Taking Notes

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I’ve been taking notes all weekend. We are in Northfield, Minnesota for the wedding of Emily and Brian and I can’t help ignore the feeling that this one is different; this one is special. If you want to see how a father should give his daughter away, this is it. 
Emily is very special to us. She babysat Sorin and Norah a few years ago and really connected with our family. Anyone who watches your kids is special. But there are certain ones that still rise above for whatever reason. The more I’ve gotten to know the Quinnell family this weekend the easier it is to see why Emily rose up on our list. 
Tonight I was taking notes from Emily’s father, Mark. He lead the team and conducted himself with such grace, love and poise that I couldn’t help but notice it all starts with him. He has exactly one daughter; he gave her away tonight. If and when I ever get to give away Norah, this will be one of my models. 

Three Things I Learned Last Week at Ironman Wisconsin

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I’ve been attending Ironman Wisconsin since its inaugural race in 2003. I’ve had numerous friends race and this year was no different. Two friends from church were in the race, one client from Pinnacle raced (and placed 5th in his age group!), and one friend from my Wednesday morning book study was there. This last athlete, we’ll call him Will because that’s his name, was the one I was tracking the most on Sunday.

If you’ve never been to Ironman, this needs to change. Especially if you’re here in Madison you need to realize that this amazing event is right in our back yard and offers so much to the community and will do wonders for your own personal motivation and appreciation for what the human body can accomplish.

I followed the race a little more this year than in years past because I’ve gotten to know Will better. It helped that I knew he would be doing really well – the guy can bring it! At the end of the day, I learned three things from Ironman.

Starting and Not Finishing is Better than Not Starting at All

Ironman Wisconsin 2015 start

When I was in college, one of my instructors introduced himself as an athlete that had competed in several Ironmans. When we followed up with details, we learned he actually never completed any! Each time he had injury or race-day complications that prevented a finish. At the time I dismissed his efforts, not realizing how much time he had put in. Fast forward to 2015 and I can tell you that standing at the start of Ironman Wisconsin I am very confident every athlete that gets into that water has put in countless hours of training. Most of them will finish, some won’t. But all the athletes have put in the training and now they’re treading water at the start line. Just getting to that start line is a huge accomplishment. You cannot finish without starting. Put in the work and get to that starting line.

Even Pros Get Passed

Will Ironman Wisconsin out of water 2015

Sorry – blurry because I had to raise my camera and couldn’t focus. The volunteers are ripping off his wetsuit so he can get to the run.

When Will got out of the water, he was in 52nd place. Wanna see? Check out this video. You’ll want to fast forward to 1:28:00. Look at the race clock in red, he’s the guy in the middle of the screen 58:35 ripping his cap off); here’s the video. Out of the water he was 52 overall. Will is not a pro but he’s darn good. And even the good ones get passed. Of course taking nothing away from Will, but almost 50 people passed him on the bike. (Editor’s note: he pretty much passed those same 50 people and finished 52 overall, same as when he got out of the water.) This is a good reminder that you can’t always be first; you can’t always be at the top. Please hear me out – Will is in the top percentage of this race at all times. But my point is that there are still times when we get passed. Do not get discouraged. Run (or in this case, bike) your race. But whatever you do, don’t give up.

Champions Play to the Whistle

In my football days the coaches always emphasized playing all the way through the whistle – never give up on a a play. You stop when the whistle blow and you never anticipate a stop in play. At about 4:30pm Will was on the race course and looking very strong. It was difficult to find him but once I did I got right behind him and was able to get a few pics. I was talking to him (assuring him he didn’t need to talk to me – “you need every breathe to run!”) and then I noticed something. Will kept checking his watch. He was at mile 23. There is nothing easy about the last three miles of a 140.6-mile race, but Will was looking very strong and I was taken back that he was still checking his pace. “Just finish” I kept saying in my head. Not good enough for Will. He needed to know who fast he was going and he was calculating just how fast he could go; what was in the tank to finish well.

Will has three miles to go

Will has three miles to go

 

Champions always play to the whistle. Each workout, each test, each project – there is a distinct start and finish to most things in life. Will reminded me that his Ironman was over when he finished the finish line. And that finish line was captured on video:

https://instagram.com/p/7lmdM9QQtPsMKcdnNUHPMUOlzYmlsIuuBDXXk0/

There’s not many events more inspirational that an Ironman. You don’t need to even want to do one to show up and cheer on these athletes. Go an watch, cheer hard, and learn a few things about competing with yourself and competing in life. I was honored watch Will on Sunday – from getting out of the water, to high speeds on the bike and as I biked along side him as he finished Ironman Wisconsin this year. He’s a champion. And he inspires me.

