Tag Archives: challenge

Speaking Of A.D.D.

I have so many things to tell all of you about and yet each time I’ve tried to sit down to write a blog about them I get interrupted – From my husband being hospitalized unexpectedly last week, to me needing to fly to Washington DC this week for some really important meetings and to […]

Stop Defending And Start Listening

In yesterday’s blog I shared points from a Forbes article I’d written years ago on the importance of giving people honest feedback. Today I thought it would be good to share points from a follow-on article I’d written for Forbes on the importance of receiving feedback (The article was titled, If You Want To Improve, […]

The Motivating Power Of A Friendly Competition

I’m a firm believer in competing against our own best selves over trying to compete with other people.  That being said, I am all about having fun friendly competitions once in awhile because they are just a great way to motivate yourself.  Growing up as a middle child in a family with ten children it […]

Be That Star On The Hill #lighttheworld

Every night as I drive home the weeks before Christmas I look up on the hill above my house to see a big star that is lit up on the mountainside. It’s a star a neighbor has lit up for years during the holiday and I look forward to seeing it every night. There is […]

Adventure Is Out There

This past week has been one big adventure in my life and after a week of numerous public speaking engagements, several board meetings, two black tie events, and hardly any sleep, I just got home. It’s near midnight and I still need to prepare a powerpoint presentation for another speech I am giving tomorrow morning […]

A great story of determination and persistence

I love a great inspirational true story. Here is the story of determination and persistence that occurred with the building of the Brooklyn Bridge in New York back in 1870-1883. I had never heard this story before and it was so inspirational! “In 1883, a creative engineer named John Roebling was inspired by an idea […]

What you fill your mind with

“You are the books you read, the films you watch, the music you listen to, the people you meet, the dreams you have, the conversations you engage in. You are what you take from these. You are the sound of the ocean, the breath of fresh air, the brightest light and the darkest corner. You […]

Only love drives out hate

This coming Monday we celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. day. What an amazing man he was and what strength of character he had. I love that he didn’t let others dictate his own behavior. He decided what his values were and he decided the kind of man he wanted to be and then he lived […]

The Executive Team is the single greatest factor that determines Success or Failure for any Company

Earlier today I was looking through some documents and I found an outline I had written for a talk I was asked to give clear back in 2005 on How To Build And Operate A Successful Executive Team. As I sat reading it, some eleven years later, I can tell you that if I were asked to talk on that same subject today I […]

#LIGHTtheWORLD In 25 Ways. Over 25 Days.

Today I learned about an awesome challenge for all of us to “light the world” in 25 ways over 25 days as we lead up to Christmas. It’s a challenge meant to help us focus on incorporating more Christ-like attitudes and behaviors in honor of this Christmas season and over 800,000 people have already joined […]

She was really here and she really lived

Today I want to pay tribute to an amazing woman named Iris who happens to be my Aunt. Aunt Iris would have celebrated her 98th birthday this week, but sadly on Friday we got word that Iris had passed away. On the one hand I am incredibly sad to see Iris pass from this life because she was such a […]

Music and Memory – an Old School Throwback Jam

Some of the greatest song quotes ever – “It takes two to make a thing go right…it takes two to make it outta sight…” –Rob Base  and “Don’t just stand there bust a move!” -Young MC and “If you gotta problem, yo I’ll solve it….Word to your mother…” -Vanilla Ice Last Saturday night my husband […]

Will That Help Me Get Better?

Today I had the opportunity to interview someone about their professional and personal journey as an entrepreneur. Having the chance to hear other people’s stories is such a blessing because you can learn from their life lessons without having to go through the actual experiences yourself. It happened that the entrepreneur I interviewed today has […]

Take the 14 Day Challenge to Love One Another!

