Breakthroughs are transformative moments that shape and empower our lives. These breakthroughs often come when we challenge our limits, confront our fears, and find the strength to overcome challenges. This week, we continue to explore the journey of breakthroughs in leadership growth and the pursuit of dreams.
During John’s lesson, he shares the remaining 4 breakthroughs everyone needs to experience to reach success. He recounts a personal episode of overcoming a life-threatening challenge, about living his dream, striving for continuous improvement, and the transformative power of our dreams in shaping who we are.
Mark Cole and Traci Morrow cover why self-care is paramount for leaders to effectively take care of others. Mark shares the importance of working from a place of rest instead of resting from a place of work—a crucial mindset for any leader’s mental health. Traci highlights one challenge faced by many leaders — the temptation to serve from an empty cup — and how self-care helps us serve others better.
You’ll also hear how one 76-year-old proved there’s no finish line in dreaming. As Terrell Owens once wisely put it, it’s about focusing on “breakthroughs, not breakdowns.”
Stick around as we also preview our Day to Grow event and dive into the significance of personal and team growth. This is an episode brimming with wisdom on the four types of breakthroughs that all leaders must navigate to achieve success.
Get ready to be inspired to experience your own breakthroughs. Let’s grow together on this episode of the Maxwell Leadership Podcast.
Our BONUS resource for this series is the “Experience Breakthrough Worksheet,” which includes fill-in-the-blank notes from John’s teaching. You can download the worksheet by clicking “Download the Bonus Resource” below.
Breakthrough is the bridge between who you are and who you want to become. Experience your breakthrough at Day to Grow on March 9th in fun-filled Orlando, Florida. Secure your tickets here!
References:
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Put Your Dream to the Test book by John C. Maxwell
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Mark Cole:
Hey, welcome back to the Maxwell Leadership podcast. This is the podcast that adds value to leader who multiply value to others. Now you’ve joined us as Traci Morrow and I are listening in and then giving application to John Maxwell’s message on experiencing breakthrough in your life and your leadership. Now, John gave us four breakthroughs. Last lesson, in fact, you’re going to hear in just a moment, he’s going to jump right into five and give us five through eight. But here’s my question. Do you want to experience breakthrough in your life, in your leadership, in your dreams? This whole lesson is built off of John’s book. Put your dream to the test.
Mark Cole:
And I challenge you that you cannot chase a dream until you chase yourself, until you strengthen yourself. So your first breakthrough moment, your first experience moment of 2024 perhaps, is to finish this episode and then get tickets today to grow on March 9 in Orlando, Florida. You can find out more about this event and what we’re doing with this event by going to daytogrow.com. That’s daythenumber twogrow.com. But until March 9 rolls around, be sure to download the bonus resource for this episode and watch this episode on YouTube@maxwellpodcast.com. Breakthrough now grab your pen and paper. If this is your first podcast, you’re going to hear the first number is five. That means you got to go back to last week.
Mark Cole:
But for all of us, John is getting ready to give us a breakthrough to the life, the leadership, and the dreams we want to accomplish. Here’s John.
John Maxwell:
Let’s go to number five. The fifth breaker in my life as far as my dreams, is what I call the tiebreaker. Now we know what a tiebreaker is.
John Maxwell:
A tiebreaker is something that in a sporting contest, the teams are tied. What’s going to break the tie? I mean, who’s going to win? Now in my life, I’m going to finish this sentence and I’m going to explain it. The tiebreaker in my life for my.
John Maxwell:
Dream encouraged me to serve.
John Maxwell:
God began to show me that what.
John Maxwell:
I should do is when I left.
John Maxwell:
The church, I should pick ten people.
John Maxwell:
Ten great christian leaders, and serve them as long as I could add value to them.
John Maxwell:
And I made my list.
John Maxwell:
I still have that list today of those ten people that I would serve.
John Maxwell:
That I would add value, I’d come alongside of them, I’d do whatever I could to help their ministry. And the whole concept began to really motivate me. But here’s the principle, John. If you’ll go to bigger men than you are and better men than you are. And you’ll add value to them. Your ministry will be much bigger and better than what you could ever do.
John Maxwell:
It by yourself anyway.
John Maxwell:
And I really began to care aspirate, and I really got to see it.
