How Preparation Transforms Ordinary into Extraordinary

How does an airline pilot have the right to get in the captain's seat and fly a plane? How does a dentist have the right to tell you to open your mouth so they can look inside and start drilling wherever they think is necessary? How can a medical doctor ask you to take your clothes off or stick a needle in you in order to give you some medicine, or to help you or to check out your bodily parts and functions to see that everything's in order to. Who gave them the right to do that? How did they get the privilege of being able to check out our body physically or fly us in a plane, or to be able to check out our teeth? How do they get that right? Well, on this podcast, I'm going to show you how they got that right, plus a whole lot more.

Welcome to becoming wiser with Dr. Robert A. Wolfe, author and world renowned public speaker, as he shares stories involving his experiences and lessons learned in a good, spirited, positive and fun way. Here's Dr. Robert A. Rome.

Hi, I'm Dr. Robert Rome. Thanks so much for listening to this week's podcast. And I want to share with you one of the most important concepts yet, one of the most simple concepts that I've ever learned. When a person goes to the dentist and the dental person, whether they're a male or a female, the dentist has the right to give you Novocaine or put a shot in your mouth or to work on your teeth. Or when you go to a medical doctor and they ask you maybe to take off some clothes so they can check out a bodily part or a function to see if everything's operating correctly. Or when you get on an airplane and the pilot walks in and he or she sits down in the captain's seat to fly the plane, you don't ask them for their credentials, you don't ask them for their flight log. You just sit back, buckle up and enjoy the trip. Waiting for your peanuts and your cookies and Coke. Well, the truth of the matter is, whether it's a medical doctor or a dentist or an airline pilot, or get this, any thing else in life, it all happens because of one word. And that word is preparation. You see, in order to be a pilot, you have to prepare, you have to take classes, you have to go to flight school, you have to take flight training and instruction. It's doable. There are thousands and thousands of pilots all over the world. But here's the key, and I wish someone had explained this to me. I know it's simple. I just missed it. They were not born knowing how to do that. They had to learn how to do that. It's called preparation. The medical doctor, when he or she graduates from medical school, they start their medical practice, they start practicing medicine. And do you know who they're practicing on? You guessed it. They're practicing on you and me. Yet even though it's called medical practice, they know what they're doing. For the most part, they've been through rigorous training. Four years of college with usually a major in chemistry or physics or science or math. Then four years of medical school. That's eight years of college. Then three more years of an internship where someone watches their hands, guides their life, gives them experience from an older, seasoned, wiser physician. That's the way the medical practice works. And then I have so many good friends who are dentists. I wanted to be a dentist all my life until my dentist talk me out of it. I'm glad that he did. Dr. Henry golden was my dentist growing up, and I wanted to be him. He was an amazing person in my life, but he talked me out of it. I don't know whether he understood personalities or not, but he said, this is not for you. You're more of a free spirit. Go in business with your dad. My dad was a furniture and antique dealer. He traveled all over the world. But my dentist told me, he said, now, you don't want to get tied up in this office all day long working by yourself. He said, find something else to do. It kind of broke my heart, but looking back, I think it was some good wisdom and good direction. But how did he get to. How did Dr. Gold get to be a dentist? He went to dental school. He learned everything there was to know about teeth and about gums and about the oxygen that needed to come into our body while he was performing the different acts of dentistry, the nitric oxide and the other things that would be necessary to know how to use correctly. You know, I'm just interested in the fact of you on this podcast, and I kind of feel like I'm talking to some younger people, so I hope you'll listen. Whether you're a dentist, an airline pilot, whether you're a lawyer, whether you're a physician, whether you're a Spanish teacher, a history teacher, an auto mechanic, or running a restaurant, you were not born knowing how to do that. You were not born knowing how to do anything.

Gene Piaget, the great Swiss psychologist, was the one that mentioned in his research how children were born. Tabula rasa. In other words, they are born with a blank slate. What he Meant by that was we are born knowing nothing. None of us has a lot of experience and intelligence when we're first born. However, we're all born with the capability, for the most part, of learning new things. And that's what life is all about, learning and growing. And don't beat yourself up and don't feel badly that you don't know how to do something. There was a time everyone who knows how to do something now did not know how to do it. I like what my friend Brian Tracy says, every master was once a disaster. So please understand. This is so helpful. I. I know I've beaten myself up many, many times growing up because I. I didn't understand something or I didn't know something, or I thought I should know something, but I didn't know something and I felt bad because I didn't know it. Well, listen, you can't know something you don't know. That's one of the great statements that's been very popular in the last decade or so. You don't know what you don't know. However, we can add something to that. You don't know what you don't know.

