Hard Act to Follow

The other night I had to speak at the Bayside Business Network at the Sandringham Football Club.  They had asked me to speak there because they had heard me speak for AXA Insurance back in August about what having Income Protection Insurance had done to assist me when I had to leave full time employment.  What I didn't know was that there was going to be another speaker that night who would speak before me.  We had the same amount of time to talk and when I saw who it was a couple of days before hand I just about died!  I had to speak after one of Australia's all time major Olympic Stars!!!  Duncan Free!
 


Drew Ginn & Ducan Free



Now for those of you who may not know who Duncan Free is, he is one of Australia's best rowers ever!  He was a member of the quad sculls crew in the 1996, 2000 and 2004 Olympics.  After Athens in 2004 he took a year off and then switched to sweep rowing and in 2006 and 2007 won Gold at the World Championships with Drew Ginn in the pair.  Then in 2008 at the Beijing Olympics he and Drew won that elusive Olympic Gold Medal in the pair.

So I figured that was going to be a hard act to follow!  He started with a video of their Gold Medal winning row which was fantastic and so inspiring to watch!  He then talked about set backs, dedication, persistence and attitude.  Upon hearing what he had to say I started to realize that what I had to say would just reinforce his ideas! 

I was feeling much better with the fact that I was going to follow on from him and realized that what I had to say was just as important.  Persistence and Attitude is what life is all about.  We all have set backs in life, but you really have to pull through and take the good with the bad.  Our world is full of challenges and opportunities and we are lucky to have such a big choice.  Life can be so exciting, so don't waste one moment.

Duncan did give us a formula:

a  b  c  d  e   f   g   h   i   j   k    l    m   n   o   p   q    r   s    t    u   v   w     x   y   z   =

1  2  3  4  5  6  7   8  9 10 11 12  13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22  23 24 25 26

He then gave us some words and what percentage those words add up to in life:

T    R   A  I  N   I   N   G  = 92%

20  18  1  9  14  9  14  7

D  E  D  I  C  A  T  I  O  N  = 84%

4  5   4   9  3  1  20 9 15 14

A  T   T   I  T   U  D  E  = 100%

1  20  20 9 20 21  4  5

I think the last one says it all!  You can have everything else right no matter what you are doing but it is your attitude that counts!