Jesus, the Twitter King!

Tonight I read the story of Jesus calling the disciples to follow him (Luke 5). In the story he tells peter that he will be a fisher of men and then the bible says they all followed him. That thought just made me stop and think, Jesus is the Twitter King! I know it is a little extreme but the fact is that he followed God the Father unconditionally and called others to follow him. Isn't that what twitter or any other sort of social media is all about.

If you tweet or use twitter you know of a tool that makes it much easier, called tweet deck. Tweet deck organizes your tweets and helps you see when things are directly to you, you are mentioned by another, and the entire river of thoughts from those you are following. God has given us a tweet deck to house our relationship with him called spiritual discipline. I think the categories on this deck would be personal prayer, bible study and healthy relationships.

• Personal Prayer- Who are you Following? It you never hear from the one you are so called "following" are you really following them?
• Bible Study- The river of information that gives us direction and gives us a foundation in which to stand on.
• Healthy Relationships- God uses people to give Direct Messages to you!

How does your Tweet Deck look? Keep your eye on these categories!

Great Teams Lose?

Why do great teams lose? Have you ever thought about that? If teams are so great, why do we need wins and losses? Shouldn't great teams win all the time? I ask this question because my favorite team can beat the good teams but struggles with others. Is it momentum, passion, the challenge or what?

I would love to hear your thoughts.

The Day I Met My Hero!

Wow, this past weekend was one of the most incredible few days of my life! On Saturday I watched my childhood hero (Ruben Sierra) get inducted into the Texas Rangers Hall of Fame. While that may not mean much to you, it means the world to me. For me during a rough childhood Ruben ,along with the Rangers, gave me a sense of hope. Baseball was always my outlet to dream and laid a foundation of a never quit attitude. I had to have that attitude because my team never seemed to win, lol.

As I listened to Ruben give his speech, I sensed such humility, thankfulness, and pride. While he was speaking I realized how emotional this event was for me. I drifted back to my early childhood and remembered the hard times. Times of defeat, of feeling there really wasn't much to live for. But through it all God was faithful.

On the drive home I contemplated all these thoughts and tried to focus on the talk I was to give about my childhood the next morning at church. I was going to share with NORTHchurch, give them a taste of where I have been and the heroes that helped pull me through everything.

There have been a lot of people have impact on my life, but three really stood out to me. Roy, guy that took me to church when no one else would, Uncle Phil, taught me to dream and is responsible for my love of baseball, and my dad and step mom, who gave me an example of normal life and rising above adversity.

Little did I know, my hero Roy, who I hadn't seen in over 20yrs was actually Rod. And Rod was sitting in church when I began to share my story on Sunday morning. When it was brought to my attention, I was overwhelmed. I was given the opportunity to say thank you! I met my long lost hero.

This weekend was a great reminder of who I am and where I have come from. God is amazing!

Question: Who is your hero? What does it mean to be a hero?

Refuse to Lose

I refuse to lose! Regardless of life circumstances, challenges ahead or anything else that may stand in my way, I refuse to lose!

Life seems to be a series of wins and loses, doesn't it? It is true that you win some and lose some. However some people take the L's harder than others. As important as self-perception is I think there is an attribute that is just as or possibly more important to our success in life. That attribute is resilience. Resilience is the ability to bounce back and move forward in the midst of adversity and it gives you the ability to refuse to lose!

When times are tough we should be too!

What are your thoughts?

The Mighty Rangers

So I have been talking about self perception and how it impacts us. I am a huge Texas Rangers baseball fan. It all started growing up in Arlington, TX and watching Ruben Sierra hit homers and attending Nolan Ryan's 7th Hitter. From there I was hooked. My Rangers have really only had 3 successful playoff seasons in the history of the club (est. 1972) and haven't made a lot of noise in the past 10 years. Needless to say there hasn't been a lot of success.

But over the past year or so they have changed the perception. They changed leadership, established a game plan, brought in lots of young talent and reshaped a struggling franchise in a very short period.

The question is why wasn't this done years ago?

I think sometimes it is hard for us to commit to the little things that will set the course of our futures. The little things that make such a huge difference not only take big commitment, it takes perseverance.

What do you think? Who is your favorite team?

Go Rangers!

Perception is Everything!

Do you believe, you are what you think? Pretty crazy idea huh. That the way you perceive yourself actually has an impact on your daily life. The truth is your perception determines who you are as a person. I have a bad habit of making fun of myself and cracking jokes when I make an honest mistake but if I am not careful it can throw me into a whirlwind of defeat. God created me to succeed and even in defeat I am learning.

How do you perceive yourself?

Social Media

For awhile now I have been "against" blogging, twitter, facebook, etc... This past week I had a revelation of the value of social media. Someone out there may actually care about what I have to say, and may just find value in the things I am learning. So here it is I am going to do my best to use technology to impact others. And maybe it will help someone out along the way.

If you get a chance follow me on twitter.com @clintsmithxp. I will be sharing leadership thoughts, life lessons and sharing things about my blog.

Question: How has social media impacted your life?