Wednesday 10/1/08

Well I wish I could say that Nike signed me to a $25 million dollar contract to be the official spokesperson for the Nike Air Stairs but I’d be lying. There’s a better chance of an Amish family pulling up in a hummer. However I am the proud owner of the first ever Nike Air Stairs. As you can see in the picture below (barely) my new left shoe says “Take The” and my right shoe says “Stairs”. I’m sure that we will sell hundreds of thousands of sets for Nike. You can create your own by using Nike’s Signature customization tool on their website.



The shoes are blue and silver which are the official colors of the Take The Stairs World Tour and they match nicely with the blue wrist bands that we’ve been selling to raise money for Charity. We’ve raised over a thousand dollars for charity so far mostly by selling these wristbands. All the proceeds from the wristbands are being stockpiled to go to charity. You, too, can buy one here: Take The Stairs Wristband

These two items, along with the official Take The Stairs Tour T-shirt complete what is almost a full new clothing line! It’s a cool way to get the word out about the tour and to raise money for charities. The bands say “Take The Stairs” on one side and “Discipline" on the other.

Most importantly for you though, is that having physical reminders of your commitments increase your accountability and the likelihood of you reaching your goals. Just like a wedding ring signals to the world that you’ve made an important commitment, you can create other physical reminders of goals that are important to you. There is something extremely powerful about moving commitments of the mind and the mouth to the point of manifestation in the physical world by either writing down your commitments or creating physical reminders such as wristbands, sneakers, and t-shirts.

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Saturday 9/20/08

So I am not sure if you caught in my last blog that today I was in Canada speaking to the Canadian Snack Food Association. Anybody see the dilemma? Snack food companies…discipline…do you see my predicament? Well, let me spell it out for you, I was terrified as to how snack food companies would respond to my Take The Stairs message of discipline. Because a major part of discipline is eating right and exercising to maintain physical fitness and I was concerned that everybody would hate me. So how’d it go?

They loved it! This is by far one of my favorite stops on the World Tour so far. This group was so lively and energetic and welcoming! They are an outstanding group of people with very strong morals and ethics. You’ll never believe what a major part of their conference was about…SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY. I was impressed at how hard these companies are working to develop healthy snacks for people to eat and also at how much they advocate snack foods as a piece of a balanced diet. Additionally some of the companies have initiatives that support and promote physical exercise and health.

We were in total agreement. Snack foods, and indulgence in general is an incredibly important piece of a disciplined lifestyle, as long as like everything else it is in moderation. And I for one love a piece of cheesecake on Sundays after a solid week of consistent working out. I also eat healthy snack foods on a daily basis.

Wheew! Glad it worked out. Plus the facility was one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. In conclusion one more great reason to join the Take The Stairs tour is so that you can eat more snack foods!




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Friday 9/19/08

Today was officially the first time the Take The Stairs World Tour actually made it International. I was invited to speak for the Canadian Snack Food Association in Mont Tremblant Canada! Although the whole idea for the tour came from my trip when I was speaking in Taipei, Taiwan for Toastmasters International earlier this year, I hadn’t actually climbed the stairs of any buildings internationally yet.

And this was also my very first trip to Canada! Upon landing in Canada I noticed two things right away: 1. That everything is much quieter there from the very moment you get off the plane and 2. They have ESCO-STAIRS! Check it out:



Why am I getting the feeling that most of you reading this are not as excited as I was? :) Ok, so I admit I know that I’m a giant nerd for being excited about something so small but isn’t that a big part of what life is all about? Disciplining yourself to take the time to find the little things in everyday that keep you smiling? What things are important to you in your life that you can get truly excited about even if no one else does?

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Tuesday 8/5/08

Some people have had a hard time believing some of my stories - such as that I really did get help from the guys at Atlanta airport to turn off the escalators just for the Take The Stairs guy. And as unfortunate circumstance would have it I recently had to go back through Atlanta Airport, only this time it was in the middle of the day. No chance to turn off escalators in the world’s busiest airport this time – I had to find another way.

It’s been over 5 months since I’ve been in an elevator or on an escalator and I wasn’t about to ruin the streak now. I was flying on my least favorite of all airlines but I wouldn’t dare mention the name of them here publicly – so for the purposes of this blog we’ll just call them DareTran airlines. And DareTran has an incredibly consistent track record of poor performance. From delayed flights, to abnormal turbulence, to lost bags, to horrible customer service, to very rocky landings, and insanely long check in lines. So it was no surprise to me that I got very little empathy from the first 3 DareTran customer service representatives that I approached. One gentleman was extraordinarily nice however and actually offered to move an entire flight to the concourse I was on just to support that Take The Stairs tour!

