Booknotes: Quiet Strength

I've been meaning to read this for awhile, and I finally got around to it. It's a bit religious-ey but not in a bad way. I could definitely use a bit more religion or god or spiritualness in my life.

And I like the parts about teaching and helping others. I've also been chasing money all my life and still am, and I worry if I find all the money but then what? What if I lose my soul in the bargain, as that famous Matthew quote asks. Which Dungy's book brings up a few times.

With that, here are my notes:

• My father often said, "If you're going to be a good teacher, you can't just teach the A students. A good teacher is one who helps everybody earn an A."
• "When I was in the service," his father said, "they didn't want to teach us how to fly planes, so we taught ourselves to fly."
  
• We. Blacks. African Americans.
• Things will go wrong at times. You can't always control circumstances. However, you can always control your attitude, approach, and response. Your options are to complain or to look ahead and figure out how to make the situation better.
• Usually my mom and dad were calm and gave us the whys and hows of the situation before they took away privileges.
• ...but blanket rules don't always fit every individual. I need to treat everybody fairly, but fair doesn't always mean equal.
• My mother was a phenomenal storyteller, and from her I learned the importance of illustrating a lesson with a word picture.
• Coach Cal Stoll: "Success is uncommon and not to be enjoyed by the common man. I'm looking for uncommon people because we want to be successful, not average."
• Most people have a better chance to be uncommon by effort than by natural gifts.
• Coach Noll: "Champions don't beat themselves. If you want to win, do the ordinary things better than anyone else does -- day in day out. We're not going to fool people or outscheme them. We're just going to outplay them."

Coach Noll got it from Paul Brown. It all goes back to Paul Brown.

• "Talent is God-given; be thankful. Praise is man-given; be humble. Conceit is self-given; be careful." -- Dave Driscoll.
• "When you can do the common things of life in an uncommon way, you will command the attention of the world." -- George W. Carver.
• "Life will never be the same again, but you won't always feel like you do right now." -- friend and pastor Tom.
• Same list of goals I use every training camp: 1. Top 5 in the NFL in giveaway/takeaway ratio; 2. Top 5 in fewest penalties; 3. Top 5 in overall special teams; 4. make big plays; 5. Don't give up big plays.
• That's what this is all about. Touching lives. Building a legacy -- not necessarily on the field but in those places that most people will never see. Trying to be faithful in the position God has given me.
  
• My purpose in life is simply to glorify God. We have to be careful that we don't let the pursuit of our life's goals, no matter how important they seem, cause us to lose sight of our purpose.