The Slight Edge Principle

The Slight Edge is a book written by Jeff Olson who explains the secret to a successful life. And of course, that secret is The Slight Edge principle.

The Slight Edge Principle is a detailed system that will help you see how consistent effort can make a difference in your life.

The Slight Edge Principle has a variety of definitions. For example: Simple actions, repeated daily over a long period of time, lead to massive results. If you consistently do a little more than others, you will consistently have more than others.

Another definition is: Small changes over time make a big difference.

In other words, doing little things or putting in a little more effort can make a big difference and lead to massive results in your life.

On the surface, those little things may not seem relevant at the time but over time they can have an enormous impact on your wealth. The small efforts you put in now will result in great reward down the line.

Slight Edge Finish:

There are three ways for you to get this knowledge:

1) Studied Knowledge

2) Activity Knowledge

3) Modeled Knowledge

STUDIED KNOWLEDGE. Books, tapes, seminars, training; read, listen, and attend everything you can; then, read, listen, and attend some more...study. READ 20 PAGES OF AN INSPIRING, INFORMATION - RICH BOOK EVERY DAY. Pick books that make a contribution to your goals. You're either building someone else's dream or building your own. When you read romance, mystery, or detective novels, whose dream are you building-yours, or the author's and publisher's? When you read Napoleon Hill's Think and Grow Rich-a book that took 20 years to write, that interviews the richest and most successful men and women in the world and reveals their 13 success secrets-whose dream are you building? Read 20 pages per day of an empowering book. Is that easy to do? Sure. And that simple discipline compounded over time, like a penny doubled daily for a month, will send you to the top! Is it easy not to do? SURE. And if you don't do it, will you destroy your life and work today? No way. But that simple error in judgment, compounded over time, will pull you down and take you out of your life!

Listen to a self-improvement cassette tape for 15 minutes every day. You can listen to music on the radio in your car, building Michael Jackson's dream or Barbara Streisand's. Why not choose instead to build your own dreams? Listen to Jim Rohn's tapes. He's a master-and he'll help you build YOUR dreams. Is listening to a tape for 15 minutes a day easy to do? Of course. Is it easy not to do?...And if you don't do it, will that ruin your life right now?...

Do a self-improvement seminar or training every few months.

Better yet, do one every month. Take a course. Take two. If you don't have the time to do that, because you're playing softball every Tuesday and Thursday night, you just don't get it! If your bowling average is over 180-you're losing your Edge, right now! Skip the bowling league. Take a class instead. Is that easy to do?... Is it easy not to do?...And if you don't do it, what will happen today?... But that simple error in judgment, compounded over time WILL kill you! You'll end up a willing participant in the "conspiracy of mediocrity" that 's destroying 95 percent of the people in this country!

ACTIVITY KNOWLEDGE. Life is not a spectator sport-fish or cut bait. Lead, follow, or get out of the way. And life is not a result, either. Life is not the goal-it's the PROCESS. The road to success is always under construction. Marx was wrong: Life is both the ends and the means. Emerson said, "Do the thing and you'll have the power." You can't just go get the power and then do the thing. The only way to have the power is to do it, just do it. People constantly ask me for the key to success. "What's the one thing I can do to guarantee my success?" My answer is always the same: Be here- actively immersed in the process-one year from now. That's the right answer-don't you agree? It's The Slight Edge answer. Commit to the process. The process is THE SLIGHT EDGE. Is it easy to do?... Is it easy not to do?

MODELED KNOWLEDGE. Did you know that your income will tend to be the average of your ten best friends' incomes? (If having more income is a goal of yours, either get new friends or raise the income of the friends you have now!) If you want to raise the quality of your life, hang out with people who have been there and done that. If you want to be a great public speaker, hang out with great speakers. If you want to be a success in business, hang around successful business people. If you want to be a terrific parent, spend lots of time with men and women who have mastered parenting. Do you know why birds of a feather flock together? Because they're all going in the same direction. They share a common vision. If you're after a goal-any goal-go find the people who have achieved that goal, or who are well along the path to attaining that goal, and be with them, hang out with them, camp on their doorstep. It's called the Law of Association. It's a Law because it always works. The first commandment of The Slight Edge:

Thou shalt educate thyself.

Is it easy to do? Is it easy not to do? And if you don't do it, will you fail today? But that simple error in judgment, compounded over time, will ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY, GUARANTEE YOUR FAILURE! LEARNING TO LEARN is committing to the process. The Slight Edge is the process.

"The only person who is educated is the one who has learned how to learn." -Carl Rogers Freedom

To make The Slight Edge work for you, you must learn how to learn.

Alvin Toffler, author of Future Shock, wrote:

"Learning is an approach, both to knowledge and to life, that emphasizes human initiative. It encompasses the acquisition and practice of new methodologies, new skills, new attitudes, and new values necessary to live in a world of change. Learning is a process of preparing to deal with new situations."

Clearly, we live in a world of change. Constant change. Rapid change. Today, we accomplish in five years what our grandparents and parents took 50 years to do. And everything's getting faster! Learning to learn is a mandatory for success today-and especially for tomorrow. Learning to learn is committing to the process. The Slight Edge is the process. Learning to learn is a choice. You make that choice moment to moment-not just once and then you're done with it for the rest of your life. Each new moment will present you with a new choice. Choose to read 20 pages a day-and you'll have to make that choice every day. Choose to model and associate with winners-and you'll have to make that choice every day as well. You have to choose to make The Slight Edge work for you-moment to moment.

