Road Trip by Madeline Frank, Ph.D.

Have you ever taken your family on a road trip? 

 

When our two children were ages 9 and 5, we packed up our purple Grand Voyager, and headed out on a 3 ½ hour trip to visit President Thomas Jefferson’s home, Monticello, in Charlottesville, VA. 

 

If you are older than 35, you recall a time when the term “road trip” meant more than simply typing an address into your phone and following turn-by-turn directions. 

 

It likely conjured up memories of deciphering large maps, using a highlighter to mark points of interest…and then struggling with the nearly impossible feat of folding the map back into its original shape. 

 

After what seemed like 6 hours of countless “are we there yet?” questions from the back seat, we rounded the corner of Thomas Jefferson’s manicured estate…Monticello. 

 

Our tour guide was an expert on all things related to President Jefferson. He knew all about his life, his work, and his passions. He showed us many fascinating features of the property, as well as some hidden gems we hadn’t thought about. He wanted us to gain the most from our visit. 

 

Our guide showed us President Jefferson’s beautiful architecture of his home, that he designed and built, his many inventions like the dumbwaiter, macaroni making machine, the crops he grew in his garden to eat and sell, his ice house, his library, and how his family cooked and lived. It was a wonderful guided tour full of purpose and direction.

 

When we left there, my husband, Allan, and I were discussing how we would have enjoyed the visit if it were a self-guided tour; but the tour guide helped shed light on so much more than we could have imagined.  

 

Our family still carries fond memories of this road trip. Who are you taking on your “road trip” through life? Where are you going? What legacy do you want to leave? We are all leaving a legacy…whether we want to or not. Are you leaving one intentionally or by chance?

 

There will be detours along the way. Some will fuel your soul…others will test your resolve. You may even find yourself asking for directions. 

 

Whether you use paper maps, or rely on your phone to get you from point A to B…you must know where you currently are. Without that, directions are useless. 

 

Personal development pioneer, Zig Ziglar recounts a story of when he was traveling across the country, giving speeches for free. 

 

He began two hours early to make sure he would arrive a little early. He stopped for directions when he was lost. The person he asked drew a little map for him. He followed it and 45 minutes later he was further away from his destination. He then asked again and found his destination. Imagine if Zig Ziglar had given up after the first time.

 

When Zig Ziglar was going in the wrong direction and was again lost, he didn’t have a meltdown. Instead he asked again, and then again for directions until he found his destination.

 

How often do you check in with your goals to see if you are on track?

 

Are you willing to pivot when needed to change your destination?

 

Living a successful life is like a wheel.  Imagine your car wheel having 7 spokes.

 

For this exercise, grab a sheet of paper and draw a small circle with 7 spokes leading away from it with 10 marks on the line. 1 is closest to the center, 10 is at the outer edge.  

 

The First Spoke of your Wheel is the Mental spoke of your wheel: 

 

Do you find yourself focusing on where you are going, or spend most of your time thinking about the “good old days”?

 

Do you read, listen to audios, and watch videos that help you stretch mentally?

 

Rate yourself from 1 to 10. (10 is the top).

 

2. Financial Spoke: Financially how are you doing?

Do you have a goal for income, spending, saving? 

Do you tell your money where to go by using a budget, or do you get to the end of the month and wonder where your money went?  

Do you have insurance? Do you have an emergency fund?

Rate yourself 1 to 10. No one sees this but you!

 

3. Spiritual: 

Do you feel connected to a higher power? Do you feel like you are fulfilling plans for a magnificent future? Are you living life on virtues?

Rate yourself 1 to 10.

 

4. Career/Professional: What are you doing to grow your stack of skills that will make you more marketable in the future? (If you are raising small children, that is more than a full time job, but you still need to grow in your skills as a parent). 

A year from now is this where you want to be?

How is your attitude, effort, and skill?

Rate yourself 1 to 10.

 

5. Personal Life: 

How are you taking care of yourself? 

Do you make time to relax and rejuvenate, or are you constantly running from one thing to the next?

 

What hobbies bring you joy? (You may realize that you got away from doing things that brought you joy when life became busy. Pick up that guitar, paintbrush, or whatever else refreshes your soul. )

 Rate yourself 1 to 10.

 

6. Physical:

Do you get 7 hours of sleep each night? Do you fuel your body with real food, or do you cook out of a box? Do you drink enough water?

Are you working out?

Rate yourself 1 to 10.

 

7. Family:

Do you have good relationships with your family? Where do you feel you accel, and what do you need to work on? Most problems in any relationship are rooted in communication (or a lack thereof). It is easy to blame others…but you can’t change others. Own the situation and sharpen your communication skills. 

Rate yourself 1 to 10.

 

Connect the dots. Does your diagram resemble a wheel, or does it look uneven?

Despite everyone wanting to show the world that they are perfect, we all realize that each of the areas in our lives are in constant transition. The outer edges of your circle have high points and low points. 

 

You may be able to maneuver with a flat tire at 5 mph in a parking lot. What happens if you pull onto the highway of life? Things likely spin out of control.

 

Which of the 7 spokes of your wheel needs attention?

