There are a couple of motivational speakers that I have learned from in my life that have uplifted me and given me the strength keep pressing on when I was ready to give up. I want to talk about them a bit and then find out who has inspired YOU in your lifetime.

The Big Guy

Nope, I'm not talking religion or faith-based gurus here, but 6'7" Tony Robbins. Love him or hate him, he has inspired millions of people to create better lives for themselves.

I first heard him speak when I was at a particularly low point in my life in my mid-30's. Having come from a fairly negative family background, especially having a lack of strong male figures to look up to, it was wonderful to hear such positivity from a man! A strong, upbeat, successful male figure who shared his story of how he pulled himself out of a bad situation and created a successful life for himself.

My husband and I went all in, buying the Personal Power II: The Driving Force 12-part lesson plan (in cassette tape - does that tell you how long ago that was?). We had the notebooks and the life plans and listened to every one of the tapes. And you know what? Every goal but one that we wrote down in the exercise books has come to pass. Every modest dream we reached for became a reality.

The one goal of retiring with a certain amount of money hasn't happened yet. And the funny thing is, we actually reached the monetary goal but then realized we were too young to actually retire because of inflationary reasons. The amount of money we thought we could retire with won't sustain us into our old age as we had hoped! Is that poor planning or do we just need to adjust our goal? We thought that that amount of money would be all we needed. Wrong.

Well, this isn't Tony's fault, anyway. But we kind of drifted away from Tony after following his lessons. He virtually disappeared from the motivational scene for awhile due his own personal problems. Now, that's kind of ironic, yes?

But he is back, strong as ever. We've absorbed his lessons though, so don't feel the need to hear him talk about them over and over again.

The Teachings of Abraham

Now, this is kind of too woo-woo for some people. It requires that you believe in an afterlife, which a lot of people don't, but I do. That you believe in the idea that there is more to "life" than what happens here in our consciousness or existence here on Earth.

In a nutshell, everything is energy. Everything. When you ask the Universe for something you truly desire and align your energies with that desire, you have to receive it. The trick is, how do you align your energies? What do those energies feel like?

This is what they (Esther and Jerry Hicks) talk about in their books. They are very enlightening, but you do have to be willing to take a "leap of faith" so to speak. But this is not a religion, not at all. It's more of a belief system.

Do you remember the book Think & Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill? The Teachings of Abraham are very much in accord with Hill's book, he just uses slightly different terminology but it's the same theory, in my view.

One of the things Napoleon Hill teaches in his famous book is that "Thoughts are Things." Thoughts have power. Thoughts can create things, and thoughts can destroy things.

Too Heavy for a Blog Post?

Probably. But this is something I've been thinking about a lot lately. What is it that I turn to whenever I'm discouraged in life? What helps me get past the potholes in life without too much stress?

And I remembered that it is the teachings of these two, Tony Robbins and the Hicks, that I've carried with me most of my adult life that have helped me so much.

Please Tell Me

Who or what inspires you? What pushes you forward to keep fighting when you sometimes just want to throw in the towel? I look forward to hearing your thoughts. Please share!