IS IT EASY TO DO?

IS IT EASY NOT TO DO?

FreeNote: I tell the kids: The answers are simple, not necessarily easy, but simple. You have to have th discipline to do what has to be done. The best quote I heard this week? Your Belief has to be greater than your Fear.

Heir to a Dream

Maravich Biography by Amy Kinzie

Pete "Press" Maravich instilled in his son, "Pistol" Pete Maravich, a love for the game of basketball that carried throughout his life. Press, a naval aviator and former professional basketball player turned coach, began showing Pete the fundamentals of the game when Pete was seven years old. Together, father and son devised creative and fun ways to help Pete master the fundamental skills needed to excel in basketball. Named everything from around the world and the space clap to the scrambled egg and the flap jack, these drills improved Pete's quickness and hand-eye coordination while strengthening his self-confidence. Pete was obsessive about improving his skills, spending hours upon hours practicing shooting, ball handling, dribbling, and passing in an old gym. Press went to great lengths to keep the drills interesting for his son - even going so far as to drive his car at varying speeds while Pete leaned out the passenger window, trying to control the ball he was dribbling!

Pete's high-school basketball career did not begin well. Being a short 5"2" tall, ninety pound eighth-grader shooting warm-ups with varsity boys who were five years older and ten to fourteen inches taller left him wide open for jeering and laughing comments from the crowd. Maravich tried to ignore the humiliation, determined to prove his skills on the court. However, his debut game did not go well. Once he passed the ball for the starting play, he rarely got to posses the ball again. It was a terribly frustrating and disappointing first game for Pete, who had never before experienced being cold shouldered by his own team. The next game seemed to be more of the same until the final few seconds. As the clock ran out, there stood Pete, alone and unguarded. Amazingly, the ball was passed to him. As the buzzer sounded, "Pistol" Pete shot from the hip . . . the ball was up and through the hoop for the winning score!

"Pistol" Pete's reputation quickly began to spread and he suddenly found himself under double coverage. This kind of coverage forced him to use behind the back and no look passes, which the crowd loved. Encouraged by the applause, Pete continued to play the style of basketball he had learned with his father. His characteristic showmanship style of playing soon began to draw large crowds of spectators who loved to watch his sleight of hand artistry with the ball.

When his father accepted a coaching position at North Carolina State, Pete began playing for the Needham-Broughton High School Caps. Although he had grown to be nearly six feet tall, he was still a slight 130 pounds. Opposing teams tried to capitalize on Pete's slight stature with elbows to his ribs and he was often deliberately knocked to the floor. As a result, Pete developed a form of retaliation - he often drew the foul by stumbling backwards or falling. He had found a way to deal with the physical obstacles, but learning how to handle a loss was an even more difficult obstacle to overcome, and Pete began turning more and more to alcohol to beat back the dark memories of defeat.

After graduating from LSU in 1970, Pistol Pete made league history when he was drafted into the National Basketball League (NBA) by the Atlanta Hawks with a $1.9 million dollar contract. Although Pete continued to succeed at the professional level, his team performances were far from stellar and he was never quite able to reach his most coveted goal - receiving a championship ring.

A leg injury forced "Pistol" Pete to retire on September 20, 1980. Overweight and despondent without basketball, the next two years were the darkest period of his life. Pete said he continued to search "for life", trying yoga and Hinduism, even something he called UF-ology. Then, in 1982, he finally found peace in Christianity.

He became a lay preacher and traveled to churches and basketball camps to relate his story to young children. His message was simple, the man he had become in his late 30s was far more important than the alcoholic basketball player he had been. As part of the speech he delivered in 1982, Pete said, "There is nothing wrong with dedication and goals, but if you focus on yourself, all the lights fade away and you become a fleeting moment in life. I lived my life one way for 35 years, for me. And then the focus came in on what I really was."

On January 5, 1988, while playing a pickup game of basketball at the Church of the Nazarene in Pasadena, California, "Pistol" Pete Maravich collapsed and died of a heart attach at the age of 40.

The number of schools still participating in their state playoffs goes down dramatically every week. In the end as the Highlander movies say, "There can be only one." For the rest . . . well for all the players who will be back on next years team, the Dream shall never die. The Dream is still with them and you who coach and support them. When the season ends, it is like a death in the family, but "The Family" lives on. It is up to the next generation to pick up the torch and press forward. We are BFS would tell you to take time off to celebrate the season and grieve the the death in the family, perhaps till after Thansgiving. Then it's time to get back into preparation for the birth of a new season. There's no time to lose because as Coach Tom Osborne of Nebraska said, "75% of winning takes place before the season starts." In Two weeks it is time for the team to come together, establish next season's goal, and develop a plan of action to make it happen. That is what our BFS Be An 11 Seminar is all about. Dial me up (503.312.2138) to schedule your Seminar today, or call our clinic coordinator, Kelly, 800.628.9737. Get started on that 75% winning percentage today.