Influence of Others

Hey Team. Alright, Workshop Wednesday. Well, today I happen to be in Las Vegas. Right now, I’m in Las Vegas. I haven’t left yet but when you’re watching this, I’m in Las Vegas with my family on spring break. We’re running around the chocolate store. Just picture it. David and Jonathan running around the chocolate store. That’s right. We’re climbing hills, we’re playing at parks. We’re at the Coke store. Yeah. Four stories of M&Ms and a New York slice of pizza.

All right. Workshop Wednesday. What should we talk about? Well, I wanted to share with you something that came into my perspective here recently. As I was reading earlier this month, I was reading John Maxwell and he was talking about how a lot of our failures can be traced back to people. Now some of you are going, “You’re not kidding, Chad. Boy, let me tell you a story.” I can tell you some of those same stories. But I think you’re missing what I’m about to say. I think this is going to maybe hit you a little harder than you think.

Most of our failures and our successes can be traced back to the people we hang around.

Oooh, okay. That might sting a little bit. I want you to think about who are you hanging around. Who are you spending time with? Who are you letting influence you?

Because many times our failures translate to the people we listen to. I see on Facebook and social media all the time, somebody talks about, you know, their boyfriend or girlfriend, this, that, or the other. And I’ve also heard it on the MAX train. Then everybody pipes up and they talk about how you should this or you should that, or you should teach them a lesson or do this to them or do that to them. I don’t think those are quite the Dr. Phil look-a-likes that you want to be hanging around. Because in your relationships, both at work. Family. Husband. Wife. Boyfriend. Girlfriend. Parent. Teachers.

The people you decide to hang around that influence you can take you down a good path or sometimes a not-so-good path. Sometimes we end up where we’re at and maybe you’re standing right now in a hole or in a puddle covered in mud. Figuratively, of course. And you got yourself there because you listened to the wrong person. You went down the wrong path. You took the wrong kind of advice. And that’s good advice to listen to. To recognize that sometimes you might be hanging around the wrong people.

Sometimes a change of atmosphere is a good thing.

When I was younger, I had a group of friends and I made a decision. I was 17 years old. I made a decision to not go out with this group of friends. That night, they made a decision to break in and steal $27,000 worth of stereo equipment. I think I made a good choice that night because they got caught. That group of friends, one of them went to juvenile hall. One of them was 18 years old. He went to prison. One of them was the brother of that young man, and he, a month or so later, committed suicide and blew his head off with the double-barrel shotgun.

Sorry to kind of throw a little wet blanket on your Wednesday parade, but I made a decision to not go out because I knew that some of my friends were doing some things that were not so good. And I didn’t want to be a part of that.

I made some choices of what kind of people I was going to let influence me and hang around.

I’m so glad I did because here I am over 30 years later. Leading a thriving team with a thriving business with a loving wife. And a couple of great, amazing firecracker kids. That would have never happened if I would have gotten in trouble. I would have never made it in the Marine Corps. I would have never accomplished many of the great things I’ve accomplished because the people I was hanging around were not a great influence in my life.

And I believe that someone on our team that’s listening to this right now needed to hear that. Sometimes the people you’re hanging around, no matter how much fun they are, who they are. They’re not leading you to a place of success. They’re keeping you from growing and becoming great.

So…Workshop Wednesday. Do a survey. Who’s influencing you? You might need to take a few people off that list. You might need to go find a couple of people to add to that list. People can influence you for greatness because there’s greatness inside of you. You just need to have the right people around you to draw it out.

All right. Till next Wednesday. Be valuable because nothing less will do. See ya.