STANDOUT

I opened a can of chopped carrots to cook for myself and dumped it in the pot to heat up on the stove. To my incredible astonishment, there was a Lima bean in the can! How the heck?! It was a can of carrots… I still have no clue how a Lima bean could have gotten into the can of carrots. Though it will bug me endlessly until I figure out how this magic happened, the experience was a reminder – a reminder to Standout.

I wrote a 500 character description of this picture for a scholarship test called “Frame Your Future”. The directions said to post a picture that described your future and write a 500 character description on it. Reading over my original writing, it was not good enough. Why? I wrote how it involved my future when my heart was telling me to write about how I could positively impact your future. I used the picture to describe myself rather than to provide a life lesson. While it was originally for a scholarship test, I would now like to expand it for your sake and have it serve its appropriate purpose.

Framing Your Future and How To STANDOUT

You would think that to Standout, you have to be different, unusual or weird. This was once the status quo of Standing Out, but is now a failure. The true definition of Standing Out is to be your true self – to be comfortable with who you are, to have your individuality open to all, to be the only person you should be – YOU.

But, there is still one factor missing in the definition of Standing Out. The most crucial aspect of Standing Out is to influence everyone in your life.

“The more you try to be different, the more you look like everybody else. The more you try to be YOUnique, the more you STANDOUT”

What Standing Out Is NOT

Standing Out is not being looked at in a quizzical manner by everyone that notices you.

Standing Out is not wearing the “dunce” hat.

Standing Out is not challenging everything that is said.

Standing Out is not doing everything that you are told you “should” or “should not” do.

Standing Out is not being the center of attention everywhere you go.

Standing Out is not to have a negative spotlight on you.

How To Successfully STANDOUT

To successfully STANDOUT, you must focus on your influence of others. There is no certain way to STANDOUT than to express your character, attitude and mental/emotional persuasion upon others. Here are the key ways to STANDOUT in the world and achieve all you want in life.

