“Fall seven times, stand up eight.”

— Japanese Proverb

Japanese culture and ways of thinking can not be adequately addressed in a short space, but this Japanese proverb reflects an important and shared ideal: “Nana korobi ya oki” (literally: seven falls, eight getting up) means fall down seven times and get up eight. This speaks to the Japanese concept of resilience. No matter how many times you get knocked down, you get up again. Even if you should fall one thousand times, you just keep getting up and trying again. You can see this ethic reinforced in all facets of Japanese culture including education, business, sports, the martial arts the Zen arts, etc. It is especially important to remember the sentiment expressed in this proverb when times are dark. There are no quick fixes in life and anything of real worth will necessarily take much struggle and perseverance. Success does not have to be fast—what’s more important is that one simply does their absolute best and remains persistent.

Source: Presentation Zen

“I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.”

— Thomas Jefferson,
Diplomat, Lawyer, Architect, & Philosopher

Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743^[a] – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He had previously served as the second vice president of the United States between 1797 and 1801. The principal author of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson was a proponent of democracy, republicanism, and individual rights, motivating American colonists to break from the Kingdom of Great Britain and form a new nation; he produced formative documents and decisions at both the state and national level.

During the American Revolution, he represented Virginia in the Continental Congress that adopted the Declaration, drafted the law for religious freedom as a Virginia legislator, and served as the second Governor of Virginia from 1779 to 1781, during the American Revolutionary War. He became the United States Minister to France in May 1785, and subsequently, the nation’s first secretary of state under President George Washington from 1790 to 1793. Jefferson and James Madison organized the Democratic-Republican Party to oppose the Federalist Party during the formation of the First Party System. With Madison, he anonymously wrote the provocative Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions in 1798 and 1799, which sought to strengthen states’ rights by nullifying the federal Alien and Sedition Acts.

Source: Wikipedia

“Successful people do what unsuccessful people are not willing to do. Don’t wish it were easier; wish you were better.”

— Jim Rohn,

Entrepreneur, Author, & Motivational speaker

Emanuel James Rohn (September 17, 1930 – December 5, 2009) professionally known as Jim Rohn, was an American entrepreneur, author and motivational speaker.

Rohn left college after just one year^[2] and started his professional life by working as a human resource manager for department store Sears. Around this time, a friend invited him to a lecture given by famous entrepreneur John Earl Shoaff. In 1955, Rohn joined Shoaff’s direct selling business AbundaVita as a distributor.

In 1957, Rohn resigned his distributorship with AbundaVita and joined Nutri-Bio, another direct selling company. It was at this point that the company’s founders, including Shoaff, started to mentor him.^[3] After this mentorship, Rohn built one of the largest organizations in the company. In 1960 when Nutri-Bio expanded into Canada, Shoaff and the other founders selected Rohn as a vice president for the organization.

After Nutri-Bio went out of business in the early 1960s, Rohn was invited to speak at a meeting of his Rotary Club. He accepted and, soon, others began asking him to speak at various luncheons and other events. In 1963 at the Beverly Hills Hotel, he gave his first public seminar. He then began presenting seminars all over the country, telling his story and teaching his personal development philosophy.

Source: Wikipedia

“It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.”

— Babe Ruth,

Professional Baseball player

George Herman “Babe” Ruth Jr. (February 6, 1895 – August 16, 1948) was an American professional baseball player whose career in Major League Baseball (MLB) spanned 22 seasons, from 1914 through 1935. Nicknamed “The Bambino” and “The Sultan of Swat“, he began his MLB career as a star left-handed pitcher for the Boston Red Sox, but achieved his greatest fame as a slugging outfielder for the New York Yankees. Ruth established many MLB batting (and some pitching) records, including career home runs (714), runs batted in (RBIs) (2,213), bases on balls (2,062), slugging percentage (.690), and on-base plus slugging (OPS) (1.164); the last two still stand as of 2019.^[1] Ruth is regarded as one of the greatest sports heroes in American culture and is considered by many to be the greatest baseball player of all time. In 1936, Ruth was elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame as one of its “first five” inaugural members.

At age seven, Ruth was sent to St. Mary’s Industrial School for Boys, a reformatory where he was mentored by Brother Matthias Boutlier of the Xaverian Brothers, the school’s disciplinarian and a capable baseball player. In 1914, Ruth was signed to play minor-league baseball for the Baltimore Orioles but was soon sold to the Red Sox. By 1916, he had built a reputation as an outstanding pitcher who sometimes hit long home runs, a feat unusual for any player in the pre-1920 dead-ball era. Although Ruth twice won 23 games in a season as a pitcher and was a member of three World Series championship teams with the Red Sox, he wanted to play every day and was allowed to convert to an outfielder. With regular playing time, he broke the MLB single-season home run record in 1919.

