Category — Attitude of Gratitude

By: Tina Baiter

Do what you can, when you can. Those are seven words Tim Reynolds and Pam Reynolds live by in all aspects of their lives. And on a Monday morning near the end of May, the Reynolds were both at the gym doing their normal workout routines when they learned a tornado had devastated the town of Joplin, Missouri.

Joplin, a small town of about 50,000 people, was located only six hours away from the Reynolds spacious and cozy Texas ranch located near Texarkana, Texas. Usually Joplin would never make national news, and usually the Reynolds wouldn’t be watching the news even if it had. On that Monday, neither incident was the case. The devastating tornado had taken out a large majority of the town, and the national media was covering the story. Pam was watching coverage of the disaster in disbelief as she did her workout.

As a registered nurse and the chief operating officer of HealthCARE Express, an urgent care clinic in Texarkana, Pam always wanted to go and volunteer when other national disasters had happened. As an emergency medicine doctor and a former Green Beret, Tim had too. Timing, raising five children, and distance away from the disaster areas had kept them from volunteering in past disasters, but not this time.

“I always felt a little bit guilty that I couldn’t get down to help when (Hurricane) Katrina happened,” Tim said. “Then when Alabama happened, the same feelings came up. I always felt bad I couldn’t go. When Pam came up to me at the gym and showed me what was happening, I said, ‘Alright, I’m not going to feel bad about this one. We’re going.’”

Tim and Pam left the gym and headed back to their ranch. They loaded up a trailer, flashlights, blankets, extra clothes, their Polaris Ranger, water, and food.

“We didn’t want to become part of the problem, so we took enough supplies for ourselves for several days,” Tim said. “By the time it was time to go, my parents who were in visiting (from Salt Lake City, Utah) said they wanted to go.”

The Reynolds oldest two children, Spencer Reynolds and Natalie Reynolds, both pre-med students home for the summer from university, also volunteered to go.

“When we left here, we actually had no idea where we were going to stay or what we were going to do when we got there,” Tim said. “We didn’t care where we stayed. We knew we could sleep in the truck if we had to. We just took off and started driving.”

Because of their unique medical background, the Reynolds felt they could help most in the medical arena. They contacted Buzz Barron, the director of the Red Cross in Texarkana, to find out where they should go to sign up to be volunteers upon arrival in Joplin. That was the only plan the family had as they headed to Joplin with a desire in their hearts to help.

“When we drove into Joplin, it all looked fine when we got there,” Pam said. “That was because we came in on the interstate and were not yet at the parts of town totally devastated. We drove towards the hospital because we knew it had gotten hit. After we left from there, we drove to the university where the Red Cross was. We did go in medically to try and help with the Red Cross, but because the hospital was one of the things that had got hit, they had so many extra medical physicians available.”

The Reynolds arrived in Joplin late in the evening that Monday night. Luckily, they had made connections to stay with the family of a friend of theirs who lived in Joplin, Hilton and Kathy McDonald. Though the McDonald’s house was untouched by the storm, their lives were not.

The McDonald’s son, Daniel, had graduated high school the night the tornado hit. The tornado completely destroyed the high school, but those attending the ceremony were spared, as the ceremony was held on the campus of a local university. Hilton, a surgeon, was scheduled to perform an emergency surgery immediately following his son’s graduation. Hilton left the graduation after his son walked across the stage and headed to the hospital. He was notified his surgery had been bumped to a later time slot, so he decided to go by Sonic to get a drink, when he heard there was a tornado heading towards Joplin.

“There were two 16 year old girls working there, and he told them, ‘You guys need to take cover. There’s a tornado coming straight towards Joplin,’” Pam said. “They told him, ‘We can’t do anything about it, we don’t own the place.”

From there, Hilton headed to Wal-Mart. He was there when the sirens started going off, 17 minutes before the tornado hit. They closed the Wal-Mart and wouldn’t let anybody out. Hilton was snuck out the back door after management learned he was a surgeon on his way to do emergency surgery.

