Love is Greater Than …Life through a lens of love and hope

<Today’s guest blog is provided by Addison Hollands>

“An apple a day keeps the doctor away.”

If the above statement is true, then why don’t we do that? It doesn’t seem too difficult to eat an apple. There is no need to microwave it, cook it, etc… virtually no prep time whatsoever. Part of me thinks that we don’t do some of the things we know we should because we don’t die right away. I mean, if I had a whopper with an extra side of badonkadonk, I wouldn’t have a heart attack immediately. If I did have a heart attack, you bet I wouldn’t do whatever caused that heart attack again. But this gets me thinking. I’ve been doing a lot of reading and searching ever since I became a father about 2 years ago. I just want to make sure that I’m following the Big Guy Upstair’s lead and I’m becoming the father and husband I was created to be. One of the things that I have come to realize is that life is made up by thousands and thousands of decisions everyday…. and COMPOUNDED over TIME… those same decisions will either help me or hurt me… there is no “in between….”

Let me explain. Anyone with a 401k or an IRA has been introduced to “compound interest.” It is that wonderful little teenie interest that COMPOUNDED over TIME can possibly have a SUBSTANTIAL effect on how much money is in one’s retirement account. But, let’s look at something else. If you and myself were the same size, age and weight today and I chose to eat an Extra Value Meal with a supersize Coke and you decided to eat a salad and a water…. there really wouldn’t seem to be much of a noticable difference in either you or myself. I wouldn’t die today and you wouldn’t be super skinny and or healthy… BUT… if we each made that same decision every day for the next 5 years there would be a HUGE difference not only in physical looks but in health.

I read a book recently that called this the “Slight Edge.” If you made a decision that effected you 1/3 of one percent each day…, meaning you change for the better .03 percent, in three days you would have IMPROVED 1 whole percent… or in a year you would change over 100% just by a simple easy decision. In engineering this is called “kaizen” Basically, if you COMPOUND your decisions over TIME you can be whomever or whatever you want. Get this, if you were a 1 at the beginning of year one and improved over 100% for 5 years (or less than .03 percent a day) than you would have a 3200%+ increase after 5 years.

Case in point… If I read 10 pages of a good book (Bible, 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Success Principles…any Ron Paul book ha. just kidding) every day (no Star magazines or romance novels), you wouldn’t notice a difference. But, in a year from now, I would have 3650 pages of great info floating around in my dome. Even 5 pages or 1 page will make a 1/3 percent difference for some people. Even opening the Bible would be a start. Some folks may have to limit dessert to 1 piece instead of 6 (me). I personally have changed my car into a “drivetime university.” Instead of reading while I’m at home and can spend time with my family, I am “reading” in my car. I have sermons and quality books galore. 20 minutes a day is over 80 hours or something like that a year!!!! You can’t tell me with 80 hours of goodness pumped in my head that it won’t make a difference.

I also went to the dollar store and bought a huge deck of playing cards for some “card pushups.” I do 5 card pushups a day. Here are my rules: an Ace is worth 1 pushup and a King is 13. If I draw a Joker, then it is TRIPLE the next card. All I have to do is 5 cards a day. That’s it. 5. My lowest was 13 pushups and I have been in the 80s a couple of times. The confidence that I have gotten from doing this is empowering. Now I feel buff yet my heart isn’t super healthy yet… 1/3% decision each day and that heart will be pimp pretty soon.

The main reason why I share this is because everyone makes huge unattainable New Year’s resolutions and all this is may be as easy as ONE APPLE A DAY. I hope your minds are working on the things you may want to improve on. The only warning that I have is “Something that is easy to do IS ALSO easy NOT to do.” Whatever decisions that we make will be COMPOUNDED over time and can either make us or break us.

Who do you want to be? What small decision made everyday can get you there? 5 minutes of scripture, 5 minutes of a good book,…. here is an idea GO GET A LIBRARY CARD (I say that because less than 3 percent of American’s have one), what about turning off the tv (for everything except LOST) and being still…? Do you want to be a better dad, husband, wife, daughter, brother, mother, etc or do you want to at least enjoy the life you have? What about savings or investing or financial freedom? Are those goals?

Best of luck… as for me I got some card pushups to do :) Have a wonderful day!

Addison

P.S. Here is a nice political video for those of you that expected something of the sort from me… enjoy.

The Difference: Obama & Ron Paul