I finally got the book off to the printer this week. I have a lot of cool stuff coming up in the next few months. I think the book is some of my finest work. I have a PR campaign coming up with the online component. There’s not much that I can do right now until I get the book back from the printer.
Over the weekend, I had to remind myself why I love what I’m doing. I went online and watched videos of some of my favorite speakers. I went on the speaking bureau site and watched some more videos and I got excited.
Excitement is a great thing, but in the excitement, I had to be very careful because excitement without action is just an empty dream. I want my dreams to come true because speaking and writing give me a sense of normalcy. It makes my disability seem like less of a hindrance and more of an annoyance.
Some people look at greatness and say, “Wow, that’s cool.” When I look at greatness, I say to myself, “Wow! That’s cool, let me play,...
About a month ago I was very busy and when I am busy, my manager Linda is even busier because she has to assist me with 50% of the activities that I do. I sensed she was overwhelmed. How did I sense it? Well, it’s very easy. She told me!
We all want to feel productive and so often, we equate being productive with being busy. I am in a very unique position that sometimes I just need to let Linda work and put my own activities on the back burner. Some activities I need to perform but some activities just keep me busy and in a weird way, hurt my productivity overall. I noticed that I don’t need to have Linda coming every day. Once or twice a week is more than enough.
I am very eager and anxious to get my book out. I have a lot of pent up energy and in the back of my mind, I want to stay busy but I have to remind myself, that busy doesn’t always translate into being productive.
There is always an ebb and flow to anything you do. The trick is to know when to work hard...
On Monday, my wheelchair stopped working and I had to schlep to Sylmar, which is 45-minutes away form my house. On the way back, my good friend said that I should try Bill’s Burger in Sherman Oaks and I never pass up a good burger unless we are going to Sushi. I was really upset that my chair broke and I had to pay between $200-$800 to fix it so trying a new place for a good burger seemed like a good idea.
After dropping off my chair and a quick trip to Costco to pick up dinner, we arrived at a shack. Not a restaurant, a shack! Once we ordered, my buddy Pat had to find an ATM because as it turns out, they did not accept credit cards. I wondered to myself, “why wouldn’t they at least have a Square to accept credit card payments?”
Then I heard customers congratulate the staff on getting a story written about them in the Los Angeles Times. I thought to myself, “just how good is their burger?”
After about 10 minutes, Pat...
I am launching an Indiegogo campaign for pre-sales of my book Big Dreams Take Small Sacrifices. Part of that campaign involves a video that I’m having edited.
In the video, I speak with my onstage partner about being ordinary. Last Friday, we set up a time to meet and unexpectedly, my partner got called into a meeting. We were texting and emailing all day to set up a time to meet. We finally met around 5:00 pm and after half an hour of takes, we got it done. After I edited the video, it was only 17 seconds.
The number one thing I am reminded of over and over again is that it doesn’t matter what sacrifices I have to make, the only the issue that matters in my mind is whether I want to get it done, or not.
I cannot compare how much other people have to sacrifice, the only thing that matters to me is whether my efforts are worth it to me.
There are times when life is easy and there are times when life is not so easy. The trick is to determine what sacrifices need to be done...
There have been many memorable 4th of July weekends like watching fireworks on a boat in Lake Tahoe or in 1994 hanging out with friends before my senior year in high school, but nothing compares to my 4th of July weekend last year. It all
I am in the middle of finalizing my book. The book is being laid out and the cover is getting it’s last touches. I’m planning an event for May 22nd in Agoura Hills where I will be speaking, signing books and having a great time! What I need from you is to get the word out there on social media and tell everybody that you know about the book. I’ve been working really hard trying to get my name out there so I can achieve my big dream. In the next few weeks, I will be launching a an Indiegogo campaign as well as an online social media campaign. Here is where you come in. Can you do me a huge favor and help me spread the word? Please invite your friends to go to www.sourenav.com and sign up for my newsletter where you can also...
It all began on a fall day back in 2006. I was finalizing my first book Love Your Life and it Will Love You Back when my assistant back then thought it would be a good idea to give Coach Carroll, the USC Football coach a copy of my manuscript. I was hoping that he might endorse my book. When I found out that we were on the list for practice and I was actually going to meet the coach, I assumed that at the very least, I would get him to sign a football and take a picture. For me, that would have been incredible! As practice ended, Coach Carroll trotted my way and we met for the first time. I handed him a copy of my manuscript explaining that I was an alum, did the fan stalking thing and expected nothing from it. The next day was a Friday night and my office phone rang. I let it go to voicemail. When I checked it 24 hours later, I had a message from Pete Carroll saying that he loved the book and shared that he started to tear up on the plane, but he flew with the players and he...
I have been extremely busy trying to get my book out. There’s a lot of nitty-gritty activities associated with getting a book out that have consumed my attention. Often times when we have a big project or something goes wrong in our lives that requires extra attention, other parts of our lives suffer. In the past, when I had a big project, I would neglect other activities that I may have thought were not that important at the time. It turns out, every activity in my office is important and needs a consistent, measured effort if I want results.
If you have a six-year-old child, you don’t decide when they need attention. They need attention all the time, almost every hour. So do your goals and dreams.
Even though I am trying to get the book out, one of my goals is to get on stage and it would be so easy for me to yank phone time away from my manager’s sales activities. July would then come around and I would wonder, “Why don’t we have any bookings?”...
It seems like my new year began in September. That’s when I really started to commit to my goals. For some reason people like to start their new year fresh. One of my new partners loves this time of year because he owns a gym and people always seem to sign up for the gym in January. There are so many topics that I could write about, but today I want to focus on consistency.
Consistency is the number one problem people have in achieving their goals. The majority of people start off excited about losing weight, but two or three weeks down the line, they have a staring contest with a piece of warm, mouthwatering, chocolate cake and the chocolate cake wins. Or, they want to save money but they get an email from Amazon and it’s so hard to resist one click ordering. By the way, one click ordering is very dangerous. It’s even easy for me. And let me tell you, very little is that easy for me!
My goal this year is to get out there speaking. I love the road and I love coming...
This year, has been the best of my life. I can’t believe that I have a son and I get to play with him. I can’t wait to see him walk.
My family has pushed me to really commit to my goals. While other people are winding down towards to the New Year, I have gotten a jump on my new year’s resolution. I started implementing a new business strategy and decided to become more committed to my business.
As I write this, the book is almost done. It taught me a lot. I realized that I can’t worry about how hard anybody else is trying, I only have to focus on what I have to do. I get so much out of writing and speaking that I have to be more strategic about making it happen.
I am on my way to Seattle with my best friend Patrick to watch the Seahawks take on the Cardinals on Sunday. Next week we are driving down to Laguna Beach for a getaway so even though I am working hard, I’m also relaxing.
Andrew and Leslie are in the Philippines visiting my in-laws and...
As I end the year, I am studying the behavior of people. My new book Big Dreams Take Small Sacrifices is 98% done and I am excited. What I am seeing with people is that people want to be successful but they don’t want to earn it. I have a very comfortable life and I don’t have to work if I don’t want to but what drives me is I want more. Does that make me greedy? Maybe. But frankly, I want more. One day soon, I would like to pack my buddies into a car and take them for a $2000 night out on the town. The problem is that people don’t want to sacrifice for their dream. I believe a sacrifice is a payment in advance for a dream.
Because of my disability, there are some sacrifices that I have to make that no other people have to make. And for years, it irritated me down to my core. But one thing I always knew but recently realized was the fact that who cares what sacrifices other people make. The only question in my mind should be am I willing to pay for my dreams,...