Your #1 Most Regrettable Loss is…
March 9, 2008 – 6:00 am
I speak all over the world to all groups, one time professional athletes, the next counter-terrorism units, one time on active aging and the next childhood obesity, one time to martial artists, and the next to corporate executives. It amazes me the diversity of groups I get to speak to.
[That’s me speaking at the 2008 Arnold Active Aging Festival.]
There is one universally common theme running through these presentations. Every person from each crowd expresses the exact same regret. What is the #1 most regrettable loss by all people in all cultures?
I’ll tell you a little later, so please keep reading.
I’ll explain to you why I’ve come to uncover this unifying regret across the world, by sharing a story with you. Pay attention because it’s hidden in the details, and I’m sure you’re smart enough to pick it out if you pay attention.
As a kid, I felt imprisoned by my body, by my mind, by my school and by my community.
I couldn’t learn anywhere near the rate of “normal” kids. It was only years later that I discovered that education at the time was geared toward only 15% of the student body: those capable of verbal/linguistic and mathematical/logical learning styles.
Special mentors in my life had to reveal to me that those who learned how to learn were much more successful than those who learned passively, because only the former had “cracked the code” on digesting new information. It meant that even someone with my “unique neural wiring” could become an award-winning author.
I couldn’t speak like other kids because of my apraxia and anomia, so I rarely voiced my ideas or opinions. They remained locked within my swirling head for fear of embarrassment. Through decades of martial art I became convinced it was safe to express myself, only to discover that people find my presentation style “captivating and endearing” like my audience wrote in reviews of this past weekend’s Arnold Classic Stage.
Due to my joint disease, I couldn’t develop athletic skills like everyone else because my joints weren’t strong enough to handle the methods used to teach them. Only many years later did I discover that not only could I learn skills fast; I could learn skills faster and longer than even the genetically gifted who sat on their laurels.
I couldn’t even see well enough to ingest the information being taught because being legally blind and eventually suffering a corneal fatigue disease. And yet, now I get to travel to the most beautiful places on the Earth and see the most amazing natural and man-made wonders of the world.
And in speaking to people in different cultures around the planet, I heard the echoes of my imprisonment. I wasn’t alone. They lament the same thing I did as a child:
The #1 Most Regrettable Loss is Freedom!!!
It could be loss of ability to drive, loss of ability to reach overhead, to play soccer, to crawl around with their kids, loss of freedom to dance around in a sexy outfit, loss of ability to get a promotion or keep doing one’s job, loss of ability to travel to a new country, loss of ability to eat healthy food (or at all), loss of the ability to find shelter, loss of feeling the energy of love, loss of one’s loved one and the times they spent together, loss of one’s dearest memories…
All of these are a loss of freedom. And the most visceral, the most tangible - is loss of one’s very mobility. It’s so insidious, the slow creep of losing function: one millimeter a month. It could be from dis-use (from lack of mobility drills), mis-use (such as strength training without compensation), or abuse (through improper technique or collision.) It’s that slow deterioration which erodes your freedom which you pine most for.
But you don’t need to regret. You can reclaim your freedom. YOU CAN DO IT!
I’m a “true believer” because frankly if it weren’t for what I’ve learned through the Intu-Flow® Longevity System, I wouldn’t be vertical. And it’s why I won’t settle for hearing you say that you’re too old, too fat, too poor, too busy, et cetera. They’re just excuses: they’re the bars on the cage. And you can tear those walls down. You can. I promise to show you how and to help you along the whole process. Believe me: if I can do it, you can too!
What is your #1 most regrettable loss in your life? I’d love to hear it and how you have or intend to address it!
Flow Thyself™,
