Transcript
Heartbeat: The Podcast
Landon Saunders:
I know that across America today, there are tremendous concerns, there's tremendous anxiety, tremendous dis-ease. But I'll tell you what I will not do. I will not settle for any vision of life that is outside of my control, none. The abundance of my life, the joyousness of my life, the hope of my life I demand the right to take responsibility for.
Announcer:
Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of Heartbeat the podcast featuring the insight and teaching of Landon Saunders. Today, we continue a series lifted from Landon's popular community workshop, Feeling Good About Yourself. Last time Landon explored the idea of how appearance can often define the way we feel about ourselves. Today, he looks at how performance far too often defines worth. Now here again is Landon Saunders.
Landon Saunders:
How do we assign value in this world? Looks and performance, they just don't quite get there. What about the individual who makes $100,000 and the individual who makes $10,000? Is the one who makes $100,000 worth more than the one who makes $10? Is that the way we decide who has value in a society? If an individual is physically impaired in some way, does that mean that they don't have as much value? And as people of one color look at people of another color and decide that they have less value? I don't want to be that kind of person.
I don't want to look at human beings that way, because in this human family, there is such wonderful diversity, such wonderful multiplication of skills, such wonderful creativity, so many gifts, and so many different kinds of human beings.
Is it asking too much of people so rational, people so intelligent that we can overcome whatever may linger within us that partakes more of hatred and hostility on the basis of performance? Do I assign value on the basis of performance, on the basis of these differences? What about those who are elderly in our society? When my father reached 74 years old and could only move with the help of a walker and that at almost a snail's pace, when his mental faculties had begun to wind down, and with a face deeply scarred from cancer surgery, do you think his worth went down?
I saw on one of the morning shows once a story of this young man who had down syndrome and he was one of maybe 10 or 12 children, big family. And my, how they loved. They called him Moose. He was nicknamed Moose, and how they loved. And so it showed the family playing. It showed him playing basketball, and Moose was playing basketball even though he might put it in the wrong goal. And when they played football, Moose played football, though he might run the wrong way for the touchdown. And it showed them entering Moose in Special Olympics, and he was going along around that track. And when he passed the section of the stands that his family was seated in, and they all began to clap and clap and say, "Go Moose, go Moose," he became so excited that he just stopped the race and went up in the stands and hugged and kissed each one and then went down and resumed the race. And afterwards, they asked the father and the mother, they said, "Your son, your child, all this works really well now, but what about when all the kids are gone, then what happens to Moose?" "Oh," they said, "we've made arrangements for that. As the other kids leave home, we've arranged for Moose to leave home, too, so that he has that wonderful experience of being away and coming home.”
Now, let's think about what we can do. How can we make some positive steps toward this whole business of self-esteem? First of all, we should relax. Whatever my feelings about myself, whatever my feelings about whether I've gotten much self-esteem or low self-esteem, it's time to just take a deep breath and relax. Just chill out, take it easy. You have that life, and all too soon, it's going to be headed right down that western slope. And the good thing about what we're doing tonight is this, that no matter where you are, self-esteem can rise at that point.
Announcer:
Landon will be back in less than 30 seconds, but we wanted to take this time to remind you that you can always access a full transcript of today's episode by visiting the show page. Heartbeat the podcast is brought to you by friends of Heartbeat, and we invite you to visit our website at thisisheartbeat.com to learn where you can find other materials featuring Landon's teachings. Now, let's get back to Landon.
Landon Saunders:
Ken Dychtwald, who's done so much with the process of aging, he sometimes asks audiences, "What do you think is the greatest decade to live? What's the best decade really to live?" Well, maybe it's the decade we're in. That may be the best one. Now, when I think about self-esteem, no matter what my age is, and also no matter how much time I've got left, if I'm dealing with someone who's dying with AIDs, I want to approach that life in a way that says, your life is worth more than all the world. And if you haven't felt good about yourself, there's still time. No matter what the disease, no matter what the failure ratio, no matter how much you've suffered in your life, it's never ever too late.
Relax, self-esteem doesn't just depend on you; it depends on a lot of factors. And the second thing is to remember some undeniables. Now, I'm going to give you a list of undeniables.
These are things that are undeniably true about you. And because they're undeniable, I want you to write them down, and then stick them on your refrigerator, stick them on your bathroom mirror, put them on your lamp stand by your bed, put them in your automobile, put them on your desk at the office because these things are absolutely undeniably true about you. You can hang on to these no matter what the external circumstances.
The first one of those is I am unique, I'm unique. Now, you put that down because I'm going to add two words to it. I am unique. Now, because you are unique, there are two things that are also true. You are irreplaceable. Things that are unique are irreplaceable. There's just one. And secondly, you are responsible, that as a unique human being, it means that never in all human history has there ever been another human being just like you, never in all of history. Because you are unique, it says that there will never ever be another person as long as time stands that will be just like you. And it means that all around the world tonight, there is not another human being who is just like you.
If there ever had been is now or ever will be another human being just like you, there would be no need for you to be here. You are unique, you're irreplaceable, and you must be responsible for your place on this earth. There's something for you to do that nobody else can do, and that will never be done if you don't do it. I don't know of anything that will help to begin building a feeling of self-worth more than for you to say and remember this is something you have to live with. It's not enough simply to say it tonight. It's something that you have to live with. It's something that you have to take deeply in your own life and assimilate that.
The second thing is, it is absolutely undeniably true that you are the only person you're absolutely sure of spending every night the rest of your life with, the only one. Now, that being undeniably true, have you decided at least what one person will be like that you're going to sleep with the rest of your life? Now, are you going to sleep with a slob? I'm not talking about the one on the other side of the bed. I'm talking about you. Are you going to sleep with a slob? If you are a slobbish, then it means that you are going to sleep with a slob every night. Again, why would anyone want to do that? We went through the checklist of jealousy and resentment, why would you want to sleep with that? It disturbs good deep sleep. Why would you want to live with that? Think about the kind of unique individual that you are, and then know that you're going to sleep with that individual every night the rest of your life.
Third, it is undeniably true that nothing in the world has greater importance than you, nothing. Nothing in the world has greater importance than you. One of the great teachers, in fact, the center of the whole Christian tradition once in a very dramatic, dramatic speech said that if you put a big pair of scales down, and on one side you put the entire world and everything in it, and on the other side you put one single solitary human being, that the scales will always tilt in favor of the human being. There's nothing in the world that has the importance of a person.
The fourth undeniable is that you can change. Whatever those feelings, whatever those problems are in our lives, we can change. I said earlier this evening that one of the greatest things about a human being is the ability to change. I can be different. If you don't like me tonight, come back tomorrow night. I might be different. The capacity to change, it's one of our great gifts as a human being. And the fifth undeniable is every single one of us, any one of us, is worth a lot more than we look like we are. And so we must put the light at I am worth more than I look like I am, I am worth more than I might feel like I am at any given time. I am worth more even than some value that I may have assigned to my own life. I'm worth more than that.
Announcer:
We trust that you've enjoyed today's content from Landon's Feeling Good About Yourself workshop. And if that's the case, we encourage you to share it. And if you're so inclined, visit the show page and rate, review, and follow the podcast. This will help others who are looking for the same kind of material. Until next time when we'll continue with content from the workshop, here's to feeling good about yourself.
