Be Careful Who or What you listen to

“Belief and doubt are like two tour guides each vying for your attention on the road of life. Where you end up depends on who you listened to the most. People who excel in life are not the ones who eliminate doubt but the ones who conquer the natural tendency of being double minded.” –Wes Beavis, “Fuel”

We have become an “expert” society. You can search the internet and find an expert on just about anything you can imagine. In her book, “Unstoppable” Cynthia Kersey gives some powerful examples of misguided expert advice that had the potential to stop brilliant people and ideas in their tracks!

• “Liquidate the business right now and recoup whatever cash you can. If you don’t you’ll end up penniless.” – Attorney for Mary Kay Ash, weeks before she opened her first cosmetic store:
• “Working out with weights causes athletes to lose their speed and agility. Bodybuilding causes hemorrhoids and hernias.”- health “experts” to Jack LaLanne
• “You can’t play the piano, and God knows you can’t sing. You’d better learn how to weave chairs so you can support yourself,” – “expert” advice to Ray Charles by his teacher.

Though there is much wisdom in counsel, we must exercise caution when we allow others to give us their “expert” opinions. Very often visionaries are so far ahead of their times the average “expert” cannot begin to comprehend the fulfillment or need of that vision. Like the saying, “eat the chicken but spit out the bones” we must glean the prudent warnings and counsel and fine tuning our thinking without abandoning our God-given dreams.

When Greg and I saw what EnerPrime did for our daughter, we thought of how it could be a giant step in helping others take responsibility for their health. Yet when we shared our vision for IMPaX with my Dad, he looked at Greg and said, “Greg you are looking at a crystal ball.”  He then gave him this advice,“ You have a nice accent. You should think about being a waiter because people like foreign accents in restaurants.” My husband is one of the most brilliant men I have ever met in my life and his new father-in-law’s “expert” advice is to get a job as a waiter!  Another “expert” told him Koreans don’t get good jobs in America and that the janitorial industrial cleaning industry is really his only option. Greg came to America an educated engineer, having attended a top university on full scholarship. He is a brilliant business man. What if he had listened to these “experts”? Where would he be today?

Be careful who or what you listen to.