“Springhill is growing…certainty”
“No one ever made a difference by being like everyone else” -P.T. Barnum played by Wolverine, oops my bad, Hugh Jackman. History makers are easy to write about, first because there is material about them, because they are noteworthy; almost always because they are controversial, but second because they nearly to a person, have enormous passion, large hearts, big souls; and Barnum had one of, if not, the, biggest heart of all time. Abraham Lincoln is purported (in the movie “Lincoln”) to have asked two of his telegraph operators “Think we choose to be born into this world or are we fitted into it,” (dialogue of agent omitted) and that question, as regards big souls such as P.T. Barnum, is still being wondered about by many today. When you talk about lives that became forces, his is one that easily slides into a conversation
about larger than life ideas, salesmanship, elephants and the powerof a parade (Hey- who doesn’t love a parade!)! It’s not studied much
but Barnum became a Republican and in his life did some great
campaign work on behalf of Abraham Lincoln and championed
the Thirteenth Amendment, the lives of big souls soon become
intertwined for the betterment of the world God created and rules,
such is often a certainty.
Economic Development moves through the motions
of big souls, such a notion isn’t easy to understand, but
it is easy to see here’s a clue. You see people all the time
where you say, “I just don’t get how they are wealthy,
they suck as humans?” Your observation is then often put
down by your partner who might even wax biblical and
get all New Testament on you, “Well you know what Jesus said a
bout judging, you know judge not lest you be judged.”
That statement isn’t true, what was said was very close to
the following “Do not judge, and you will not be judged.
Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive,
and you will be forgiven.” (Luke 6:37) Because you have
also seen people who you say “My gosh, they deserve what
they have achieved they work their butts off.” A statement
which also isn’t true, you can look back there, they have a butt,
it’s a certainty.
Big souls is a factor of life that we’d rather
not have to play with, why are some people different,
is it genes or is it learned? The debate is getting deeper today,
because we have unlocked the code of humanity, the genetic key of human chromosomes is now mapped,
we know where blond comes from, and we know the genetic
keys of characteristics. “OK, Dana, seems like your saying
we can make tall, handsome, blond and smart leaders every time?”
Genetics it turns out only lay the framework there are other
more complex elements. Think of it this way, the person is
like a car, genes are the gasoline, where the drive takes you,
is what gasoline and experience will provide. That’s how
success gets brewed, not coming from a place of no mistakes,
mistakes are how we can learn that we don’t need to do that again.
Some folks it turns out, are great at processing that lesson,
some it turns out, don’t, for a certainty.
So now we get to it, the difference between don’t, and can’t,
and we run into a gigantic wall called life combined with
what genetic predisposition will allow. People like Barnum,
Lincoln and others of that irk, make gigantic efforts
seem the normal actions of their day. They make
mountain sized mistakes but they recover from them,
and when they do, the entire act of humanity benefits.
But our discussion would be, just normal, if we left it
there, but, you’ve come to know me, we aren’t going to
leave it there because there is a weird factor that some
people choose to lose? Life isn’t just a matter of
being here, it isn’t just a physical reality, that’s a
part of the definition, the other facts of life are how
you choose to spend it? Suppose it works out exactly
like the greatest teacher of all history, Jesus, said;
suppose that different people are given different amounts
of life to spend, put the hours of your life alongside money
think of it that way, you can spend what you have and only
lay on the couch watch television drink soda (we should be
so lucky?), and do and accomplish very little with your time.
Or you can do like the young men and women of
Louisiana Tech University who study how to
let computers and plastic composition elements
come together and instantly ‘print’ out a copy of
what you draw? Their life spending will amount to
multiplication that will benefit the entire planet.
The choice to make your amount of life amount to s
something which will benefit others isn’t easy; but the servants,
as they learn to serve, benefit us all. Consider the
choice made by one local young man, to lift the weights,
to learn to run like the coach said he should, consider
the young ladies and the crowds who cheered him on,
consider all those hours of life, and consider that when he
finally steps out onto the field as a professional football
player, quite possibly the entire planet will get to benefit from
everyone's spending, that’s a certainty.
We live in times that challenge not our physical
ability to withstand assault so much, as they
challenge our ability to withstand the fear of knowing
nearly too much? What we as a people of choice may
need to do is decide to determine that our future will
remain free, that we won’t give in to irrational fear and
that despite the desires of those who would limit
freedom we simply will not all that to happen no matter
when, no matter what, no matter who and no matter why,
if someone stands to assault freedom we will choose to be
brave and not allow it. This choice to be bold and not allow
your individual nor collective right to expression to be put
away or limited in any way may be the greatest fight of all t
ime, that’s very close indeed to a certainty.
Dr. Dana C. Richardson, drd4u on Facebook &
Dr. Steve Broe, author of, “Leaders in Transition.”