  • Remain Naive: Often our parents, mentors and elders (do we still have elders?) say that we are naïve because we are ignorant of the possible consequences. My friend rewrote the definition of “naïve” when we were getting ready to move out on our own. “Naïve: inexperienced? … more like..ones dreams haven’t been crushed by society.” It is not that others can’t see the positive, the life lessons and growth that is created through being naïve, it is only that they still have not learned from their mistakes. You know that you have not learned from your mistake if you encourage others not to make the same mistake. I once argued with my dad that if I listened to everything he said and did not do the opposite or make my own mistakes what would I have learned? How would I have truly grown? I would not be me.
  • Ask Yourself: Does it empower all, without conditions and favoritism? Is everyone loved, forgiven and accepted eternally?
  • Do Things Differently: It is my motivation to find a new way to look at everything I read,see and hear. The easiest way to do this is to challenge everything! Learning is a competitive matter between yourself and the source of the information you are learning from. You must find a way that, what you are learning, could be improved. What is the information you are learning, missing? Once you discover that which was not taught, act on it. It is then that you begin to do things differently and you succeed in doing so because instead of waiting for the next step in the lesson, you created the next step. There is always room for improvement.
  • Think Outside Of The Box: This is very similar to doing things differently. Thinking outside of the box requires you to break status quo but, rather than challenge your mind, you have to become mentally creative. (Which may be challenging, but it’s a different type of challenge) Thinking Outside Of The Box also requires you to think about every situation in the one way that very few in the world do – as a life lesson.
  • Character: is the single strongest determinate of your future. Character is the soul of our soul, the heart of our heart, the mind of our mind and the creator of our future success.  When you read about successful people, you will often read countless characteristic words. Collectively, what do they define? Character                    Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired, and success achieved. – Helen Keller
  • Dress For Success: In addition to dressing your attitude in the finest garments of value, integrity and positivity, you must have the appearance of the successful. It is as much of a personal mentality as it is an impact on those who judge you (which is everyone). At work where the dress code is casual, I decided to begin wearing a suit and tie. On the third day I met the new executive director who I did not think would be in the office for another week. I was dressed for success and outdressed all the others in the office. You can never be overdressed or overeducated. – Oscar Wilde  Another tip on dressing for success, is the basis of this post, to STANDOUT. Who do you think Stands Out most in the picture? Obviously the guy in green. (Me) Dressing for Success does not mean dressing in blue, black and white every day. If you were to attend a business growth seminar for all the CEO’s of the Fortune 500 companies, you are going to want to Standout among the others dressed in bland and so-called “professional colors”.
  • Be Early: It PAYS to be early
  • Seek Advice: I have to honor Oscar Wilde again for saying “I always pass on good advice. It is the only thing to do with it. It is never of any use to oneself.”  While you may use the advice someone gives, it is just as important as to have advice to pass on. When I say to seek advice, I do not mean it in the sense of finding out what advice people have to offer you, but to partake in opportunities which produce advice you can pass on to others.
  • Speak: At every opportunity, make suggestions, voice possibilities to make improvement, ask questions, and participate in every discussion whether it is focused on your area of specifics or not.
  • Public Speak: “One of the greatest individual steps you can take in improving your self image is to learn how to public speak. People automatically give speakers credit for intelligence they don’t necessarily have.” – Zig Ziglar
  • Do More Than Is Required: We learned from above that there is always room for improvement. Well, there is always time and strength to do more than is required. I always say “Go as far as you can see, because once you are there, you can see just a little bit further.” The common thought is that there is nothing better than knowing you had done a good job. I would regularly feel this when I finished painting a room or the exterior of a clients house when I was in the Painting business. Near the end of my painting career I began making more people happier and even earning an extra few dollars. How? By also painting the closet when all that was asked was for the room to be painted. By putting a new coat on the downspouts when I was only supposed to paint the siding. Make this your newest thought, there is nothing better than knowing you did a good job, and a bit extra.
  • Lead: I have to point you toward John Maxwell for the most powering explanation and advice on leadership.
  • Bring The Energy: everywhere you go. Every meeting, every class, every get-together is unbelievably boring when it lacks energy. More importantly, every meeting, every class, every get-together is undeniably life progressive when it has energy. It is up to you to STANDOUT and be the one who brings the energy. Someone mentioned a friend who works at Starbucks with her that is completely energetic every day and exploits the energy with co-workers and customers. However, another co worker or customer might get annoyed by it. There are two responses I have. 1. This friend positively effects infinitely more people with the energy than the opposite. 2. It is not that his energy is annoying, it is the attitude of the one being annoyed. Please do not be the one who is annoyed – be the one who brings the energy. You can’t climb to the top without stepping on a few fingers, it’s better to do so with positive energy than in a negative way.
  • Find Your Passion and Live It: Nothing is more difficult in life than narrowing your interests down to one subject, your passion. When you do this, you have conquered the world. The next step is a form of constant progression – practice your passion.
  • IF: <<read and live it.
  • Health: Referring back to the initial picture in this post, do you know which is packed with more nutrients and vitamins between a carrot and a Lima bean? What is a man if he makes 10 million dollars but suffers a heart attack and loses his health in the process?
  • Positive Attitude: I saved the best for last, also the reason for my signature at the end of each post. There is not a successful person living that does not have a positive attitude. Absolutely no one has achieved a thing without first thinking that they may be able to. There is no victory if there is no thought of it. There is a reason I am writing a book called Infinite Positivity. Stay Positive.

Make your future to  Stand Out among the rest, just as the Lima bean does among the carrots. As a result you will always be on top and successful.When you Stand Out, you stand on top. All of success is about Standing Out in a positive way. The only way to get there is to also be the spoon that stirs the contents in the pot, rub your positive behaviors off on others and influence them. Be the one that prevents others from being burnt.

I have always said, we learn nothing by doing nothing, we learn everything by doing and wishing we hadn’t.

Only thing stopping you from being who you want is yourself.

I began to really Standout when I decided that I just want to make things and be creative, even if no one else loves it.

My statement: We need a positive revolution, one where more is given that you want, then what we are currently doing which is giving less of what you don’t want.

Fall into boundaries that life forces you and join everyone or begin prioritizing what you want and need and not what others want or expect from you.

Stay Positive and Why Fit In When You Were Born To STANDOUT

Garth E. Beyer

Kids Kill the Successful Spirits of Their Parents

I was thinking the other day at work how I have slowly quit telling my dad about my goals and interests in life. It’s a bit depressing when you have to stop sharing stories about your life with your parents because they have become negative and “worried” about you. Do your parents express the following qualities?

