2025 August 19 Life is opportunity

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Surrounded by Amazing People: Life's Unexpected Opportunities

Hi, this is Jim Cranston from 7EveryMinute, 7EveryMinute.com, the podcast and website about reimagining your life. Thanks for joining me today to talk about amazing opportunities.

I'm currently in a situation again of being surrounded by many talented, obliging, friendly, and generally enthusiastic people. There are many explanations for this phenomenon, but the one thing you pretty much can't deny is that for most people, when you're around great people doing great things, it's very difficult not to be enthusiastic along with them.

In this case, they're mostly podcasters and other content creators who come from a wide variety of backgrounds and interests. The thing they all have in common is a passion for their niche and their topic. I've met people of all ages, skill levels, and viewpoints. Yet that doesn't change their enthusiasm for what they do and what they're willing to do to get better at it.

And therein lies the lesson. People of many backgrounds and interests can all work and play together when they have something of a higher level as a common bond. Many of these people are our age peers. They aren't young technology experts. They're just people who are willing to take a chance to learn something completely new in order to share their passion with others.

I mentioned last week that I'm getting a number of new people lined up for interviews on some very interesting topics, but now I've met even more people in areas that I never would've even considered, and many from different walks of life. They all have different backgrounds, different interests. They're all different ages, from various social backgrounds and different regions of the country and even other countries. But the thing they have in common is they're all passionate about something I think you'll find interesting and they're enthusiastic about sharing.

A lot of what they're talking about is directly related to things that we often discuss here. Perhaps they're involved in ageism and the defense of people in age discrimination suits, or they went through life changes of some sort and realized they had more avenues of opportunity than they first imagined. Some even just had a fulfilling life but now they're helping others in unexpected ways.

They're taking on new things. I met a gentleman who started a podcast about being a father or grandfather to girls who play sports seriously. It turns out there are a lot of different considerations than when your son plays sports. These are just some of the different things that I hope you'll find interesting and enlightening, give you some ideas, and make for good listening and learning.

There's a ton of interesting, useful opportunities all around us, and that's exactly what we often talk about. It's not defining yourself by your age or any other arbitrary measure. It's defining our life by what we have accomplished, and just as importantly, what we still have and are still planning to accomplish.

So I'm very excited about what's coming and the new perspectives that'll be coming our way. Life is filled with amazing opportunities of all sorts, and they're not just for young people or rich people or any other arbitrary filter. One of my podcasting friends who I haven't seen in about five years proudly told me he's finally started to lose weight. He's more active, works out three times a week. He said he works less and earns more. He's spending time with his grandkids and feels better than he ever has in his adulthood, and this is despite having had five major surgeries in the last two and a half years.

He was more upbeat than I had ever seen him, and his attitude has changed. He realized he was wasting part of his life and knew he had to make some changes. As we often say, you can't always control what happens, but we can almost always control how we respond to it. His name is Michael, and he just realized he was letting his life slip by. He thought he had been doing everything he possibly could to make the most of it, and then realized that there were things he could really change—and he did. He's much happier now than I've seen him in a long time.

These people and more have already agreed to spend some time with us. It's really exciting, and I hope you enjoy learning from them as much as I did meeting them.

So that's it for the evening. Your homework tonight is to remember that life truly is filled with amazing opportunities. They may be different than you expect, so try and keep an open mind and look for some things—quite possibly totally unexpected—that you might find interesting, rewarding, or helpful to you in some way.

Extra points if you write a couple of those ideas down and then look at the next steps you'd have to take to turn those discoveries into part of your own reality.

Thank you very much for stopping by. If you found something interesting and useful, please pass it along and remember UKR7.com. That's the site we have with links to people that support the people of Ukraine and World Central Kitchen (WCK.org), where they work throughout the world, helping people in times of disaster.

As we always say, there are lots of people—both national and international and also local—who can always use your help. So if you have some free time, some free cash, or just some free interest, go help them out. Think about them, talk them up. Do whatever it is to help someone else who might not be as fortunate as you are right now.

Even if you're not in a position right now to donate money or time, remember that one of the best ways to live a better life and feel better about yourself is to live outside of yourself, to look to other people, and to show empathy towards others. Something as simple as a smile in the morning can change somebody's day for the whole day.

Again, thank you for stopping by. If you found something interesting or useful, please pass it along and please subscribe and hit that like button. And if not, please drop me a comment as to what else you'd like to hear. Have a great week. Remember to live the life that you dreamed of because that's the path to true contentment. Love and encouragement to everyone. See you next week on 7EveryMinute and 7EveryMinute.com. Thank you.