A great teacher once said love your maker with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself.

Without getting ultra-religious on you, I want to share my five part business life strategy I live by. I will submit this blog in five parts.

First things first, I question self made people. I know that what it is like to hit rock bottom. I also know it took alot of faith, people and friends to get me to the place I am today. I like to find out who makes an individual. Many people have a maker that they have chosen to control their lives. Their maker might be a habit, or negativity. Their bad childhood could be controlling and making their lives. A bad marriage or even wealth could be the maker of some.  I want to know what makes people tick.

 Heart in the purist form or as the original greek describes the word as kardia. A good definition could mean inmost area of our lives that makes us tick. What makes you tick? That is where your heart is. I am driven by my inner most gut to be a person of intergrity, to follow-up on commitments I have made and keep pushing when times get tough. When I wrestled in high school, we ran many miles before we practiced. The coach never told us how far to run, he just told us to run until he called "gut check time". Which meant that we were going to kick it up a notch before we stopped. Often times, he would wait until we were fall down tired before he called "gut check". I know guys who made it no further and quit before we got to "gut check" time. For those of us who kept running, we found a "second wind" to go further and further. It was during those times of practice, I found out who I really was and who my true team mates were. We found our heart beat as a team during the tough times. Sometimes, we would even turn and cheer one another on so others would push themselves further and further.

It is easy to have heart when things are going well. It is when the coach yells gut check or when your competitior or the market is kicking your butt, that's when you know where the condition of your heart is....

What I am trying to say is that today is gut check time. How far are you willing to go for your first love? Those persons or things that really makes you tick? Who or what controls your heart? Your maker, your past, or your experiences good or bad?

Vernon

www.knoxvilleleadershipnetwork.com