Take That First Step

By Joseph Skillin

Encouragement, advice, help -- we all need these from time to time. A greater need is motivation. How can I get going on this project or life-time goal? Why do I keep putting it off? We all have at least one thing we know we should do, yet don't take that first step to start. We need motivation.

Here is a gift for you. Joseph Skillin's book doesn't just help you take the first step to motivation. He walks you through all six steps to self-motivation. 

If you read through all six steps and use the tools he gives you to motivate yourself, you'll be able to accomplish anything you truly want, whether it is a physical, spiritual or emotional goal, whether a recent desire or a yearning from long ago. You can do it. He will show you how. Step by step by step.

At the end of each chapter, he cites a scripture passage of comfort, encouragement and wisdom. God is with you on your journey.

• Language: English
• Publisher: New Harbor Press
• Release date: Jun 6, 2018
• ISBN: 9781386295280

Joseph Skillin

Joseph Skillin's education helped him to understand people and their needs. He spent four years studying post-grad philosophy. He has been motivating people ever since, starting in the slums of Oakland, Ca. in the 1970's. After he moved to Boston, he founded the Center for Motivation and Achievement, teaching motivation techniques to corporate and general audiences. Now retired, he still motivates people through his writings, public speaking engagements and volunteer activities. He can be reached at [e-mail]

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

As far as I’m concerned, I’m an ordinary Joe. I’ve had some nice life experiences, maybe even a few that some would call special. But you have never heard of me. I don’t make the news or the lists of the famous in any category. For the most part, my life is private.

Just an ordinary Joe, but with a life that, while private, has been wonderful. My wonderful private life has resulted from two facts – I was taught useful values and I have tried to live with those values. My Christian religion and the values my parents taught me are the strongest motivators in my life.

As I have gone through life, important life lessons came from simple family living, from ordinary conversations, from every-day events and from my religion. All these stories have a life lesson. Clearly, they do for me.

Many of today’s motivation books are a flood of stories about the world’s top successful people. These are terrific people but I think many are so successful they intimidate most of us.

My life won’t intimidate you. My hope is that each of my simple stories and the lessons I took from them will help you in your life.

As you can see from the Table of Contents, I have organized my stories, my life lessons, into several main sections: The Essentials, Yourself, Others and God. Then I will share several motivational sayings by famous people – statements that inspired their lives and the lives of others around them. They still motivate me today. Finally, I will give you some help on getting started on your road to a better life. 

All my stories, all my suggestions are written in the context of my belief in God. Bottom line, He is our ultimate source of motivation. Yet I am going to talk in terms of what we need to do for our part, to live our lives fully.

It is completely your responsibility to take charge of your own life. I offer my own life lessons so one or two of them might help as you build your own life and seek greater satisfaction with that life. Some of you might be struggling just to get by day to day, burdened by the stresses of worry, illness, job, parenting. Others might be quite satisfied, yet with a hunger for just a little more.

No matter your present status or your current life wish, one of my life lessons might help you take the next step. That, precisely, is why I have written this book. That, precisely, is my hope.

At the end of each story, I submit a scripture quote. To my mind, the quote fits the meaning of what I am trying to encourage in you. You may think of a better quote, more in line with your understanding of God and His Word. If you have better passages, write them into the pages as you go along.  Your citations or mine, if they are the Word of God, they will be helpful.

One suggestion. Once you finish going through this book, you can use it every day as a motivation/prayer book. Just go back through it and, every day, read the scripture quotes and think deeply about them. They will be enough to motivate you for the day.

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Jesus said, Everything is possible for the person who has faith. Mark 9:23

SECTION ONE

SIX ESSENTIAL LESSONS FOR EVERYONE

1. Focus on the positive.

2. You can do anything you genuinely want.

3. The most you ask for is the least you will get.

4. Live!

5. Take immediate action against your inhibiting fears.

6. You are not stuck where you are.

1  THERE WAS A PSYCHIATRIST

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THE STORY

There was a psychiatrist