Jamy Bechler

Providing Insights on Leadership and Success. Coach Bechler is a John Maxwell Leadership Team Member.

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Dec 28 2020

Greatest Baseball Player

“If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at will start to change.” (Dr. Wayne Dyer)

“I’m the greatest baseball player in the world,” a little boy boasted as he strutted around his backyard.

Shouldering his bat, he tossed a baseball up, swung, and missed.

“I am the greatest ballplayer ever,” he reiterated. He picked up the ball again, swung, and missed again. Stopping a moment to examine his bat, he stooped down and picked up his ball.

“I am the greatest baseball player who ever lived!” The momentum of his swing nearly knocked him down. But the ball plopped, unscathed, at his feet.

“Wow!” he exclaimed. “What a pitcher!”

[Read more…]

Written by Jamy Bechler · Categorized: Leadership, Personal Growth, Sports · Tagged: Albert Einstein, Baseball player, Empathy, mentality, MLK, open-minded, paradigm, Perspective, Understanding

Mar 22 2018

March Madness

“If opportunity doesn’t knock, build a door.” (Milton Berle)

“In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.” (Albert Einstein)

“March Madness” is my favorite holiday! My wife says that it isn’t really a holiday but then again she wants me to celebrate “Sweetest Day” 🙂

Regardless, this is a great three-week period that caps off the college basketball season. The tournament is a win-or-go-home event. It is a true reality show with plenty of intriguing story lines and drama. Plus, who doesn’t love filling out a bracket?!?

Of this year’s four #1 seeds, The University of Virginia was the tournament’s top overall team going into the tournament. They have a great coach and the team thoroughly dominated the regular season. This past Friday, they made history! Just not the kind they were anticipating.

UVA became the first-ever #1 seed to lose to a #16 seed. The University of Maryland-Baltimore County wasn’t even the best team in their conference but they got hot during their conference tournament and pulled off an upset to qualify for the NCAA’s. They were 22-point underdogs going into this game against Virginia. Instead of losing by 22, they won by 20! If you watched the game, you would have been impressed by the way they took advantage of every opportunity. They played to win – not to lose – even when they got up big and the game was winding down. They played with confidence and swagger.

Virginia might have been the better team overall, but this past Friday, someone out-performed them. There are many lessons that can be learned from this but the NCAA Tournament once again provides some madness in March. It provides a reminder that we need to be prepared for our opportunities. The Retrievers from UMBC believed in themselves and that is all that mattered. Abraham Lincoln used to say “I will prepare and perhaps one day my chance will come.”

What about us? We may be grinding day-in and day-out and the results might not be what we’d want. The odds might seem to be stacked against us. We might be 22-point underdogs to life. But, just like UMBC, we can believe in ourselves and keep preparing for the day that our opportunity comes. I am reminded of the Jacob Riis’ quote concerning rock sculptures…

Look at a stone cutter hammering away at his rock, perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred-and-first blow it will split in two, and I know it was not the last blow that did it, but all that had gone before.

Just like the stone cutter, you don’t always know when good things will come to you but you do know that if you quit, it will never come! Be encouraged today and know that even though life might sometimes seem like a tough #1 seeded opponent, the underdog still has a chance to win! Success is a choice. What choice will we make today?

 

Jamy Bechler is a motivational speaker, team consultant, and John Maxwell leadership coach. He works with businesses and teams, including the NBA. He is also the host of the “Success is a Choice” podcast. He can be be reached at Jamy@JamyBechler.com.

Written by Jamy Bechler · Categorized: Sports · Tagged: Abraham Lincoln, Albert Einstein, Jacob Riis, March Madness, NCAA, NCAA Tournament, Stone Cutter, Tony Bennett, Underdogs, Virginia

Dec 29 2017

Episode 044: Lolly Daskal, Top-50 Leadership & Management Expert

Lolly Daskal is the go-to executive leadership coach for Fortune 500 companies. She has been named by Inc. Magazine as a Top-50 Leadership and Management Expert. The Huffington Post honored Lolly with the title of “The Most Inspiring Woman in the World”. She regularly writes for the Harvard Business Review, Inc, Fast Company, Huffington Post, and Psycholgoy Today. Her newest book is called The Leadership Gap: What Gets Between You and Your Greatness. It has appeared on the New York Times and Wall Street Journal best-seller charts. Lolly is the founder of Lead from Within, a successful leadership firm that offers custom made programs in leadership and organizational development. Lolly also has more than 1 million followers on twitter.

In today’s episode, we discuss:

  • How Lolly is able to read a book every day
  • Why leadership is important for everybody
  • What to do when you have a gap in your life and leadership
  • How to measure success when working with Fortune 500 companies

[Read more…]

Written by Jamy Bechler · Categorized: Podcast Episodes · Tagged: Albert Einstein, Bob Burg, Books, Business coach, Carl Gustav Jung, Ed DeCosta, executive coach, Forbes, fortune 500, George Washington, Huffington Post, Inc.com, Inside Out Leaderhip, Jamy Bechler, jeremie kubicek, John Avalon, Joseph Campbell, Kevin Harrington, Lead from within, Leaders are Readers, Leadership, Lolly Daskal, Micheal Burt, Quantum Physics, Reading Books, Simon Sinek, The Leadership Gap, Viktor Frankl

Apr 13 2012

Greener Grass?

In his book WINNING EVERY DAY, the former Notre Dame football coach, Lou Holtz, tells the story of the Trappist monk who was allowed to say only two words every three years.

After the first three years, he met with the his order’s Brother Superior and  said, “Bad bed!”

3 years later, he came back to say, “Bad food!”

After 3 more years of silence, the monk said, “No TV!”

Another 3 years passed. This time, when the monk met with Brother Superior, he handed him his robes and sandals and announced, “I quit!”

Brother Superior said, “Well don’t expect me to try to dissuade you. You’ve done nothing but complain since you got here!”

[Read more…]

Written by Jamy Bechler · Categorized: Job Search, Leadership, Personal Growth · Tagged: 2-2-1 Zone Press, Albert Einstein, Andy Carter, Coaches, Coaching, Defense, Job Search, John Wooden, Leadership, Lou Holtz, Newberry College, Notre Dame, UCLA

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