Top 5 Inspirational Movies - Weekly Wednesday Inspiration #6

-by Matt Leedham

Welcome back! We have a very special announcement today. Velocity's blog turns 100!! Can you believe that we have posted 100 times since October 2010? Unbelievable...

Thank you for your support!

What better way to celebrate than with another installation of the Top 5 Most Inspirational Movies. There are many more than 5 inspirational movies, so we’ve divided them into three categories:

1. Sports
2. Military
3. Life

We covered Inspirational Sports and Military Movies already over the last two weeks. Below, you’ll find the Top 5 Most Inspirational “Life” Movies. This is a general category of very inspirational movies that didn’t fit into other specific categories. Did your favorite movie make the list?

Top 5 Most Inspirational “Life” Movies:

#1: It’s a Wonderful Life – This is my favorite movie of all time. In this 1946 classic, local businessman, George Bailey, has been generous and good to people his whole life. But when the scrooge-like Mr. Potter puts the screws to George on Christmas Eve, George begins to lose faith in who he is and thinks that the world would be better off without him. His family’s prayers are answered when an angel is sent to show George just what his home town of Bedford Falls would be like without him. *Editor’s pick!

#2: Life is Beautiful – This is a heartwarming, yet tragic film about a life-loving Jewish bookkeeper named Guido in 1930’s Italy who marries a beautiful girl and is blessed with a son. When his family is sent to a concentration camp during the German occupation, Guido tries to protect his young son by using his imagination and humor to pretend that the Holocaust is a game that his son must play in an effort to escape and win a tank.

#3: Dead Poets Society – In some moving performances by a great young cast, the Dead Poets Society takes place at the Welton Academy for boys in New England. When Professor Keeting, a new English teacher arrives, he challenges the boys to think outside the box as individuals. This results in great learning and great conflict, both internally for each boy, and also externally at the school. This story is packed with tragedy and triumph, learning and growing.

#4: Stand and Deliver – Based on a true story in East Los Angeles, this story shows how powerful expectations, positive thinking, and hard work can be, even in the most dire situations. Jaime Escalante is a math teacher at Garfield High School – a predominantly Hispanic school with a terrible performance record. Jaime believes he can turn a class of underperformers into college credit-earning calculus students. His students perform so well that the he is charged with cheating and his students are forced to retake the Advanced Placement exams.

#5: Good Will Hunting – A native of Boston’s South End, Will Hunting can’t picture a life apart from his blue-collar roots, but as a janitor at MIT, his talent for mathematics and chemistry is discovered. With pressure from every angle to be more than he thinks he is capable of, he needs the assistance of psychologist Sean Maguire. Together they uncover what’s holding Will back and how he can live the life he was meant to live.

Will there be more inspirational movies? Stay tuned! Have a great Wednesday!

Why We Launched A Triathlon Training Program

-by Matt Leedham

One of my core values is “Purpose & Meaning.” I have defined that in 3 ways for myself: analyze activities and goals for meaning; strive to live my life for something big, and; help others discover their purpose. Essentially, knowing why I chose to do something, and doing it with intention, is very important to me. Time is limited, and I have so much to get done, so I need to be very critical with what I choose to spend my time on.

When the opportunity presented itself to create this Triathlon Training Program, we didn’t jump at it right away. We reflected on it, asked some hard questions and really thought about whether or not this had purpose and meaning for both Velocity as a whole, and for us personally.

As you can tell by our excitement in launching the program yesterday, our conclusion was that it was a great fit. And here’s why:

1. Walk the Walk – Jaime and I have been writing and teaching about personal achievement for some time. We’ve shared a lot of personal stories, successes, and failures. We encourage people to be great and live up to their potential. And we’ve received a lot of wonderful feedback from those that are inspired by what we write and those that have attended our live workshops. Well, now is the time to lead the charge and take action. We’ve been talking the talk and now it’s time to walk the walk. We started this program based on the passionate belief that regardless of current weight, fitness level, or physical ailments, anyone can compete in and complete a triathlon. Join us!
   
   
2. Common Denominator – The more we talk to people the more we realize two things. First, we are all so amazingly different, complex and yet simple. We perceive the world in a way that only we can – uniquely based our experiences. However, in spite of our varied perspectives, almost all of us seem to have one goal in common. I have yet to talk to someone where health or healthy living was not a priority. Whether or not we are actually living a healthy lifestyle, we all seem to want it. We all want to be faster, stronger, thinner, sexier, more energized, and more vibrant. We believe this program will answer the call for many of you. It certainly will for us!
   
