Welcome to the Excel Stillmore podcast. I am your host, Chris Emerson. I'm here to encourage you in your walk with God. Thank you for joining in.

Today's podcast is sponsored by Cunningham Financial Group. John Cunningham is a friend of mine and a brother in Christ, and he can help you with financial

decisions and future planning.

He's been a big help to me and my family, and I commend him to you.

You can reach him at 205-913-1720.

I am so thankful you're here, so let's get started.

Hey, welcome back. I'm really excited today to share with you a conversation that I had yesterday with one of my best friends. Ben Shipley is an elder here at the Lindale Church, and he came by the office yesterday. We were just talking. We do that a lot.

But I always enjoy it and get something out of it because Ben is the single most self-disciplined person maybe that I've ever met in my life.

Once he decides that something is right, he doesn't care how hard it is.

In fact, it's like it needs to be really difficult to accomplish in order to be worth his while. In that way, he's kind of a

nice counterbalance to what we covered last week, where we talked about working smarter, not

harder. Then is a guy who is not going to labor foolishly. He's looking for the wisest, most efficient way to do it,

but once he finds it, it doesn't matter how difficult it is.

If he has determined it is the best way, he will find a way to do it.

So he applies hard work, challenging steps to wise decisions. Let me give you a few

examples from his past. He had a vice and addiction many, many years ago. He decided one day to

give it up, and that was the end of it. He never went back, not once. Five years ago, he decided to

become plant-based, a vegan-like diet, and so that's what he did. Five years later, he is still

holding to it just like he did on day one. I mean, who does that? We start things all the time, and even though

we still know they are valuable, we quit them. He does not. He's committed to a certain amount of

Bible study and listening to sermons per week, a certain amount of miles ridden on his bike. It doesn't matter if he's sick or having ankle

replacement surgery. As soon as possible, that's where he is. He's incredibly disciplined.

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