  • Apprehensive and hesitant about every choice you are going to make.
  • Constantly suggests that you get a full time job and focus at one thing at a time.
  • Go to school, stay in school. Do whatever it takes to be in school.
  • Refuses to support you in what you are interested in. They will only support you in what they think is right.
  • Similar to the above, but their way is the right way.
  • Always take the safe route, in a job, activity, etc.
  • If you are not in school, they don’t support you financially.
  • They don’t care about your passions.
  • The opposite of your 3rd grade homework, they no longer care as passionately about your personal creations.

Now I may have been a bit critical, but I wanted to express a point that there are parents of all degrees of negativity. I have tried talking to my dad and telling him what he needs to do – support me, be interested, keep the cynicism to himself (If you don’t have anything positive to say, don’t say it). After his half-hearted attempt at acting like he supported me, I decided I needed to find out what went wrong. He was once the opposite of all the bullet points I listed above. So what happened?

Parenting is a career that any parent can quit

To put it simply. I grew up and he forgot how to stay young. Do you remember how ecstatic your parents would be when you would bring them a B paper, or a picture you drew of an ancient Victorian castle that actually looked like a gross crustacean vomited on the paper and your parents still loved it and put it on the fridge? (maybe behind something, but at least it was still on the fridge) Your parents would encourage you to be creative as hell! I remember listening to Brian Tracy and he mentioned a fourth grade teacher that asked her student what he was drawing. He replied “God”. She said “Oh honey, you can’t do that. No one knows what God looks like”. I admire the student for how he responded, “Yea, that’s because I havent finished drawing him yet”. All parents begin by having that attitude that you can draw God, that you can create, be, do absolutely anything you want in life. They are completely patient with you and love your experiments no matter how much time, money, or resources it takes from them.

Why does this parenting attitude end? Because parents are quitters.

It’s not the kids fault afterall

I really did laugh out loud when I finally came to the conclusion that parents quit practicing the lessons they taught their kids. Think about that for a moment, every parent is about creating the best kids, so they teach them the greatest lessons. Of course they are aware that you are going to mimic them, so they have to live up to their advice and preaching. But something flips the switch in their minds when you reach a certain age. They resort back to the lifestyle they lived before they brought you into the world. They become cynical, apprehensive, full of anxiety and all they ever focus on is the “reality” of life. (Reality being interchangeable with The Negative)

They also forget that they raised you to be creative and to go after big goals. But once that switch flips, all the sudden none of it matters. -Worst case of undiagnosed Alzheimer’s in the world-

“The greatest gift a parent can give a child is the ability to become independently happy. And the greatest gift a child can give a parent is exercising that ability”

A word to the parents

Don’t grow up. I am speaking for the billions of kids in the world when I say that we would rather you treat us like babies our entire life and keep a positive attitude, than let the switch be flipped.

A word to the kids

Don’t grow up. I am speaking for the billions of kids in the world when I say that we would rather you keep the heart and mind of a 4th grader than live the cycle of your parents and let your switch flip off.

Stay Positive and Youth-Spirited

Garth E. Beyer

“The greatest gift a parent can give a child is the ability to become independently happy. And the greatest gift a child can give a parent is exercising that ability”

New Life Resolutions: An Out-Of-Your-Box Goal Challenge

“Change itself is neither good nor bad, but knowledge is always useful” says Christopher Paolini. What better knowledge to have than to know what you want from life? What you want today, tomorrow, a week from now, a month, a year, 20 years, 50 years, and the rest of your life.

I have about eight pages of goals, some scribbled on sticky notes, others on notepads, legal paper, college ruled, and printer paper. If I had better handwriting and artistic abilities, I would even make a poster board listing all my goals with pictures. There are times that I am more passionate about thinking of new goals than I am accomplishing them. Quite simply, I am fascinated with the concept of goals. Justifiably I have to make a post for New Years Resolutions.

Ever since I read “The Four-Hour Work Week” by Tim Ferriss, I continuously notice how cheap it really is to go on the vacations I want to go on. A one way ticket to Paris, an apartment, oil painting lessons, food, and a french language class for two weeks can cost less than 5,000 dollars. It may not seem cheap to you now, but I have to call you out on something… I know something you have done. It’s something I have done and everyone else in the world. You imagined winning the lottery…

Most of the time you win one million dollars. Do you realize that 10,000 dollars out of a million is 1% of your winnings? Now you’re going to have to trust my college education and a bit of deep common sense when I say that in your life time you will make an average of 2-6 million dollars (tax included). The point is, if you really wanted to take that two-week trip to Paris, you could VERY easily do it. Why is it in the “if I won the lottery” category. Put it on your New Life’s Resolutions list for 2012.