John Maxwell:
So I wrote those ten names down and I diligently over the next few years, serve them.
John Maxwell:
And the tiebreaker for me was when I realized I could pour my life into others and I could serve value to them. So now where are we in this adding value dream? All right, now notice what’s happened to my dream. In this breakthrough, I’m now adding value to specific leaders. Do you see how the dream keeps getting refined and molded because of these breakthroughs? Number six? And by the way, ask yourself the question at the end of each breakthrough.
John Maxwell:
This one, what is the tiebreaker of my dream?
John Maxwell:
I promise you, some of you are.
John Maxwell:
Already wrestling with one.
John Maxwell:
And what am I going to do.
John Maxwell:
And what decision am I going to make?
John Maxwell:
Number six is the chart breaker. When you think of something off the charts, you think of something that has soared and just gone bigger and higher than you could have ever imagined. And the chart breaker, this encouraged me to soar. This one got my dream to a whole new level, way beyond anything I could have imagined.
John Maxwell:
Now do you see what’s happening to my dream?
John Maxwell:
This chart breaker is just now I’m soaring. We’re getting way beyond anything we could ever imagine. What do I want to do? I want to add value to people. Well, then I’m going to add value to leaders. Well, those people are going to add value to back to me and, oh, I’m going to add value to specific leaders. And you see how it’s just continually getting bigger and bigger now at this breakthrough, the chart breaker, guess what I’m doing? I’m adding value to leaders. Who are what? Multiplying value to leaders. Now we’re compounding.
John Maxwell:
This breakthrough has me in a compounding state again. The question for all of us is, what is the chart breaker of my dream? What just causes me to soar? Number seven is a heartbreaker. I think every great dream has a heartbreaker in it.
John Maxwell:
I think usually the heartbreaker is not exposed in the beginning because if it.
John Maxwell:
Did, we wouldn’t have heart to pursue it. Dreams are fun in the beginning, aren’t they?
John Maxwell:
Think about a dream in the beginning. I mean, you’re just sitting around the table, two or three of your buddies, and you’re sketching out something you’d like to maybe do together. Dreams are fun in the beginning. Because guess what? In the beginning, there’s no price to be paid. There’s no people to be enlisted.
John Maxwell:
There’s no cost involved. There’s no adversity.
John Maxwell:
I mean, dreams are fun in the.
John Maxwell:
Beginning, but in that dream, somewhere, I’ll promise you, you’ll have a heartbreaker.
John Maxwell:
And this heartbreaker encouraged me to stop. Now, isn’t that interesting? I had a groundbreaker that encouraged me to start, and now I’ve got a heartbreaker that encouraged me to stop. Now, when I said encouraged me to stop, it encouraged me to stop everything.
John Maxwell:
I was doing and reevaluate. It happened in 1998. My heart attack. It literally was a heartbreaker.
John Maxwell:
I could remember in Grady hospital the night when they weren’t certain I would make it. And I had six doctors kept talking.
John Maxwell:
To themselves and working on me. I couldn’t remember. I was 51 years of age. And I kept asking myself, is my mission really done? And I didn’t have anxiety. I can tell you. I know what the peace of God. I know all about that death kind of.
John Maxwell:
I view it much differently now because I thought it was going to die.
John Maxwell:
I mean, I wasn’t anxious, but I kept asking myself the question, is this it? I mean, is my mission for God done? And I kept thinking, it can’t be done yet. I still got stuff I want to accomplish.
John Maxwell:
And I went through that process quite.
John Maxwell:
A bit that evening. And fortunately, God spared my life. And I had wonderful doctors and all of those good things that happened. But I’ll tell you what it allowed me to do. It allowed me to stop and understand that if I didn’t take care of myself, I couldn’t take care of anybody else.
John Maxwell:
Now we close out with one more.
John Maxwell:
Breakthrough, the record breaker.
John Maxwell:
Whenever you think of a record breaker, it’s the person who did something that no one else has done or they broke something that is amazing, kind of a feat.
John Maxwell:
And my record breaker encourages me to smile. It really does. And today, I’m living the dream I’m.
John Maxwell:
Experiencing today, the value and understanding the value of adding value to others.
John Maxwell:
I was interviewed yesterday. They were doing for a magazine. It’ll come out in a couple of months.
