You Can Be MORE!

My friend sat across from me in my office during our weekly coaching session. He had received an assignment and was not satisfied with the results. As he reported to me on his activity he said, "I did my best."

"Don't ever say that," I replied, rather shocked at my own bluntness.

"When you say you've done your best, you are telling me that you cannot and will not get any better, that you have reached your highest potential, that you have no room for growth. Say that it was the best you could do at the moment, but never tell me that something was your best. You can always do more.."

You can always do more.

You can always be more.

You can always jump higher, last longer, reach farther, delve deeper, and perform at an increasingly more refined level. We are human - not only human or merely human but human with a capital H, fearfully and wonderfully made, created with uncharted potential and open-ended possibilities.

Fortunately, I did not offend him. He is still coming to me for guidance and encouragement and growing. He is more today than he was that day.

The M in More is for mastery and motivation.

Mastery is what masters us. It is that depth-level commitment to something or someone that centers our thinking and defines our existence. When I am mastered by something greater than myself, I know that I am not alone and I am not floundering for a sense of purpose. Who I am and where I am going is a settled matter. I attach my devotion to the ultimate values that are at the heart of all my commitments and I can begin to master the things that have vied in vain for that position.

We are mastered by so many things: an urgency, tendency, or superficiality until the moment when we submit to that one great center point of life from which flows our lives. Then we can take charge of the things that used to run us and we find that we are motivated.

Motivation is what moves us; gets us up in the morning and gets us going. It is about movement and motor function and it is powerful. It flows from the core of ones being or is of little but temporary value. Real motivation kicks us in the fannies and reminds us that we can always do more and be more.

When your get up and goes gets up and goes the other way, it is the mastery-motivation connection that empowers you to stretch on a reach for the prize.

The O is for opportunity and obligation - and they go hand in hand down the path of potential and growth. Like the shape of the letter, they round us out.

Opportunity is everywhere. We need to move from the place of being obstacle thinkers to opportunity thinkers. There is no obstacle that cannot become a propellant in our quest for more. There is no hardship, tragedy, or struggle that we cannot mount and surmount and ride to a brighter tomorrow.

I saw Danielle recently on a trip to the Bay Area. She's a teenager now, but there was a time when no doctor or other professional would have put a dollar on her surviving that long. She was born with severe spina bifida, mental retardation, blindness, and hearing impairments - and a heart as strong and stubborn as any I've ever seen. Then, she was surrounded by love and a can-do attitude and she has become more than anyone ever expected. She crawls everywhere she goes and pulls herself up to get what she wants. They said she would never talk, but she knows how to ask for her needs to be met. She knows people and calls them by name. She loves and is loved. She and her foster family turned obstacles into opportunities and everyone has grown as a result.

I have been moved forward by having known her.

Then, with great opportunity comes great obligation. Once you know it, you owe it. When you come to realize how vast the possibilities are, you are obligated to make the most of them and share the hope with others. I have a statuette in my office of a frog with a crown on his head. The caption says, "What you are is God's gift to you; what you make of yourself is your gift to God." We are obligated to become all that lies within us to be. We are made for greatness. Anything less is affront to the master design that envisioned our future.

The R is for reverence/respect which enables us to take responsibility.

Reverence is our attitude toward a power greater than ourselves that infuses us with humility and perspective. I know I have not arrived. I know I have not yet done or even imagined my best. I have a long way to go and there is a perfect ideal that holds me in awe. There is a wonder that causes my jaw to drop. When reverence kicks in, we can respect others and we can respect ourselves.

"One of you is the messiah," the old rabbi told the abbot of a dying monastery.

He pondered it and shared it with his brothers. No one understood, but in awe and reverence they took it to heart and started treating each other and even themselves with extraordinary respect. It created such an atmosphere of expectancy and graciousness that people started to visit to experience it for themselves. Soon, young men were seeking to enter the monastic life because of this amazing aura of respect that permeated the place. To think that each of them was potentially destined for greatness gave them permission and hope to become more.

