Get Motivated! Seminar

I attended this day-long seminar yesterday at Freedom Hall at the Kentucky Expo Center. Prior to the seminar, I had talked to my dad about it as we had extra tickets and I would have been happy to have him along. He declined the invite as he had heard from fellow pastors that there was heavy sales pitches involved and he didn't want to make a 2 hour for a sales pitch. Needless to say- I was torn between excitement and skepticism going in.

The seminar was almost exactly what I expected. The speeches from Dr. Robert Schuller, Rick Pitino, Terry Bradshaw, Rudy Giuliani, Colin Powell and Laura Bush were wonderful. Each of them is well spoken, knows their subject and had they been the entire program- I could have been VERY happy.

Interspersed with these speakers were Phil Town and James Smith who were the afore warned sales pitches. The sad thing about that is they are both extremely charismatic and they (especially Phil Town) really pull you in as if he were doing a true educational seminar before he springs that the "secret" is the thousands of dollars worth of classes and software that you need to follow his "system". At that point, I stopped taking notes and my jaw dropped at the number of people rushing to the sign up table to take advantage of the "incredible bargain price of $99.00" If none of them follow through with any more than the one offer yesterday (and do not continue to pay for the web service which is 149/3mos) I am estimating that $250,000 easily was cleared on that piece alone. Possibly the same number of people signed up for the real estate seminar offered by James Smith (another bargain at $49.00). I do know that many of the SAME people signed up for both. Googleing when I got home found that at both of these seminars- you get a hard sell for further seminars. Not my idea of good investments- but I hope these people feel they get their money's worth.

The biggest...disappointment of the day was Zig Ziglar. Disappointment was not the word I am looking for, but seems appropriate. I have seen his presentations via tape before this and in his prime he was amazing. Very inspirational and motivational. What I found was that Mr. Ziglar has taken a fall and actually suffered a brain injury which has led to vertigo and short term memory impairment. This was disclosed to us by his daughter who was acting as his "interviewer". Mr. Ziglar answered a few "questions" and the majority of his segment was video clips from his old seminars which basically showed us the same information that he had already said during his live segment with his daughter. At the end of the segment, they had to remind him several times that it was time to leave the stage. It made me horribly sad to see this icon in this condition. My disappointment comes from his family allowing him to continue like this. I cannot fathom what it would help. It just hurt my heart.

All in all, considering that we paid only $19.00 plus parking (and an additional $40 since we preordered the workbook for each attendee-which was on sale at the event for 20 each) for the entire office to go, we got out of the office for a day and we enjoyed (very much) the key speakers- the seminar was a good investment. The workbook was a good value as it had plenty of places to take notes, outlines of the key speakers and speakers from other cities, and articles from the speakers and other world leaders in different fields- but again, I would order it ahead of time.

Physically it was VERY hard on me (I am paying in a big way last night and today for having spent easily 8 of the 10 hours in stadium seating)but I learned that we will not be able to attend concerts there (LOL- my 6'4" husband would NEVER fit in the seats with his long legs)and that if we go again next year, I can get up and walk around and give myself a break during any speaker with which I am not specifically wishing to see.

Would I go again? Yes. Would I plan my day differently- definitely! Now I just need to figure out how to use the insights that I learned yesterday in my own life. My biggest takeaway of the day was that I am on the right path. Many of the speakers talked about the need for positivity to acheieve success and make a good life for oneself. That alone was worth the price of admission!