After I had written goals for today, 30 days, the year, five years I looked back at them and asked myself “where’s the fun?” All I wrote was about getting money, gaining more muscle mass, rising to success, publishing my book, finding a job I love, etc. Basically, the same goals as anyone else — to get what we want when we want it. Every page or two I may find a goal to take a trip somewhere but when I read it I even thought “Ha, only if I won the lottery”. I decided I needed an attitude adjustment so I challenged myself to write 110 goals..

110 goals without limitations, no false “reality”, and without the help of the lottery. Can we accept our fate for a moment, if you are reading this blog post, than I can guarantee you are going to be financially victorious. You are going to rise to success, earn a larger income than 6 digits and the job is going to be something you love. It’s who you are and who I am.. so why are we writing goals that we all know we will carry out?

I am going to admit, the first 20 goals I was skimping. It is as hard as you can imagine to think and write what you want out of life without any monetary boundaries. Nearing the half way mark it got even harder… I had to start detailing my goals like “go to a pepper tasting event in Chile and not get the runs”.

This year, forget writing new years resolutions on new years eve and start writing New Life’s Resolutions today.

I am more than happy to give you the 110 Life Goals Challenge. As I said before, everyone knows you are going to be a hit and happily make enough money to do whatever you want… so instead of making goals you know you will accomplish, go crazy and write Out-Of-The-Box Goals!

Stay Positive and Accept Your Successful Fate

Garth E. Beyer

Quality Over Quantity Is An Antiquity

Quality Over Quantity Is An Antiquity

 

 

Quality

It’s expressed over and over that quality should always be over quantity. It is one of three factors to profiting most from a product.

1. Lowest Price

2. Best Service

3. Best Quality

But I am not telling you to choose quality over quantity.

Quantity

Sure quantity over quality had its spotlight at one time. But the light has since gone dim. It flickers from time to time and that is how we got generic brands or bulk items. There are times in life that we can forget the quality of something for the quantity. Do you really want to spend 60 dollars on one new quality toy for your four-year old? Or purchase 10 toys for 60 dollars? Especially when you know that if you paid extra for the one toy, the chances of a four-year old breaking it is pretty high.

But I am not telling you to choose quantity over quality again either.

So What’s The Q-Fusion

Why is it that you have to choose quality or quantity with a product? Why do we have to place one over the other?

You know what you can do? Put them on the same level and see what happens. Yes, I’m telling you to use both. If we are talking about importance then sure quality is the most important, but that doesn’t mean quality can’t be completed at a steady pace. Nor can you argue that a quantity of quality will always make you — not just A winner, but THE winner. A winner in sales, in business…in life.

 

Abraham Lincoln said, “And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.”  — Quality

I will add, “And don’t settle for a bit of life in each year, go all out” — Quantity

 

Stay Positive and Synthesized

Garth E. Beyer

 

You Get More Than One First Impression

Cliché’s are phrases that are so commonly used that they have lost their originality. Regardless, cliché’s are created because of the truthfulness of them and their ability to be used negligent of where you are. “You only get one first impression” used to be a cliché’. It used to be a nationwide truth. This cliché’ is now deceased. Whether you are aware of it yet or not,

You get more than one first impression.

It is hard to believe that people thought they could not change others’ original judgements of them. We have all evolved since the days the cliché’ was originated. We know each other on a deeper level and understand that each of us have our own lives that we may be having trouble with at the time. A first impression is appropriately defined as the first consideration or judgement one person has on another. That is how it is truly defined, yet those who still live by the original cliché’ define a first impression as the first time that a person meets.

Following the correct definition, it would be universally correct to say that you have a first impression each time you see someone, whether it is your first time meeting them or 100th.

While I agree that how you look, your behaviors, and actions create the first judgement on you when you first meet someone, your true first impression is how the conversation or meeting with the person will go. You have the ability to make a new first impression with each meeting by going in with a positive attitude, an open conscious, and the willingness to help the other person.

Stay Positive and Impressionable

Garth E. Beyer

The photo is of me participating in a Live Radio Talk Show about the Running Start Program in Belvidere, Illinois. Though I have met the other people I talked with previously, I had the opportunity to make a first impression that I was prepared to do the talk show. I was optimistic and energized to take part in the talk show and socialize.