Hello everyone and thank you for tuning into episode five of The Blue Collar Executive poscast.  I am your host Lewis Taulbee, Jr.  Good morning, good afternoon or good evening depending on when you are tuning in.  Today is going to be a little different.  I came in here ready to talk about the next chapter in my book, but I feel compelled to talk about a different topic today.  I'm just going to close my talking points, leave the record button down and just roll unscripted and let's see where it takes us.  Today's topic will be love.  Maybe I feel compelled to talk about it because it's what we all need right now.  Then again, it's what we all need all the time.  Perhaps it's because today is Good Friday and love is the reason for Easter.  I know today is the day Jesus died for our sins and Easter is the day he was resurrected but love was the reason for it all.  It is plainly stated right there in your Bible.  John 3:16 starts with the words “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son”.  This is stated over and over throughout the Bible.  In fact, it says God is love and we are made in the image of God.  C. S. Lewis said, “I believe in love as I believe the sun has risen not because I see it, but because by it, I see everything else.”  I guess now that I think about it, it is a great topic.  It's not only a key component for success, but it defines who we are.

In previous episodes I've talked about my dad's one liner farm analogies and advice.  It's helped me along the way.  For this topic I think I'd be remiss if I didn't start by saying perhaps the biggest lesson or quality that was instilled in me came from my mom.  She worked hard every day in a hot, dirty factory.  She would come home exhausted and just beat down but she never let that interfere with showing love to everyone she met.  She greeted everyone, and I mean everyone, with a smile and love in her eyes.  She told me so many times to always love and have compassion for people.  Not only friends and family, but for everyone I met.  Even the people that didn't like me, she would always say you don't know what that person has gone through.  Now don't get me wrong, my dad was a kind, loving guy too, but he showed it more in his actions and would rarely say the words to anyone including us.  We knew he loved us though.  That's the thing about love.  It's not a word. It doesn't need to be said to know it exists.  We throw it around a lot as a word.  For example I love that car.  I love that house.  Real love isn't a word it's something we all have inside of us and like all of the things I've talked about, God put it there.  It's our choice whether we use it or not.  I remember one day mom was upset with some people that she worked with.  I was just a kid so she didn't give me a lot of the details, but I could tell whatever they had done upset her.  It had to be pretty bad because she had the patience of Jobe.  I said, are you mad at them mom?  She smiled and said, no honey, I'm just disappointed in them.  She continued and said, I don't get mad because anger doesn't resolve anything and it takes away your joy and I will never let anyone steal the joy that God put into my heart.  I can't, can't tell you exactly when she said that or what age I was, but it has never left me.  I can still hear it just as plain as if she was standing here saying it now.  I'd love to say I've always lived by those words.  As a young adult, I allowed myself to get angry especially when I felt someone had crossed me.  However, when I was 28 years old I caught a couple of employees engaging in some wrongdoing.  Now these fellows had been with me for a long time and I'd always treated them like friends.  When they did what they did, I was shocked.  I was truly hurt.  I went back to my office and called one of my mentors about it and the first thing he asked was if I was mad.  I paused and thought for a minute because I probably should have been mad.  I'm sure in prior years I would have unleashed some anger on him.  As I sat there pondering his question, I said, no, I'm not mad at all.  I'm just disappointed.  There is a big difference.  That's when I realized I had inherited the trait from my mom.  The trait of listening to your heart and approaching every action with love.  I can honestly say that the best decisions I've made in business and in life have been when I listened to my heart.  I have since been disappointed many times by people because I expect everyone to have the same level of love and integrity.  At least until they prove me wrong.  I have actually been told this is a weakness for me in business, but I refuse to change.  Although I know I'll continue to be disappointed from time to time, I would much rather believe in the good of people than to walk around with a shield on my heart.  One of the best success books of all time is Og Mandino's Greatest Salesman in the World.  It's one of my favorite books.  It came to mind because in it, I remember Og wrote that the key to success is love and he goes on to say we should greet each day with love.  We should greet each person with love and we should greet each task with love.  Funny story.  