Likewise, it instilled in them a sense of responsibility to handle every person they met, every word they spoke, every deed they did, and every object that passed through their hands with dignity. We have that responsibility as well. We are handling holy things. We are standing on holy ground. Our lives and the lives of the people around us are destined for greatness. As we pass through, let us add value to others and add value to ourselves as well. It is our responsibility.

And that sense of responsibility growing out of reverence and respect teaches us to be responsible for our choices, our actions, and even our thoughts. No one can spoon feed "MORE JUICE" into our experience. We must chose it and move toward it.

The final letter, E, is for effort and energy. Nothing comes to us that enhances our lives without someone's effort - usually our own, often a cooperative effort. We must take initiative to grow; we must be dissatisfied with status quo and eager to reach. It takes effort.

Success is a four letter word: W-O-R-K.

We take baby steps and those baby steps lead to leaps and bounds, but not without perspiration, frustration, aggravation, and agitation. Yes we need inspiration, innovation, and contemplation, but even they are useless without effort/

Buster whined and moaned like only a dog can do. He was sleeping on a pile of nails.

"Why don't he move?" Gus asked Homer.

"I reckon it just don't hurt 'nough," Homer quipped.

How badly does it hurt not to reach your goals, to stay where you are, to be stuck in the rut and stagnant in time and space? What will make a person put out the effort to change? We must pose the question to ourselves. Am I willing? Do I want it? Do I believe I can do and be more?

Faith says yes. Hope says yes. Love says yes. What do you say? The last word is energy and that is what many of us are out of. It has been depleted by disappointments, discouragement, and failure. But our failures are the cobblestones on the path the victory. We must embrace them and return to the basic question of what masters us. Once we know that - so deeply in our lives that we bleed purpose-blood, then we can get the energy from the fountain of possibilities.

You can be more. I can be more. We can be more.

I was driving 10 miles east of Porterville, CA. last week when I started to see some interesting signs. It was success this and success that and I was looking for a place called Success Valley. Then, it suddenly occurred to me that I had been on the road to Success for about 50 miles and never knew it.

Maybe that's the way it is with our lives. When we muster up all we have been given and refocus our attention on the prize. By golly, know it or not; we are on the road to success, the pathway to more.

Our Founder

We thought you'd like to meet our founder, Mike Lenhof. Mike has a vision to help people with disabilities like himself become independent, self-reliant, and productive in society.

He is a purpose-driven person who is devoted to Jesus Christ and deeply desires to follow God's call in this ministry. Mike is an entrepreneur who has years of experience in sales. He is married and about to celebrate the first anniversery of his marriage to Dianne, the love of his life.

People love Mike because he inspires them and truly cares about them. As Road to Success Ministries prospers, it will be because of Mike's drive and passion to help others. He is a winner with a winner's attitude and an overcomer who knows the source of his strength.

The World Through Georgia's Eyes

Why the First Lady of Cyber-Space Has Inspired Thousands

She graduated cum laude from Capital University where she was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. She has been a music teacher, can play 12 instruments knows at least 7 languages. She has been featured in Discover and People, has conversed online with the Vice President, is remembered in the Smithsonian Institution and has been inducted into the Ohio Women’s Hall of Fame. She single-handedly designed the IBM Special Needs Data Base and holds the highest certification as a Braille music proof-reader for the Library of Congress. For eighteen years she has managed some of the busiest and most volatile forums on CompuServe with a membership of thousands. She is a woman of deep personal faith, Indecently, Georgia Griffith has been blind since birth and deaf for over 40 years.

Georgia’s achievements would have been noteworthy for a sighted and hearing person. In fact, most of us who met her in cyberspace would have never suspected that she was “handicapped.” I use the word, “Handicap” because that is Georgia’s word. She detests the term, “disabled.”

“I am not disabled. I’m handicapped—just like in golf,” Georgia has reminded me time and time again. And I have never heard her complain about those handicaps.

