My starting point - The "Flop"
During school I've often thought about the sense of life. As many teenagers do I've talked about that with my fellows and friends with but little success in finding an explanation for myself. One day I read about Max Planck's Nobel Prize in Physics and his Banquet Speech. Within his speech I was struck by lightning as I discovered one KEY ELEMENT that would serve me to follow the right direction in finding the sense of life. The BASIC MESSAGE was decent and tremendously noble that makes this speech honorable. I summarize its force of expression in ten words:
The reward of a good deed is the deed itself.
By following this principle, i.e. by anchoring this thought within my daily attitude, I was and I am still able to see the good things in life.
The "Turn"
The "turning" point in my life was the marriage with my wife and the birth of my two lovely daughters. Having Max Planck's guiding principle within my mind and the gift of taking responsibility for feeding my family there was but little questioning about the sense of life. All I had to do was to work hard to offer my family food, clothing and shelter, and to be the best husband and father. The principle that I follow to educate my daughters I don't really want to call it a principle. I call it an axiom and it reads as follows:
Happy children become capable adults.
This is a self-evident principle, which neither needs to be proved nor could be questioned in any way from any person. I don't ask you to follow any of the principles I stated so far but I would like to ask you to see this axiom as a given directive by nature.
The "River"
...or how 20 dollars can influence your life in strengthening your positive attitude?!
As I walked through the book store at an aiport in the United States I wanted to invest my last 20 dollars that I had in my wallet in buying an interesting book, which I could read during my flight back to Europe. And there it was that inspired me at first glance, Jeffrey Gitomer's Little Red Book of Selling: 12.5 Principles of Sales Greatness. After having read this book I immediately ordered all of his published books and many of his recommended reading. One of those books is Napoleon Hill's Think and Grow Rich, which has been sold more than 30 million times. Once you've read this book you know what you have to do to fulfill your life. Very shortened and summarized from his first chapter it is as follows:
Don't speak about dreams, wishes or hopes, instead create a definite plan to establish a burning desire.
After studying several books I'll remain on a learning path all my life. But what I've learned is that I've now to learn to get the "Nuts".
The "Nuts"
"We become what we think about" - Earl Nightingale -
Yes, this is my definition of how I'll get the "Nuts". Yes, I said will get the "Nuts", because I haven't got them until now. This is my leading record now in front of all my other principles and axioms, respectively, and I am sure that my thoughts will make my life a success by earning the "Nuts".
You may ask why I have chosen these specific words from the poker world to describe the steps of creating my philosophy of life. I see poker as a game of strategy as it is chess too. Of course poker is more related to probabilities compared to chess but nevertheless it is affected by strategy. And life is also a mixture of strategy and fortune. Therefore poker fits most likely better than any other game of strategy.