The Law of the Rubberband | Episode # 161 | Encore Episode # 22

Empowered Living With Jeff Byrd.

Welcome to Empowered Living. Listen as Jeff tackles critical issues in a way that brings "Insight for business, leadership, and life!

https://www.talknetworkradio.com/hosts/EmpoweredLiving

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Hello, this is Gabriella on the scene today with Top
Network Radio. We have a real treat for you just
around the corner, and that is Empowered Living with Jeff Bird.
Jeff is the owner of Jeffrey for Coaching, and he
will be coming to you weekly to teach you more
about empowered living. Now let's join Jeff already in the studio.

Speaker 2 (00:56):
Hello and welcome. This is Jeff Bird with Jeff Bird Coaching,
and this is Empowered Living. I'm so pleased that you're
able to tune in and join me today for this broadcast.
The reason that we're going to address the topic that
we're going to take on today is because I had
an interview lined up. I've got a very good friend
who's just coming out with our new book, and we

(01:18):
were going to do an interview on that. But do
to some tragic circumstances beyond anyone's control, that's had to
have been postponed. So I didn't really have any topic
in mind for today, and so what I did was
I put it out on social media and asked you
all if you had any topic suggestions, and this is
one that came up. A friend wrote back and said,
I need help just growing, just getting the desire to

(01:42):
keep growing, and please motivate me. So I said, Okay,
I think I have just the topic, and I'm going
to do my best to motivate not only her, but
myself and everyone listening as well to keep growing. The
topic for today is called the law of the rubber band.
The law of the rubber band, and the law of
the rubber band says that growth stops when we lose

(02:05):
the tension between where we are and where we could be.
Growth stops when we lose the tension between where we
are and where we could be. Now, as a John
Maxwell Team Certified speaker and coach, this is one of
the laws from John's book, the fifteen Invaluable Laws of Growth.
But this so fits the request that was made that

(02:26):
I thought, I've got to take this on today and
modify it a little bit and get this out here
on the show so that everybody can benefit from it. So,
if you think about a rubber band, that's why it's
called the law of the robband, because if you take
a rubber band, that rubber band didn't much good for
anything unless the rubber band is stretched. That's why we
have rubber bands. So we can stretch them and use

(02:47):
their elasticity to stretch out and then to bind things together.
That's what rubber bands are for. So our rubber band
is not very much good unless it's stretched. It's the
same way with us. We're very very very little use
unless we are being stretched in some healthy way and

(03:08):
useful way. That's what I want to talk about today.
Rabbi Knachman said, if you won't be better tomorrow than today,
what do you need today for? Wow, that's a pretty
piercing question. Right. If I'm not going to be any
better tomorrow than I am today, if I'm not growing today,
what do I even need today for? Just like Groundhog Day,

(03:28):
It's gonna be another day of the same old, same old. Right.
If you tune into the show very often, you know
that I love the Apostle Paul. I love his way
of thinking, his mindset, and the fact that he's so
open with us. He just shares his heart. Why it open.
There's very few historical figures that go back that far
that we have this much insight into their personality, into

(03:50):
their being. But this is something he said to in
the Book of Philippians, chapter three, verse thirteen. For this
one thing I do forgetting that which lies behind and
reaching forward to what lies ahead. He didn't say ten
things I do, and this is one of my favorites.

(04:11):
He said one thing I do. And we all know
that if everything is important, then nothing is. This is
the one thing that this apostle, who wrote most of
the New Testament and who has impacted so many of
our lives thousands of years later through his perspective and
his gifts and his abilities and what God gave him,
he says one thing I do. I forget what's behind,

(04:33):
and I reach forward, reach forward. There's some decisive intentional
action in that word, I reach forward to what lies ahead.
And I looked up the Greek for that term reaching forwards,
and it's to stretch out towards. This isn't just setting
laid back on the sofa. This is a stretching towards.