John Maxwell:
And in the interview, they said, now.
John Maxwell:
What do you yet want to accomplish?
John Maxwell:
And I know I disappointed him because.
John Maxwell:
It was a success magazine.
John Maxwell:
I really do. I know I disappointed him because they were wanting me to say, well, next I want to do this. And I said, I would like to.
John Maxwell:
Do better what I’m doing now, I.
John Maxwell:
Hope I’m not lazy.
John Maxwell:
I hope I’m not lethargic, but I’d just like to do better what I’m doing now. I’d like to write better books than I’m writing now. I’d like to communicate better than I’m communicating now. But I don’t have ambitions to.
John Maxwell:
I don’t need to start anything again.
John Maxwell:
Don’t need to leave anything again. Been there, done that. Loved every moment of it. Great contentment. Here it is. Here’s the best way I can phrase it. I’m living my dream. I’m living it.
John Maxwell:
And I think if I do better, I’ll live it more fully. But I’m living my dream. I’m not going somewhere else to finally get my dream. It’s not some destination or some place or some person.
John Maxwell:
I’m living my dream.
John Maxwell:
And I put it in your notes. After years of trying to make my.
John Maxwell:
Dream, I have now discovered that my dream made me.
John Maxwell:
That’s fact. All those years, I’m trying to make my dream, make my dream, make my dream, make my dream. And these breakthroughs, these breakthroughs that we’re.
John Maxwell:
Talking about, these eight breakthroughs, they molded me. And today I would say I didn’t make the dream. The dream made me. And when you realize that instead of gloating about the dream, you’re grateful for the dream, it’s a whole different perspective. Well, what’s the record breaker in your dream? Many of you aren’t there yet. It’s okay. It’s a journey.
John Maxwell:
I gave you eight breakthroughs, and there are some of you probably have four or five of them already under your belt. Some of you maybe haven’t got any of them under your belt. Somebody may have eight. And say, john, soon as the lesson’s.
John Maxwell:
Over, I’ve got another one to teach you. I have no idea. But I know this. Somewhere in your dream, you’re going to need to have those breakthroughs.
John Maxwell:
Hey, John Maxwell here. I’m in the studio. We’ve been recording all day, and I was thinking about, really, one of my very favorite experiences that we have, and that is called day to grow.
John Maxwell:
If you want to grow, you want.
John Maxwell:
To grow in every area of your life. I tell people all the time, you don’t want to go to something. You want to grow to something. But if you’re passionate about personal growth, development, your team and growing them, you do not want to miss day to grow. I’m going to have some real players with me, Dion Sanders, Jamie Kern, Lima, myself. Oh, my gosh, you don’t want to miss it. So market. Come and see us on day to grow.
John Maxwell:
I will promise you this. You come and bring your team, and at the end of the day, you’ll come up and shake my hand and say, one of the best days I’ve ever invested in for myself and for my team. I’ll see you there.
Mark Cole:
Hey, welcome back. Traci, Mora and I here in studio and growing. I hope wherever you are listening or watching, you’re growing as well. Maybe you’re listening to us while you’re improving your health. Way to go. It’s February. It’s the end of February and you’re still focused on it. I’m proud of you.
Mark Cole:
Maybe you’re commuting and taking your kids to school. Wherever you are and however you’re listening to this or viewing this, we’re really proud of you. In fact, we’re so proud that we want to challenge you to have breakthroughs in your life, your leadership, and certainly in achieving your dreams. Now, last week, last episode, John gave us four breakthroughs that built his or that shaped his ability to today experiencing his dreams. His dreams was not 36 million copies of a book. His dream was not to speak to millions of people every single year. Yes, I said millions every single year. His dreams were not houses and cars.
Mark Cole:
He’s accomplished every last bit of that. His dream was to add value to leaders who would multiply value to others. And he has been breaking that down for us last week. We’ll continue this week. Last week, he talked about a groundbreaker, the first breakthrough experience. A groundbreaker, then an icebreaker, then a wind breaker, and then a cloud breaker. And so, Traci, we’re going to pick up today on the final four that John has done. I’ve watched him do these breakers in chasing things all of my career here and certainly had some experience breakthroughs myself.
