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Today I am talking to myself and many others that just do not know when to stop working and go home.  As a career teacher and coach I have worked so many extra hours all these years and seem to always find a reason to stay a little longer to do things on my list.  As I got older I realized that I had to find better balance in my work and home life.  I got home late so many nights and suddenly it hit me that things could wait for tomorrow.  I began to make adjustments and started delegating responsibility to my team and coaches and it made a world of difference for me at home.  Being a driven person that wants to be successful, work hard and win at sports and life I would tend to be one of the first to arrive on campus and the last to leave.  I coached football in the fall, wrestling in the winter and softball in the spring.  Yes, I spent nine months a year actively coaching a sport, but lets be real it was a 12 month job when you add in summer workouts, camps, clinics, fund raisers and

We all are given 86,400 seconds, 1440 minutes or a total of 24 hours per day. Every second, minute and hour is a true blessing we receive from God. We are given this time here on Earth as an opportunity to spend it how we choose to. God made us in his image and has high expectations of our conduct, behavior and actions. We choose how to use that time, spend that time and the impact we will have on our family, friends, co-workers and community. We can choose to be kind, compassionate, caring, loving, supportive, engaging, friendly, helpful, honorable in our actions, behaviors, thoughts and conduct. We also have the option to be rude, selfish, mean, unsupportive, unloving, cowardly, bad, ill, sorry, lazy and all the other words that are negative in our lives. God gave us the option of choice and that is where we fall short so often. Human nature tends to lead us to react to, behave and treat others the way we are feeling at the time. Those choices have consequences either good o

Today we are talking about basic life skills that we need to be teaching our pre-teen and teenage children that will assist them in being a productive young adult once they leave the safe confines of mom and dads house.  They will no longer have mom and dad to take care of their clothes, make sure the oil is changed in the car, things are clean and organized and all the other stuff we do for and with our children.  As a high school teacher that specializes in working with kids with intellectual and behavior disabilities one of my main focus points all school year is growing the basic life skills of my students.  As a coach I also assign certain duties to the team so they can learn how to do laundry, clean and keep the locker room neat and orderly.  Our children do not need to grow up having everything handed to them or done for them. Our goal as adults, parents, grandparents, teachers, mentors, aunts and uncles should always be to help our kiddos learn to live, work and play the best t

Today I am writing about the four main parts of my life that equal up to 100% of good spiritual, mental and physical fitness.  This is my list and may vary from what you think are your top four.  For me all of these are necessary for me to live my life with vigor, intent and pursue my dreams.  These four areas are Faith, Family, Friends and Fitness.  I will explain each and how it applies to my overall well being, goals and inner self.  We all have things that drive us, traits, behaviors, beliefs and actions that define us to our family, friends and community.  These four are my main definers and are equal parts to the overall well being of my spirit, mental and physical condition.   I have not always been focused on all of these and they probably were not equal parts.  My faith defines me and drives my interactions, behaviors and thought process with people.  My family is a priority and taking care of them, being a good father, husband, brother, cousin and all those other roles is ver

Today I am writing about one of the biggest problems, issues, conflicts or whatever you call it we have as adults. Balancing work and everyday life is a daily challenge, chore and task that at times can get the best of us. I have been working as an adult now for well over 35+ years and have already transitioned through the various cycles we see in our life cycle as adults, parents, working people and all the other stages we enter and leave in our life. During all of these stages of life one monster was always in the way and that was finding a way to balance home life, work and play. First lets define how I see balance in the parts of your daily life. Work-life balance is basically the concept or way that you prioritize your time, energy and commitment to work, family and fun activity. It is a way to encourage you to divide your time in a way that is best for you and the family. The benefits of prioritizing work-life balance include increased productivity, higher work engagement,

Today I am writing about being a teacher and thinking back on my career especially when it started.  We go to college and learn our subject matter, take those fancy classes about classroom management, fundamentals of teaching and all those other elective classes to prepare to go conquer the world and be the best teacher we can possibly be.  Prior to graduation you serve an intern with a veteran teacher and in a short semester you are off into the field at your first job.  I am not discounting all the training, classes and prior knowledge and experience brought into that first job.  It is a plus and helps set a foundation for a bright future, one that regardless of what some people think is not easy, very rewarding and comes from the heart. Over the years we have all been through tons of training, read books, attended seminars and continued our education to become the most qualified teacher, mentor, facilitator, administrator, media specialist, lead teacher, and all the other opportunit

I am borrowing todays blog post idea from a friend that posted a picture online today about men and pocket knives.  Looking back I think about my first pocket knife my dad gave me when I was just a wee little fella back in the 1970's.  It was one of his older model "Old Timers" and a pocket knife I still have in my collection of hundreds today.  It is worn, tattered and rough looking, but it is sharp and will lay your skin open really quickly if mishandled.  My brothers and I have knives that belonged to our granddads, dad and uncles and we cherish those finely crafted pieces of wood and steel.  They are priceless to us and we wouldn't take anything for them.   You see a pocket knife is a right of passage for young boys and merging young men.  To be given a pocket knife is a like a ticket to responsibility, one that has to be taken very seriously and with caution.  I have had my fair share of cuts from whittling on wood, carving my name into a tree or just simply doin

Today I am writing about seven things that I look back on that I should have done a bit different when I was twenty.  Thirty four years later I have learned many lessons in life and am grateful for those lessons.  Setbacks, disappointments, tragedies, and unexpected life events allow us to grow and become who we are.  These events give us wisdom to share with our children and the next generation.  These events make us tough skinned and give us direction to overcome obstacles.  I am mostly satisfied with the way things have worked out so far, but looking back I now see doing these may have opened doors for me, my family and prepared me for life as an adult. 1- Get rid of toxic people- We all have family, friends and co-workers that we know are energy vampires.  We do not look forward to being around them or hanging out with them.  These negative people drain you and will hold you back with their poor pitiful me routine.  Get rid of them, see them less often or whatever it takes to keep

This weekend my wife and I went to Myrtle Beach to buy an ornament at our favorite Christmas store.  The store is at Barefoot Landing as is called the Christmas Mouse.  It has every kind of decoration and ornament a person would want.  About every kind of interest from traditional, country, city, sports, hobbies and about anything one would want.  We have been going to this store for twenty years or more to get ornaments for our family tree.  Ornaments are a tradition in our family and we have filled the family tree up with them at this point. The store brings back memories of traveling to the beach with my family, mom and dad and friends.  We always find time to go by the Christmas Mouse and grab some ornaments.  The store smells so good with all the wonderful greenery, candles, and traditional Christmas smells that reminds us that the Holiday is upon us.  Even if you go in the summer time when most people head to the beach, it makes you feel Christmas in July and those special memori

Right After Church- When I was a kid growing up we would all go to church on Sunday and then head straight over to my Grandma Smiths house and spend all afternoon eating lunch, playing outside, watching football and fellowshipping with family and friends.  When I say family and friends, I mean the entire extended family of at least 20-30 people.  My grandparents were not rich so I do not know how they fed all of us every week like that.  We did have some great fresh garden veggies, potatoes and corn that was grown on the property.  It was the coolest place to go and spend time growing up.  We had all the outdoor activity a child or teenager needed.   Summertime Fun And Sports- Summer time was my favorite season as the grass was nice and green and much softer to land on when your cousins and brothers piled on top of you playing tackle football.  Of course, we played with no pads and you got busted up good on most Sundays.  We played every sport you can think of, football, soccer, softba