As the tornado hit, Hilton was under an overpass trying to avoid hail damage. He survived the storm fine. The two girls working at Sonic were killed by the tornado in Joplin. The Wal-Mart where he had been just a few minutes earlier was completely destroyed. The hospital where he was headed to do his surgery, also destroyed. But Hilton survived, and the next night he was able to open his home to a family of volunteers from Texarkana.

On Tuesday morning, the Reynolds loaded up in the truck with their trailer attached and started looking for someone who needed help. The McDonalds had given them directions to a neighborhood they knew had suffered major damage.

“Several of the houses had four or five people there already, and we decided to look for somewhere that didn’t have a lot of help,” Pam said. “When we pulled up to the Miller’s house, it was just the two of them. Their house was completely gone. It was on a corner lot, and their house was all squished and behind where it had been.”

Luke and Jana Miller had lost a lot in the storm, and they were hesitant at first to accept help.

“I think it is so personal having people go through all of your personal belongings,” Tim said. “Can you imagine everything you own being thrown across your yard? Once we did start to help them, they became so grateful. It was interesting the things they wanted to keep, the things that had some sort of emotional meaning.”

Luke wanted only two things from his house. The first was a dresser his dad built. The dresser had been stored up in the attic, which after the tornado was now missing a ladder and easy way to get into. The second was the head of the first deer he had shot. Jana was excited when she learned it would be possible to salvage her piano. All of the other stuff in their house that was gone, was gone. They were okay with that because they still had each other.

“They were small things to us, but it meant the world to them,” Pam said, as tears filled her eyes. “They had been so violated, it made them so vulnerable. I think as the day went on, it got to the point it became so overwhelming, Jana started asking me for advice on what to do with things. It was amazing how close we became in 12 hours.”

After helping that afternoon, the Reynolds and the Millers headed to another part of town that had also been devastated to help Jana’s mom, Millie, recover things from her home. Pam and Julie Reynolds, Tim’s mom, spent most of the afternoon drying out hundreds of family photos. The photos told the story of Jana and Millie’s life.

“That was also the home Jana was raised in,” Pam said. “So she lost her own home, and she lost her childhood home. Her mom had lived there for 38 years. She lost all of that.”

“And Luke was a pharmacist, and the pharmacy where he worked at was Wal-Mart. That was also destroyed,” Tim added. “So she lost her home. She lost the house she grew up in, and he lost his job, all in the same evening. And their attitude was amazingly grateful. Grateful they were still alive. Grateful their child wasn’t with them when it happened.”

Living with an attitude of gratitude is something Tim and Pam also do every day of their lives. It is a personality trait they believe they developed because of their background. It is the same personality trait that leads them to help others.

“We both come from very different backgrounds than the lifestyle we have now,” Tim said. “My dad is a truck driver with six kids. We were very poor when we grew up. Pam’s dad is a farmer from North Dakota. Her mom made her clothes when they grew up. We’ve been blessed with so many things, and I believe part of happiness is being grateful for what you already have. So every day we try to remind ourselves how lucky we are. Part of that is what makes us want to go help when those things happen.”

The Reynolds are planning a return trip to Joplin later this summer, not only to help the friends they have already made, but also to help the town continue to recover from the devastation. The one thing they realized is more than anything else, the people of Joplin need help digging out and cleaning up.

Helping others is something the Reynolds have always been good at. In addition to their volunteer work in Joplin, Tim also volunteers his services as a life coach through his free weekly newsletter, LivingEveryMinute.com. He has helped numerous people set and reach life goals. As an expert in the urgent care field, he serves as the publisher for a free urgent care publication, UrgentCareManagementMonthly.com. He believes in the importance of giving back and sharing education with others. In 2005 he was given the Wilbur Smith Award for starting People’s Clinic.

Pam brought a leadership class to Texarkana called LifeSkills Leadership from the Heart. So far, almost 60 people have had their lives and businesses changed through the classes, which are held every three months. She is working to raise funds to send those who cannot afford to go to the classes to them. She is a former member of the Texarkana Chamber Ambassadors, a graduate of Leadership Texarkana, and a member of the local Kiwanis Club.

Neither Tim nor Pam have any intentions of halting their volunteer work anytime soon.