   
3. Adult Recess – We are all guilty of taking ourselves too seriously sometimes (or not seriously enough). We can get into habits, routines, and ruts. We get distracted by “life” and all of a sudden our commitments pile up and we forget about one very important thing – ourselves. This program is designed to be fun! It’s opportunity to get outside, get active, and get healthy. Nothing feels better than the sun on your face and the wind in your hair. So get off the couch and come join us! Make some time in your life to invest in yourself. Spring is around the corner and we’re going to go have some fun!

I will leave you with this final thought. You may not be able to join us in our Triathlon Training Program for many reasons. You may not live in the area, you may have insecurities about your athleticism*, or you may not have the resources to join us. Whatever the reason may be, don’t stop here. Get out there, get active, and get healthy. You’ll thank yourself for it. And so will everyone around you that you inspire.

*please email us at answers@velocitygoals.com about your concerns - this program was created to include anyone, regardless of fitness level.

I could never do that!

-By Jaime Willis

"Impossible is Nothing."

- Adidas

Two performers in Cirque Du Soleil's Ovo

James Stigler wanted to understand why Asian students perform so much better than American students in mathematics. In his book, Learning Gap, Stigler mentions the impact of variables such as instructional time (both per day and length of the school year) and curriculum, but he finds that attitude is a large factor in Asian students' success.

Asians, it seems, have placed a high cultural emphasis on hard work as the path to achievement. So when an Asian student tackles a math problem beyond their level of comprehension, they work and work and work at it until they understand the problem and can solve it. They believe that the only thing that stands in the way of their success is just doing the work.

Americans, on the other hand, have placed a high cultural emphasis on skill and talent. So when an American student tackles a math problem beyond their level of comprehension, they believe that they don't "have what it takes" to do that type of math. In fact, an American student will work at the problem no more than 5 minutes on average before giving up, while the Asian student will work for 30 minutes or longer on the same problem.

Esperanza Spalding - 2011 Grammy Winner

Two University of Illinois psychologists, Carol Diener and Carol Dweck, did a similar study in 1978. They found that children who attributed their failure to complete a task to 'lack of ability' did significantly worse at achieving tasks of all difficulty levels than children who attributed their failure to 'lack of effort.'
Even further, the study showed that when they taught children to disassociate failure with lack of ability/talent, the students were able to improve their success rate.

Malcolm Gladwell had a similar conclusion in his book Outliers. He discovered that innate talent and ability was something of a misnomer. In one study, which we've mentioned before in our workshops, Gladwell found that the best violinists in the world were not the ones with the most innate ability, but simply the ones with the most practice time in.

Aron Ralston, survivor

For every single amazing achievement you can think of, there is someone out there who was able to make that happen despite their lack of innate talent or ability. I think of Eddie Izzard, an actor and comedian, who was able to run 43 marathons in a row (one per day) with very little advanced training. I think of Carl Brashear, who became a Master Diver in the Navy as an amputee after twenty-two YEARS of working toward his goal.

So when someone tells me, "I could never do that," I want to scream. SCREAM. "Yes, you can!" The only thing that is truly stopping you is YOU. The path to your "impossible" achievement may take time. And encouragement. And heartbreak. But you CAN achieve anything you set your mind to.

Believe it. Achieve it.

TGIF: Matt Leedham

Happy Friday! I hope everyone had a great week of achievement this week. If this is your first time reading our blog, Welcome! You can read more about Velocity in the tabs above this post. If you'd like a daily dose of inspiration, like us on facebook or add us on twitter.

Today we’re going to switch it up a bit and use this format to interview Matt about accomplishing one of his major personal goals. Matt’s written a lot of stuff on this blog, so feel to look around and read more about what he thinks and feels.

Now, onto the good stuff!

The Achiever

My name is Matt Leedham, and I am a married, Yankee-loving, marathon-running, dog-owning, native New Jerseyean, who is currently a Washington DC resident, and is passionately driven to help others achieve their goals. In my dream to change the world by building a community of achievers, I co-founded Velocity Goals with my good friend and former business partner, Jaime Willis. I also work extensively with entrepreneurs across the U.S. on strategic planning, goal setting and experience sharing at the Entrepreneurs’ Organization.

The Goal

My goal was to finish a marathon (26.2 miles) in under 4 hours.

Why This Goal

In 2004, at the age of 26, I signed up for the Marine Corps Marathon. I trained hard for months, but as the race got near, I let up on the training a bit. During the race, I ran into all sorts of trouble and there were times when I just stopped. I remember limping along Rt. 110 next to the Pentagon, grabbing my hamstring with my left hand and the highway guardrail with my right hand. It wasn’t pretty. I finished the race in what I considered a disappointing time knowing my potential - 4 hours and 34 minutes.

