Living Life Juicy

Is brilliance within our grasp? There seem to be paths to brilliance for us; executive coaching, life coaching, personal coaching, performance improvement programs, etc. I'm pretty sure that the self-help section of the bookstore is still the largest. I googled "self-help" and got close to 25 million hits. Are these the same thing as "becoming brilliant?" I'm not sure. It's about becoming something. Often it seems to be about "becoming dependent." Not that that's the intent of all the authors, coaches and consultants but people who seek these resources often look for the "silver bullet" that will launch them toward success and happiness. They look for an easy external fix. At the first sign of difficulty we blame that failed approach and, since it is external, we need not take any responsibility for it's failure. We then can easily move to the next disconnected approach to improvement. If we experience any hint of success w...

I’ve been fascinated by the word “brilliant” for a while now. Where I might have said “That’s great,” I noticed my friends from across the Atlantic would say “That’s brilliant!” Is it just a different word choice or their accent that caught my ear? I think it might be more than that. Brilliance points us to several, rich images. In this one word we think of light, shining and vivid, excellence and intelligence. To be brilliant is to be a shining example that stands out from the rest of the world. It is to be a model of excellence; to set the highest standard for intelligence and performance. Wow! I want that. I want to be a person who stands out like that. I want to become brilliant. But, with all that tarnishes my image, can I reach that level? What steps can I really take on the path toward becoming brilliant?