*Blogger's Note: this is one of my most favorite chapters in this boo! After rereading this chapter, the second time around, it still deeply resonated with my emotions and soul, like the first time i read it on Jan, 6, 2018, shortly after coming back from my 10 day Vipassana retreat. Thank you for sharing your wisdom, Mr. Gregorek!
1. I raised my head and looked at the hundreds of
books in my study, then I walked to my living room and looked at more books
there, and then I looked at the piles in my bedroom, the kitchen, my gym, and
my meditation room. I had a strong feeling that almost all of them contributed
to the person I have become. P 114
2. The Doctor and the Soul by Viktor E. Frankl. A
psychiatrist who emerged alive after six years in a concentration camp,
Frankl’s work is based on our search for meaning in life as a very personal
task. This book helped me embrace hard choices and keep imagining a better
future. P 114
3. I learned self-mastery: to constantly improve
myself so I would be ready for any possible disaster. I also learned that when
disaster happens, it means that something is being asked of me. I need to
improve. The whole scenario is so clear while aging. After 35 years old, no
matter what we do, we’ll get worse. Deterioration is automatic in the process
of aging, and the result is that we get depressed. But if we live like a stoic,
it does not affect us in a negative way. A stoic is always ready for any
disaster and ready to embrace it, to turn it into opportunity. My wife used to
ask me, “Why are you happy when something bad happens?” I am not happy, I am
just not unhappy. I focus on removing what is wrong. One day my friend did
something unethical, so I stopped being friends with him, but Aniela was curious
why I was not more upset. I replied that I was happy because I did not have to
be associated with him anymore. Can you imagine if it had happened five years
later when I felt even closer to him? P 114
4. When I was 19 years old, I had just become a
fireman and was racing for the first time to a fire that had broken out in an
apartment. As our fire engine raced through the city with the lights spinning
and the siren blaring, I felt an overwhelming feeling of goodness. For the
first time, I felt somebody needed me, and I really liked it. Since that time,
I’ve kept educating myself and have tried to keep becoming an even better man
so I can again help people in need and feel that goodness. P 114-115
5. ~one day, I told one of my clients who blamed
her husband for everything to take 100 percent responsibility for her part in
their interactions. “This way,” I said, “you will be free of trying to control
him, and you will be able to find constructive solutions in your relationship.”
When she left, I realized that the same advice could help me as well. Taking
100 percent personal responsibility would help me to stop blaming or
complaining and achieve a sense of flow. It would also give me the clarity in
any conversation to locate the right words to help a person to accept a hard choice.
On March 8, 2017, I bought a bracelet on Amazon for $ 19.95 with the first
letters of each word of a sentence: IARFCDP. They are the key to my personal proverb, a
line that brings awareness and helps me see through my own emotional storms. It
means: I Am Responsible For Calming Down People. Sometimes it helps me to teach
what I need to learn myself. I never take it off. It reminds me many times a
day what the letters stand for and lets me feel its goodness. Sometimes while
reacting to an irritation, I notice the bracelet and stop myself before I get
to the point where I’ll be sorry. Then, I experience glimpses of flow. P 115
6. with consistent effort, someone can turn their
life completely around in the space of a year. I realized firsthand how
important mentoring is in this process of deep change; it’s why mentoring is so
important in our work today. It also gave me insight into the mind of an
alcoholic, or any addict. Today I can drink moderately without tipping into the
reckless fatalism of addiction. Without having been there, though, I doubt I
could find the right words at the right time for the alcoholics who need me to
understand them. P 116
7. “Hard choices, easy life. Easy choices, hard
life.” Nothing truly meaningful or lasting has ever been created in a short
period of time. If you learn the story behind any great success, you realize
how many years went by and how many hard choices were made to achieve it.
Reaching for more is not only an act of ambition, it also comes from passion
and love. Nothing is achieved because of easy choices. I believe that people
can endure any hardship if it is sensible and constructive. Hard choices means
never retiring, because the brain has to be engaged in finding new solutions in
the moment, not just remembering old formulas. Hard choices make us wiser,
smarter, stronger, and wealthier, and easy choices reverse our progress,
focusing our energies on comfort or entertainment. In every difficult moment
ask yourself, “What is a hard choice and what is an easy choice?” and you will
know instantly what is right. P 116
7. ~since those teenage years, when I discovered
the power of learning and decided to educate myself, knowing more has been my
path to personal power and happiness. When Aniela and I were refugees in
Europe, books were like clothes. We couldn’t be without them. We’ve never
regretted investing in our education. When we were dissatisfied with a hired
writer’s work on the first draft of The Happy Body, we decided to pursue
master’s degrees in creative writing so we could better communicate our own
stories and ideas. Our work is a synthesis of the thousands of books we have
read over the years, and we will never stop learning. To us, books are what
make us human. P 117
8. When I started studying fire protection
engineering, a professor gave a welcome speech and said something like this:
“Up to today, you studied hard and repeated what the world told you. Our
purpose in the next four years is to teach you how to think for yourself. If we
succeed, you will create something this world has never seen before, but if we
do not, you will just be stuck copying others and repeating. Take my words
seriously, study hard, but also open your imagination. One day you will be
designing a new world, and I hope it will be better than the one we live in.” P 118-119
https://thehappybody.com/
https://www.amazon.com/Happy-Body-Nutrition-Exercise-Relaxation/dp/0982403828/ref
https://www.amazon.com/Happy-Body-Mastering-Food-Choices-ebook/dp/B01N21O2W4/ref
https://www.amazon.com/Happy-Body-Mastering-Exercise-Choices/dp/0996243933/ref
https://www.amazon.com/Happy-Body-Mastering-Rest-Choices/dp/0996243917/ref
https://www.amazon.com/Happy-Body-Food-Your-Soul/dp/099624395X/ref
https://www.amazon.com/Got-This-Art-Getting-Grit/dp/0996243968/ref
JERZY GREGOREK emigrated from Poland to the United States as a political refugee with his wife, Aniela, in 1986. He subsequently won four World Weightlifting Championships and established one world record. In 2000, Jerzy and Aniela founded UCLA’s weightlifting team. As co-creator of the Happy Body program, Jerzy has mentored people for more than 30 years. In 1998, Jerzy earned an MFA in writing from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. His poems and translations have appeared in numerous publications, including The American Poetry Review. His poem “Family Tree” was the winner of Amelia magazine’s Charles William Duke Long Poem Award in 1998.
Reference
Ferriss, Timothy. Tribe of Mentors: Short Life Advice from the Best in the World (P. 113). Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Kindle Edition.
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