The EXTRAORDINARY Family Life Podcast

This is the account of an unbelievable experience we had in Ecuador while preparing to climb a big mountain. I had an opportunity to go back up and help someone who had fallen. She later died in my arms on the mountain. There are a lot of great lessons from this incredible experience that you and I can use to prepare ourselves for life and for emergencies. And there are several things that are ext...

While I was climbing a big peek in Ecuador with my wife we met a man who we quickly connected with. In just a few minutes he told us the short version of his life story and how he totally transformed his life. His story is packed with proven principles and practices for all of us to transform ourselves into who we can really become. You have the power and the potential to take your greatest weakne...

Wow! Do I have some stories for you today! Are you willing and ready to help when the situation arises? And more importantly, are you actually prepared to help? Many of us will be offered many opportunities to make a difference in the lives of people around us. This happens to me all the time. Just in the last 10 days I was given the opportunity when lives were literally on the line. But the thing...

Failure hurts. A lot. It’s not some thing any of us want to do, but I think it’s something we all need to do. We attempted to Summit Orizaba and failed. Epic story. But in that failure were many successes—if we look for them. In life, if we will acknowledge the successes and learn from the failures we can have all the growth and ultimate success we want. Are you willing to fail in order to succeed...

If you’re on the right path and it’s the appropriate time for you, find a way to make it work or make a way to make it work! Too many of us give up too often and too soon. We give a first attempt or maybe a feeble second and then throw in the towel thinking there’s nothing else we can do. But we have found again and again in our life that the most incredible experiences come after we commit to fin...

How would your life be different if you had all the inspiration and guidance you need and want? Well you can have it! You just have to be more strategic. I remember vividly times in my life when I desperately needed to know what to do. Oh how I wish I had known what I know now! There are simple ways for us to tap into the inspiration and guidance that surrounds us all the time. Listen to this epis...

Formidable -very strong, especially in character; producing respect and a little fear in others: -Worthy of respect - tending to inspire awe or admiration because of great size, strength, excellence, etc.   -If you describe something or someone as formidable, you mean that you feel slightly frightened by them because they are very great or impressive. -a formidable opponent: capable, able, profici...

Serendipity: the Occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial wayI believe that God and the universe are conspiring in your favor and are presenting wonderful opportunities to you all the time! But you have to believe it, be open to it, and accept it. We have had literally Countless experiences that have been a gigantic blessing in our lives that have come through serend...

What is the greatest tragedy in life? If we look at the whole picture of life, it seems to me that the greatest tragedy is when an amazing human being fails to live a life that is meaningful, fulfilling and maximized. Each person has so much potential and vast amounts of untapped greatness ready to be utilized towards some meaningful purpose. But so many people settle for a life that is far less t...

“The second most deadly instrument of destruction is the dynamite gun; the first is the human tongue. The gun merely kills; the tongue kills reputations and, ofttimes, ruins characters. Each gun works alone; each loaded tongue has a hundred accomplices. The havoc of the gun is visible at once. The full evil of the tongue lives through all the years; even the eye of Omniscience might grow tired in...

Every single day I condition myself to be at my best! I recently asked a friend how often he hast to tune his musical instrument. “Every time I pick it up.“ The same is true for you and me. Your mind is your instrument. Your body is your instrument. Your spirit is your instrument. And they need to be tuned every time you pick them up. That is every morning at a minimum, but I would suggest tuning...

It seems counterintuitive. Actually, it seems crazy, but you and I have to be strategically out of balance in order to master the most important things in life! If you want to be truly successful, you have to become really good at several things. Otherwise you condemn yourself to mediocrity and then your life begins to unravel. One of the most effective ways to be in the master the most important...

Are you living an expanding life? Or perhaps a shrinking one? Are you growing, improving, progressing, and really living? Are you moving at a pace that makes you feel alive? Or do you feel like you’re just existing, or merely coasting along? In every important area of your life do you feel expansion or contraction? Every one of us has the privilege, opportunity, and responsibility to live an expan...

I know this sounds crazy. I realize that it’s hard to believe. But I have seen it too many times to not notice the pattern. You and I can get trapped in trauma that we experienced in the past, and that trauma keeps us from succeeding joyfully in other very unrelated areas. I even experienced this myself. Traumatic experiences with people or places or things left a negative mark in my psyche, and t...

If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,Or being hated, don’t give way to hating, And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:If you can dream—and not make dreams your maste...

There are levels of thinking. Most people think at first level thinking. Second, third, and fourth level thinking is extremely rare. But in order to learn to think like a genius, we must discipline ourselves to practice next level thinking. First level thinking sees what is immediate and obvious. It only observes the immediate problem without consideration for potential consequences. It only obser...

Every person I have ever met wants more freedom! We were born to be free. We were created for freedom. Freedom from guilt, pain, poor health, debt, addiction. We want money freedom and time freedom. We long to be free enough to live life on our terms! What kind of people enjoy the most freedom in this life? Those who consistently make good choices! In every area of your life the choices you make a...

The quality of your sleep is far more important than you probably realize! It can affect you physically, mentally, emotionally, and even spiritually. It affects your cognitive performance and the way you feel. It even affects the way you view yourself and your life. In this episode I share some simple proven principles and practices about the importance of Great sleep and how to massively improve...

There are two ways to experience life. You can let it happen to you or you can make it happen for you. For most people, the only things that happen in their lives are the things that happened to them. They live like puppets, where other people and things manipulate the strings of their lives. I want to invite and challenge you to take full responsibility and ownership for everything in your life....

Do we have to have trials in life? Do challenges make us stronger? What if we could choose our challenges and trials? Is that even possible?!What if we told you that there is a way to avoid trials and embrace challenges that can totally transform your whole life experience and help you become the kind of hero you want to become without the kind of suffering you want to avoid? Listen to this episod...

What do you do when life gets crazy? What will you do when life gets crazier? The answer is that we all fall back to our training! Archilochus said, “we do not rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training.” In the last week we went on a few extraordinary hikes in the Rocky Mountains. On Saturday we had the opportunity and privilege to help rescue a young man who was...

Winning requires a different set of skills and a different mindset! Anyone can show up to play or to participate, but if you want to win you have to think and act differently. You have to be more strategic! And so we must ask ourselves in every important aspect of life, are we showing up to participate or to win? Because the world is becoming more competitive and more advanced, none of us can affo...

Our society has become really good at using softeners, and at making others feel like they have to use them too, really guilt tripping the rest of us to use them so that we don’t make other people feel bad. Big problem!-we’re teaching and spreading victimism—that another person can make us feel something -that we should live in a world where nothing and no one makes us feel uncomfortable or threat...

Are you progressing? Really progressing? We are made to move! We are created to create! When we are not moving, creating, progressing we feel empty and blah. And we feel that way if we are not moving at the right pace. We have to move, and at the right pace. It is in our spiritual DNA. We were made to move. We were created to create. Many of you are struggling only because your goals are impotent!...

Repetition is the unsexy secret to success! And it is one of the greatest ironies in life. We are so quick to say to ourselves that we’ve already done that before, we’ve already heard that before, we’ve already seen that before, and so we don’t need to do it again. Oh how wrong we are when we tell ourselves that story! The top performers in the world in every field practice repeating the key skill...