One Thousand Wells: An Intervew with Charlie Lowell

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In 2004 Jars of Clay and Jena Nardella founded Blood:Water Mission. I’ve written about Blood:Water many times on the blog. Today’s guest, Charlie Lowell, first appeared on the blog back when Inland was released. Please check out the history of Blood:Water, one of my favorite organizations.

Jena on the Jars tour bus

Jena on the Jars tour bus, left to right Jena Nardela, Matt Odmark, Steve Mason, Charlie Lowell, Dan Haseltine, Aaron Sands

This is a big release week! No, there’s not a new album coming out from the band, but their Blood:Water co-founder Jena Nardella is releasing her first book. Everyone associated with the band and the organization is very excited for One Thousand Wells. Charlie graciously took some time to answer a few questions about the book and his experience with the work Blood:Water is doing in Africa.

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Hans: Charlie, thanks for taking some time again to talk about a book that I know is near and dear to your heart. You and your bandmates along with Jena started Blood:Water back in 2004. The non-profit started with $1 and has since raised $27 million. Talk about a tipping point where you could feel the organization really building momentum.

Charlie:  At some point pretty early on, we began talking about 1,000 wells, and we learned that one US dollar can provide 1 year of water for 1 person in Africa.  That was pivotal- both in realizing how much difference we can make with so little, and empowering us to think about the human story.  So often we hear the huge statistics- millions of people are dying, etc… and we lose that human connection and get overwhelmed.  It’s debilitating to think we can do anything helpful.  The $1/ 1 person “human equation” undermines that all and makes it about people again.  I can think about a person, a family, not too unlike my own, and I can do something about that.

HS: How many trips have you made to Africa? What is one story or scene you can share with us who have never been, but want to feel connected to the work Blood:Water is doing there?

CD:  I’ve been about 5 times over the past decade.  One of the most memorable experiences was an early trip (maybe 2 years into our partnerships on the ground), and a middle-aged Kenyan woman named Dorkus was recounting how a clean water well had positively affected their rural community.  She listed all the great health effects (which were many), and then her eyes lit up and she said with pride, “And look at my beautiful, smooth skin!”, and continued to describe feeling younger, being asked out on a date by an elder, and a powerful sense of renewed dignity and womanhood.  Again, it wasn’t just about water- the building block of life- but this human empowerment/ dignity element that we didn’t see coming.

HS: Every summer my family vacations at a family camp in northern Wisconsin, Fort Wilderness in Rhinelander. This year I did a double-take when I saw a Blood:Water t-shirt! Blood:Water and Fort Wilderness combining forces! As a co-founder you’ve seen many small campaigns like a t-shirt partnership contribute to the cause. Talk about one that sticks out to you.

CL:  Indeed!  Well, it’s really about fans and friends taking the cause up and getting creative with it.  We’ve seen elementary school kids selling tomatoes in their neighborhood, families foregoing a sprinkler system and donating the money instead, kids doing “Lemon:Aid” stands, and college campus water walks.  The most fun we have is when people take what they are already great at, and find a way to bring the Blood:Water story into it.

HS: Can you give us a quick glimpse into the book from two perspectives? Since you and Jena were side-by-side over the last 11 years, what is in the book that was a good memory of the organization for you? And what didn’t make the book that you personally remember from the Blood:Water journey?

CL:  I loved reading the book (we got a preview copy a couple months back, in return for all the pre-release CDs we gave Jena over the years), and was not expecting the honest memoir part of the book.  Knowing more about Jena’s upbringing, what stuck with her, what offended her, and how she was shaped, was new to me in many ways.  So I love that it’s not just about those few years of starting an organization, but the formation up to the point, the struggle in the midst, and the wondering and hope moving forward.  What I wish was in the book, and is really hard to communicate through writing, is more of the many Heroes and She-roes we were honored to meet and partner with on the Africa side.  And seeing a community experience clean water is just impossible to share with others.  I always loved being on the ground there with Jena, seeing the way she would related and communicate with women’s groups and leaders was breath-taking.

HS: At many of your shows with Jars of Clay, Blood:Water is there and the audience gets to hear Dan’s pitch. Today we hand the mic to the piano player: Please tell us what Blood:Water means to you and how we can get involved.

CL:  To me, Blood:Water came along at a time when I was struggling with how faith played out- actively, engaging all parts of the person. Worship felt flat and un-sustaining (I think many musicians struggle with that, if we’re honest), and suddenly this work of partnering with Africans- having our eyes opened to new people and places, and seeing God SO much bigger and wilder than ever before- became a new understanding of more holistic worship for me.  Engaging and being awake to the heart, soul, mind, hands, eyes, ears, and recognizing that it all comes from our Creator.  Isaiah speaks of the new worship of service, not sacrifice.  That was a big puzzle piece for me, and I have our friends in Africa to thank for making some sense of it.

