, today’s quote comes from John Wanamaker, considered the father of the modern departments store. Wanamaker’s quote is “God has not seen fit to distribute evenly the gift of intelligence.”
• We’ll unpack this quote a bit more here in a minute, but first let’s start off with a proper dose of nostalgia and fun facts from this day in history. I always find that nice dose of dopamine that our brains release along with feelings of nostalgia really tend to improve my mood and reduce stress and anxiety.
[HISTORIC NOSTALGIA]
• So, let jump into today’s nostalgic news facts on this day Dec. 2.
o Did you know that on this day in 1982 the first artificial heart implant was completed at the University of Utah hospital. It was a successful 12 hour surgery.
o In 1983, MTV aired the full 14 minute version of Michael Jackson’s ”Thriller” video for the first time! I remember going to my buddy’s house across the street to watch this live, because they had cable…and I do remember being slightly scared. Classic!
o In 1993 – The space shuttle Endeavour was launched – and if you recall this was a big deal because the mission included critical repairs and improvements to the Hubble Space telescope. The Hubble Telescope has captured some of the most incredible and iconic images from space like the Pillars of Creations. Definitely worth a look up.
o In 1999 researchers unraveled the genetic code of an entire human chromosome, basically providing a complete blueprint of human DNA.
o The last fact comes from 1997, when my favorite movie, or it’s got to be in the top 3 movies, either way on this date 27 years ago “Good Will Hunting” premiered. Incredible underdog movie about moving forward in life and conquering fears. Went on to win a ton of awards.
[BIRTHDAYS]
• Okay, Happy birthday if today is your birthday. You share a birthday with:
o [Beginning PLAY] Rick Savage, bass guitarist of Def Leppard – 64
o Gianni Versace (1946-1997)-he would have been 78
o Tennis star Monica Seles - 51
o Singer Nelly Furtado – 46
o Treach of Naughty by Nature is 54
o Britney Spears – 43 – that’s one those birthdays that makes me feel my age.
o Aaron Rodgers - 41
[MUSIC/MOVIES]
• Let’s take a quick hop back to Top of the charts:
o Here is the #1 song from this date. I’ll play a portion of the song and see if you can name the song and year [1:05 PLAY] This was an easy one, I think. “Blame it on the Rain” Mili Vanilli. It was #1 in what year? 1989. Scandal or not, these were great songs.
o On Monday’s I give Today’s #1 single on the charts and today it’s “A Bar Song” by Shaboozey [0:36 PLAY]
o National Lampoons Christmas Vacation was number one movie in 1989 – my family watches Christmas Vacation every year to kick off the Christmas Season, but classic quotes from the movie are used year-round in my household.
[BOOK REVIEW]
Okay, let’s move on to the wellness segment of “Morning Cereal” where we take a few moments to reflect on lessons from the current book we’re reading. I’ve chosen to start the podcast reading through Dale Carnegie’s “Howe to Win Friends and Influence People.” It’s a timeless book that is packed with rock-solid advice for all of us to use and build healthy foundational concepts and actions to live by.
Chapter 1 is entitled “If you want to gather honey, don’t kick over the beehive.” In the first few pages of this chapter Dale walks the reader through fact that we as individuals live out our lives, in general, only seeing our own life and our own circumstances through our own perspective. And in general, we tend think this individualized perspective we walk through life in is unabashedly, the correct one. This would mean my reality might not reflect what you believe to be your reality. The current state of US politics underscores this perfectly.
In the book, I really love this quote by John Wanamaker, “God has not seen fit to distribute evenly the gift of intelligence.” I have to tell you that I think this quote is referring to all the other drivers on the highway, but that’s a whole other podcast. What Dale Carnegie is tying together in these pages by discussing our different perspectives is that it doesn’t work, it’s not beneficial to criticize someone else’s perspective because 99 out of 100 times, Carnegie says, “people don’t criticize themselves for anything, no matter how wrong it may be.”
I’ll read you an excerpt from the book here, “Criticism is futile because it puts a person on the defensive and usually makes him strive to justify himself. Criticism is dangerous because it wounds a person’s precious pride, hurts his sense of importance, and arouses resentment.”
Remember, this book is about how to win friends and influence people. I know sometimes it seems so easy to criticize someone, especially when you feel they deserve it and in the moment it makes you feel better. Kind of like the referee in last nights soccer match that I did not make a friend of. So, I get it, it’s hard to take the high road at times, but in the end I know I feel better about myself when I take that high road… and putting some positive Karma out there probably isn’t a bad thing either.
Ultimately, Carnegie makes this point that we all go back to human nature, to see the world from our individual perspective. When you are tempted to correct and condemn someone, remember that that person is going to default to their nature, and our criticism will probably just justify themselves and condemn us in return. Right, so this is true, the referee last night was clearly wrong on a call, but he dug in the second the sideline criticized his call and he thought we were a bunch of idiotic parents.
This concept is perfectly summed up by Abraham Lincoln’s quote, “Judge not, that ye be not judged.
We’ll pick it up from here tomorrow as Carnegie explores a bit further, the human nature of handling conflict.
Ok - if you’re facing a big project, a personal goal, or just another day on the grind, know that you’ve got this! Have the courage to just keep moving forward in a positive way. Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans – So, make those moments in between matter. Have a fantastic day!