“Does the door stay open the whole time??”  Yes ma’am, I remember it well!

What are we talking about? The Bush/Meade jump of Friday, June 12.

Former President George H. Bush celebrated his 85th birthday yesterday and marked it by going skydiving.  He’s done so in the past and committed to a goal of a repeat on his 90th birthday.

Skydiving with him was CNN’s Headline News anchor, Robin Meade, who interviewed him before and after the jumps. It was her first jump and she’s the one who uttered the words above as the plane took off for the jumps.

It brought back “fond” (wild) memories of my own skydiving experience of a quite different variety.

Surprise “Gift”

As a Trainer for years with Tony Robbins and his transformational events across the nation, you never knew what “opportunities” would present themselves. Tony created a surprise experience for the trainers in the several days before a big event was to launch. They were meant to be fun, as a thank you of sorts, and to further prepare us to support to the fullest the teams of participants assigned to us. You didn’t know where you would be going for the surprise and were to show up ready for anything.

Before attending my first Robbins event, as a participant, I had an intense phobia to flying in an airplane. I left that first event free of that and all kinds of fears … plus empowered beyond imagination. But overcoming a fear of flying was a bit different than being thrust into the experience of skydiving. Yet that’s what the surprise was for my first tour as a trainer.

We showed up at 5:30 AM ready for whatever it was to be. We boarded a bus and traveled to unknown places. After a long drive, full of speculation about where we were going, we pulled into a grassy field and drove to an area where there was a hut and a few small planes. It had all become sickeningly clear!

We were ushered to the hut and an unshaven man in grubby attire handed us forms to sign waiving all liability and warning of what could happen. Words like “all FAA regulations are waived” got my attention right off the bat. But the real zinger was when the man told us “you could be maimed”, followed, of course, by “you understand that you could die?”.

You Could Be What??

He then asked who wanted to go first. While the fear had already welled up within me (and I knew that was just the start), my hand shot up in the air. I knew enough from my experiences with Tony and his events that huge value awaited those willing to step past their fears. So I committed to myself to do what it took.

The open door, plus no seats in the plane, started things off. With the door open, it was loud and you could feel the wind (and imagine yourself being sucked out, without even a seat to hang onto). I couldn’t even bear to look in the direction of the opening (a gaping wide open side of the plane) and the fear was intensifying.

The jumpmaster had been told that the group they were receiving would be excited about the experience. My excitement was taking quite a different form. As I began dramatically hyper-ventilating he knew we were in for trouble. He did everything he could to calm me down, with no success, then as a last resort cuddled me and started started petting my head. He was very sweet and kind, to my good fortune.

Sickening Reality

Then the utterly sickening word came that it was our turn. We had to inch our way to the opening, while seated on the floor and strapped together (and me gyrating with fear energy). When we got there, he had me sit on the ledge and hang my legs out the door. In an instant we were pushed off and tumbling through the air.

He began yelling at me to do something (we probably weren’t supposed to be doing summersaults as we were) but I couldn’t hear him and was frozen with fear. After all, we were plunging at a speed over 125 mph from a height of over 10,000 feet! The fear grew even more as I didn’t know what he wanted me to do.

I’m not sure if I was supposed to pull the cord for the chute or if he was. But if I was supposed to take any active action on anything whatsoever, it wasn’t going to happen. I was paralyzed and terrified to the nth degree.

When he pulled the cord and the chute opened I thought it was all over for sure. We were jerked so hard when the chute filled with air that I thought all the cords were going to tear loose and we’d plummet to our deaths. Plummeting was a recurring fear throughout.

The jump was not from any ol place. We were in Hawaii near the coastline in one of the most beautiful places in the world. Of course, my eyes were slammed shut most of the time. Gladly, though, I got to see some of the scenery later. The jumpmaster remembered that I had a camera with me (not knowing of the real surprise) and that it was tucked away in my jumpsuit. He started fishing around for it and ended up taking pictures of us and the exotic views all around.

As we approached the ground he started calling out instructions that, fortunately, I did hear and did follow – to tuck my legs up when we were landing. This was very important so that his experienced legs would take the force of the touchdown.

The video crew ran over to us the moment we landed and expected me to be spurting words of exhilaration. I was still absorbed in the energy of fear beyond belief. We unstrapped and I was so exhausted from the energy of my own emotions – which were continuing as I remained shaking like a twig in a raging storm -- that I had to go scollapse on the ground in a quiet area and try to recover.

Why Would Anyone Jump?

Then the reality began to set in. Not of the jumping but the meaning of the jump to me. And therein was the gift of the experience.
It was as though everything in my life was re-calibrated. The remaining fears I had evaporated in that moment. The keen awareness of how much I could do as a human being was radically expanded. I had pushed myself past limits of wide variety and created the capacity to accomplish a gazillion times more in my life – and in the lives of some 50 souls who would be on my team for the Robbins event.