You you really want, you can read the first chapter for FREE. If you want to purchase a copy, you can get it on Amazon and any other major vendor. For more information on Blood:Water, visit bloodwater.org.

Essential Habits

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If I were to drill down the best predictor of my clients’ success, it would be the quality of the habits they’ve formed. All of my clients have very specific goals. Success starts with goals but success makes progress with habits. How are you spending your time? What is a non-negotiable in your week? How often is that non-negotiable happening in any given week? When you have answered these questions, you can claim a habit as your own.

I have too many irons in the fire. Can you relate? Either way, a productive and efficient life will be defined by the habits you’re able to execute. Are you signed up for a race? You need to get miles in. Are you running a business? What habits make that happen? Are you trying to launch a business? What habits do you need to have to put in the work before you go live? Are you writing a book? Chapters don’t write themselves – you need to do the work and you need to write on a regular basis. Are you trying to learn anything new? It takes many practices stacked on each other to move the ball down the field.

Think about your workflow. Think about your habits. Think about your distractions. Think about your goals and be realistic about what it will take to get there. Put together a game plan of habits and start stacking successful weeks on top of each other.

For me, I’m at a one year anniversary at Pinnacle. Katie and I just bought our first house. The kids have a new school district. I have a lot of reasons around me to examine where I am and where I’m going. I suppose I wrote this more for me. Hopefully you can find some value for your own season of life.

Mom’s Retirement

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MONDAY MORNING, 5:05AM

I’m up as I am every morning, sitting on the couch getting ready for my day. I’m watching across the street more than usual because it’s my mom’s last commute to work. She retires tomorrow, but she’s staying the night in Pewaukee to see some friends. So this morning she leaves for the last time. It’s been an interesting year for us because we both leave for work around the same time in the mornings.

5:20am

I think I missed her! She’s not opening the garage door at her usual time. But I’ve been up since 4:30 – I couldn’t have missed her!

5:30am

There she is! I’m out the door but she doesn’t see me. Now waving and now I missed her! I wanted to wish her well on her last commute! Now I have to catch her before she hits the belt line.

I proceed to blow through the lights at Siggelkow and Terminal; she’s just turning left under 51, but four cars are now between us. This probably won’t happen. A red light at Vogues! And there’s a perfect amount of cars in each lane, I pull up right next to her and wave! She doesn’t look happy. But there’s a good reason. It’s not that she’s not happy, it’s that she’s fighting back some tears, her eyes are leaking a little bit. No surprise… if you know my mom. We both know it’s a sentimental moment here at 5:34am. Only the son of a sentamental mom would take a picture of said mom as she takes the belt line east commute for the last time.

  
TUESDAY: RETIREMENT

I’m so proud of my mom. For years she’s worked at WCTI, then it became WCTC. I remember when we would walk across the fields from the Pewaukee campus to her car while she finished work at “CTC” as we called it. When the family moved back to Madison (and McFarland), she kept commuting because she loved he job and she was in for the long haul. 

6:19am

Mom just texted me. 

  

Charleston

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I still haven’t made sense of the shooting in Charleston. Of course I never will. Yesterday I steered clear of the typical tweet: “Thinking and praying for Charleston.” I was thinking. I was praying. But I wasn’t writing about it because it was too fresh. Plus I agree with Eddie:

So can we talk about this in the absence of crisis? Can we be proactive instead of reactive? I don’t have answers. I’m not sure I’m for or against gun control, but I can relate to the words of President Obama:

As a Christian I believe we live in a fallen world. I believe the world was originally perfect and our sin messed that up. Our only hope for glory is trusting that Jesus has paid for our sin. If we believe that, we can be redeemed.

I offer that note because it’s how I can somehow wrap my mind around these types of tragedies. It helps me. But this latest shooting somehow hit closer to home. It brought me to a new reality: for the first time I realized it’s entirely possible that a random act of violence can happen to me. And in that reality I can only find comfort knowing when this life is over, I will be with Jesus. I do not say that flippantly. I do not want to die. But waiting until the end of life is too late to determine if God does or does not exist.

Published with Desk.


Ten Years Ago

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Ten years ago today my girlfriend, Katie, threw me a surprise birthday a party at Vilas park. Somehow I got wind of it and decided to turn a celebration of me into a celebration about us: I asked her to marry me. 

So that went well. 

What great memories. What a great adventure. 

Ten years ago today, Katie said yes. Time flies. Don’t miss it! Capture every moment, give thanks, and tell a great story with the life you’ve been given.