(04:54):
This is a This is a striving towards something. This
is not a passive situation or can at all. He
has determined that he's going to get better and reach
out for what lies ahead, making the most of himself,
making the most of his gifts, his abilities, his calling,
his purpose to help others become their best too. Mediocrity

(05:16):
is not a worthy goal. So many people just settle.
They settle for so many things. They settle on their job,
they settle with their lives, they settle with their current education.
And it's been said that, you know, so many professors
they get tenured and then they never learn another thing again,
you know. Or so many Nobel Peace Prize laureates. You know,
once they win that Nobel prize, very very few have
ever gone on to do anything significant beyond that. They

(05:38):
spend the rest of their lives cutting ribbons at ribbon
cutting events. It's that we don't keep on. We feel like, oh,
we got there. Whatever are there was, if it was
a certain level of education, if it was a certain marriage,
if it was a certain job, well we got there.
Now we're just kicked back. We're not reaching, we're not
striving to grow, to become more, to be all that
we can be. As the commercial says, the world is

(06:02):
filled with people who are living small, thinking small, acting small,
far below their potential and their potential impact on others.
For good. All of us wish other people would get better,
but it's rare that we think of improving ourselves and
determined to do it. Earlier in the year, I had

(06:23):
a room filled with people, and these were all people
fifty five and above, and I asked them all. I said,
how many of you would like to see change in
the world? And everybody raised their hand. I said, okay,
put your hands down. Now think really clearly, get a
picture in your mind of what change you would like
to see. And I said, everybody got it. Everybody had it.
I said, now, how many people were thinking about yourself?

(06:47):
Put your hand up? Not one hand went up. Everybody
wants to see change in the world. But what we
mean is we want everybody else to change. We don't
think of ourselves very rarely do we think of ourselves
as Wow, How can I change? How can I become

(07:07):
better today? How can I uplevel my thinking, my motives,
my attitudes, my actions to other people, my words to them,
my learning? How can I keep up leveling myself to
be the very best I can be in the most
useful person I can be for other people. It's been
said that God's gift to us, as our gifts and
strengths and abilities and our gifts back to him is
to develop them and do something with them that makes

(07:29):
a difference. Our motto on the John Maxwell team is
I want to make a difference with people who want
to make a difference, doing something that makes a difference
at a time that makes a difference. And that's the
kind of people I want to be around. That's the
kind of people I want to build up and pour
myself into and help develop. Are those kind of people
who want to make a difference. I don't want to

(07:50):
spend all of my energy and give that to somebody
who doesn't want to do anything with it, who's just
going to take it. No, ho hum, same old, same old,
business as usual. I want people who have a heart
to make a difference, who know that they have gifts
and abilities that can make a difference in this world,
and are committed to developing those two make a difference
in the lives of the people around them. It's been

(08:13):
said that life begins at the end of our comfort zone. Right,
it's very comfortable to do nothing, not to grow, because
growing means we need to take on something new, something
we haven't tried before. Oh my gosh, we might fail
at it. Oh well, wouldn't that be terrible. No, that's
not terrible. That's the beginning of learning. You know, no
baby ever said hey, I'm not going to start crawling

(08:34):
because I don't know how, or I'm not going to
stand up and try to walk because I might fall down.
That would be ridiculous if at thirty years old they
were still lying around on the sofa because they had
never taken the risk of crawling and walking. You know,
it sounds ludicrous, but yet how often does that happen?
In developing our gifts and are really reaching for those
abilities that we've got. The comfort zone has been defined

(08:57):
as this. The comfort zone is character by doing that
thing with the same people at the same time, getting
the same results, and then asking the same question, why
why do we keep getting these same results Because you're
doing the same thing. Nobody's up leveling anything, nobody's taking

(09:17):
the risk, nobody's doing something different. So I want to
give you a few benefits of stretching. There's some benefits
of stretching. Number one, it is never too late to
become what you might have been. Think about that. Anybody
wants some of those years which they had, those years back, Hey,
you can't get those years back, but let me tell
you what you can start today. Becoming what you might

(09:40):
have been. But change is needed. We always change to
grow in the areas of our greatest giftedness and ability.
Don't waste your time trying to change and grow in
areas that you're no good at, that you don't have
any gifting or interest, and that's not going to be
any good and it's not going to make much difference.
Find the those areas that you love, where you have ability,

(10:02):
where you have interest, where you have strengths, where when
you utilize them you make a difference and have an impact.
Identify those areas and then purpose to grow in those daily.
I would rather try, fail and learn any day than
to forever play small and safe and be haunted by

(10:24):
the ghost of what if what if I had taken
that course, what if I had had that conversation, what
if I had read that book and developed myself. What
if what if I had gone on that trip, take
done whatever it is that I could do to become

(10:45):
more and to help build up other people. I would
rather any day to try something, fail at it, learn
a lesson, get back up, and then try again, more
wise and more experience this time, until I get it
right and I'm really doing it well. And then keep
growing beyond that too, any day than to be haunted
forever by the ghost of what if? What if you

(11:05):
had gotten off the couch, What if you had done something?
What if you had developed your strings? What difference could
that have made in your life and in the lives
of the people around you? Many successful people I looked
this up in preparation for this and it was amazing.
And I've just got a little piece of the list here,
But many successful people started to really grow later in life.