Traci Morrow:
Yes, I have as well. And I’m excited to hit on these last four. I want to kick off by saying, I hope that you will all come to day to grow because that’s where you kind of close the gap between listening to us on a podcast or watching us on YouTube and actually meeting us in real life, because Mark and I are both going to be at day to grow. So we hope that you will join us there and get to meet us and we’ll get to meet you live and in person at data grow. So what I love really about John talking about experiencing breakthrough is it sets the expectation that there is going to be something to break through. And I think a lot of times when we think of success we think that there isn’t going to be anything to break through. And as a great mentor and John is the best, he lets us know that there are things that we need to break through in order to have success. And as we hit these last four, and these last four are tiebreaker, the chart breaker, the heartbreaker, and the record breaker.
Traci Morrow:
Before I get to our first question mark, I wanted to see last time you kind of went through and summarized, did you have a desire to kind of summarize again before we hit into questions?
Mark Cole:
Yeah, let me do that, Traci. I enjoyed that last time. I don’t do that every lesson, but yeah, because John is so in tune with his passion, his vision, I found a lot of times in lessons like this. You said it, Traci, that this is more of the art of leadership. It’s not necessarily the three bullet points and a nice application point. It’s really an illustration. And let me tell you what I did with that illustration so that I could then break through to my dreams. So because it’s artsy, because it’s John’s journey that he intuitively worked through to accomplish the success that he’s having in his dream right now, I wanted to just take a couple of minutes from my second chair bird’s eye view, yet also my own personal journey and kind of break these down for you.
Mark Cole:
So when I think of breakthrough number five, which is the tiebreaker, there have been many times in John’s life and in my life to where there were two roads to travel. There were two great roads to travel, roads that would lead to the vision. And you have to ascertain what’s going to be the tiebreaker to chasing your dream most exponentially. I know for me, I’ve had ten promotions at Maxwell leadership. Ten got the last 1 January, the 6th of 2020. But I will tell you, in every one of those promotions, I vetted the promotion. I vetted the opportunity with its ability to help me exponentially chase the dream that I had been called to. In other words, I didn’t vet it with how much money, what status, what opportunity it was going to be.
Mark Cole:
It was the question always, will this better align me with my purpose? Becoming CEO was one of them. I was pretty happy being John’s business manager and having my own consulting firm and felt a lot of flexibility for the first time in mine and Stephanie’s life, with Macy and Tori, I was having a little bit more flexibility. And then John came and said, I don’t think I can get to the next level without you being my CEO. And I went, oh, okay. Stephanie and I went into the closet, prayer closet, and we determined, what’s the tiebreaker on this? And the tiebreaker is, as John Maxwell, CEO, I would exponentially reach my purpose of motivating and inspiring people to reach their potential while building my consulting firm. I would incrementally do that. It was a tiebreaker for me. Many of you today, you’re thinking and you are considering the best option.
Mark Cole:
And I will tell you this. I’ve heard it said often, sometimes the best option is the enemy of the better option, because the better option is indicative of growing into something. The best option is taking over something that may have already had its best days behind it. Make sure you’re looking for something from an opportunistic standpoint. When John says chartbreaker. I told you this, Traci, and I’m going to tell this right now. I hope I have your permission if we don’t tell Jake and he’ll edit it out after this. But when you and I were talking in our pre show conversation, I was thinking about you as a chart breaker.
Mark Cole:
Now, you don’t think of yourself as a chart breaker. In fact, you say, mark, what do you think John meant by chart breaker? And I will tell you this. You have created a chart that only few even show up on. You are an incredible business leader. I’ve observed you and Casey’s relationship. You have an incredible marriage. You have an incredible set of kids that were doing quite well. And then you and your kids and Casey decided that we should extend our family and adopted two incredible young men that are brilliant.
Mark Cole:
And yet you’re trying to integrate them in from a different culture, a different place. They were born geographically different. And I’ve watched you and your team rally around it. And you’re now living in the years of grandkids and getting married and all of this. And yet you still volunteer and make yourself available to John and you still travel in or on stages. Somehow you have found a way to break the chart of what people say can and cannot be done. With people carrying your responsibility, your passion, and trying to call that competition. You’ve called it completion.