February is upon us! Which means Valentine’s Day is only 14 days away (friendly reminder, especially to all the gentlemen out there who don’t want to end us as one of those men in the hallmark card aisle the night before desperately looking through the last remaining cards in the store). Whether you have a […]

Imagine The Perfect Day

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have a Perfect Day? Well last Friday I found out for myself and it was A-MAZ-ING! Friday morning my son Dalton was married to his sweetheart Alexis in the Draper, Utah LDS Temple. My own father, Dalton’s grandfather, was the one who performed the wedding […]

Trading the Terrible Two’s for the Terrifying Twenties…

How could I have been so naïve? Here I have been thinking that the older our children get, the easier it is to parent them… FALSE! Sure when they were babies they kept you up all night and barfed on every nice outfit you owned, and then as toddlers they threw themselves on the ground […]

Labor Day, the day we celebrate work by not working

Happy Labor Day everyone! I hope you all had a fantastic holiday away from work today…you gotta love that we celebrate work by not working today – PERFECT! Today I was able to spend time with good friends and their families and it was a very welcome break from all the madness the last few […]

Don’t put off living

“One of the most tragic things I know about human nature is that all of us tend to put off living. We dream of some magical rose garden over the horizon – instead of enjoying the roses that are blooming outside our window today.”    -Dale Carnegie I totally agree that too often we put off […]

I was really here and I really lived

“I don’t want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautifully tailored clothes, my hair expertly coiffed, and with long, perfectly manicured fingernails. I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the wheels from taking kids to scout camp. I want to be there […]

Maybe the Angels Will Quote From It for Eternity

As we go through life we have experiences that teach us, hurt us, bring us joy, help us grow, and shape us into the person we are. But if we don’t take the time to stop and write down those experiences and what we learned from them we are limiting their impact to only impact […]

“It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.”

Tomorrow early morning we send our daughter off to go and serve a voluntary 18 month long mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  For the next 18 months she will be sacrificing time away from her family, home, friends, cell phones, Facebook, Instagram, college, vacations, trips to Lake Powell, movies, etc […]

“Just go right along and you’ll start happening to”

Welcome back!  I hope all of you had an amazing Labor Day Holiday!  So mine was awesome, mainly because my two children came home from college for the weekend to spend it with me and that was pure heaven!  Oh my goodness how I value every second I get with them now.  Saying goodbye to […]

“It’s kind of fun to do the Impossible”

“Never tell a young person that anything cannot be done. God may have been waiting centuries for someone ignorant enough of the impossible to do that very thing.” – G. M. Trevelyan So many things in life can either feel impossible or appear impossible.  Our immediate reaction to something difficult is often to tell ourselves “that’s […]

Radio Interview Broadcast on Erin Stewart Show

I was recently interviewed for the Erin Stewart Radio Show. We did the interview over the phone so I was curious as to how it would go but she asked me some really great questions during the interview and I appreciated what a good job she did as the host of the show. The interview […]

Mental issues: we all have them, so now go fix them!

Mental Illness is something everyone deals with in one form or another – whether they deal with it personally, whether they are living with someone who has a genuine mental illness, or whether they have a friend who is suffering from it. It touches all our lives in one form or fashion. And I personally […]

“I want all the cultures of all the lands to be blown about my house as freely as possible”

“I do not want my house to be walled in on all sides and my windows to be stifled.  I want all the cultures of all lands to be blown about my house as freely as possible.”   – Mohandas K. Gandhi I absolutely enjoy learning about other cultures.  I love learning about different traditions people […]

“First we make our habits, then our habits make us.”

“First we make our habits, then our habits make us.” – Charles Noble.  How true it is! And so often we talk about trying to change our bad habits, but rarely do we talk about starting good habits. I have learned that focusing on the positive is much more effective for me than focusing on […]

“Do the best you can in every task, no matter how unimportant it may seem at the time.”

I decided long ago that anything I was going to do in my life, I was going to give it 110%. I never wanted to put my name on something that I couldn`t feel proud of doing. And I felt that if I wasn’t willing to give something my all then why even do it?  I can […]

You were given this life, so LIVE IT WELL!

“You were given this life because you are strong enough to live it.”  That quote has helped me many times in my life.  Especially during difficult or stressful times when I feel overwhelmed or incapable of handing a situation I am given.  We have all heard the phrase that “God doesn’t give us more than […]

If You Want To Improve, Stop Defending And Start Listening (Forbes Article)

To grow and improve is a desire that most all of us share. Yet, in order to grow and improve we must first be willing to acknowledge our areas of weakness; we must accept who we are in order to become something better. So how can we best recognize our weaknesses? We can stop defending […]