Big Is The New Small

I really love our worship team led by Stephen Cole and Kaci Baldwin. The team is a diverse group of genuine worshippers that truly love Jesus and care about those they are leading in worship each and every week. One of the things that I love about their worship is the fact that they have fun and they are all “Worshipping” and not simply singing songs and playing instruments.

This weekend they were jammin’ as usual and broke out into a little reggae funk in the middle of a Rockin’ King Of Glory worship tune. Every service was different as Stephen was just free-styling.  One is the beauties of worship is the fact that it’s a universal language and genuine hearts for diversity will help to break down ethnic and style barriers. People were swayin’, bobbin’, yellin’, shoutin’ and jammin’ in the isles.

The above video is a little sample of today’s worship, shot with an iPhone video camera.

What do you love about your worship team? Share some of your favorite worship songs or unique things that you like to see from your worship team.

I was already tired of hearing all of the crybaby hype coming out of the City Of Cleveland before the game even tipped off this evening.   I don’t want to even waste writing space sharing all of the negative antics, as I’m sure that you have heard or seen most of them.

I’m not gonna lie, the shirt featured in this post did make me chuckle out loud — “The Lyin King.”  Seriously, holding onto the bitterness it’s such a waste of time…  Get Over It! To top it all off LeBron rolled into Cleveland and put on a clinic, as he scored 38 points before the 4th quarter even started.

I remember similar crybaby antics coming coming from the City Of Seattle when they lost the Seattle SuperSonics to Oklahoma City.  They are gone… Get Over It! To top it all off the now Oklahoma City Thunder franchise has record sell-outs and will be in the playoffs again this year.

Why should you waste your time on water that has clearly strolled way on the other side of the bridge?  You shouldn’t…  You Should Get Over It!

• If your boyfriend or girlfriend cheated on you… Get Over It!
• If someone wronged you… Get Over It!
• If life brings you lemons… Get Over It!
• If a player or your favorite team decides to do something different… Get Over It!
• If you want to move from where you are to where you need to be… Get Over It!

The bottom line is that if you allow someone to anger you, you are allowing them to conquer you.

“Anger is one letter short of Danger.” ~Elanor Roosevelt

Get Over It!

Why are people so unwilling to Get Over It?

evaluate your life

evaluate what’s important to you

evaluate what those who are the closest to you are saying about you

evaluate where you’ve been and where you’re going

evaluate the seeds you are sowing

evaluate what your are doing today and how it will affect your tomorrow

evaluate the things that cause you sorrow

evaluate your heart and ask God to make it clean

evaluate your life in relation to the things unseen

evaluate the unreleased dreams that you are holding captive

evaluate your life and become adaptive

evaluate your life, make adjustments in your life and re-evaluate your life

evaluate your life

~Scott

Criticism is a one of those words that seems to cut most people like a knife.  Although the knife doesn’t seem as sharp when we put the word “constructive” in front of the word criticism; none-the-less the word still seems to pierce.

When I was growing up my mom would always tell me: “Son, you can’t control or worry about what people say… you can only control what you say and what you do.”  Later on in life, as a young leader I had a mentor that would always say “If you’re doing something worthy of people taking shots at you… they will.  I would much rather have a leader that people don’t always understand and who are occasionally criticized, than a “leader” that no one ever talks about.”   I have heard my pastor say something like “If you want to find the leader, look for the one with the arrow in their back!”

I tend to view criticism as neutral… “It Is What It Is!” I prefer to “Eat The Meat and Spit Out The Bones!”  If you don’t want to be criticized, I have some advice for you: Say Nothing, Do Nothing & Be Nothing!

“It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes short again and again, who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause, who at best knows achievement and who at the worst if he fails at least fails while daring greatly so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.” ~Theodore Roosevelt

I don’t ever want to find my place with those “Cold and Timid Souls.”

Criticism: “It Is What It Is!“

What do you think?  Share your thoughts!

Every High Capacity Leader Should Ask Themselves This Question:  Am I encouraging, developing and producing other high capacity leaders?

“The growth and development of people is the highest calling of leadership.” ~Harvey Firestone, Founder of Firestone Tires

Is the encouragement, development and producing of other leaders the greatest measure of success for a leader?

Upon finishing the amazing thanksgiving feast at our home, it was finally time for all of the Thanksgiving festivities to come to an end and all of the BlackFriday preparation to begin.  On my way to take my mother home, my mother in-law (who is staying with us for the Thanksgiving holiday) asked me to stop and get her a newspaper with the sales circular ads.

She was in the process of planning her BlackFriday shopping spree.  This year she will be doing her BlackFriday shopping without my wife who has conceded to the fact that, “She no longer wants anything to do with that madness.”

During one of my pit stops, I sent out this tweet: “Just dropped my mom off at her house… Now on the hunt for a newspaper with the crazy #blackfriday sale ads.” I then proceeded to stop by 7-Eleven, Wal-Mart Market, Wal-Greens, Shell, 7-Eleven #2, Valero, The Post Office and 7-Eleven #3.  No newspaper were to be found anywhere and all of the store clerks seemed to be perturbed by the question, “Do you have anymore newspapers?”