(11:29):
I was surprised by some of these. Vera Wang created
her first design clothing design at age forty. Julia Chiles
wrote her first cookbook at age fifty. Samuel Jackson played
his first major role at age forty three. Henry Ford
was forty five when he created the model t Ford.

(11:52):
Rodney Dangerfield was forty six when his comedy career took
off after making an appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show.
Ray Kroc was fifty two when he bought McDonald's and
turned it into the world's largest fast food Laura Ingalls
Wilder was sixty five when she first published A Little

(12:14):
House on the Prairie book. Obviously, it turned into a
series and a very famous TV show, But she was
sixty five when the first of the series was published.
What did they all have in common? The common don
the common denominator was that they all stretched and kept
moving forward. None of them just settled, None of them
chose mediocrity. They all responded to that calling to be more,

(12:38):
have more, do more. That's built into every single one
of our DNAs. Now here's the thought for you. What
changes the world next? Maybe because you stretched today? Think
about that. I'm going to say it again. What changes
the world next? Maybe because you stretched? We have no

(13:02):
idea what that next thing that we do when it's
going to meet with success and have life and world
changing consequences. Okay, number two, these are the benefits of stretching.
Number two. The second benefit is stretching sets you apart.
Oh my goodness, it's not that hard to be set
apart if you decide to stretch and grow. You know,

(13:22):
somebody said that eighty percent of success is showing up. Well,
my goodness, we can certainly do better than just show up.
We can show up, and we can step up, and
we can build up, and we can learn up, and
we can study up, and we can really move up.
Good Enough is the motto of the defeated. Never enough
is the motto of the successful. We're going to keep developing,

(13:43):
keep developing, keep growing daily until the end. Number three
third benefit of stretching. Stretching gives you a shot at significance.
And like I already gave you that list, many, if
not most, of the great contributions were made later in life.
So often we simply don't have the wisdom in our

(14:04):
early years to know enough to make a significant difference.
We have to learn, we have to fall, we have
to get back up, we have to try again. We
have to study, we have to find mentors. It takes
a little while to get good enough to really make
a difference. So don't give up, keep at it, keep developing.
Number four, Stretching must be intentional until the end. Churchill said,

(14:27):
never never, never give up. Make your greatest fear achieving mediocrity.
That should scare us to death is to come to
the end of this life and look back and go, oh,
my gosh, I lived a mediocre life. I lived way
below my potential. I never accomplished what I could have,
never benefited others the way I could have, and never

(14:48):
developed myself as I could and should have. That should
scare us. Mediocrity should scare us. Number five. When you
decide you're going to grow and develop, you learn things
faster than people who don't take risks. I mean, just
think about that. Somebody who tries ten new things by

(15:09):
age ten, you know they're gonna have learned a lot
more in the attempts than a person who tried five
things or by age twenty. However, many things, the people
who get out there and try more, they're gonna learn more.
They're going to have more failures, to be sure, but
they're also going to learn a lot more, and from
that learning, have a lot more victories. Number six, You're
gonna have a broader range of experiences. You're gonna have

(15:30):
so much experience, so many stories to draw from, and
applications and ways to help people. By the things that
you learned. Number seven, you learn to overcome obstacles sooner
than those who won't stretch, thereby becoming more valuable and
wiser than those who stay stuck. Those who stretch overcome

(15:52):
that fear. They break through what we call the terror barrier.
Anytime we have a new idea, it competes with our
old existing paradigm, and the old paradigm says, no, don't
do that. You might fail, you might crash, people might laugh,
you know. But for those who will strengthen that signal
of trying the new and stepping forward into being stretched

(16:12):
in growth, and they break through that terror barrier into freedom,
into freedom, they're no longer afraid. They'll take on anything
that makes sense, that has a probable that plays to
their strength zone and their abilities, and has a probable
healthy positive return. So now I want to talk about

(16:35):
where we want to stretch. We don't want to just
stretch in every area of life. Again, like we said,
if everything's important, nothing is. So we have to identify
those areas in which to stretch because most of us,
you know, we're really good just a few things. We
may have a lot of interest, but we want to
focus in on those things that we're really good at.
You may have heard of the pareto principle or the
eighty twenty principle that says that eighty percent of our

