Welcome
Thank you for visiting my website. As a motivational speaker I speak about the real issues of living. What each of us can do to make our stay on this earth productive and enjoyable.When I speak I try to achieve a number of things like motivating people to look at their lives to see where they are now and what is required to move to the next level. My experiences in life have been rich and powerful. I am happy to share these personal experiences to assist my audience to understand that it does not really matter what happens to us in life, what matters is what we do with it.
Therein lies the secret of successful living. If you need someone who will connect with your audience, a speaker who will entertain, inform, change behavior and motivate, then give me a call and we can discuss your requirements. In the following remarks I express some of my philosophy about life. This will give you a feeling of where I am coming from.
The Banquet Table
It was Helen Keller who said, "Life is either a daring adventure or nothing." Life is a banquet table. Upon it we find every delicacy imaginable. The lamb, beef, venison, duck, chicken, turkey and pheasant have been cooked to perfection in sauces that tempt the taste buds (unless you are a vegetarian). A cornucopia of vegetables, pumpkin, potatoes, carrots, cauliflower, and broccoli are to be found in a state of perfection. Exotic seasonings, poppy, wild marjoram, thyme, capers, and ginger enhance the flavour of the dishes. Fruits of every kind, the common and the uncommon, even the exotic quince, currant, mango, durian and pomegranate grace the table for taste and decoration. For the wine drinkers, there are reds and whites of every kind and vintage that would make Bacchus jealous.
We have all been summoned to attend the banquet of life. As special guests we arrive in anticipation and yet, instead of sitting on the gold embossed chairs provided for our comfort, we elect to sit on the floor and eat the crumbs that fall from the banquet table.
Too many of us, for too long, have sat on the floor eating the crumbs that fall. Get up off the floor and feast at the banquet table before it is too late. To waste a day would be to waste our inheritance.
Henry David Thoreau, said, “Oh God! To reach the point of death only to realise you have never lived
The Measure of our Creation
Observation tells us that we live in a well-ordered universe. Each day the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. Its rays give light and warmth to all the creatures of this earth. At the end of the day, night arrives. This twenty-four hour cycle never ceases. One season follows another. Spring is always followed by summer; summer is always followed by autumn, etc. This course is unchangeable.
All vegetation and animal life fulfill the measure of their creation. The tomato bush must fulfill the measure of its creation in producing an abundance of beautiful red tomatoes. It is doing what all tomato bushes do. It is doing what its ancestors have done for generations.
Have you noticed when sunrise and sunset approaches, there is a chorus of birds that chirp and sing? They cannot avoid this. Nature, if you like, has programmed this into them and they must fulfill the measure of their creation. If we can observe order and beauty in the creation of nature, then should we not consider the order and beauty of our creation, the greatest of all the species?
We, like nature, also have to fulfill the measure of our creation. In doing this we experience true happiness because we are living at the most ethical and productive level. For each of us the measure will be different according to the role we have to play.
We are all at different levels of our development. Some of us are seedlings, others grand oak trees, but every level is needed. We should remember that the grand oak tree was once a seedling. Therefore, to be in harmony with all, you must allow all to be at the level they are at. You cannot take a seedling and expect it to act like a grand oak tree. It is just not possible. It has to go through the growing process. There is no other way. The role of each oak is to assist the seedling through the process. I should quickly add, only if the seedling wants to be assisted.
Wherever we are and whoever we are, the purpose of our life is to rise to the measure of our creation. This is the great challenge of life, to understand our role and our purpose. It is only by fulfilling this that we experience what Joseph Campbell and others have called our 'bliss'.
The Grand Design
It seems to me that we can view life in at least two ways. Firstly there is a grand design to our creation and we play an important role in this design. If so, no other person can fulfill our role. Every thing and every person has a place and a purpose. This is what makes us unique amongst all of creation.
An alternative theory is that life is a series of accidents. Things happen randomly without rhyme or reason. Where you are positioned is the luck of the draw. It is either good luck or bad luck. You do not have any control over life. You just wait for the next accident to occur.
