First, here are the 11 rules of life that you won’t learn in school:

Rule 1: Life is not fair—get used to it!

Rule 2: The world won’t care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something before you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3: You will not make $60,000 per year right out of high school. You won’t be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both. (car phone??? really?? ask your parents about those)

Rule 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait until you get a boss.

Rule 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your grandparents had a different word for burger flipping—they called it opportunity.

Rule 6: If you mess up, it’s not your parents’ fault.  So don’t whine about your mistakes; learn from them.

Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes, and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parents’ generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life has not. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they’ll give you as many times as you want to get the right answer. This doesn’t bear the slightest resemblance to anything in real life.

Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters. You don’t get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you “find yourself.” Do that on your own time.

Rule 10: Television is not real life. In real life, people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Rule 11: Be nice to nerds. Chances are you’ll end up working for one.

What do you think?  Are we missing any life rules here?  Add your thoughts in the comments section.

Refuse to be reduced to a spectator.

To casually watch as the action unfolds.

Refuse to be passive. To be complacent. To be comfortable.

Refuse to let the days of your life drift by without purpose.

Refuse to allow the drone of the clock to become the pulse by which your heart beats.

Tick Tock, Tick Tock Never escalating, never racing.

Refuse to live a life of indifference.

As if you are the centerpiece of the story.

Refuse.

Just some thoughts I wrote years ago that inspire me to make a difference.

While this happened to me this morning, this is not a isolated event.  I have been honked at, swerved at, and cussed at.  Bike riding can really bless you! What is crazy to me is what happens inside of me when that happens.  Something in me goes mad and I begin to pedal faster (as if I’m going to catch them) and I begin to pray that they catch the next red light (so that I can pull up beside them and smash their window out with my water bottle and drag them out by their collar) oops, did I just type that???  Ok, so maybe I don’t carry it that far but I do want to very kindly explain to them that “I BELONG HERE!” We have signs all over our city that say, “share the road with bikes” however, some people missed that day in kindergarten where we all learned about sharing.

I write this because the same thing can happen in life.  Too often we are minding our own business, trying to do the right thing, when somebody comes along and tries to intimidate us and tell us that we don’t belong here.  Sometimes it is a person and sometimes it is the devil himself.  “You don’t belong on this stage preaching!”  “You don’t belong at this church!”  “You don’t belong with these friends!” “You don’t belong in this relationship!”   “You don’t belong _______________!”

When those moments happen all you have to do is the same thing that I do when I’m on my bike.  When someone tells you that you don’t belong you simply point to the sign that says, “YES I DO!”  Somebody went ahead of me and put signs all over this city telling me that I belong.  We serve a God that has gone way ahead of us and has given us His Word to tell us that “WE BELONG!”

Don’t listen to the honking people!

What was one of your favorite toys when you were a kid?

I think this will be a great way to share “off the cuff” ideas with everybody. Here’s where I need your help…What should I call these “off the cuff” ideas? Should I call them: Pocket Podcasts, Thought of the day, Word of the Day… I know some of these are lame. Help a brother out! Leave me some ideas in the comment section.

“Only 455,000 people on Earth will run a 26.2 mile marathon in 2009.  This puts you in the top 0.00758% of the population.  ROCK IT OUT!  Proud of you!”

If you think about it, would you pray for me and my running partner Aaron on Saturday?  The gun goes off at 7:50am.  Here is a map of our running route.

Posted by Mike Foster:

What is the most effective, career/life altering, and most simple secret to success?

BE ON TIME!!!

When you keep people waiting for no good reason, you undermine your relationship with them.

When you are late to a meeting, you lose the advantage and edge in the conversation.

When you show up late to work, your boss puts you in the slacker category.

When your company misses a deadline, your clients remember.

When you’re late with your mortgage, you toast your credit and borrowing power.

I have a simple philosophy. There are only 2 reasons for being late.

1. You’re dead.

2. Or you wanted to be late.

My point is simple: Be on time.

My wife and I decided to give a micro-loan today to a nice lady named Samaya Khnjanova.  Samaya is from Imishli, Azerbaijan.  I have no clue where that is but that doesn’t change the fact that buying someone a cow is cool.

For the record here is a map of Imishli, Azerbaijan.

View Larger Map

Technically we didn’t buy her a whole cow but we partnered with a bunch of folks that all chipped in and bought four cows.  It’s cool to think that somehow we are making a difference in someone’s life across the globe.  In 17 months we will get our investment back and then be able to reinvest in another person’s life.

Want to learn more?  Check out Kiva.org.

This is just one of the cool things you can do when you get out of debt!  Don’t miss this weekend at Lifepoint as we talk about how everyone can get their finances on track and change the world!