Because, for many years, I have been preparing to write her biography, my personal files are filled with newspaper and magazine clippings, letters of congratulations from people in high places, including former President Ronald Reagan, and personal glimpses into the life and achievements of this remarkable woman that I call, “friend.” I have copies of awards, videos, interviews, and e-mails to inform my writing, but I have much more.

My memories are blessed by daily conversations over the past nine years, and two personal visits. No, I did not go to Lancaster, Ohio where Georgia lives alone in the home where she was raised. Georgia came to California with her long-time friend, Bettye Krolick with whom she served on the Board of Directors of the National Braille Association. Georgia loves to travel and she loves to sight-see. I will never forget taking her to the Science and Technology Museum in San Jose . Her curiosity and sense of wonder were active in the wide smile she displayed at we outlined words describing the exhibits in her hand. She touched displays and asked questions and, during breaks, yanked on her friends beards with a girlish giggle.

Georgia loves to eat too. Her mouth was watering in San Jose for a cup of strong, sweet, Vietnamese coffee with a plate of noodles. The stronger and hotter the better. At a banquet, people lined up to shake her hand and tell her how much she had meant to them through the years and how inspired they were by her life. She barely got through her dinner, but had a genuine smile and word of encouragement for each. When honored, she tries to deflect some of that to her friends and assistants. As an example of her humility, I have often received e-mails to this effect:

“Hurry! Write me an acceptance speech—you know, the usual, ‘I’m a nobody, but thanks for this great honor.’”

When Georgia goes out in public, she is in a wheelchair because of balance problems. However, in her home, she shuns that help and pulls herself up on a railing or crawls. Her work schedule is grueling for a young person, much less a newly initiated septuagenarian. She is constantly reading, writing, and thinking using her specially equipped Braille “monitor” on her computer. Instead of tired eyes, Georgia occasionally complains of sore hands—but she keeps going and going and going. In the evenings she reads the Bible and a novel. Retirement is never mentioned.

Every day, Georgia answers hundreds of e-mails and manages online forums with thousands of posted messages, library files, and management duties. She deals with contentious people with grace, humor, and firmness. Everyone is welcome in her forums, but they must comply with the rules and respect other people and their views.

When Georgia reads what is on her computer, she does not scan—a screen or quickly view graphics. She must convert graphical interfaces to text and read one line at a time. Having taught herself several computer languages in 1980, Georgia had to learn to navigate the world of the Worldwide web with all it’s “purty pictures” in the nineties. She did so with determination, grace, and prayer as she has tackled every other task in her life. It takes her longer to read all the material—because of the limitations of Braille technology, but once she has read it, she knows it. Her capacity for learning, digesting, storing, and retrieving information puts most people to shame. A word of advice to the novice: Never challenge Georgia to a battle of wits. You will lose

Georgia has often said, ”to live is to give” and she has lived by that philosophy. Her generosity is celebrated by many, as I can testify. Each of us, sworn to silence, is prevented from widely discussing her kindnesses to us. Therefore, we talk about her keen humor, lively faith, honesty, work ethic, compassion, fairness, and drive. . Mostly, we are grateful for her friendship.

When I first met Georgia in the early nineties, she had recently lost her beloved mother, Toots. We prayed and talked a lot about Heaven and God’s grace. But through the years, I have learned far more about grace from her than I could have ever imparted. I am privileged to call this pioneering woman, my dear friend and sister in Christ.

Postscript: Georgia died in September of 2005 after a brief illness. It took three people to fill her jobs on CompuServe including the author. No one has been able to take her place.

(copyright, 2001, Thomas B. Sims, all rights reserved, used by permission)

We Are On the Road

Road to Success Ministries is a dynamic outreach to and by people with disabilities.

It is not that people with disabilities have no abilities. It is just that they have other abilities and must focus on the development of abilities that many people take for granted.

People with disabilities are built for success, created in the image of God, fearfully and wonderfully made for purpose and significance. Our ministry works sie by side and a hand in hand with our partners who are also our clients.

Together, we can build a program that addresses needs while channeling the energies of people with great potential into service as volunteers and business builders in our communities.

- Mike Lenhof, Director
- Tom Sims, Pastoral Consultant