The word ‘accident’ had to have been invented by someone who could not explain or understand why a certain thing occurred. Accidents never just happen, they are caused. If you do not know the cause of an event or was not expecting it to happen then you label it an accident or a coincidence.
Life takes on a new meaning when we come to know that there are no accidents, only experience. There is a grand design for our existence and we do have control over much of what we do, therefore we can make a decision to live life with excitement and energy.
To Reason is Divine
What makes us different from all other creations is that we have the ability to reason, the capacity to think things through. Seneca said, “Reason is nothing else but a portion of the divine spirit set in a human body”.
Reason allows us to make informed choices based on what is real. Reason is the enemy of desire; therefore, desire will do every thing within its power to subdue reason. For life to have meaning we must allow reason to play its role. If not, desire takes over and conquers all with a passion that can be a curse or, according to the English proverb, “A man without reason is a beast in season”. On most occasions reason and desire are at war. You must decide who will be the victor. We have been given the freedom to choose how we will live or, to use an American term; it is our ‘inalienable right’, one that comes with us at birth. It is easier to choose once we have worked out what our purpose is or the ‘why’ of life. Once we know ‘why’ then we can work out ‘how’.
Some people seem to find a purpose without difficulty. This may be because of who their parents are or what country they are born in. For others it is a talent or gift that may dictate their direction. The talent is the call, or so it seems. The age one is born into will provide different opportunities and challenges.
Some know from a very early age what they have to do in life. For example, Mozart played the harpsichord at the age of three, composed at four, and went on tour at the age of six. Haydn played and composed at the age of six. Mendelssohn was playing and composing when he was nine.
In contrast, others never seem to discover their purpose. Sometimes we are like the man who goes in search of a light while holding a lantern. “We look too high for things close by.”
We have control over most things in our life and this is the way it should be. We are the architects of our own destiny. It is also true that there are things over which we have little or no control however we can control our reaction to these things.
You have no control over how you look. The sixteenth president of The United States, Abraham Lincoln, was not the most handsome man. He knew this but still saw the humorous side of it. In a debate, Stephen Douglas accused Lincoln of being two-faced. Lincoln replied, “I leave it to my audience to decide. If I had two faces would I be wearing this one?”
Life is about making the best of what we have. We are here to progress and to succeed no matter what cards you have been given. We have the power to choose. Whatever we choose there will be a consequence. We either choose to move forward or go backward. There is no standing still. You cannot even say, “I am coasting” as there is only one way to coast, and that is downhill.
The measure and purpose of our creation then is to move forward, to grow, to win, to excel, to be better when we leave here than when we arrived. Each generation should be better than the former, not in what we accumulate but in how we live.
Competition in Life
We live in a very competitive world. Everybody seems to be competing with someone at some level. Each week we spend hours playing or watching others compete in sporting activities all over the world. We cannot help being impressed by the level of excellence that these people achieve.
In sport and business, competition encourages excellence in performance. Where there is no competition, improvement in performance is less likely. We have lived through an era where governments have held monopolies in business. With no competition from free enterprise, services deteriorate. Monopolies create sloppy business practices, less innovation and higher prices. Business performs better with competition. Costs and prices decrease. Some level of competition is necessary in all aspects of life.
We all compete when the motivation is strong enough. However, competition is not the real purpose of life. Fulfilling the measure of our creation can only be achieved individually. We are not in competition with any other person, so we do not have to compare ourselves with others. We do not have to become discouraged because we think that someone else is better than we are in a particular area. The essence of our being is equal to that of any other person. There is only one person that can fulfill our role and that is us. This means that others cannot beat us to the finish line because there is no race. This is not to say that others do not have a similar role to us, but it is never the same. This is important to understand if we are going to enjoy life. Every human being is unique and cannot be duplicated.
Concluding Remarks
If you feel my philosophy on life is what the people in your organization could benefit from then I would be delighted to hear from you.
I wish you every good wish, Dennis
