Family Papi

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A few years back, I had a colleague at work who constantly complained about everything (yes I do mean everything).

It seemed that every day, he complained about his boss, the weather, the copy machine, the “rich getting richer”, his wife, his kids, his neighbors, his job, etc. – you get the picture.

Whenever he called me or stopped by, I knew he had something to complain about.

He had what I call the negativity virus.

Symptoms of the negativity virus include:

• seeing anything from a negative standpoint all the time
• complaining instead of coming up with solutions for things you could control
• complaining for things out of your control
• whining and complaining to others about stuff outside of their control
• not appreciating life and all it has to offer
• not being thankful

As we approach the Thanksgiving season, it’s important to recognize these symptoms. 

My colleague ended up not only losing his job, he lost his family.  The family broke up after the divorce and he lost his home as well.

Let me be clear – I am not saying that his negativity virus actually directly caused all of this to happen.  I just know that the negativity virus blocked his opportunity to prosper.

Another way to say this is that positive things happen to positive people. 

Negative people don’t “see” positive things.  They ignore them or consider them negative – and with that – they attract truly negative things.

How to combat the negativity virus

During conversations, I would plead with him to please begin to look at the bright side of things.  I articulated the power of positive thinking and most importantly, the need to be thankful and appreciate all we are blessed with.

I also noted that as a family dad, his words were hurting rather than building those around him.

His response was that he couldn’t do any of that.  He said he needed to be himself and “tell it like it is – like it or not”.  His negativity was only made worse by his stubbornness.

After a while, I moved on.  He would call me once in a while. 

Once I sensed the negativity creeping into the conversation, I’d make an excuse to end the call. 

I didn’t want to catch that negativity virus.

I learned that the best way to combat it is to stay away from it.  It will drain away your energy, ambition and motivation.

Instead, surround yourself with positive people.  Positive people will provide support, encouragement, and most all be thankful for what they have. 

As a family dad, set the example and encourage your family to be this way.  Banish negative self-talk and self-defeatist thinking from your household.

Stop negativity on its tracks and master the art of living thankfully and positively inspiring those you touch every day.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving.

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When you have figured out what you want to do, that’s when the fun begins.

It’s action time.

So many family dads talk endlessly about what they would love to do, but never actually commit to doing it.

There are many reasons for that, but today we are talking about the family dad of action – the one who gets it done.

You see, you can visualize and plan all you want, but if you don’t act it doesn’t matter.

Hold yourself accountable to do something every day.

Do not have an attitude of just getting by – in order to prosper, you’ll need to have the proper mentality.

Resolve to not waste any time, go the extra mile to learn every detail about the area you have identified. Focus on excellence.

Get your hands dirty by learning about the nitty gritty of the subject area – spend hours every day building your expertise.

Read and learn all you can about your field. Since it is what you love to do, this should come naturally to you.

Move fast and execute flawlessly when an opportunity becomes available.

How about if the opportunity doesn’t come?

Create it. Talk to people. Volunteer. Be willing to work for free if need be.

Your enthusiasm, skillsets, and excellence in execution will be made clear for all to see.

You need to get out there and just do it.

Now that sounds like fun, doesn’t it?

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In order to answer that question, you need to know what you love to do.  If you know it, do it, and actually get paid for it – you’re in great shape.

Problem is, many family dads don’t know and therefore they don’t do.

Knowing comes first

As a family dad, if you find yourself in a situation where you don’t love what you do – that is your work, career, or day job – you have to do something.

Preferably, you have to get out of that and into a good place.

But what is the first step?

The first thing you need to do is figure out what it is you want to do.

Ask yourself the following three questions:

• If you had all the money in the world, what would you do?
• What are your natural strengths & abilities?
• What is it that people around you always compliment you on?

This is the point: you must find a job /career / business that will so completely fascinate you, it’ll be easy to throw your whole strength & focus into it and therefore increasingly prosper because of it.

The choices you have in terms of occupation are limitless, and that makes it sometimes hard to decide.

But you need to understand that only you can do this. 

Once you answered the previous three questions, the second step would be to research. 

This could be in the form of surfing the Internet, taking trips to the library or bookstore, and finding out who or what organizations can help.

This will mean sacrifice – what are you doing in your days off? 

I’m not saying to completely stop having quality or fun time, that’s very important.  But make a decision today that you will take at least a few hours every week to invest in knowing what you want to do.

Give yourself the amount of time necessary, don’t make a hasty decision.  While continuing your research, gain feedback from others, pray about it, visualize it, ask, write down some pros and cons, you name it.

Once you narrowed your choices to two or maybe the one, celebrate.

Yes, celebrate – you have accomplished something very few get to even identify – their purpose.

Now get ready to make it happen.

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