Mark Cole:
Many of us, John Maxwell is a proof of this. Many of us, when we get in our sweet spot, chasing our dreams, we defy the logic of the people around us. Quit trying to explain it from their logical point of view. You’re just a chart breaker. You just broke all the charts. And, Traci, that is absolutely true for you. And I’ve just said that if you don’t like it, tell Jake to delete it. But I watch you do things that truly defy what most people consider the nice tight chart of what one person should or should not do.
Mark Cole:
The 7th breakthrough that John talks about is a heartbreaker. And boy, in this year of hope, in this year of excitement, and we’re two months in, I’m still super encouraged and excited, but boy, he got me on this heartbreaker. Because in the life of every dynamic leader, there is a moment to where your heart is broken, your will is lower than it’s ever been and you have more passion to quit than to continue. That happens for every one of us. And some of you are there right now and let me just come in today perhaps, and speak to one of you, maybe more of you, but speak directly to you. And if you’re watching YouTube, look me directly in the eyes. It’s okay. Your dream’s not broken.
Mark Cole:
Just your heart is. Your heart’s going to mend and your dream is going to begin again. Don’t give it up in the moment of a heartbreak you will overcome. The final thing that John talks about here, and I’ve watched him do this over and over again, is record breaker. I love that John said this encourages him to smile because I have watched John smile as over the last four or five years, the law of compounding influence has taken place in John’s life. We get reports now all the time of things that are happening that we don’t even know how they began because the law of influence, the record breaking consistency compound statement that John has lived with forever, continues to bring in brilliant reports. I just got a report just a few days ago that in the country of Rwanda, Rwanda is how we say it mostly. There are 40,000 students by mandate and encouragement of the government, going through values based training.
Mark Cole:
And they did it because they experienced it somewhere else and wanted to take it back to Rhonda. You have the ability to break records beyond yourself. When you go through these eight breakthroughs, you will be surprised at the records that you break.
Traci Morrow:
Wow. First of all, that is quite a list. I’m so glad I asked you to do that. I didn’t know that you were going to talk about me on number six, but thank you first of all for those kind words. And I think as we break these down again, just like in week one, I love how we can hear the same lesson and take it from a little bit different angle. So I love hearing you being second chair to John. Take this angle from being right up close and personal to John being several steps back but also still in that same world, I’m going to kind of take it from my angle, if you don’t mind, and then ask some questions in that vein. And you can take it, however, which way that you want.
Traci Morrow:
So, like you said, this is something that I view as the artistic side of John. This lesson is flowery. This lesson is not a bullet point lesson, even though there are eight points. This is the language of these breakers that you can sometimes get lost in the language. I know that for my brain, I did. So I had to redefine them for my own brain, for them to make sense. So I did that last week. I’m going to do it again this week.
Traci Morrow:
So I’ll just read through mine. The first one for the tiebreaker, I put that where the dream becomes something beyond yourself. For the tiebreaker, the chart breaker was where it compounds the dream, and we’ll get into that in just a little bit. You kind of talked about that. The heartbreaker was the testing of the dream. I think that was pretty clear in both your example and John’s. And then the record breaker, where the dream takes on a life of its own. And so for the tiebreaker, where he talked about for John, where this encouraged him to serve, why do you think in serving, just taking on from what John talked about like he was on his dream path, he was bringing people alongside of him.
Traci Morrow:
He was making progress already through points one through four that we discussed last week, why do you think it’s difficult for a leader? It’s a tough decision for a leader to make, to choose to serve others while they are building their dream, and yet it is such an important piece of breaking through towards getting to be a record breaker.
Mark Cole:
Yeah, I think that it truly does come down a lot of times to heart and motive. What is the motive in the pursuit of advancement? And I’m not going to pretend that there is not a lot of aspiration out there for accomplishment, because, man, I don’t want to live in poverty like I did growing up or I want to live with more self respect and other respect than I lived before. I’m not going to go back and relive all of that. But what I will tell you, or even deny that those reasons for success and pursuing success are not legitimate, what I am going to tell you, until your dream is about serving others, you’re not going to have a sense of fulfillment that I want for you. You’re not going to have this ability to look back and watch others feel the power of your servanthood. So, Traci, you talked about a balance, and we all have it. I’ve lived in this balance in any one given year or any one given quarter. The balance between serving and the balance between directing and what I had found is the answer to that question only can rest within one’s own person while they review their motives.