Several years ago I was speaking to a group of college students and was asked to recommend one book for business success.  I said, well, that's easy.  The Bible.  They really looked confused because I'm sure no professor has ever recommended The Bible.  It’s true though.  I've read dozens of books on business success and every single one of them has the same principles that you're going to find in The Bible.  If I have to recommend two Og Mandino's The Greatest Salesman in the World would be my next choice.  About two years ago, I had an opportunity to meet a very affluent business owner.  Out of respect I won't say his name on here, but if I mentioned him or his company, you would know exactly who I'm talking about.  He was a friend of my partner at the time so the three of us had a casual business dinner in Manhattan.  I was really excited to meet this guy and was fascinated to hear him talk about his business.  As the dinner stretched on, I began to realize that this guy may have been successful in business, but he was failing miserably in life because he was missing one key element.  Love.  This is one of the wealthiest people on earth, but it was so easy to see that he wasn't happy inside.  He was so focused on making money that he didn't allow himself to be loved and he certainly didn't offer it.  To see this guy on the surface with all those riches, cars and mansions, most of the world would probably aspire to be him.  I'm here to tell you that without love this guy was not happy.  I would even say he's dead inside.  It was sad.  Look, it's true that money can't buy you happiness.  Now it can park you right outside of happy’s door.  Without love, there is no value in all the riches in the world.  We all aspire to have wealth, but to be truly successful in life, we have to keep love as the priority.  Our lives are shaped by those who love us and they are shaped by those who refuse to love us.  Who we are and everything we do is defined by love.  Going back to Og Mandino’s book, he says we should greet everyone we meet with love.  Now that doesn't mean just walk up to everyone we meet and say I love you.  Remember I said earlier in the podcast, love is not spoken words.  He suggests that as you meet someone think in your mind, I love you.  Our eyes are the windows of our soul.  It’s easy to show love through our eyes and to see love in other's eyes.  I challenge you to give this a try.  Let me know how it works.  I can tell you it works for me.  We all have people we don't like.  They bug us.  We don't like the way they live.  We don't like the way they speak.  We don't like the way they smell.  Whatever it is.  The great news is we don't have to like everyone.  We just have to love them.  There is a big difference.  Let me explain it this way.  If you have kids you can relate.  One of the most heartbreaking things for a parent is seeing their kids at odds or fighting.  We are all God's children so think about how he feels when he sees us having anger and resentment toward each other.  Maybe that's why he told us over and over and over in The Bible to love each other.  Love is written over 500 times in the literal translation of The Bible.  My kids all have different opinions and they argue about everything.  I have no problem with that.  In fact, I'm glad they're independent as long as they always love each other in their hearts.  Let me end with my favorite poem.  I've had this hanging in my office for more than 20 years.  It's by an unknown author although some credit Mother Theresa with it and Martina McBride put it in a song a few years ago.  It's called Do It Anyway.  People are often unreasonable, illogical and self-centered.  Forgive them anyway.  If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives, be kind anyway.  If you are successful, you will win some false friends and true enemies.  Succeed anyway.  If you are honest and frank people may cheat you.  Be honest and frank anyway.  What you spend years building someone could destroy overnight.  Build it anyway.  If you find serenity and happiness, people may be jealous.  Be happy anyway.  The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow.  Do good anyway.  Give the world the best you have and it may never be enough.  Give the world the best you have anyway.  You see the final analysis is between you and God.  It was never between you and them anyway.  Well, this turned out to be one of the easiest topics I've ever talked on.  With the category of this podcast being success, I didn't know how this would all tie together, but I think it's easy to see that the key to success and the key to life is love.  I mean, without it, we're just walking around blindly.

This brings us to the end of another episode.  I hope you've enjoyed this one as much as I have.  I'll leave you with First John 4 “Let us love one another for love is of God.  I wish every one of you a happy Easter.  While this virus continues to spread, always remember a smile is the most contagious thing.  Keep love in your heart.

I hope you found some value in this episode or at the very least found it entertaining.  Thank you so much for listening.