Pete Maravich Assembly Center

Pete Maravich Assembly Center

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

What parents want to know

Is my child important?

Will my child be around other good kids?

What kids want to know

Am I important?

Do other people like me?

Will I there be someone for me to like?

Attitude

 

Key questions in attitude

Mine

Others

How do I react to others?

How do others react to me?

How I react to others reaction about my attitude?

How others react to me reacting about their attitude?

Friday, September 17, 2010

Think about someone else

I.Think about someone else.

It is amazing what happens when you think about others first. You get involved in their situation and what they may be going through. It begins to take the focus off what issues you have in your own life.

We are here not just to live a life that is just pleasing to us, but we are also here to help other people through the trials and transitions of life. You will find energy and excitement by helping other people. It could be someone less fortunate or a good friend. Who they are and what they do does not matter. Something about helping someone else is gratifying. It becomes even more special if no one else knows about the good deed. As a young person you are in such transitions, but that is when you dig down and find ways to help others you will be glad you did.

The greatness of Jesus Christ promised for those who serve is reserved for those who give to give. The folks who give to get are traders, not givers, and they raise a family of traders to follow them

Joe White

We have a young man on our team at Belhaven University that graduated in 2010, John Jibol, who is one of the Lost Boys of Sudan. His story is amazing for what he has had to persevere. At a young age he had to run for his life through the jungle to get to freedom. His dad and a two of his brothers have been killed in the war in his country. In the last couple of years both his mother and another brother have died.

Because of the unrest, John cannot get back home and then get back out of the country quickly. He does all he can to help his family by working a job in the summer and on weekends during the school year so he can send as much money back home as he can. He also has to provide for his own meals and housing while he is a student here. He gets by with basketball scholarship, federal aid and student loans, but it is still tough on him.

John is one of the nicest and most humble persons you will ever meet. It has been good to see how many people have stepped up to help him here around our campus. He is helping his family back home and we have concerned people here that are doing all they can to help him. It is fun to see how much our team cares about John. They would do anything to help him and want him to succeed so badly. Each time John has had a setback his teammates have stepped up and been there for him emotionally.

In the 20 years of coaching John is one of the most caring and team oriented players I have been around. He cares about the other guys first and not for himself. How he stays so positive is a constant encouragement to me. As a coach, I get to see it everyday how much people can think about others and have that joy in their own life. John is one without question the player with the most unique background of any player I have coached. Also, he has come from the toughest background. The special thing is he is also the most sincere and appreciative young athlete I have ever been fortunate to coach. He is always asking about my family and thanking me for the opportunity we are giving him. We should be thanking him for the blessing it is to have him in our program. He sets a great attitude. If our players ever complain I can subtly remind them of how good they have it and if they do not believe me then go talk with John.

He did not set any school records or become an All American, but his impact while here at our school is tremendous. Never before have I had more people ask me off the floor about John and maybe I won’t have any like him again. He is one of the most unassuming people I have been around. The thing about his humility is that he is always willing to help and concerned for others. He is totally there for other people.

This spring John made some of the biggest progress he has made academically and it was one of my biggest thrills in coaching. I have been able to be around great players, great teams and great environments for the game of basketball, but this was one of the most heart-warming moments when he did so well academically and was able to graduate. He has had so much to overcome and he does not complain. The campers that come to our summer and winter basketball camps love to be on one of the teams that John is coaching. The parents love having him around and you can see how contagious his humble spirit can be to a group. He exemplifies the phrases “team player” and “serving others”. I hope that you have some John Jibol’s in your life to be such an example.

Here is an article that appeared in the Jackson Clarion Ledger Sunday October 1, 2006 about John. This was written by one of the best writers in the state of Mississippi and Belhaven alum Orley Hood

It's been almost 17 years since he's seen his mother, John Jibol, 23, says.

He's sitting in the stands at Charles R. Rugg Arena on the Belhaven College campus during a break in basketball practice. But his mind is in Sudan, Africa's largest country, where what's left of his family - those who have not been killed in a genocidal civil war - remains.

He talked to her on the telephone. "Mama," he said, "I want to come home."

"No," she said. "You finish school first." "But Mama, I need to see you." "No. Not now. Stay in school."

When he speaks of his mother, of his father who was killed, of two brothers who died in 1996 in separate skirmishes, a faraway veil slips over his face.

He's a little boy again, running from war, living in refugee camps, taking cover in Ethiopia, returning home for two months, and then racing for his life again, this time to Kenya.

For the young in Africa, sometimes the best that can be hoped for is a narrow escape, through desert and jungle, across rivers teeming with crocodiles, away from civil wars and genocide and hunger and AIDS and malaria. You can't think about tomorrow when it's so hard to hang on to today. When you're running for your life, there's no room for school and basketball to squeeze their way into a boy's dreams.

