Anti-Motivation...?

As mentioned on Monday, I went to Nashville last week. In addition to MIKE ROWE, I heard a guy named Larry Winget speak. He's marketed himself as "the pitbull of personal development" and "the world's only irritational speaker." He was funny and personable, but most importantly he was real and realistic. (Much like Mike Rowe...)

In fact, he poked a little of fun at some of those other inspirational messages. He points out that some of them don't even make any sense. For example...

1) You can be successful if you give 110%.

-->Larry says you can only give 100%. That's all there is.

2) If you can think it, if you can say it, you can achieve it.

-->Larry says he'd be Halle Berry, if that really worked.

3) You can be anything you want to be.

-->Larry says short, overweight people will never be runway models or ballerinas. Just. Ain't. Happening.

And so on.

What he does say is that honesty, integrity, and just plain old hard work will get you so much farther than just believing in feel-good claptrap. (That's my paraphrasing, he didn't put it quite that way.)

Everyone wants to believe they can get something for nothing. Everyone tries to get more for less. Even me. Probably even you.

But if you want to be successful at whatever you're trying to do, you have do it right/be good at it, be nice, and keep your word. Easy to say, easy to aspire to. Not always easy to pull off. C'mon, let's face it, we're all human.

And even though he was speaking to a roomful of IT guys, his point was applicable to everyone. Even me as an author.

Now I can't be as good a writer as Shakespeare or Hemingway. Patterson or Brown. ROWLING. Roberts or Steele. But I can strive to be the best writer I can be.

There's always something to learn and I'm still trying to get a grasp on plot. Some plots come easy, some don't, so for the foreseeable future, I've got to figure out how to consistently cobble out a decent plot.

So...the point of this post? I don't even know, other than if you get a chance to listen to Larry (check YouTube maybe?), you should.

And try to be a better, nicer person. Me, I mean. I need to work on that.

Hope you're having a great week!!