“Our goal is to be able to grow HealthCARE Express big enough to have a disaster relief unit we can take to give out water, first aide, and supplies,” Tim said. “What we did was helpful, but it is so little compared to what we could do.”

Source: Four States Living Magazine

Over the last few months something has really started to irritate me, and I notice it irritates a lot of other people too. I even realized that by partaking in it, I was becoming irritated at others. That is when I realized just how much our society has grown to allow the feeling of entitlement to control us. Let’s face it, you decided to read this article because you wondered what tips it would give on how to ensure you get everything you are entitled to get.

Getting everything you are entitled to get is easy. Why? Because the only thing you are entitled to on this earth is the right to breathe, and that could be debated. Everything else is privilege, a luxury, a lucky chance, or a direct result of the effort you put into living the life you design for yourself. Do you feel the need to argue that point? Go ahead, you’re entitled to.

History of Entitlement
Sociologists attribute the growth of entitlement to Generation Y, or the group of adults born between 1982 and 1995. In general, adults who grew up in Generation Y were sheltered by their parents, not taught the value of work, and given just about anything they wanted. Why? Their parents wanted them to have life easier than their own childhood had been. This is the same group of parents who grew up reaping the rewards of their own work and saying things like, “There is no elevator to the top, only stairs.” Ironic, eh?

Additionally, the over promotion of the “customer is always right” and “because I’m the boss, that’s why” mentalities has led us to believe everything should always be just the way we want it. After all, if I am going to pay $6 for my morning coffee, I am entitled to a smile and friendly banter. If my doctor is going to charge me $100 for my visit, I am entitled to be treated like royalty the entire time I am at the clinic. If I work for my company for a year, regardless of the amount of effort I put into my job, I am entitled to a pay raise on my anniversary. And if my employees are salary instead of hourly, I am entitled to be able to call them when it suits me, even if they have already put in a full days work.

I am part of generation Y. I wish I could say I lack the feeling of entitlement. I do value hard work, but there are times when I feel I deserve preferential treatment just because I am me. Lucky for me, I have also realized if I live my life believing everything should just happen to me because I was put on this earth for it to happen, nothing would ever happen.

Problems with Entitlement
What about you? Do you feel like you are special, or do you realize there are a lot of “special” people out there all competing with you to succeed? The problem with feeling entitled is we lose site of the perspective that everything we get and do comes with consequences, conditions, or effort spent. When we allow entitlement to overtake us, we lose the joy of work and gratification. We rob ourselves of the chance to develop initiative, motivation, and personal responsibility.

Being Special Will Hurt You
If you have never been told this, the next sentence could be a hard pill for you to swallow. You are not special just because your parents told you that you are special. You are not special just because you won a major award two years ago. You are not special just because your business succeeded and now you are making more money than you ever dreamed possible. The moment you start to think you are special you stop your ability to continue with progress. The reality is you are not entitled to anything. You have to continue to earn success, every day. Yesterday’s accomplishments are just that – yesterday’s.

Being Special Will Hurt Your Future
Another problem with entitlement is it stops people from setting their dreams and goals. Take a second to look back at your life. At this very moment is your life where you thought it would be 10 years ago? My guess is the answer is no. It may be time to sit down and map out a goal plan for your life. If you need help, check out the program I completed recently, Living Every Minute: Design the Life You Deserve. It will help you kick the entitlement curve and set up a plan to actually get you where you want to be. The hard part is you will have to actually work. The good news is you know you are entitled to reach your goals because you are willing to work for them.

Being Special Will Make You a Victim
Finally, you need to realize you become a victim the moment you let a sense of entitlement take control of your life. It is very easy to recognize when this happens because you will start to blame everyone on earth for your failures instead of owning up to how you could have preempted them or how you can avoid them in the future. The more special you feel, the more you anticipate receiving appreciation, recognition and praise when you do something right, and the more you start to resent people when those things do not happen.

Don’t get me wrong. To your parents you will always be special. To the rest of the world, however, you are going to have to work very hard to succeed. If you sit around feeling special, at the end of the day, all you will have is a feeling. It is important for you to understand what makes you unique. It is even more important for you to work hard and use those unique skills to foster a successful life. And the only way you can do that is by setting goals, working to achieve them, and using your unique attributes to benefit others.

