Youth Leadership Camps Canada

Stu-Pendous Blog - Archives for November 2009

These are the thoughts of speaker, author and camp director Stu Saunders.
For Stu’s original blog, you may still access his archives here.

• Mistakes

  Nov 30, 2009

  I remember growing up in the eighties and listening to Billy Joel. He was pretty popular back then. I saw the “Storm Front” tour at Maple Leaf Gardens. There is line from a Billy Joel song that says “You learn more falling flat on your face then you ever will in school.” That line has stuck with me for 25 years.

  Yesterday was the annual Grey Cup football game in Canada. The Montreal Alouettes won the game on a last second field goal. They also lost the game on a last second field goal. You see the other team, the Roughriders, had sent out too many men and were called for a penalty just as the first kick missed the uprights and the Roughriders won. Then didn’t win. Montreal got a second chance and didn’t miss. Now they won!

  The look of sadness was so clear on the losing players faces. They just thought they had won, they jumped, screamed and celebrated. Then they cried, yes some were in tears.

  I know it’s just a game. For these players though, it could have been a moment that they won’t ever have again. After it was all over they interviewed the coach responsible for the mistake. He said something that really resonated with me.

  “It was a mistake, I take full responsibility for it. If I have the chance to be in this situation, it won’t happen again.”

  Incredible response, such poise. He admitted he made a mistake, took full responsibility and learned from it! That’s great. You can’t teach mistakes in school, the real life hard lessons are so powerful. It’s how you deal with them that matters. Yes they hurt sometimes, but, if you pick yourself up, dust off the dirt and pain, you learn.

  Be a leader, learn from your mistakes! It’s never too late to start.

  
  

  Posted by Stu Saunders in Leadership on Nov 30, 2009 at 2:30 pm | Permanent Link | Comments (0)

• Family Time?

  Nov 18, 2009

  Every night as a child without question we came home and my family ate together. It was just the way it was. We all talked at dinner, sometimes we fought, sometimes we just sat together and celebrated our disfunction. This continued well after my parents separated. My mom would make dinner for my brother and I. Even when she was a single mom, working full time and struggling to make ends meet.

  As the generations changed, the idea of nightly dinners disappeared. There became Sunday night dinners. One night a week that you would try to eat as a family. Now, in 2009 we fall to the quick fix, microwave, boil in the bag, throw in the oven for 20 minutes type meals. The real crime is that a family dinner has become “eating out”. I am guilty of this as well. I am a single dad that struggles with eating at home, making a dinner, creating a meal that everyone likes. It is MUCH easier to just order off a menu and let someone else cook and clean.

  It doesn’t make it right though.

  I was just in Michigan, having dinner at a very expensive chain restaurant, on a Tuesday, in an area that is the hardest hit in America due to the current economic “crisis”.

  Not a seat open in the house. 15-20 minute wait. I look over at a family of four, drinking pop, eating a tower of onion rings, one of the boys standing on his chair while eating, the oldest daughter texting, the middle daughter playing her Nintendo DS, the mother reading an email on her Blackberry, the father was oblivious to it all.

  I asked my waitress how much they spent on their dinner… “about $200…”

  I was so saddened. I was sad for that family because they won’t have the experience that I had. My family was and is far from perfect, but I cherish those dinners more then ever. I am making a commitment this weekend to my family, we will eat at home, I will cook and we will all talk, laugh and argue together. That’s a family, I hope it’s not too late to save that old idea.

  What’s for dinner tonight?

  
  

  Posted by Stu Saunders in Leadership Family Life on Nov 18, 2009 at 6:42 pm | Permanent Link | Comments (1)

• Commit

  Nov 16, 2009

  Leaders are people that can commit to something, anything, all things. There are two keys to being a success at this skill. One, is not to over commit. The other key is to simply follow through with what it is you say your going to do. It’s that simple if you say “I will do that.” then you should do it. If you are having a hard time with following through you should go back to whomever you committed to and say, “I need more time.” or “I may have over extended myself.”.

  If the person you are working with is not irrational then they should, I hope understand. Just don’t leave it to late so it can’t be fixed.

  The other and just as important type of commitments you make are the one you make to yourself. If you say you are going to drink two litres of water a day, do it. If you say you are going to stay in shape and walk everyday, walk every day. It’s true there may not be anyone to call you on it, but you will know and your confidence will be damaged.

  ALWAYS under promise and OVER deliver. That’s my commitment!

  
  

  Posted by Stu Saunders in Leadership on Nov 16, 2009 at 4:32 pm | Permanent Link | Comments (1)

• Oink, Oink

  Nov 3, 2009

  Here are my thoughts on the current H1N1 flu. I was reading today on the “Facebook” and saw some 22,000 plus people had joined a group called close schools because of the swine flu. I had to join and I had to read the wisdom behind this suggestion. Well there is none. They do have a fancy, very scary logo though.

  Here’s my take.

  The Logo is dumb, the hype is dumb, the billions of dollars being made off this “pandemic” is dumb, the whole thing is dumb! Thousands die every year from the flu… and car accidents, cancer, aids, being hit by busses… why not put all of the students, teachers, hyper reactive parents in a padded room and let them live out their days being fed a liquid diet so they don’t choke! This is the most asinine over-blown media driven event ever (except SARS, Bird Flu, Mad Cow, Y2K and soon 2012). God help us if we have a real global crisis. It’s sad that people get sick and die… but this is not the global emergency that we have spread. If schools wanted to do something of value then make a massive effort to ban smoking within 2 km’s of your school. Way more people will die from lung cancer then will ever die from the swine flu.

  I was in mexico at the height of the scare last spring and came back with sure enough… H1N1. I survived, I stayed home for a couple of days and now I am living to type this BLOG. Please people, parents (that’s me too), media, school’s and school boards take a deep breath (somewhere away from anyone who might be coughing) and calm down. We will be ok.

  Wash your hands, drink liquids, take natural vitamin C and don’t share your pepsi…. you (the VAST, VAST majority) will live!

  PS the drug companies are about to make over 4 billion dollars… hmmm

  
  

  Posted by Stu Saunders in Leadership on Nov 3, 2009 at 1:30 pm | Permanent Link | Comments (1)

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