But you can learn.

And that's what preparation is all about. If you're going to run a restaurant, it'd be a good idea to learn how to do that, probably by working in a restaurant and learning from someone who has restaurant experience. I have a friend who's a car dealer. I asked him, I said, wait, how did you learn how to do the car business? He said, I got a job working at a car lot when I was in high school and I started paying attention and I knew I wanted to do this one day. So I kept asking questions and kept learning until I got to eventually, instead of washing cars, I started selling them. And then I learned the business. And when I felt like I knew it pretty well and saved up some money and was prepared, there's the key word. I started my own car business. You see, preparation is something you do.

Every day of your life.

Have you ever watched a house being built? They don't put the roof up first, do they? No, they dig the foundation. They make sure the foundation solid, and then the house is built from the bottom up to the top.

They will add the the walls, they'll.

Add the beams, they'll add the roof, but it starts with the foundation. And let me encourage all of you, myself included, if you don't know how to do something, and there's plenty that I do not know how to do, you can Learn. I've got four or five things going on right now that are surprising even to me. I am looking into different opportunities that have to do with finances, that have to do with travel, that have to do with business acumen, that have to do with retirement. I'm 75 years old. I'm strong as a horse and.

Going to live forever. But just in case I don't, I'm looking at what to do to make sure that my business and the personality information that I've created over the last 33 years continues on without me. I've had to get legal help. I've had to get help from experience. Are you aware of how many wonderful, great, powerful, mighty people have lived and they died and everything died with them? The best I can tell, the only person get this, the only person that I know of who has ever left a ongoing, lasting legacy is Dale Carnegie. Dale Carnegie with his how to win friends and influence people, with his ability to teach people how to stand up and speak.

There are Dale Carnegie training schools in all 50 states. Dale Carnegie is one of the most unique individuals because he figured out a way how to duplicate his system of leadership, team building, understanding sales techniques. Bill Carnegie's methodology has outlived himself, but that's because he spent some time developing and working and training in the whole area of preparation, learning how to do things, learning systems, learning information that could be passed on to the next generation. So I know in this particular podcast, I've covered a lot of different areas. That's the way my mind works. It goes 100 miles an hour in two or three different directions, all at the same time. I want to encourage you to do several things. Number one, realize you're building your life. Regardless of whether you're 8 or 18 or 80, you're still building your life. As long as your heart's beating, as long as you're breathing, you're building your life. Build it with things that are good and healthy and wholesome and pure and positive. Stay away from people who are negative and bitter and hateful and mean. They're not going to do you any good and it'll never change and you can't change them. The only person you can change on this whole planet, yourself. Learn to look for the good, the pure, and the positive. Ask yourself this question.

What is it that I want to do?

What is it that I want to learn? Years ago, I wanted to learn business. I didn't learn it overnight. I read a lot of business books and eventually buying a piece of real estate, learning how it worked. I made some mistakes, but I learned business right now. Would it surprise you to know the thing that I'm focused on more than anything else is learning health. I'm pretty healthy. I've been healthy all my life, and I thank God for that. But I also know I could be healthier. At 75, I'm being more careful about what I eat and how much I eat. I mean, I love to eat. I am a foodie. Guess what?

I've.

I'm cutting down almost out sugar and white bread and other things that I find just aren't good for me anymore. Wish I had done that sooner, but I didn't make it a priority. But now it's a priority and I'm preparing myself each day to be wiser and more careful in what I eat. So I hope there's been at least one thing. If there's one thing on this podcast that you've picked up, I hope it's the word preparation. Don't be upset at yourself that if you don't know physics or if you don't know science, or if you don't know how to fly a plane or become a medical doctor or a dentist or a Spanish teacher or anything else, that's another thing. I'm learning a little bit of Spanish along and along and along. We should learn it sooner, but it's never too late to start. I hope that one thing that I've shared on this particular podcast will help you to realize your life is the only life you'll ever get. Let me encourage you to do your best. Try hard each day. Put the building blocks of life together one day at a time, and you'll be the winner for it. I'm Dr. Robert Rohm. Hope this podcast has been helpful. I look forward to sharing with you again on another podcast real soon. Thank you so much. Bye bye.

For more information about this podcast, please visit www.becomingwiserpod.