The experience, for me, was life transforming and its value went way beyond the act of jumping out of a plane.

Life’s Hidden Messages

The meaning we give to our experiences, no matter what they are, determines how we feel about them, what we learn from them and the value they serve for us (and for others through us). The jump experience was one of the most profound in my history. I jumped, so to speak, to a whole new level of being.

Life presents an ongoing stream of experiences to us all, and our particular combination of emotional wherewithal and skills determines the results that show up for us.  We may not always get to choose the experiences we encounter, but we can indeed choose how we “experience”  them and what we do in the process. 

Courage, trust, faith, a desire to learn and grow, leadership, spontaneity, a focus on a higher purpose -- these are qualities we can grow within ourselves. And you don’t have to jump out of a plane to do so!

Even better, the list doesn’t stop there. Love, optimism, gratitude, enthusiasm, compassion, cheerfulness and a seemingly endless list of other capacities can be cultivated within us by our choice as well (by indeed our everyday choices).
 
For me, the decision to jump – and to not back out when given the option – was a strategic decision to further shape and enlarge my fundamental being and my capacity to serve others.

Turned out, there was one trainer who didn’t get to go up for the dives because she chose to go last and there wasn’t an available jumpmaster at the time. So they planned a final flight and, having room for another pair, asked who would like to dive a second time. My hand shot up again.

I was still shaking, exhausted, and literally “transforming” (with a rush of many emotions, insights, confusion, etc.). But even in that condition I knew there was great value to again be had by putting myself on the line.  The next step for me was to place myself in a frame of mind (actually, emotion) of discovering the thrill (rather than terror) of the experience.

Someone else was chosen to go. But being ready to do it was enough for me. I left that primitive little airstrip with about as much value as anyone could.

That was 17 years ago and it remains with me today as a part of who I will always be.

Marcia Elder is President of Creative Pursuits, Inc. and Tech-Knowlogy.com. Come see their Websites for ways to transform your business or organization for the best success in changing times.

© by Marcia Elder & Creative Pursuits, Inc, 2009. May be re-printed as article with written permission.

I picked my breakfast from a tree this morning ... as I've enjoyed doing all week long. There are multiple types of “meals” to choose from, as we have an orchard full of options. 
 
All of them are organic. All of them taste great. It makes for a very healthy meal, and it's fun picking them right from the tree. Plus, there's no requirement to expend fuel (and time) to go to the grocery ... or to pay for the groceries. 
 
Being organic, there's also no cost of fertilizer or pesticides.
 
So you live in an urban area? No problem. Trees grow everywhere …in yards of any size, and even if you don’t have a yard -- in pots and on patios. Fruit bearing shrubs are another great option.
 
A since-passed relative used to preach and teach to plant a tree a year for the many benefits they bring. What better time to get started than now in planting for the future.
 
Some fruit-bearing trees and shrubs are already producing when you purchase them in the pots from the nursery or wherever. Others will take longer to grow and yield, but it's amazing how fast the time goes and also how plentiful even just one tree can be. 
 
The tree that I chose from this morning, for instance, will produce at least a couple of hundred large and juicy persimmons by season’s end.

It's also a great way to teach children (and adults) about our dependence on the land.  People seem to have lost touch with the fact that we depend on the land for our food.  It naturally follows that taking care of the environment is a must to sustain our ultimate well being.

So consider a trip to the nursery and plant a tree … for thee and the planet.

Notes from CPI’s Marcia Elder.

We’re big believers in preparedness. And being ultra-creative as we are, we tend to think ahead on the many possibilities to be prepared for.  Our preparedness this year was stepped up in some major ways. In other respects, we weren’t as ready as needed for the season’s first big storm in our part of the world.

There are many good Websites on steps that can be taken to prepare for hurricanes, tropical storms and other weather emergencies. They’re well worth a look in advance of the storms to get properly informed and prepared.
This two-part blog includes steps that go beyond those most thought of (like getting batteries, extra food, fueled gas tanks, and such). We offer them in hopes they will make a difference for others in storms to come.

Many Steps Taken Proved Too Few

 “Piece of cake” is what I thought as we were well into day two of Fay’s effects. We were told that the storm’s main character was “a lot of rain”. The rain was indeed pretty non-stop when the bands arrived our way. But absent, thank goodness, were the high winds, lightening and heaviness of the downpours.

Then the other shoe dropped, and with it truckloads of rain at a rapid race that our preparations were no match for.

We almost lost our offices and conference center in the process – the contents of them, that is, which was our major focus.