Tom Kelsey, beginning his second season as Belhaven's basketball coach, looks down to the court and sees No. 55 warming up, getting loose, and he smiles. "He's a gift from God," Kelsey says, without the first hint of hyperbole in his voice.

It was spring 2005. He gets a call from an assistant coach at Mississippi State. You need a player? There's this guy down there ..."We're all set, full," Kelsey told him. Still ..."Then a week later Julie Mabus called about him. He was a refugee from Sudan. She'd seen him at church at St. Andrew's. I watched him work out at the YMCA on Fortification Street." He was 6-feet-6 and as raw as a stalk of celery.

For the Lost Boys of the Sudan, who swam for their lives across the Gila River, working on their low post moves was not a priority. There was, Mabus says, a former Mississippi first lady, 5,000 of them. In 2000, 67 of them came to Jackson.

They'd been caught in a war of attrition, racism, religious intolerance and economics - the Arabs of the North against the blacks, many of them Christian, in the oil-rich South. "The war created an exodus of 20,000 young boys in 1987, as bombs were going off and the Arabs were annihilating villages," Mabus says. The idea was both comforting and chilling: To preserve the boys until they could mature into the South's army of the future.

"Many died along the way" to Ethiopia, she says. "They traveled at night - the North was hunting them in the daytime - in a straight line, and you could hear the lions picking them off at the end of the line. For four years they trained and were educated at a military refugee camp." Then the regime in Ethiopia fell "and the new government came down one night after them.”They've been through so much," Mabus says. "All they want to do is go home and see family." They didn't know who was alive back in Sudan and who had evaporated into the mists of war. They swam across a swollen river, some surviving the crocs, some not.

"They lived in the desert for a month and half," Mabus says. "They had nothing to eat. Finally, the Red Cross found them and took them to Kakuma, on the border of Sudan and Kenya."For nine years they lived in the refugee camp. An English school was set up. The United Nations High Command for Refugees went about the business of finding the Lost Boys home countries, places without genocide, without crocs and lions, places with hope, where boys could be human beings again, where they could have futures.

Where, here, they could go to Bailey Magnet School in Jackson. And where one, John Jibol, could find a spot on Belhaven's basketball roster, where he could be No. 55, not a target for madmen half a world away

"When the boys came in, in the custody of the state, our program provided the services," says Barbara Pigott, director of social services with Catholic Charities in Jackson. "Most all the boys see education as their priority and they worked to support themselves and live in the community.

"Despite the language barriers, they've all excelled. It's just remarkable. They are so appreciative of everything because of where they came from." And because of what they've been through."Miss Julie helped us find tutors," Jibol says. "Catholic Charities have been a big help.

"He's polite, hard working, the favorite of a lot of the guys," Kelsey says. "He works at St. Dominic (hospital, in radiology) on the weekends to make money to send back to his mom. For him to have success would do wonders for his confidence. It's heartwarming." Mabus, seeing their courage, their steadfastness, their humbleness and their lack of bitterness, says, "These boys have changed my life. And Tom thinks John is magic."

But many battles remain.

Blood still runs in the streets of Darfur as the U.N. and western powers struggle with the notion of sending troops into the genocidal maelstrom. John Garanga, the father of the southern independence movement, died in a helicopter accident, putting 2005's peace agreement at risk.

In the meantime, for John Jibol, life is school and work, with basketball in the afternoons and deep dreams of home at night. After graduation 2 1/2 years from now,

"I try to go back and help people back there," he says, and to see the mother he aches for who he's not laid eyes on since he was 6. "I pray to God," he says. "I pray for the people back there."

Acts 20:35
In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: 'It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Saturday, September 11, 2010

Article for parents about your kids

“Nothing is More Precious than Children” Syndicated Column Tuesday August 26, 1997 by Tony Snow

Here is what I learned on my summer vacation: You don’t go on vacation to relax. You go to reclaim lost priorities. This may not seem such a grand revelation to you, but like lots of dweebs in the journalism business, I often busy myself with being busy. My wife and I have been married for 10 years, and it wasn’t until this month that we took the first bona fide , non working vacation since our honeymoon.

We packed up our three kids and a baby sitter and struck out for Italy. There, we met an old college buddy and his family- also three young kids- and spent a little more than a week touring the countryside, using a marchese’s villa as our headquarters. No doubt this sounds romantic. But think: six kids under the age of 6; three in diapers; one not old enough to crawl. Forget about lingering lunches in scenic cafes or leisurely and museums.