At this point I had done my duty as a good son-in-law and had to forfeit to the fact that there probably wasn’t a newspaper available in the entire Oklahoma City Metro. Meanwhile, I got this Twitter response from @amyurbach: “@ScottWilliams have one that I’m getting ready to toss into the recycle bin of you can’t find one.”

Aha… It looks like Twitter was going to save the day, not only the day — but #BlackFriday.  @amyurbach and I DM’ed back and forth and I made my way over to her and @ericurbach’s home to pick up the newspaper.  Amy blessed me, I blessed my mother-in-law and the wheels on the bus go around and around.

That’s How Twitter Saved #BlackFriday.

How has Twitter helped you or saved the day?  Are you indulging in the #BlackFriday Madness?

Dessert is defined as: A sweet course, treat or dish; served after the main course.

As I was thinking about the holiday season and all of the desserts that I am going to consume; I was reminded of what dessert really is by definition.  It’s that sweet course or treat after the main dish.

In life that main dish could be college and the sweet treat could be obtaining that degree.  The main dish could be your role as a leader and the sweet treats are the lessons that you learn daily.  The main course could be that step in obedience in making the commitment to tithe, the sweet treat is the opening of the floodgates of blessings that God pours into your life.   The main course could be the struggles of life, darkness, insecurity, sin… and the SWEET TREAT is the truth, life, grace and forgiveness through Christ.

You get the picture!  dream BIG. think BIGGER.

The bottom line is to always be mindful and thankful that even though the “main courses in life” may not always be good or our favorite dish…  there is always opportunity for dessert.

It’s All About The Dessert…

“Some people complain that roses have thorns, I’m thankful thorns have roses.”

• Are you able to anticipate the sweet treat after the main courses in life?
• What is your favorite dessert during the Holiday Season?  I’ll go first: Pecan Pie (a little crispy on top and not extra goo-wee.)

I was taking a look back on memory lane last night and ran across this video that I shot exactly two years ago to the day.  It was a video of My Day Through My Eyes, basically a compilation of my entire day.

It was crazy to look back and see all that has changed in two short years.  My youngest son is not a lil’ boy anymore going to private school but rather a Big boy halfway through his second year of elementary school. Some of the blogs that I read in the morning have changed, the music has changed, my oldest son is in middle school, my staff is completely different, I have a book deal and this list goes on and on.

Videos and pictures are great for reflecting.

Here is what you have, a video of My Day Through My Eyes exactly 2 years ago via unedited chunks, all shot from a flip camera (that’s another change, today it would be shot from an iPhone 4).  Some of the video highlights include:

• My morning regimen
• My 5yo son singing & 9yo son dancing
• OU Women’s Basketball Paris-Twins (Courtney and Ashley Paris)
• Meet my staff. BTW-The one who had jokes is Vince; one of our Associate Youth Pastors.
• My wife is MIA… she said I couldn’t record her. LOL
• Live interview with Shaq, as he helps Larry Jones raise money for Feed the children!

What has changed in the last two years of your life?  Do you ever look at old videos and reflect?

Oklahoma City based Lamar Advertising Company has a cutting edge project dealing with Tweets and their Digital Billboard space around Oklahoma City.  In my opinion it’s one of the smartest examples of a business leveraging Social Media for community connection and Brand/Business awareness.

@LamarOKC has these 14 foot by 48 foot digital billboards around the city. They will screen thousands of tweets a day from their followers and choose 4-5 tweets to place on these monstrous digital billboards.  My tweets have been “Lamar’d” several times.  I always know when one of my tweets have been featured, because I will receive phone calls, tweets, emails, facebook updates and new followers letting me know they saw my tweet on the Big Screen. Early on, I even had people ask me if I paid money to have my tweet on the billboard. I simply chuckled…

This is another example of “How and Why” businesses should leverage Social Media. I am writing, you are reading and people are talking positively about @LamarOKC.

You can watch the 2min. video above for the complete story.  The coolest thing about the story is the last tweet they feature on the billboard.

dream BIG. think BIGGER.

Share your thoughts on the Twitter Billboards or any other examples of businesses uniquely leveraging Social Media.

If You Believe That You Can’t… well you are probably right. It’s so easy to get caught up into what we can’t do and what others think we can’t do, that we end up not doing it.  If you don’t believe in you yourself, it’s difficult to get other to believe in you.  On the contrary, if you believe in yourself it’s easy to attract naysayers who think you’re over-confident and Believe That You Can’t.  It’s the Paradoxical Tension of Believing In Yourself.

When people don’t believe in you, let that be motivation to fuel your “can-do” fire.

When you don’t believe in yourself, let that be motivation to fuel your inner “little engine that could” I think I can, I think I can.

Don’t beat yourself up for believing in yourself… it’s the first step to success. If you accept the expectations of others, especially negative ones, then you never will change the outcome. ~Michael Jordan

Even when you don’t believe in yourself… Believe In Yourself!

God Believes In You!

dream BIG. think BIGGER.