Mark Cole:
So there’s sometimes I’m very directing. I’m not doing a whole lot of serving. There’s other times I’m serving and I’m frustrated because I’m not directing. If I allow external factors to determine the difference of when I need to serve or when I need to direct, most times I’m putting on somebody else’s perspective and somebody else’s armor on how I should lead. I have to settle and reconcile inside, and I do that with a motive question. And if you can get settled and certain in your motives, you will be able to navigate the tiebreaker breakthroughs that comes to all of our dreams and leadership.
Traci Morrow:
I agree. Moving on to number six, where I feel like you really expanded on what that looks like, expanding your personal expectations or your team expectations that go beyond permission or maybe a model where you’re breaking out of that as a chart. You know, I think that looks different for every person. And I think John gave a great example of what that looks like when you allow yourself and you are encouraged to soar and our time is know. But I feel like you hit on that one so well. I’d love to go to heartbreaker where John talks about the test of the dream, where he had to take a pause, where he had a defining moment. And I feel like this is very common with high level leaders where when they are so busy in all these breakthroughs and finding success and creating significance that there comes a place where they realize that they’ve maybe gotten to a place where they’re serving from an empty cup, they’ve not taken care of themselves. I don’t think that it is uncommon to John that his own health or taking care of you.
Traci Morrow:
You kicked off the call saying like, hey, if you’re still taking care of your health, good for you, I’m proud of you. But a lot of people aren’t because life presses in. How easy is it to think I’m going to eat well? And by February you aren’t eating well because you are on the run, you are traveling, you are meetinged out. And so talk about how can younger leaders and older leaders alike learn the value of taking care of me so that we can serve from a full cup. The difference of I’m sure you know this, Mark, because I know you well, but I would love for you to share a little vulnerably of, like, the difference of serving from an empty cup versus how it feels when you do take care of you and you serve from a full cup, how much better you are and how much better you show up in the spaces you leader when you are serving from a full cup.
Mark Cole:
Yeah, I was really influenced by a guy by the name of Mike Breen about 15 years ago when he taught a principle that says, in a sabbath, in a time of resting, or in a time of breaking and slowing down the pause that John’s talking about, you need to work from rest rather than resting from work. Too oftentimes we go into the point of burnout, and then we have to go to that forced stop that John was talking about. In fact, John’s was a heart attack. It was a true forced stop. So the first thing that I would say is, many leaders are not good at this, so let’s put that out there. I’m certainly not. I can’t teach this with a lot of integrity. I can just tell you that we all need to find ways to replenish and refresh ourselves in a way that allows us to come into an environment, challenging or otherwise, with our best.
Mark Cole:
And I think our best comes from a place of rest, a place of being in tune with ourselves. I spend every January really honing in on being my best. And I go through some spiritual exercises, I go through some physical, some relational exercises, and I tell people all the time, you will want to work for me during January and dread working for me a lot of times by about February 15 and on. And I’m kidding. But I do believe that we really spend time leading better and at greater peace when we take care of ourselves. So then why doesn’t I. Why doesn’t you? Why don’t we do it better? Why doesn’t a leader do it better? And I think that’s because a part of leadership effectiveness is leaving it all on the field. I believe that there is this.
Mark Cole:
I want to be in the fight. I want to be in the middle of the journey. When it’s all said and done, whether that’s chasing and pursuing one’s family, whether that’s chasing and pursuing one’s skydiving or rock climbing pursuits, the people that really have the passion to do something like that have counted the cost and say, would there be a better way to go out? Now, I’m not saying that. That’s not at all what John is saying here or what I am encouraging here, but here’s what I’m going to tell you. I think us leaders that are driven are going to always deal with the moment when we reach a breaking point and we have to stop when that happens because many of us are there because we can’t help ourselves. That’s true for John. It’s true for me. It’s probably true for many of you.
Mark Cole:
When you’re there and you can’t help yourself, don’t give up on the dream. That’s the people I want to talk to today, the people that you had the worst 2023 of your life. You have lost relationships. You have lost everything. Your heart is broke. Thank you, Mark, Traci, John, for telling me how not to have a heartbreak. But I have one. It’s okay.