We sprinted though Assisi, did Florence in 120 minutes, explored dozens of hygienic facilities, and quelled occasional eruptions of violence and tears among the kids. My wife and I spent more time in the supermarkato than in the Sistine Chapel. We ate more toasty bruschette than exotic pasta. We got almost no sleep, since the kids were trying to adjust to the change in time, and we never managed to log as many poolside hours as we had hoped.

One more thing: it was great. Ed Feulner of the Heritage Foundation likes to note than in Washington, D.C., where I work, the urgent overwhelms the important. When you work there you labor under the unspoken expectation of caring about even the tiniest seismic events, such as rumors about upcoming subcommittee markups. In our neighborhood, a superdad is a guy who makes it home for dinner ten times a month. I have actually heard people talk about “quality time” so they excuse the ritual of bursting through the front door and performing one last office chore before devoting themselves fully to kith and kin.

You can’t get away with such stunts on vacations. Children become sovereigns and fathers become dads. Youngsters- at least the little ones- clamber into bed and stay with you for the duration. They dictate the pace of touring, the leisure of lunch, the rules of the game you play. What sublime slavery: Few things can match such diversions as frolicking in a pool, listening to the chiming of children’s laughter or picking blueberries beside an unquiet but hidden stream. For two weeks we saw the sights. But we also colored. We played board games. We read stories. We came up with novel meals.

No love compares to that for your children. And for the first time it strikes me just how little we see them during our average working days. When a child comes to the office, people figure the parent is trying to make up for a missed soccer game, the babysitter called in sick, or the spouse left , leaving a note: “ You think it’s easy? Tag. You’re it.”Like most proud parents, my office is a kids’ museum: Here’s a can for pencils; there’s a pot painted by my oldest. The wall features the normal retinue of refrigerator-ready masterworks, and my bookshelves display pictures of one and all.

And yet treasures can’t compare with two weeks unsullied by phone calls or evanescent crises. The things you learn! My son, it turns out, has infinite endurance. My daughter has breathtaking powers of observation. My wife becomes more spectacular and magical with each challenge and day. And the baby has left the drool-and-coo zone. She just crawled for the first time.

My dad once told me: You can never spend too much time with your kids or your wife, and you can never hug them too often. Sage advice. Like many writers, I aspire to immortality. But in this life, there’s only one thing most of us can influence directly, and that’s our families. Subcommittee mark-ups come and go, but the blessing of children comes just once.

So, at the tender age of 42, I finally get it. Next year we’ll take two vacations.

Tony Snow died July 12, 2008 at the age of 53

p.s I have some copies of John Maxwell’s latest book, Everyone Communicates, Few Connect. If you would like copy send me your name and address and I will mail you a copy. Thanks.

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Picking your friends

I. Pick your friend the way you would pick a car.

As you get older you will have more choices in whom your friends are and who you hang around. In elementary school or middle school, you may be friends with children's that live close by or go to the same school or church or play on the same athletic team. When you get older, you can be more selective. You have the ability to be careful and pick who you want to be around and those you do not want to be around.

Whether you like it or not you will be judged by the people you hang around. You say “that’s not fair”. Nobody said life is fair. It’s not fair so get used to it. But I do agree it’s not fair that we judge other people by who they hang around. Unfortunately that is how our world operates. So as long as you understand the rules you know how to play the game. Now pick your friends wisely.

You would not want to put money into something that is unreliable to drive so why pick a friend that you don’t know what you are going to get from day to day? Most adults can tell a story of having a car some point in life that they just hoped would start each time the key was put in the ignition. Once the car started, it was a relief until the next time you had to start the car again. Time after time if it wasn’t the engine it could be something else.

Most of us had a first car that had problems. We would almost beg and pray for the car to make it to Point A to Point B. Then the next day the cycle would start all over again. You knew the car did not have a lot of life left, but you wanted to milk it for everything it had. If you have not had this kind of a car you are missing a real character builder.

Friends are the same way. Pick those friends that are going to be reliable and you know what you are going to get. This is not saying they have to be perfect, just know what you have with their friendship. When you invest in a friendship if it is not reciprocated you may have to move on and develop friendships with other people. You can’t let certain individuals get you down and you can not let them destroy your confidence.

You must also know that there will be times when the relationships with friends will be strained and will be tested. If you are expecting your friends to be available and to be there for you, there is that possibility of getting let down. You know that people are not perfect and it is unfair to expect your friends to be perfect. There is probably going to be conflict and let-downs in the friendship at some point, but that doesn’t mean the friendship had to be over. Be prepared to weather the storm if the friendship has any rocky events you have to get through.

You must remember that your personality can be shaped by whom you hang around. Whether you believe it or not your friends are a match and an insight to who you are. If you don’t like the way you act and look you probably should check to see who your friends are. You have heard since you were little and will continue to hear about choosing good friends. It is one of the keys of being on target with where you want to be in life.