Need help getting rid of the entitlement attitude and writing a plan to take control of your life again? Then check out the Living Every Minute Design the Life You Deserve Complete Program.

After the most devastating tornado in US history, we spent three days volunteering help in Joplin, Missouri. The destruction was incomprehensible, but the lessons we learned together as a family through the stories of those we met in Joplin will remain as a testament to the things that truly matter in this world.

Joplin’s Devastation
You have probably seen photos of the devastation of Joplin on the news. As I write this, there are still 1500 people missing, over 120 dead and counting, many of them not identified. It is hard to find words to truly describe how the city looks now. As a former green beret, it’s safe to say Joplin appears as if a fleet of B-52 bombers dropped their entire payload on the city, multiplied by ten.

Our New Friends
After learning about the devastation on the news last Monday morning, my oldest kids, my parents (who are in visiting from Salt Lake City, Utah), my wife, and I all decided we needed to go help. My wife is a registered nurse, and I am a doctor certified in emergency medicine. We knew we might be able to help provide medical assistance. Short of that, we just left Texas with a mission to help where needed.

A local couple, Hilton and Kathy McDonald, graciously welcomed us to stay in their home while we volunteered to help clean up the community. They did not have electricity, but considering how bad everyone else in their neighborhood had it, no electricity was anything but an inconvenience.

I have never seen such tragedy. The strange thing about where the McDonald’s live is two blocks away, the neighborhood is fine. But in the area of the tornado’s path, there’s total destruction. There is only so much you can do to help.

Over the three days we spent in Joplin, we helped what I can only describe as “a little”. Most of our efforts were focused on helping Luke and Jana Miller salvage things from the rubble that once was their home. They were fortunate to recover a ladder from the attic Luke’s grandpa had built and Jana’s piano. Most everything else they owned was destroyed. Also destroyed was the company in town where Luke worked.

After helping the Miller’s, we met Jana’s mother at her house. Though, like Luke and Jana, her house had also been destroyed by the powerful forces of Mother Nature. We spent our last day in Joplin helping recover things from her house. It is amazing to me how grateful these three were to have help, at a time when they had lost so much. Their gratitude reminded me of some important lessons.

1. Live with an Attitude of Gratitude Every Day.
Nothing you own is guaranteed to be yours tomorrow. No one you love is guaranteed to be by your side when you get home tonight. Be grateful for the things you have in your life and cherish them every single minute. Remember, everything can be gone in the blink of an eye.

2. Things Don’t Matter.
As we sifted through piles and piles of precious belongings that had been reduced to worthless rubble, we kept hearing the same words across the community, “I am just glad he/she is okay.” For Luke, who not only lost his house, his job, and most of the possessions he had worked his entire life to obtain, one of the only things that truly mattered was knowing Jana was okay. Remember, at the end of the day it’s not how big your paycheck is or how fancy the car you drive is. What really matters is how you treat those around you because they are the things you cannot replace.

3. Be Prepared.
No one expects to be part of a natural disaster. Yet they happen frequently. You need to create a disaster preparedness plan for your family, and if possible, build a storm shelter. Have cash on hand, in a safe place (outside of the home, but still accessible). And always have a survival kit and a “go bag” packed that you can grab if you need to leave immediately.

4. Understand Your Insurance.
Make sure your home owner’s insurance and car insurance are up-to-date. More importantly, make sure you understand exactly what is covered. Take a video of your belongings and store it on YouTube (make sure to privatize the setting), in a safe deposit box, or in another safe place. This will give you a record of what you own.

5. Spend Time with Family.
Stop worrying about the trivial things you tend to get bogged down with everyday. Instead, make time to spend with family and friends. You never know when those last moments will happen. Don’t look back on your life and realize you prioritized your time wrong. Sure, reaching your business or career goals is important. Just weight the costs associated with the ways you may be going about reaching them.

If you need help reprioritizing your life, check out my Living Every Minute Activity Book. It will take you step-by-step through life lessons I have learned over the last 48 years, and it will guide you through setting up a life that truly allows you to value every moment.