 

What is one thing you can do to improve the measure of that one spoke every day for the next 10 days? You will be amazed by the improvement that every day action steps can make!

 

There is a cost to leading a fulfilling life. There are only 24 hours in a day. 

 

There are quite a few parallels between this wheel of life and Benjamin Franklin’s 13 virtues. 

 

1. TEMPERANCE. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.

2. SILENCE. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.

3. ORDER. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.

4. RESOLUTION. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.

5. FRUGALITY. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing.

6. INDUSTRY. Lose no time; be always employed in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.

7. SINCERITY. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.

8. JUSTICE. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.

9. MODERATION. Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.

10. CLEANLINESS. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes, or habitation.

11. TRANQUILITY. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.

12. CHASTITY. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation.

13. HUMILITY. Imitate Jesus and Socrates.

 

How did Franklin acquire these virtues?

 

“My intention being to acquire the habitude of all these virtues, I judged it would be well not to distract my attention by attempting the whole at once,  but “to fix it on one of them at a time; and, when I should be master of that”, then to proceed to another, and so on, till I should have gone through’ the thirteen; and, as the previous acquisition of some might facilitate the acquisition of certain others, I arranged them with that view, as they stand above. Temperance first, as it tends to procure that coolness and clearness of head, which is so necessary where constant vigilance was to be kept up, and guard maintained against the unremitting attraction of ancient habits, and the force of perpetual temptations. This being acquired and established, Silence would be more easy; and my desire being to gain knowledge at the same time that I improved in virtue, and considering that in conversation it was obtained rather by the use of the ears than of the tongue, and therefore wishing to break a habit I was getting into of prattling, punning, and joking, which only made me acceptable to trifling company, I gave Silence the second place.”

 

 This is exactly the way to repair each spoke of your wheel step by step like Benjamin Franklin mastered each of the 13 virtues!

 

 So, what steps will you write down to repair the spoke of your wheel of life that needs attention?

 

 

 

 

Madeline Frank, Ph.D. is an Amazon.com  Best Selling Author, speaker, Radio Show host, business owner, teacher, concert artist, and parent. She helps businesses and organizations “Tune Up their Business”. Her observations show you the blue prints necessary to improve and keep your business successful. Her latest book “Leadership On A Shoestring Budget” is available everywhere books are sold. To contact Madeline for your next speaking engagement or coaching at mfrankviola@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

LET THE EXPERTS TEACH YOU HOW TO SOLVE YOUR PROBLEMS by Madeline Frank, Ph.D.

 

Dale Carnegie: “Galen Litchfield-a man I have known for several years; one of the most successful American business men in the Far East. Mr. Litchfield was in China in 1942, when the Japanese invaded Shanghai. And here is his story as he told it to me while a guest in my home:”

 

“Shortly after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor”, Galen Litchfield began, “they came swarming into Shanghai. I was the manager of the Asia Life Insurance Company in Shanghai. They sent us an ‘army liquidator’-he was really an admiral- and gave me orders to assist this man in liquidating our assets. I didn’t have any choice in the matter. I could cooperate-or else. And the ‘or else’ was certain death.”

 

“I went through the motions of doing what I was told, because I had no alternative. But there was one block of securities, worth $750,000, which I left off the list I gave to the admiral. I left that block of securities off the list because they belonged to our Hong Kong organization and had nothing to do with the Shanghai assets. All the same, I feared I might be in hot water if the Japanese found out what I had done. And they soon found out.”

 

“I wasn’t in the office when the discovery was made, but my head accountant was there. He told me that the Japanese admiral flew into a rage, and stamped and swore, and called me a thief and a traitor! I had defied the Japanese Army! I knew what that meant. I would be thrown into the Bridge house!”

 

“The Bridge House! The torture chamber of the Japanese Gestapo! I had had personal friends who had killed themselves rather than be taken to that prison. I had had other friends who had died in that place after ten days of questioning and torture. Now I was slated for the Bridge house myself!”

 

“What did I do? I heard the news on Sunday afternoon. I suppose I should have been terrified. And I would have been terrified if I hadn’t had a definite technique for solving my problems. For years, whenever I was worried I had always gone to my typewriter and written down two questions-and the answers to these questions:" 

“1. What am I worrying about?”       

“2. What can I do about it?” 

 

“I used to try to answer those questions without writing them down. But I stopped that years ago. I found that writing down both the questions and the answers clarifies my thinking.  So, that Sunday afternoon, I went directly to my room at the Shanghai Y.M.C.A. and got out my typewriter. 

I wrote: 

1. What am I worrying about? 

“I am afraid I will be thrown into the Bridge house tomorrow morning.”

Then I typed out the second question:     

2. “What can I do about it?”

“I spent hours thinking out and writing down the four courses of action I could take-and what the probable consequence of each action would be.”

 

“1. I can try to explain to the Japanese admiral. But he doesn’t speak English. If I try to explain to him through an interpreter, I may stir him up again. That might mean death, for he is cruel, would rather dump me in the Bridge house than bother talking about it.”

 

“2. I can try to escape. Impossible. They keep track of me all the time. I have to check in and out of my room at the YMCA. If I try to escape, I’ll probably be captured and shot.” 