Mark Cole:
Dream, dream again. Because I found just like it was for John sitting on the bed when he realized, okay, God’s not ready for me to come home now. He was dreaming and came back to the workplace with some massive dreams of what he wanted to do to impact people at a spiritual level. Because he didn’t stop dreaming at the heartbreak breakthrough.
Traci Morrow:
That’s right. And then lastly, just closing out, the dream takes on a life of its own in the record breaker. And that is the season John is in. He was in the season when he taught this. He’s still in that season. He says, this encourages me to smile, but talk a little bit. Let’s close out. I’d love to hear you talk.
Traci Morrow:
This is really him saying there is no finish line. I think we can tend to think in this last breakthrough that he’s crossed the finish line. There’s no record breaker, and so he’s broken the records and now he’s crossed the line and his hands are up in victory and he’s got the celebratory cup and he’s the winner. And I don’t think that’s at all what it means. Although I think people have a feeling of when you start something, that always means you end something or there’s a finish line. So talk a little bit about how the record breaker and hitting that point in your career or in your leadership journey, where it doesn’t mean when you attain this, which is to me kind of the zone or level five leadership, where you have the smile, but you aren’t crossing a finish line.
Mark Cole:
Yeah, you know, I’m just really struck by this. We’ve all, for the last month, we’ve all been dealing with this. Bill Belichick retirement and Nick Saban retirement and Pete Carroll retirement. All three great coaches that have reached some of their top, top epitome of success in the coaching industry. And on one day, January the 10th, they all resigned at the same time.
Traci Morrow:
Crazy.
Mark Cole:
And I don’t know what drives that because I look at all three of those icons and I still learn from them by watching their sidelines and watching their teams play. But I think the way John would teach this is very much like you, Traci, are saying. There is no finish line, specifically in growing yourself and learning and applying yourself to impact others and certainly in dreaming. One of my favorite things is when we have a 74, 75, somebody even older than John joins the Maxwell leadership team. Now, we have a lot of younger people, we have a lot of people out there that are just getting started with dreams. But I love it. I was just talking with someone just a couple of days ago that said, hey, I’m brand new to the team. I’m 76 and my best dreams and my best days are ahead of me.
Mark Cole:
I went, you’re on the right team. You’re on the right team because a breakthrough, a record breakthrough, should not stop you from staying in the game. It should encourage you to go and chase the next summit, the next record. I love this quote by Terrell Owens that said, instead of having a breakdown, I’m focusing on having a breakthrough. And that’s a little bit of what we talked about in number seven, the heartbreak. The heartbreaker. As we kind of close today and we close out a two part series, I really hope that this has inspired you to dream. It’s inspired you to dream again.
Mark Cole:
And you have assessed. Where are you needing a breakthrough? Where are you needing? I want to go back as I finish and talk about this heartbreaker. Some of you have had the heartbreaker, but you haven’t lamented it as something you couldn’t control. Therefore, you’ve not moved on. Some of you just need to go and set after this lesson in this moment and allow yourself to let the things that come into you that are meant to break you to be breakthroughs. That’s what our goal has been. That’s why we’ve been talking about building on your breakthroughs. Take these eight that John has taught.
Mark Cole:
Certainly make them applicable to you. Haven’t mentioned this, but in this two part series we had a digital product that we were making available. Put your dream to the test. A lot of John’s breakthroughs is coming from this content. And so the book and the digital product is in the show notes. You can go there, you can get this digital product. It’s normally 399. You can get it for $79 over the next week.
Mark Cole:
So go check that out and maybe we’ll leave it up a little longer. For those of you that are just listening this a little bit later, hey, we have an incredible comment today from one of our listeners. Your comments fuel us, makes Traci and I just kind of smile, have kind of that record breaking moment that John was talking about. And today is from Deanne. She says if you do not like the way you feel about a situation, change the way you are thinking about it. Gratitude and negative thinking cannot coexist. Deanne, you are exactly right. Thanks for listening to that podcast, how to improve every day.
Mark Cole:
We’ll put that in the show notes because if it inspires that kind of greatness in Deanne, it’ll inspire that kind of greatness in you because that’s what we want. We want to bring powerful, positive change because everyone deserves to be led well.
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