Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast, brought to you in part by Book of Zen,

makers of wearable inspiration for a better world.

Today's podcast has been edited and adapted from the books

Pushing to the Front and the Iron Will by Orison Sweat Martin.

We assume importance and become a power in the world just as soon as it is found that we stand for something,

that we are not for sale, that we will not lease our ideals for salary, for any amount of money or for any influence or position, that we will not lend our name to anything which we cannot endorse.

The trouble with so many people today is that they do not stand for anything outside their

vocation. They may be well educated, well up in their specialties,

may have a lot of expert knowledge, but they cannot be dependent upon. There is some flaw in them

which takes the edge off their virtue. They may be fairly honest, but you cannot bank on them. If we need to look for a role model, let us turn to Teddy Roosevelt,

who resolved early in life that,

Let come what may, whether he succeeded in what he undertook or failed,

whether he made friends or enemies, he would not take chances with his good name but would

part with everything else first that he would never gamble with his reputation that he

would keep his record clean his first ambition was to stand for something to live by

his ideals before he was a politician

or anything else, he was a man of principle. In Roosevelt's early career he had many

opportunities to make a great deal of money by aligning himself with crooked, sneaking, unscrupulous

politicians.

He had all sorts of opportunities for political graft,

but crookedness never had any attraction for him.

He refused to be a party to any political jobbery,

...