After that race, I quit running for awhile. I later learned that it is very common for runners and endurance athletes to completely stop doing what they trained for months to do after a big race. Race day is such a high, and without having plans for an upcoming event, it’s easy to just give it up. I would run occasionally but I stopped doing what I loved on a consistent basis.

Flash forward to 2009. I knew I needed to run. I was dealing with some stressful situations at work and was generally not happy with my fitness level. So, I decided to pick another challenging event – another marathon. It was the Fall, so I looked for a race sometime in the late Winter or early Spring, so that I would be forced to train all winter. That’s important because normally I would hibernate and become dormant all winter. I found an interesting race in Austin, TX, one of my favorite cities. It was on Valentine’s Day 2010 and I thought the wife and I could enjoy a nice weekend in a fun town. Plus my family has all migrated to Houston and I figured they’d come watch the race.

The First Step

The first thing I did was register for the race and booked my plane ticket. If you pony up the cash and put an event on your calendar, it becomes VERY difficult to back out. Think about it – you would lose money, have to make a bunch of phone calls, and tell everyone that plans changed. Once I commit to something like this, it’s on. That’s it. Get out of the way because I’m making it happen.

Challenges

For those of you that live in the DC Metro area or on the East coast, you may recall the winter we had last year in 2009/2010. I survived Snowpacalypse and Snowmageddon, but running in it wasn’t easy! In addition to massive amounts of snow, we also experienced ice storms, rain, and frigid temperatures. It’s not easy to get out of your car at 6:30pm in the dark, when it’s 18 degrees and sleeting outside, especially when all you have on is a few thin layers of DryFit or CoolMax running gear.

There were also many minor injuries. I remember one night, running in a light snow. My shins felt sore right away, but I needed to run 5 miles. I kept running, and it got worse and worse. I should have stopped, but I really needed to get in this run, so I kept going. Two miles later, I couldn’t run anymore. I could barely walk. I was about a mile away from home and would have called my wife if I had access to a phone. I slowly limped home, very distraught. This was about a month before the race and I knew I was in trouble. I almost gave up here because I know how bad shin splints can be. I’ve had them before and the only way to cure them is rest. Rest was not something I had time for and I didn’t see how it was possible to keep training.

I took three days off, iced my shins constantly, stretched out as much as possible, and tried not to walk more than was necessary. On the fourth day, I tested out my shins on a quick jaunt and they seemed better. I didn’t want to push it, but I kept running as was able to stave off further injury.

Staying Motivated

Planning my weekend in Austin with my wife was helpful. We both got excited about exploring the city, going to the Expo to pick up my race packet, eating lots of good food, etc.

Also, I knew that I had to average at least a 9-minute mile pace to reach my goal. I had gotten to a point in my training where I was running 8-minute miles for over 14+ miles. Knowing that I was averaging a pace that was significantly less than what I needed to finish in under 4 hours was really motivating.

Who Helped?

My wife is amazing and supported and encouraged me the whole time. She was very understanding when my training affected our dinner plans or weekend plans. She kept me focused on the goal and I love her for it.

I also met up with a fairly casual running group called Potomac Runners. They’re a great group of people that are very passionate about running. Having that support was essential.

I knew a couple of guys in Austin who were running the race and they were really generous with their time and knowledge of the course.

Of course my Garmin Forerunner 305 GPS watch was amazing! It helped me track my pace, distance, and heart rate. This actually came in very handy during the race when I noticed my heart rate spiking after climbing a hill. I was able to regulate and get back to where I needed to be to finish the race strong.

TGIF – Celebrate!

My goal was to finish in under 4 hours. When I crossed the finish line and looked at my watch, I welled up inside. I finished the Austin Marathon in 3 hours and 41 minutes, well under my goal time. I crushed it. Then I went over to my wife and she was so genuinely ecstatic, that I welled up again. It was actually quite emotional.

Then, my wife and I joined some Austin locals for a post-race meal. It was one of the best meals of my life. After burning 3,000 calories, I really enjoyed my cheese smothered, chicken quesadilla at one of the best Tex Mex joints in town. A couple margaritas were a nice touch too!

Advice

My advice for race day is: just keep moving. There were times that I wanted to quit. There were times when I hit the wall. There were times when I was running up a hill and was literally angry about it. There were times when I was tight, or dehydrated, or in pain. But I remembered repeating to myself, over and over again…just keep moving. It was that feeling of disappointment from the Marine Corps Marathon in 2004 that kept me focused. I figured that if I just kept moving and didn’t stop, even if I slowed to a snail’s pace, that I would finish with a better time. It turns out that I was right.