(16:57):
results come from twenty percent of our activity. Well, we
want to identify what those activities are that get our
best results and focus on those. So here's where we
want to stretch. We want to stretch in the areas
of our greatest giftedness and abilities. The reason for that
is very simple. We're going to get much more return
and we're going to be much more effective. We're not

(17:18):
going to be so afraid in those If we have
an opportunity in an area of giftedness, we're going to
be challenged. If we have an opportunity in an area
of weakness, we're going to feel intimidated right because we're
no good at it. We're going to be frustrated, we're
going to be down, we're going to wish we were
doing something else. But when it's in those areas of
giftedness and abilities. If when we grow a little bit
in an area that we're already good at, it gives

(17:40):
us the ability to make a lot more difference in
this world. We also want to number two, That was
number one. Number two, we want to spend time time
spending other areas. I'm sorry, time spending other areas, not
our areas of giftedness and abilities, will be far less
profitable and far less fulfilling. If your natural ability is

(18:00):
like a six on a scale of one to ten,
and you really work at it, and you grow two
points and you're up to an eight. Now you're really good.
You're making a big difference. If you're only a two
to start with and you work equally as hard and
you get up to a four, you're still not very good.
You're not making much difference, and it's going to be
a lot more frustrating, a lot less joy filled, and
a lot less fulfilling along the way. Okay, number three,

(18:25):
we will become challenged, or we will be challenged to
become all we can be, not intimidating and fearing failure. Again,
that's when we play to those areas of giftedness and ability.
We're going to be challenged to become all we can be,
not intimidated and fearing failure, because we know that even
if we fail, we're failing in the right direction, failing forward,
as it's been called. And the only area that we

(18:50):
want to spend time in that may not be a
strength or an area we're good at, is our attitude.
It's our attitude. If we have a bad attitude, if
we're weak in the area of attitude, we need to
fix that because it is going to sabotage every other
area that we're good at, that we grow in. If
you can be the best in the world, and if
you have a bad attitude, you're going to bring down
your team and everybody around you. Nobody's going to want

(19:12):
to be around you. And here's the thing with attitudes.
If I have a bad attitude, guess what I chose it.
I need to go away and work on it and
choose another attitude and then come back and get back
in the game. Attitudes are things that we choose. They
are not things that are imposed on us by people
or circumstances. We choose them. We choose the mindset. People

(19:33):
have been through severe atrocities and chosen a good mindset
and a good attitude and came out more than they
ever could have been had they not had those experiences.
I've mentioned that in some past shows. I won't go
back into it again, but if you want to hear
some of those stories, go back and look up the
show that aired last week called I'm Making the Most
of Your Difficulties. Okay, so we're going to take a

(19:56):
little break right now, and we're going to come back
in just a minute, and I'm going to give some
closing applications to this topic.

Speaker 1 (20:03):
Jeff will be back shortly to wrap up today's message.
This is Gabriela still on the scene today with Top
Network Radio. If you're just tuning in, you're listening to
Empowered Living with Jeff Burn. If you've missed any part
of today's message, you can hear it again online as
well as the entire archive of Empowered Living at www

(20:27):
dot Topnetwork Radio dot com or search keyword hashtag empowered Living.
We would like to acknowledge our music partners, Sound Ideas
for Corporate to the Max and Kevin McLeod for Airport Lounge.
Any scriptures read during this broadcast are from the New

(20:47):
American Standard version of the Holy Bible. If you would
like to learn more about Jeffreybird Coaching, visit www dot
Jeffbirdcoaching dot com. Is j E F F b y
r D Coaching dot com. Do a Facebook search for
at coaching rocks, or drug Jeff aligne at Jeff at

(21:12):
Jeffbirdcaching dot com. Again j E F F B y
r D Coaching dot com. Let Jeff's coaching rocks be
the building blocks of your empowered success. Now let's go
back to Jeff for the rest of today's message.

Speaker 2 (21:32):
And welcome back again. Thank you so much for tuning
into this broadcast of Empowered Living. I'm jeff Bird with
Jeffrey Bird Coaching, and it is such a joy to
be with you today, and I hope that you're learning
as much as as I'm learning in my life as
I work through these very things that I share with
you on a weekly basis and work to apply in

(21:53):
my own life and to help build those around me
with these truths and principles. So what we want to walk,
what we want to do is to wrap up today's
broadcast with with four applications on the law of the
rubber band, how stretching stretching is good for us. We
never want to lose that tension between where we are

