Media Room

Practice Possibilities
By Paul Martin, Ironman Triathlete (download pdf)

There are things in life you’d never imagine yourself doing under any circumstances. No matter how messy your lawn is, you’re not going to run a vacuum cleaner over it. No matter how hungry you get, you’re not going to eat a shoe.

Everyone has an image of themselves, their job and the communities in which we work. However, change and opportunities happen and we should use them to better ourselves and our communities.

Ban “I Can’t”

Whether you’re an association professional or a volunteer leader, I urge you to remove “I can’t” from your thinking.

For instance, when I lost my leg in a car accident, the farthest thing from my mind was excelling at international competitive endurance sports.

I was a good athlete with two legs, but running 26.2 miles was never on my to-do list. Yet, three years after amputation below my knee, I finished the NYC Marathon. It was the most pain I’ve ever willingly subjected myself to...times ten!

Not surprisingly, I told myself I’d never do that again—then I completed the Hawaiian Ironman a few years later. Imagine swimming 2.4 miles, cycling 112 miles and running 26.2 miles with on a prosthetic leg! At the finish line I committed to ban “I can’t” in my professional and personal life. I've completed nine more Ironman races since, setting a world-record and beating 95% of the able-bodied athletes in the process.

Everyone Can

Every day, people find themselves in unfamiliar scenarios with no prior experience or intelligence on how to deal with the current situation. The leaders will look for ways to get the job done despite what the others might think or the stereotypical, “I can’t.”

In the end it’s those who think outside the box—who are willing to do things a little differently—that get the respect of others.

Transformation

One of this year’s big stories is the bankruptcy of General Motors. Until now, families with three and four generations of factory workers could not have imagined that their mighty company—the one that helped them pay for the mortgage, buy the groceries and pay the bills—would go belly up in their lifetimes.

"What’s good for GM is good for America," no longer rings true.

The changes in 2009, and throughout our lives, force us to consider and do things we never thought we could or would do. While times are tough, new models and processes are being developed by persons who practice “I can.”

Whether it’s hiring a CEO who “knows nothing about cars,” or driving a car that doesn’t use gasoline (hard for many of those factory workers to wrap their minds around), we have all started thinking differently and doing things that might once have seemed ridiculous.

I Can

Lately I’ve been changing some habits for the sake of both the electric bill and the environment. For instance, I’ve been nixing the dishwasher and doing them by hand. I’ve also recently insulated a few more walls in this old Bostonian house and a bit more of the attic. The parameters of this project demanded blow-in insulation (my choice: cellulosic recycled paper), which in-turn required renting one of those machines to blow it in.

Being the do-it-yourselfer that I am, with no experience whatsoever with the process, I jumped right in and discovered just how incredibly messy this ordeal can be when you fail to do a few simple things properly.

Admittedly, with the multitude of problems that plagued me early in the process, my attitude was severely challenged and a few unholy phrases passed by these lips. With a fresh outlook early the next morning, and with the help of an old friend, I managed to get the job done effectively and efficiently but not before blowing lots of really really small pieces of paper pulp all over my yard.

I’m happy say that our master bedroom was noticeably warmer this past winter and we’re now pumping a little less pollution into the air. The hassle was well worth it and I was able to rake most of the bits off the lawn.

The rest I had to vacuum!

# # #

Paul Martin is a keynote speaker-for-hire with guns aimed at adversity.
Contact him to speak at your next event.