The Story of the 4 Minute Mile

    Until 1954, the four minute mile was something beyond human comprehension, and thus beyond human achievement. It was believed to be a real physical limit for a human being to run a mile in four minutes or less. “The four minute mile was the goal that athletes and sportsmen had talked of and dreamt about for so many years,” wrote British runner, Roger Bannister. Like climbing Mount Everest before Hillary, Bannister wrote, runners “used to think it was quite impossible, and beyond the reach of any runner.” It seemed to be as absolute a limit as the waterfalls cascading off the edge of the Earth were to early mariners. And it proved to be just as much a mirage.

    In May 1954, on an Oxford track, Bannister shattered this barrier, running the mile in 3 minutes 59.4 seconds. Two months later, in Finland, Bannister’s “miracle mile” was again broken by Australian rival John Landy, who achieved a time of 3 minutes 56 seconds. Within three years, 16 other runners had also broken this record.

    What happened in those three years? Was there a sudden growth spurt in human evolution? Was there a genetic engineering experiment that created a new race of super runners? No, the basic human equipment was the same. What changed was the mental model. The runners of the past had been held back by a mindset that said they could not surpass the four minute mile. When that limit was broken, the others saw that they could do something they had previously thought impossible.

    Transforming our world begins with changing the way we think about it. The more we understand the role of mental models in this process, and the better able we are to recognize these models, the better we can examine the strengths of our models and their limitations. We can sustain the models that allow us to act effectively in the world and get ride of those that constrain us unnecessarily. 

    If Roger Bannister had accepted the barrier of the four-minute mile as a real, physical limitation, he might never have tried to surpass it. As Bannister writes, “No one can say, ‘You must not run faster than this, or jump higher than that.’ The human spirit is indomitable.”

–Yoram Wind and Colin Crook

What is Kevin Garnett Like?

From Boston Celtic assistant Kevin Eastman

...

1. Talented.
2. Passionate.
3. He works on his game every day.
4. He wants to know what you know that can make him better.
5. He is incredibly competitive in games.
6. He never makes excuses (in fact he blames himself).
7. He wants the truth.
8. He can respond and deal with failure.

Mind Power: Words of Wisdom For Positive Thinking

Posted by Brian Tracy on Jul 27, 2010

Perhaps the most powerful influence on your attitude and personality is what you say to yourself, and believe. It is not what happens to you, but how you respond internally to what happens to you, that determine your thoughts and feelings, mind power, and, ultimately, your actions. By controlling your inner dialogue, or “self-talk,” you can begin to assert control over every other dimension of your life.

Thought for the Day
Your self-talk “the words that you use to describe what is happening to you, and to discuss how you feel about external events” determines the quality and tone of your emotional life. When you see things positively and constructively and look for the good in each situation and each person, you have a tendency to remain naturally positive and optimistic. Since the quality of your life is determined by how you feel, moment to moment, one of your most important goals should be to use every psychological technique available to keep yourself thinking about what you want and to keep your mind off of what you don’t want, or what you fear.
Arnold Toynbee, the historian, developed what he called the “challenge-response theory” of history. In studying the rise and fall of 20 major world civilizations, Toynbee concluded that each civilization started out as a small group of people – as a village, as a tribe or in the case of the Mongol empire, as just three people who had survived the destruction of their small community.
Toynbee concluded that each of these small groups faced external challenges, such as hostile tribes. In order to survive, much less thrive, these small groups had to reorganize themselves to deal positively and constructively with these challenges.
By meeting each of these challenges successfully, the village or tribe would grow. Even greater challenges would be triggered as a result. And if this group of people continued to meet each challenge by drawing upon its resources and winning out, it would continue to grow until ultimately it became a nation-state and then a civilization covering a large geographical area.
Toynbee looked at the 21 great civilizations of human history, ending with the American civilization, and concluded that these civilizations began to decline and fall apart when their citizens and leaders lost the will or ability to rise to the inevitable external challenges occasioned by their very size and power.
Toynbee’s theory of civilizations can be applicable to our life as well.
You are continually faced with challenges and difficulties, with problems and disappointments, with temporary setbacks and defeats.  They are an unavoidable and inevitable part of being human. But, as you draw upon your resources to respond effectively to each challenge, you grow and become a stronger and better person. In fact, without those setbacks, you could not have learned what you needed to know and developed the qualities of your character to where they are today.
Much of your ability to succeed comes from the way you deal with life.  One of the characteristics of superior men and women is that they recognize the inevitability of temporary disappointments and defeats, and they accept them as a normal and natural part of life. They do everything possible to avoid problems, but when problems come, superior people learn from them, rise above the, and continue onward in the direction of their dreams.