(22:13):
and where we could be. And again we remember that
rubber band is only useful when it's stretched. A rubber
band that's not stretched is really not good for much
of anything. And so it is with us. When we're
not being stretched, when we're not learning and growing, we're
not really that useful. We're just doing the same old,
same old. Probably everybody's heard what we do have Unless
we're growing and gaining more to share, becoming more so,

(22:36):
here's the applications for today. Number one, what areas are
you most gifted in? I hope you'll take some time
and think about that and don't make a whole big list.
I know there's a big list of wonderful things about you,
but as far as the areas you're most gifted in,
just limited to one or two? Okay, of the things

(22:58):
you're most gifted in, what you love the most, What
activities that when you engage in them, it brings the
most benefit to others. Just name those top things and
what other people come to you and tell you, hey,
you're really good at that. Those are going to be
the areas that you're the most gifted in. So make
that list, and then ask number two, how could stretching

(23:20):
in those areas benefit you and others? Again, this is
something for reflection. I hope you'll take a pause and
reflect on these application questions. Think about those areas you're
most gifted in, and then ask yourself, how could stretching
in those areas benefit both you and others? And just

(23:40):
picture it. Don't put any barriers on this vision and
on this imagination. Think how far that could go if
you took those areas and develop them as far as
you can see. What would that do for you and
the people around you? How could that change the world?
And again, spend some time thinking about that, imagining that,
and try your best not to put any barriers on it.

(24:00):
Think as far out as you can see what could
possibly be. I just remember that everything that we have
in the world around us, everything that exists, exists because
somebody had an unrejected idea. They had an idea of
what could be, and they didn't give up on it.
They followed it through till they created it. Think of
the electricity around you and Thomas Edison the light bulbs.

(24:24):
Just think about all those people who didn't give up
on that idea. They did not reject their idea, they
followed it through. And then look at everything we have
in the world today as a result of that. Yours
could be the next one that makes a huge difference
in the world, or at least in someone's life. Number three,
what is the next appropriate step to grow in the

(24:48):
areas of your giftedness and ability? Just what's the next
appropriate step? You're not going to take one hundred steps
at once. Nobody flies over to Mount Everest takes three
hops and gets to the summit. It's step by step,
step by step. What's your next appropriate step? Maybe tuning
into this podcast today was a next appropriate step for you.

(25:08):
Maybe the next one. Maybe there's a book that speaks
to you. Maybe there's a teaching maybe there's a friend
that's got experience in this area. Maybe there's a mentor
you could bring on, or a coach. I'd be happy
to talk to you about that if you're interested. But
what's the next appropriate step in your growth and in
your development in those areas of your greatest strengths and abilities?

(25:29):
And number four, this is the last one. Who else
is on the same path that you can grow with,
learn from, and lead. We all need people on the
path with us. Let me tell you, as an only
child who had trust issues for many, many years, it
is hard going alone. Now that I'm opening up and

(25:54):
coming to understand these things somewhat and starting to reach out,
I wish I'd have been doing it for the last
fifty years. But now that I'm starting to hear that, boy,
life is so much better shared. It's like the old
African proverb that says, if you want to go fast,
go alone. But if you want to go far go together,
and we all benefit from having people on the same

(26:17):
path with us, about the same place we are, that
we can talk and have some companionship and share our
growth journeys and good resources that we have. We need
those people who are farther down the road ahead of
us so that we can gain wisdom from their experiences
and get wise counsel from them. And then we all
need somebody who's behind us. We're all ahead of somebody,

(26:37):
and we all need somebody who's a little bit behind us,
who we can share with, who we can encourage, who
we can lift up, who we can strengthen, who we
can say out a boy, keep at it, keep at it,
keep growing in those areas. I see your growth. I
see the difference it's making. You're not the same person
you used to be. I'm proud of you. Keep on
because you're doing good and you're making a difference, and

(26:58):
you're utilizing those guys given gifts and abilities to do
something positive in the world around you. And just keep
on keeping on. I'm right here with you, and I'm
not going anywhere. Well, thank you again so much for
tuning in today. I hope that this has been an
encouragement to you. I hope you've been blessed by this time,
and I hope that you've gotten some rich food for

(27:20):
thought that will help encourage you to take that next
step again. You don't have to take the next hundred
steps all at once. You just have to take one
next step and then keep on step in, and keep
on step in, and before long you won't even recognize
the life you had or the person that you were
because of the changes that have happened and the new

(27:41):
doors of opportunities that have opened to you. Thank you
so much. This is Jeff Bird with Jeff Burd Coaching,
and this has been empowered living