The Daily G.I.F.T. from The GratiDude

That warm feeling in your heart? That’s someone loving you from Sarasota, Florida.

www.grateful4.org

Gratitude

Intention

First

Things

The G.I.F.T. Today

Grateful: feeling less struggle and more flow daily, coming out of a hell of a year and feeling great.

Intention-keep cranking heart open vision, working nicely

First-firm up lunch meeting spot Ray n Erin

Things-Touch base Ricardo K

Morning Meditation from The GratiDude

I realize now that the stories I told myself around my teenage years and the demise of the Carpenter nuclear family without explanation prevented me from appreciating and receiving all the love around me. For DECADES.

Fundamentally speaking, if your heart isn’t open to loving yourself fully, it is hard to appreciate the love that is coming at you because your antenna isn’t up and available to pick up that signal.  

The broadcast energy from someone’s heart to you with a feeling of love just bounces off your chest, as if you’re wearing emotional armor and falls to the ground and expires without being fully appreciated.  The message today is to lay down your chest armor to open your heart as an exercise to see what you’ve been missing.

I’ll give you an example of a coworker from my days at GPS industries which was the roll up entity of all the private companies that created golf car mounted GPS systems and software solutions in the 90s and 2000s.  

My super stubborn brother David Chessler, along with our Core crew from ParView, Inc.  stayed involved in the business and worked every back channel imaginable to broker a roll up amongst ruthless, small vulture entities, and then maneuvered through federal bankruptcy court.

By the time Ingersoll Rand realized they had no choice but to acquire GPS Industries in order to maintain control of their technology platform and golf car marketing strategy, it was pretty clear that we just pulled off a pretty staggering turnaround that ended up being about $150 million turnaround of bad to good.

I’m proud that the technology division at ClubCar (even though according to anyone with experience in technology has not been optimize, to be diplomatic) is still highly profitable and growing in terms of footprint and adoption rate.  

One of my favorite coworkers from that 10-year run or so is Gerard Johnson, who was the dude who ran all of our installations and operations with Sigma-6 precision and  military-like efficiency, and a heart of gold at the same time.

“G,” as even the uptight venture capitalist owner with his European accent would say, was a solid rock of efficiency, but more than that he was and is a super kind human being that sought to add value every day in any way possible.

He would walk around in the morning, even though he was a great lover of tequila in the evening, bright eyed and bushy tail, going to office, asking every single key employee:

“Is there anything I can do for you this morning? Is there any project or anything I can help with today?” 

He didn’t do this occasionally or once a week, but every damn day.

And when G would not be in the office either out visiting with one of his installation technicians, or there were a few times, he had some bionic parts installed in his bad ass body like a hip or something, and he would be out for a week from his morning rounds and visits. 

I can tell you even though about three out of five days I was hung over early in the morning back then, by day two I would ask Jen at the front desk or Angie and HR, “Hey, where’s G?”

And I was traveling about half the time so when I would be back in the office, seeing G in the morning would always be one of those visits. I would look forward to, and I would always have updates from the field of what was going on in California or Latin America or wherever I was and G was always interested in to see how we were doing from a service and support standpoint and to get feedback on the quality of his installation processes in distant places.

When G was convalescing or nursing that hip,  or out in the Field doing site visits or visiting one of his Team Members, I doubt  he was realizing how sorely missed he was back at the Mothership.  Or, that me and other GPSI workers would be wondering where he was….it was my fourth cup of coffee and that I had some stories to share, and I missed him.

I love you, Gerard Johnson! Thanks, G, for all!!

G is still in the business I believe, running all the installation still for ClubCar technology , and I guarantee you he is being grossly underpaid and grossly underappreciated because you could not pay this guy enough or appreciate him enough. 

Express your appreciation for another person today and see how that feels. 

Key points about the benefits of expressing gratitude:

Reduced stress: Gratitude can activate the parasympathetic nervous system, which helps your body relax and can lower stress levels. 

Improved mood: Feeling thankful can lead to increased happiness and positive emotions. 

Better sleep: Practicing gratitude can contribute to better sleep quality. 

Enhanced relationships: Expressing appreciation for others can strengthen your bonds with them. 

Increased resilience: Gratitude can help you cope with tricky situations more effectively. 

Potential physical benefits: Some studies suggest that gratitude may be associated with improved immune function and cardiovascular health.

The impact of a person’s culture and productivity is impossible to measure, but more importantly, his impact on human beings through his kindness and thoughtfulness is what will be remembered the longest.