Setting Goals and Objectives: 5 Myths

Posted by Brian Tracy on Jul 30, 2010

Only 3% of adults have clear, written, specific, measurable, time-bounded goals, and by every statistic, they accomplish ten times as much as people with no goals at all. Why is it then that most people have no goals?
Myth One: “I already have goals; I don’t need to set any.” People who say this also say that their goals are to be rich, thin, happy, successful, and live their dreams. Buy these are not goals, they are wishes and fantasies common to all mankind. A goal is like a beautiful home, carefully designed, revised continually, upgraded regularly, and worked on constantly. If it is not in writing, it is merely a dream or a wish, a vague objective with no energy behind it.
Myth Two: “I don’t need goals; I’m doing fine.” Living your life without goals and objectives is setting off across unknown territory with no road signs and no road map. You have no choice but to make it up as you go along, reacting and responding to whatever happens, and hoping for the best. If you are doing well today without written goals and plans, you could probably be doing many times better in the future if you had clear targets to aim at and the ability to measure your progress as you go along. It is vital to have goal setting objectives.
Myth Three: “I don’t need written goals; I have them all in my mind.” The average stream of consciousness includes about 1,500 thoughts a minute. If your goals are only in your mind, they are invariably jumbled up, vague, confused, contradictory and deficient in many ways. They offer no clarity and give you no motive power. You become like a ship without a rudder, drifting with the tides, crashing into the rocks inevitably and never really fulfilling your true potential.
Myth Four: “I don’t know how to set goals.” No wonder. You can take a Masters degree at a leading university and never receive a single hour of instruction on goal setting and achieving. Fortunately, setting a goal is a skill, like time management, teaching, selling, managing, or anything else that you need to become a highly productive and effective person. And all skills are learnable. You can learn the skill of goal-setting by practice and repetition until it becomes as easy and as automatic as breathing. And from the very first day that you begin setting goals, the progress you will make and the successes you will enjoy will astonish you.
Myth Five: “Goals don’t work; life is too unpredictable.” When a plane takes off for a distant city, it will be off course 99% of the time. The complexity of the avionics and the skill of the pilots are focused on continual course corrections. It is the same in life. But when you have a clear, long-term goal, with specific plans to achieve it, you may have to change course many times, but you will eventually arrive at your destination of health, wealth and great success.
One last point. Goal setting has been called the master skill of success. You have two choices in life: You can either work on your own goals, or you can work for someone else, and work on achieving their goals. When you learn the master skill, you take complete control of your life and jump to the front of the line in your potential for great achievement.
Great News! With the help and guidance of four professional writers and editors, I have completely rewritten and updated my world-wide best-selling book Goals!
The new edition contains three new chapters, on how to set and achieve financial goals, how to create a wonderful personal and family life, and how to achieve and maintain superb levels of health and fitness.
There are new ideas to help you set the best goals for you in every area of your life. You learn how to create action plans, set priorities, and focus on what is most important.
In addition, you learn how to visualize and attract your goals into your life. You discover how to unlock the powers of your superconscious mind to bring you everything you really want in life.
The 2^nd edition of “Goals!” is perhaps the best guide you can have to enable you to realize your full potential for health, happiness and prosperity. Click here to get a copy of Goals! Second Edition