Lesson 1: Even Experts make Mistakes

In late 2006 Senator Barack Obama sat down for lunch with his friend George Hayward. Obama observed that the Chicago Real Estate market was softening, and Hayward, a Wall Street Bond Trader, said it was the start of a wider problem linked to subprime lending that could upset the entire financial system. Obama recounts this in his memoir A Promised Land, remembering how “I listened to all this with growing incredulity.”

Hindsight now tells us that Obama just received one of the biggest tipoffs of his life. The 2008 financial crisis defined the early…

One year freezing rain fell in our village, turning the landscape into an ice rink. We got a call from an elderly neighbour. She’d had a fall and needed our help. I walked outside with my Dad. I remember thinking how bad it must be to fall over when you get old. How you can no longer trust your balance. And then I almost slipped as soon as I stepped onto the road.

This was over 30 years ago, but it has always stayed with me. Since then I always wondered why we fall as we grow older. I assumed…

Maintaining any year-round goal was hard for me, and it’s especially so when it’s linked to health, weight loss, and fitness. Somehow I was always bargaining, scheming, and bribing the person I was into becoming the person I wanted to be. This was how it was for me when I started running until I learned a few tricks to keep going.

Building a habit is one thing, and maintaining it through all life’s challenges is another. But it has taught me a lot about achieving my goals not just in running, but in life in general.

Have you ever noticed…

When I started meditating over 10 years ago I wanted the Big E. That’s Enlightenment. The full on Gold Medal of Olympic Spirituality. I chose meditation as my method to achieve it. I call this the ‘Positive Crisis’ of meditation, the one you come to that will make you into a more attractive Human 2.0.

I can tell you already that I failed and was always going to fail because there was a lot about meditation, and even more about myself, I did not know.

The next time I approached meditation was after a very stressful time in my life…

This year I started running in celebration of my 40th birthday. Up until this point, I Hated running. That capital H is on purpose. At school when the season for Cross Country Running came, I rarely finished the distance being told to head back early or I wouldn’t make it to the next class on time. Running for me was defined by bitter cold days outside, pain, and embarrassment. So you might wonder what would make someone want to relive such bad memories decades later.

It all started with chest pains. I had a very stressful job, inclusive of an…