 

“3. I can stay here in my room and not go near the office again. If I do, the Japanese admiral will be suspicious, will probably send soldiers to get me and throw me into the Bridge-house without giving me a chance to say a word.” 

 

“4. I can go down to the office as usual on Monday morning. If I do, there is a chance that the Japanese admiral may be so busy that he will not think of what I did. Even if he does think of it, he may have cooled off and may not bother me. If this happens, I am all right. Even if he does bother me, I’ll still have a chance to try to explain to him. So, going down to the office as usual on Monday morning, and acting as if nothing had gone wrong gives me two chances to escape the Bridge-house.”

 

“As soon as I thought it all out and decided to accept the fourth plan-to go down to the office as usual on Monday morning-I felt immensely relieved.”

 

“When I entered the office the next morning, the Japanese admiral sat there with a cigarette dangling from his mouth. He glared at me as he always did; and said nothing. Six weeks later-thank God-he went back to Tokyo and my worries were over.” 

 

 “As I have already said, I probably saved my life by sitting down that Sunday afternoon and writing out all the various steps I could take and then writing down the probable consequences of each step and calmly coming to a decision. If I hadn’t done that, I might have floundered and hesitated and done the wrong thing on the spur of the moment. If I hadn’t thought out my problem and come to a decision, I would have been frantic with worry all Sunday afternoon. I wouldn’t have slept that night. I would have gone down to the office Monday morning with a harassed and worried look; and that alone might have aroused the suspicion of the Japanese admiral and spurred him to act.”

 

“Experience has proved to me, time after time, the enormous value of arriving at a decision. It is the failure to arrive at a fixed purpose, the inability to stop going round and round in maddening circles, that drives men to nervous breakdowns and living hells. I find that fifty percent of my worries vanish once I arrive at a clear, definite decision; and another forty per cent usually vanishes once I start to carry out that decision. “

 

“So, I banish about 90% of my worries by taking these four steps:” 

“1. Writing down precisely what I am worrying about.”     

“2. Writing down what I can do about it.”     

“3. Deciding what to do.”       

“4. Starting immediately to carry out that decision.” 

 

Dale Carnegie: “Galen Litchfield became the Far Eastern Director for Starr, Park and Freeman, Inc., representing large insurance and financial interests. This made him one of the most important American businessmen in Asia; and he confesses to me that he owes a large part of his success to this method of analyzing worry and meeting it head-on.” 

 

Dale Carnegie: “Why is his method so superb? Because it is efficient, concrete, and goes directly to the heart of the problem. On top of all that, it is climaxed by the third and indispensable rule: Do something about it.   Unless we carry out our action, all our fact-finding and analysis is whistling upwind-it’s a sheer waste of energy. “ (From Dale Carnegie’s book “How to Stop Worrying and Start Living”, pp.37-40.)

 

Elon Musk in 2002 “began his quest to send the first rocket to Mars.” (Space X) The cost of purchasing a Rocket was 55 Million dollars.

 

Elon Musk used First principle thinking to solve this cost problem. 

 

First Principle:

“Identify the problem. Break things down into smaller parts.  Then look at each part individually, each component. Look outside your product category for a part or piece that can be imported. Combine the parts to create something new according to desired outcome. First Principle thinking.” (Story from Darren Hardy)

 

Elon Musk: “What’s a rocket made of?”

 

“Aerospace – grade aluminum alloys, plus some titanium, copper, and carbon fiber.”

“Then I asked, what is the value of those materials on the commodity market? It turned out that the materials cost of a rocket was around two percent of the typical price.” 

 

Step by step he built his own rocket better and cheaper.

 

When evaluating an entire project, the costs may seem like they are set in stone, however, when you break things down into bite-sized pieces, they can be more manageable. 

 

For example: 

Problem: My car makes a grinding sound when braking. 

 

Total solution: replacing brakes, pads, rotors, whole assembly. Cost: $1000. 

 

Individual solution: 

Most times replacing brake pads is sufficient. Cost $200. 

 

Reducing challenges into bite-sized chunks is not only a great recipe for cost reduction; it is a fantastic way to remove friction from your customer experience. 

 

 By asking himself questions he solved his problem and built a new rocket from the ground up.  

 

How do you solve your problems?

 

What steps do you take? 

 

What are the 4 steps experts Galen Litchfield, Dale Carnegie, and Elon Musk use to solve their problems?

 

1)    Calm down. Then clearly write down the problem. Charles Kettering, American inventor, engineer, and businessman said, “A problem well stated is a problem half solved.”

      2) Write down in order “all the facts”.

      3) “Analyze them and interpret them”.

      4) ” Then make a decision and take action.”

 

By following these four steps you will be able to solve your problems.

 

 

Madeline Frank, Ph.D., is an Amazon.com Best Selling Author, speaker, business owner, teacher, concert artist, and parent. She helps businesses and organizations “Tune Up their Business”. Her observations show you the blue prints necessary to improve and keep your business successful. Her latest book “Leadership On A Shoestring Budget” is available everywhere books are sold. If you need a speaker or virtual speaker contact Madeline at: mfrankviola@gmail.com