I was shocked, and quite impressed by this unusually compassionate move. However, as it turns out his request was vetoed by one of the higher ups from DareTran – helping the company remain true to form. So, to make a long story longer, I missed my flight. My commitment to this crazy tour was again being tested. How did the story play out? I found a lovely woman at a Delta counter on the same concourse who IMMEDIATLEY offered to help me in any way possible and was able to arrange for a special passenger pickup to transport me to a different concourse to catch my next flight. I was escorted by airport security down to the tarmac and carted in my own private buggy across the runways to the other terminal. Knowing full well that no one would believe the craziness of this story, I took some pictures for proof!



As I’ve been telling this story over and over I have found some very heated debate that this whole idea may be getting out of hand. Some say “missing flights, moving planes full of people to different concourses, and approaching multiple airlines for help is absurd!” They say “it’s ridiculous over commitment and that it makes the tour too much about the stairs when in reality the stairs are just a metaphor for living a disciplined life.” They say “you can’t expect people to follow that kind of leadership because it’s unreasonable.” Others say “Congratulations for leading by example! Generally followers will do half of what the leaders do and so that is the kind of commitment it takes to succeed at any worthwhile endeavor especially one as important as the Take The Stairs world tour!”

So readers and supporters, I leave it for you to decide. Is this getting too out of hand? Or is it exactly what we would hope for in gaining attention for a worthy cause? Please post your comments. ;-)

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Friday 8/1/08

Being that my first business experience came from selling children’s books door to door for The Southwestern Company I’ve been known to make a few cold calls. Today I landed in New York City. It’s only the second time I’ve ever been here and I came because I am the Youth Chair for the National Speaker’s Association global convention. For the next few days I’ll be watching, entertaining, and playing goalie to keep 125 students between the ages of 10-24 “inbounds” and to “Dear God don’t let me lose anyone.” Obviously NYC is home to the Empire State Building which of course is an important stop for me on my Take The Stairs World Tour. Since 9/11 you might imagine that it’s nearly impossible to gain access to the stairs in such a highly secured building. In fact I couldn’t even get a phone call returned – which is why I thought I’d just stop by in person and knock on a few doors.

I’ve known for sometime via research that the only chance of getting in that stairwell is to be invited into the once a year race sponsored by the NY Road Runners. This is the same New York Road Runners who put on the Boston Marathon except instead of thousands of people participating in the race, the Empire State Run-Up Race is limited to just 100 COMPETITORS from around the world and by INVITE ONLY! The more I learned about it, the more discouraged I was becoming. But I had to knock. By some random chance of navigating an automated voicemail system I ended up calling the fund raising arm of the organization, the New York Road Runners Foundation and God must’ve been at work because the woman who picked up the phone was incredibly warm and caring and also quite curious about the Take The Stairs mission.

Her name was Elizabeth. She is just one of a team of people at the organization who have made a commitment to dedicate their life to serving young people. And I think partly because I’m a fairly young (26) guy and because the nature of my trip was reaching out to young people, Elizabeth gave me a chance – A HUGE CHANCE! She set up an immediate meeting with the Executive Director of the Foundation, Cliff. I took a cab over to their office and as I walked up to the front door of the office it’s safe to say that my palms were sweating. Not just because I was nervous but because I had to talk my way past a high security entrance on the ground floor and sprint up 12 flights of stairs to make my meeting on time!



Elizabeth and Cliff were even more amazing in person. Their entire office was buzzing with the passion of well-to-do people living a life in service of others. It was an incredible team and an incredible meeting. Cliff explained that he is fairly confident that he can get the Take The Stairs guy into next year’s upcoming run-up at the Empire State Building! (We’ll keep our fingers crossed). They also shared with me a program that they run in inner city schools called Mighty Milers. It’s a program that gets kids excited about running and physical fitness at a young age. It also teaches them the importance of setting goals and of course, my very favorite word discipline.

When I reviewed the Mighty Milers DVD I learned something quite sad. Today over 25% of the US population is more than 30 lbs overweight. Let that sink in for a moment…25%. As I’m traveling the world on this Take The Stairs tour I’m realizing two things: 1. That success really does come from doing things others won’t do – such as knocking on doors even in despair and 2. That there is no doubt that the world is in dire need of discipline. As a culture we are slipping in every area of our life. The two most noticeable failures are with the overwhelming amount of debt that we carry on our credit cards and the overwhelming amount of weight we carry on our bodies. The world needs discipline. Will you join me in fighting for the cause?

Join the Take The Stairs Tour:

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