Just keep moving.

What’s Next?

I just signed up for a triathlon in August, 2011. Jaime and I are hosting a triathlon training program, specifically geared toward novice athletes that may have never completed a triathlon before. We want you to feel like I felt when I crossed that finish line. Join us!

Be Gritty

-by Jaime Willis

Angela Lee Duckworth, Ph.D. has spent the last ten years researching achievement and believes “grit” is what ultimately determines success.


In a recent Tedx Talk, she discussed her research of incoming freshman at West Point in order to quantify their ‘grit,’ which she defines as “tenaciously perusing something over the long term.” The survey asked students to respond to questions like “I finish whatever I begin,” “I have overcome setbacks to conquer an important challenge” versus statements like “My interests change from year to year.”

She found that the 96% students who scored in the highest quartile for grit were able to successfully graduate from West Point. In fact, people who scored highest for grit performed better than the students who were in the highest quartile of the “whole candidate score” which takes into account intelligence, physical prowess, and other factors that West Point believes are attributes of the most ‘talented’ students.

What does this mean for your goals? That tenacity, perseverance, and hard work are far more important in determining your ultimate success than any innate intellectual or physical prowess you may possess.

Do not be afraid! Given enough time and practice, success is yours!

Top 5 Inspirational Movies - Weekly Wednesday Inspiration #5

-by Matt Leedham

Welcome back! This is the second installation of the Top 5 Most Inspirational Movies. There are many more than 5 inspirational movies, so we’ve divided them into three categories:

1. Sports
2. Military
3. Life

We covered Inspirational Sports Movies last week. Below, you’ll find the Top 5 Most Inspirational Military Movies. Did your favorite movie make the list?

Top 5 Most Inspirational Military Movies:

#1: Saving Private Ryan – in this critically acclaimed, epic war film, we follow a group of soldiers that somehow make it off the beaches of Normandy only to be called on for another special mission. They must find the last surviving brother of four after the other three have been killed in action, and bring him home alive.

#2: Braveheart – William Wallace, the son of martyrs fighting for freedom, is a commoner that unites all of Scotland to defeat the advances of the English King, Edward the Longshanks. He battles soldiers, betrayals, and the loss of loved ones on his quest.

#3: Gladiator – Once favored by the people and the aging King, Roman general Maximus fails to see what the jealous prince is capable of doing. After his family is murdered and he is captured, he must fight in the Gladiator Games until he is defeated and killed. His skill and fury keep him alive until he is able to exact revenge.

#4: GI Jane – After a politically motivated Senator fights for gender integration of the Navy, she is challenged to find a female candidate to enter the Navy SEAL training program. Determined to prove everyone wrong, LT Jordan O’neil, begins her quest to succeed at any cost.

#5: Top Gun – Who can forget that tenuous relationship between Maverick and Iceman? This epic Navy fighter jet movie follows the struggle of one struggling pilot to keep control while living on the edge. Of course, a hot-blooded romance ensues with the leading lady.

Did you forget the ending of Top Gun? I doubt it. But in case you did, here you go:

Will Jaime have another rebuttal this week? Even I don’t know!

Coming up next week: Top 5 Most Inspirational “Life” Movies! It’s sort of a general category for movies that aren’t really Sports or Military. Can you guess what they are?

The Truth

-by Matt Leedham

Achieving goals and living a life of purpose and meaning is like being in the Matrix.

Boy: “Do not try and bend the spoon. That’s impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth.”

Neo: “What truth?”

Boy: “There is no spoon.”

Neo: “There is no spoon?”

Boy: “Then you’ll see that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.”

I love this scene. I find it a powerful metaphor for a lot of challenges in a person’s life. In the context of this post, the spoon represents rules, social constructs, belief systems and other people’s expectations.

The point being, there is only one rule to living a purposeful, meaningful life: There are no rules.

To be happy, fulfilled, and successful (whatever you define that to be), you cannot live by other people’s definition of your world. That makes no sense. And frankly, you will never meet the expectations of those around you because you are not invested in those expectations, nor do you have a clear understanding of what they are.

When you are grounded in core values that define your existence, it is then that the world becomes a favorable place to be yourself. Then you’ll see that it is not the world, society, or other people’s expectations of you that bends, it is only yourself.

(my apologies for what appears to be Croatian subtitles…I couldn’t find a clean version to embed)