We had the foresight to have a 12 inch high (removable) wood barrier put in place (with attached brackets) along the most vulnerable point for water intrusion as the first line of defense , along with three heavy concrete barriers (four feet wide a piece) backed up by a mass of sandbags. This was at the main entrance which is a gap between two hefty concrete walls.   The system helped … but the flash floods were beyond anything we had imagined – in the volume of water, the speed of the flow and how fast it all started.

Just when we thought the storm was ending, the deluge let loose and water began pouring over the carefully crafted barriers (and, in parts, under), not just at the main entrance but at the sides to plazas and other access points ... to where it appeared we were going to quickly be submerged.

Two of us were on-site at the time and had no choice but to work for almost 8 hours straight in the rain, scrambling to bolster the barriers plus dig new channels for the sudden river of water that appeared.

At the point when it looked like we could no longer deter the gushing flow, the weather channel spoke the dreaded news that the current local conditions would be continuing for three more hours.

Then came the good news … within a few minutes the rain subsided to the point of allowing the area to drain and, hallelujah,  the heavy rains ended.

We made it through what could have been a disastrous event, exhausted but enlightened for the future. With Hurricane Season still being in full swing (and other storms year round throughout the globe), our next blog will share insights from the experience to make things easier for others in this and future storm seasons.

 

Like her or not, Sarah Palin knows a thing or two about public speaking, sure as shootin'!  She demonstrated that well in the Vice Presidential Debates, and prior to that at the Republican National Convention.  
 
Joe Biden, on the other hand, missed some key elements of effective public speaking, despite his vast knowledge and his many years of speaking as a member of the United States Congress.
 
He failed to look directly at the camera, and thereby at the viewing public.  Most of the time, he focused instead on the Moderator. From the podium this is a natural inclination. But it too often gave TV viewers a side shot of his face rather than the direct eye contact that makes people feel trust and connection.

Depending on the eye of the beholder, a lack of eye contact can make a speaker appear distracted, shifty or unresponsive – regardless of their interests or capabilities. 

In a TV forum, keeping sight of the fact that the camera is trained on presenters non-stop is also key since facial expressions have such an important impact.  In the Senator’s case, his constant broad grin seemed inappropriate at times and could have detracted from his goal by appearing superficial rather than sincere (regardless of the person’s sincerity).

In our Public Speaking Boot Camps, we always teach “know your environment”.  That’s one of many steps in preparing for a public presentation. The Senator is well experienced in speaking on the Floor of the Senate but he or his team missed this fundamental: look into the camera.

Palin got it dead on right.  That helped, too, in what she otherwise does well, conveying a strong sense of confidence.

Looking straight at the voters is also important in conveying sincerity – a basic ingredient to trust.

Of course, sincerity can be communicated by an effective public speaker who is not necessarily sincere. Effective speakers learn techniques to project an image, to get a message across, and to inspire feelings or actions on the part of audiences.

Unfortunately, studies have shown for years that audiences tend to pay more attention to body language and tone of remarks than they do to the actual words spoken.

Hopefully that won’t hold true in the upcoming elections where substance is the name of the ultimate game … what the candidates know, what views and beliefs they hold, what positions they will take (and have taken -- their track records), what skills and experience they bring to the table, their attitudes, their ability to work effectively with others, and their values and character as individuals (among still other criteria and qualifications).

Our comments on the VP candidates have nothing to do with our individual positions in this election.
 
They have everything to do with the power of public speaking (and the importance of careful attention to words and substance).
 
We teach public speaking skills and how to be extraordinary.

Through powerful public speaking comes the power to excel and to serve the greater good. Using speaking skills to help others and to make the world a better place is integral to our corporate mission.

They are skills that enable leadership at all levels.
 
On the political scene, Sara Palin and Barack Obama both are gifted public speakers.
 
In the case of Sara Palin, this skill (in its many elements) has helped catapult her to a national and international platform in the course of five short weeks. 
 
Public speaking skills are learned.  We should know – we’re masters at public speaking, and at teaching the skills for empowered speaking.

To find out more, check out www.Creative-Pursuits.com.

Welcome and thanks for the visit! Like our trusty Website – www.Creative-Pursuits.com – this blog will be focused on information, insights and insider news aimed at “adding value” … supporting others and making a difference. It’ll be well worth your while so now’s the time to add us to your Favorites, and stay tuned for more to come pronto.

For now, think of … and act on … one thing you can do to make today extraordinary.

And to sign up for free Webcasts and other amazing services, check out: www.Creative-Pursuits.com.

A Message From:
Creative Pursuits, Inc.
Celebrating 24 Years of Extraordinary Service

Welcome to my blog. Please check back soon for new entries.