Source: Wikipedia

“Learn to be comfortable in the uncomfortable. Learn to be peaceful, not bored. Learn to be inspired, not scared.”

— Maxime Lagacé,

Professional Hockey player

Maxime Lagacé (born January 12, 1993) is a Canadian professional ice hockey goaltender who is currently playing with the Providence Bruins of the American Hockey League (AHL) while under contract with the Boston Bruins of the National Hockey League (NHL).

Lagacé began his junior years with the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League in 2010. His first team was the P.E.I. Rocket for three years, finishing with a total record of 33–80–6 in 107 games and a .873 save percentage average. Lagacé also appeared in his only junior playoff game with the Rocket.

On July 23, 2012, Lagacé signed a three-year, $1.83 million entry level contract with the Dallas Stars. Lagacé had participated in the Stars’ Development Camp earlier that summer.^[2][3]Lagacé was transferred to the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles in 2013, where he only played eight games with a 3–3–1 record and a .887 save percentage. He was then traded to the Shawinigan Cataractes and the Sherbrooke Phoenix in the same season.

Source: Wikipedia

“Try not to become a man of success. Rather become a man of value.”

— Albert Einstein,

Theoretical physicist & Nobel Prize recipient

Albert Einstein (/ˈaɪnstaɪn/ EYEN-styne;^[4] German: [ˈalbɛʁt ˈʔaɪnʃtaɪn] (listen); 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist^[5] who developed the theory of relativity, one of the two pillars of modern physics (alongside quantum mechanics).^[3][6]:274 His work is also known for its influence on the philosophy of science.^[7][8] He is best known to the general public for his mass–energy equivalence formula E = mc², which has been dubbed “the world’s most famous equation”.^[9] He received the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics “for his services to theoretical physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect“,^[10] a pivotal step in the development of quantum theory.

The son of a salesman who later operated an electrochemical factory, Einstein was born in the German Empire but moved to Switzerland in 1895 and renounced his German citizenship in 1896.^[5] Specializing in physics and mathematics, he received his academic teaching diploma from the Swiss Federal Polytechnic School (German: eidgenössische polytechnische Schule, later ETH) in Zürich in 1900. The following year, he acquired Swiss citizenship, which he kept for his entire life. After initially struggling to find work, from 1902 to 1909 he was employed as a patent examiner at the Swiss Patent Office in Bern.

Source: Wikipedia

“It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.”

— Herman Melville,

novelist, short story writer, & poet

Herman Melville (born Melvill;^[a] August 1, 1819 – September 28, 1891) was an American novelist, short story writer and poet of the American Renaissance period. Among his best-known works are Moby-Dick (1851), Typee (1846), a romanticized account of his experiences in Polynesia, and Billy Budd, Sailor, a posthumously published novella. Although his reputation was not high at the time of his death, the centennial of his birth in 1919 was the starting point of a Melville revival and Moby-Dick grew to be considered one of the great American novels.

Melville was born in New York City, the third child of a prosperous merchant whose death in 1832 left the family in financial straits. He took to sea in 1839 as a common sailor on a merchant ship and then on the whaler Acushnet but he jumped ship in the Marquesas Islands. Typee, his first book, and its sequel, Omoo (1847) were travel-adventures based on his encounters with the peoples of the island. Their success gave him the financial security to marry Elizabeth Shaw, the daughter of a prominent Boston family. Mardi (1849), a romance-adventure and his first book not based on his own experience, was not well received. Redburn (1849) and White Jacket (1850), both tales based on his experience as a well-born young man at sea, were given respectable reviews but did not sell well enough to support his expanding family.

Source: Wikipedia

“Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.”

— John D. Rockefeller,

business magnate & philanthropist

John Davison Rockefeller Sr. (July 8, 1839 – May 23, 1937) was an American business magnate and philanthropist. He is widely considered the wealthiest American of all time,^[4][5] and the richest person in modern history.^[6][7]

Rockefeller was born into a large family in upstate New York that moved several times before eventually settling in Cleveland, Ohio. Rockefeller became an assistant bookkeeper at age 16 and went into several business partnerships beginning at age 20, concentrating his business on oil refining. Rockefeller founded the Standard Oil Company in 1870. He ran it until 1897, and remained its largest shareholder.