I know if I am around friends of mine that try are positive and care about other people it naturally rubs off onto me. If I am around people who are negative and selfish, that is going to rub off on me. Even as you get older your friends still influence who you are. I have been around enough different schools to see teachers and coaches who are good for each other because of their work ethic and attitude. There are teachers and coaches who really care about the children they get to work with and overlook the little annoyances that are a part of every school. I have also seen the opposite in teachers and coaches who have bad attitudes and look at things through a negative lens and have a poor work ethic.

Who you are around on a constant basis is contagious. Are you the type of friend that is contagious in a positive way or negative way? What do you add to the relationship?

I heard our preacher in Montgomery, Alabama, John Smith use this illustration back in the earlier 90’s and I have used it ever since. It has lost a little of it’s meaning because we don’t use pay phones as much today.

He talked about being a “quarter friend”. When you are down to your last quarter and you have to call someone for help who do you call to come and help you? If it that quarter was all you had and you only could make that one call from the pay phone who would you pick up the phone and call?

Then next thing is to ask yourself if there were people that were your close friends and they were down to their last quarter who would they call? How many of your friends would use their last quarter to make that phone call to you? How many of your friends would think you would be that reliable and that dependable to count on that they would use their last quarter for you?

A friend is someone who understands your past, believes in your future, and accepts you just the way you are.” Author Unknown

In this book and in my talks I will discuss my cancer. There is part of me that does not like to bring it up since I have lost my mother to cancer in 2009 and brother to cancer in 1984. Their ordeals were much tougher. They had to go through long sessions of chemotherapy and other forms of treatment to try beat the cancer they had. You will hear in this book of my cancer and some of the trials, but I in no way had to endure what my mother and brother did.

I bring up the cancer because of the story of friendship. When I was diagnosed in June of 2000 I had three children and we tried to set the surgery up as quickly as possible. We notified my family and some of our friends in Tuscaloosa where we were living. Since I was coaching at the University of Alabama I knew the word would get out in the coaching fraternity. I wasn’t really excited about making it public knowledge anyway.

We had the surgery on a Tuesday morning and had to stay in the hospital for a few days to recover. Around Friday afternoon I quickly lifted up out of my hospital bed and anxiously said to my wife, “I forgot to call Andy.” Andy Lane was one of my best friends since college and we were roommates for a short time after I graduated while living in Nashville.

Andy was the type of guy that would always be there for you and you could count on him as a “quarter friend.” We had many hilarious stories together. My mom used to get such a kick out of Andy that she would make me tell “Andy Lane stories” whenever I came to visit her in Chattanooga. Especially if she had visitors that made it all the more reason for her to ask me to tell “Andy Lane stories.”

I was embarrassed that I didn’t call Andy about my surgery. I sat there for a minute and thought about what to do next. The story on my cancer had also been in the Nashville paper so Andy had probably seen the news or at least had the information. I felt bad about not telling him first. Still feeling the effects of the pain medication it was hard for me to have the energy to call Andy right then I asked my wife to remind me to contact him the following week.

Fortunately we had a lot of visitors during the week, but we were looking forward to some peace and quiet on this Friday night. That night about 8:00pm there was a knock on our hospital door. In walked Andy Lane. He said was driving home from work and thought “I could go home or turn right and head to the interstate and make the drive to Tuscaloosa” (a 4 hour drive). It did not surprise me one bit when Andy had that decision to make whether to make the left hand turn and go home or make the right hand turn and come see a friend in need. That is the kind of person you want as a friend that they would be in the car and think, “Ok, if I turn right it is a four hour drive, but I need to see…..in the hospital.”

He stayed the night and slept on a cot in the room. He ate the wonderful hospital food and man he really lifted my spirits. The night visiting with Andy was indeed special, but the act of friendship is something I will never forget. The “Andy Lane’s” in the world are few and far between. Andy knows the value of friendship and knows what it means to be there for someone in need. Pick your friends wisely and when you pick make sure to pick an Andy Lane type friend.

It is wonderful to have friends that last for a lifetime because they have grown up together and have so much in common, Many times, due to different circumstances, these friendships are no longer. It is then time to make new friends that you can share good times with, and trust to be loyal and honest, as well as sincere. Picking the right friends is not easy and it takes a bit of searching to find them.”
http://www.wikihow.com/Pick-Your-Friends

You must constantly ask yourself these questions: Who am I around? What are they doing to me? What have they got me reading? What have they got me saying? Where do they have me going? What do they have me thinking? And most important, what do they have me becoming? Then ask yourself the big question: Is that okay? Your life does not get better by chance, it gets better by change.”

Jim Rohn