Rockefeller’s wealth soared as kerosene and gasoline grew in importance, and he became the richest person in the country, controlling 90% of all oil in the United States at his peak.^[c] Oil was used throughout the country as a light source until the introduction of electricity, and as a fuel after the invention of the automobile. Furthermore, Rockefeller gained enormous influence over the railroad industry which transported his oil around the country. Standard Oil was the first great business trust in the United States. Rockefeller revolutionized the petroleum industry and, through corporate and technological innovations, was instrumental in both widely disseminating and drastically reducing the production cost of oil.

Source: Wikipedia

“The road to success and the road to failure are almost exactly the same.”

— Sir Colin R. Davis,

London Symphony Orchestra Conductor

Sir Colin Rex Davis CH CBE (25 September 1927 – 14 April 2013) was an English conductor, known for his association with the London Symphony Orchestra, having first conducted it in 1959. His repertoire was broad, but among the composers with whom he was particularly associated were Mozart, Berlioz, Elgar, Sibelius, Stravinsky and Tippett.

He studied as a clarinettist, but was intent on becoming a conductor. After struggles as a freelance conductor from 1949 to 1957, he gained a series of appointments with orchestras including the BBC Scottish Orchestra, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. He also held the musical directorships of Sadler’s Wells Opera and the Royal Opera House, where he was principal conductor for over fifteen years. His guest conductorships included the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic and the Dresden Staatskapelle, among many others.

As a teacher, Davis held posts at the Royal Academy of Music, London, and the Landesgymnasium für Musik “Carl Maria von Weber” (preparatory school for music) in Dresden. He made his first gramophone recordings in 1958, and his discography over the next five decades was extensive, with many studio recordings for Philips Records and a substantial catalogue of live recordings for the London Symphony Orchestra’s own label.

Source: Wikipedia

“Success is not final; failure is not fatal: It is the courage to continue that counts.”

— Winston S. Churchill,

Politician, Army officer, & Writer

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill^[1] (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965)^[2] was a British politician, army officer, and writer. He was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945, when he led the country to victory in the Second World War, and again from 1951 to 1955. Apart from two years between 1922 and 1924, Churchill was a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1900 to 1964 and represented a total of five constituencies. Ideologically an economic liberal and imperialist, he was for most of his career a member of the Conservative Party, as leader from 1940 to 1955. He was a member of the Liberal Party from 1904 to 1924.

Of mixed English and American parentage, Churchill was born in Oxfordshire to a wealthy, aristocratic family. He joined the British Army in 1895, and saw action in British India, the Anglo-Sudan War, and the Second Boer War, gaining fame as a war correspondent and writing books about his campaigns. Elected an MP in 1900, initially as a Conservative, he defected to the Liberals in 1904. In H. H. Asquith‘s Liberal government, Churchill served as President of the Board of Trade, Home Secretary, and First Lord of the Admiralty, championing prison reform and workers’ social security. As First Lord during the First World War, he oversaw the Gallipoli Campaign; after it proved a disaster, he resigned from government and served in the Royal Scots Fusiliers on the Western Front. In 1917, he returned to government under David Lloyd George and served successively as Minister of Munitions, Secretary of State for War, Secretary of State for Air, and Secretary of State for the Colonies, overseeing the Anglo-Irish Treaty and British foreign policy in the Middle East. After two years out of Parliament, he served as Chancellor of the Exchequer in Stanley Baldwin‘s Conservative government, returning the pound sterling in 1925 to the gold standard at its pre-war parity, a move widely seen as creating deflationary pressure and depressing the UK economy.

Source: Wikipedia

Happy Father’s Day!

In honor of all the wonderful fathers that have impacted our lives, we are sharing thoughts from our own dads. These small pieces of wisdom were often repeated in our homes as we grew up and still serve as valuable reminders of lessons learned.

“You can be right, or you can be dead right.”

-Kristen Dyson’s father

“My dog ain’t in that hunt.”

-Eric Poerschke’s father

“Let it ride.”

-Tara Lockhart’s father

“The difference between a good day and a bad day is…attitude.”

-Eric Poerschke, father of three, coach of many & founder of NextLevel Thinking

“Don’t count the days. Make the days count.”

This is just one of many Muhammad Ali quotes. For 29 more of his most popular quotes, head over to USA Today.