Video Transcript: Your Talents are Seeds (Dr. Raimondo)
Hi, I'm Dr. Anthony Raimondo. And this is a coaching course, for your golden years to get a coaching badge from CLI. Now, on our introductory video, I talked about talents. And I gave you a little history about how a particular talent of mine was developed. But today, I want you to think about your talent, not only as it's your something to do, but I want you to think of it as a seed. But before we go into that, some of you may have worked your whole entire career, maybe in a job you didn't like, but you did it anyway. Maybe it was because the commute was easy, maybe because the pay was right. Maybe it was something that you needed to do to support your family. And you were content with just doing that job, regardless of the fact that you weren't really happy at it, because you weren't really able to use your talent. And that's what we're going to talk about today is your talent is also a seed. That's right, a seed. And I want you to think about that for a moment that your talent is a seed. Now, what do you been doing with that talent? Have you like the gentleman in the from Matthew, the servant who buried his talent, because he was afraid of losing it? Because it belonged to his master, his boss, and he didn't want to lose his boss's money. So he buried it. And he made a big mistake, because he could have gotten it some interest. Now, do you have a talent that you're not being that you're not using that you've buried? Now God gives you a talent, he wants you to use it. Like in the case of those servants who did and doubled their talent, we talked about that, already. So now I want you to think of your talent as a seed. And what are you doing with that seed? So what kind of a talent do you have? What kind of seeds? Or seed? Do you have? Do you have a seed of art? Do you have a seed for science? Do you have a seed for people skills? Do you have the seed of kindness? Do you have a seed of compassion? Do you have a seed of generosity? What type of seed Do you have? All right, we're looking at the seed. And I asked you that question, what kind of seed Do you have? And maybe now you're starting to think a little bit about your seeds. Now, during your working years, were you planting your seeds? Or not? Were you using your talents or not? Or were you trying to plant seeds that you don't have? Or were you trying to plant a seed and getting a different result? For example, you have a handful of corn seeds, and you put them in the ground and you're waiting for them to grow. And do you expect tomatoes? If you're planting for example, now, let's say you're you arrive to work generally five or six minutes late every day. So you're planting a seed of lateness. Do you expect good results from being late? Do you result that you do you expect good results that your boss is gonna like the fact that you're late? So you're planting one seed and you're looking for a different result. Have you been doing that during your work years? Have you done that? Now that you're, Now that you're not working and you're retired, hopefully, that's why you're listening to this video. And you have a handful of seeds. Now maybe you've never used those seeds for whatever reason, you never planted those seeds. Therefore, you never got a crop. Maybe you had those seeds, and you didn't plant them.
And therefore you didn't get any result at all, because you you can't have something if you don't plant. I can't get tomatoes, if I don't plant tomato seeds. I can't get squash if I don't plant squash seeds. So I might have a backyard and it might be really nice. And I want all kinds of flowers back there. But if I don't plant flowers, I'm not getting any. Now, you may sit there and go. Well, you know, God could plant flowers there. Yeah, I mean, he could cause a miracle for flowers to grow. But he's not because he needs a gardener. Because he needs a gardener. That's after all, why he plant put he planted Adam in the garden to maintain his garden. So God planted a seed. That seed was Adam, to plant trees, or what to maintain the trees, the shrubs, the grass, the flowers in the garden. Put them there, he planted them there so that he could name the animals. So God planted Adam, what are you planting? What have you been planting? Think about that. What have you been planting? Now I'm sure that some of you know what your talent is. And maybe you've had a hobby. Maybe you've been working for 25-30 years. And in the meantime, you had a hobby. You love to take pictures. Maybe you had a hobby where you were a birdwatcher. Maybe you had a hobby of painting. Maybe you had a hobby of woodworking. Maybe you had a hobby in your garage where you made furniture. I don't know, there's lots of hobbies out there. Maybe you're someone who knitted, crocheted. Maybe you make quilts. Maybe you love to cook. Maybe you made wine every year, for your own enjoyment. And maybe you did all these things, you had these hobbies that you had. And you did it because you enjoy doing it. You found some peace and relaxation from your daily work. Maybe you really didn't like your job. Maybe you didn't like your boss. But when you came home, and you were tinkering with something that you really love to do. It gave you a sense of peace and enjoyment. Now, that's wonderful. And now you're retired. And maybe, hopefully, like myself, you're doing more of that hobby. Now. I don't know if you've ever heard the expression. And but sometimes you might hear this, or maybe you heard of it. Some people might say, you know, I love my I love what I do so much that I would still do it, even if I didn't get paid. And there are people out there fortunately got God bless them that they are working their hobby. And their hobby is a job that created an income for them all their life. And you may be somebody like that, maybe you're not. But now here we are. You're 55 years old. You've been working at a job maybe for 30 years, or maybe 25. And you're able to retire out at 25 or 30 years old and get a pension. Maybe you're older than that you're 65 and now you have your pension and your Social Security. And you you're done with work. You've had you've had a career whether you liked it or not. And now you find yourself with a lot of free time. Now I mentioned that time is also a seed. Yes, it's a seed that you plant that time for something. Do you use that time for something? Or are you just sitting around watching TV, or listening to the same news story day after day after day, and accomplishing nothing except maybe worrying about the future of the of the world of the
economy of whatever. Instead, you could be working your hobby, your talent, your seed, you could be doing something with that seed. So maybe you've had a hobby. And now you have an opportunity to do something more with that hobby. For example, I like to write. So since I'm retired now, for 10 years, I've written three books, three, fiction, part of a series. And I've written three or four books on nonfiction. One of them is called our story lives, which deals with a theme. And a theme could be your seed. So I've written something about this. And I've written fiction. And I've written a number. And I've written a book about faith, having faith, and having and challenging yourself to build that faith. So I've these are some of the things that I've done. As I'm retired, I've also been involved in Toastmasters International. I've taken courses here at CLI I mentioned that already, I accumulated 61 credits, I have a I think, a GPA of 3.6. And this is what I've been doing with my time and my talents. I that I enjoy. And I'm asking you to examine yourself to see are you working your talent? Or not? If you are, how much time are you investing in it? What are you doing with it? Are you enjoying it? Are you happy that you have this opportunity to to work that hobby that you've liked that you've enjoyed all your life? Maybe you've had, you've had the pleasure of liking something, but you never had the opportunity to paint maybe you said to yourself, gee, I wish I had the time to paint. Or maybe you said I wish I had the time to take pictures. Or maybe you wished I had time to go hiking, I don't know, whatever. Maybe you had an inkling to do something, but you just never had the time to do whatever it is that's in your heart. So now I'm asking you to examine that. If you haven't done something you enjoyed, is it time to start doing something? If you have had a hobby that you enjoyed? Are you doing more with it? These are some of the things I'd like you to think about. As we move through this course about your golden years. And what you're doing with that time, God has given you some time to now do something and that time is precious, and you have an opportunity to do something with time. So you're asking yourself What should I do with my time? Or you may be saying, I don't have any time for myself. I'm retired, and I still don't have any time for myself. I have all these chores around the house I have to do. I gotta go shopping. I gotta get prepared dinner. I got the laundry. I don't know. I got to work in the yard. This thing's broke. I got to fix this. The kids always need something. I'm always they always want. I gotta give them a hand here or there. I never have any time for myself. On the other hand, maybe you're you have plenty of time. Are you sitting around doing nothing? And you don't know what to do with your time. But you know, if you're in your golden years, and you're, you know, retired, and you're somewhere, you know, maybe you're 60 or older, you really don't have a lot of time left. I'm 70 years old right now. And my mother died at 68. My father was 72. So, how much time do I have left? 10 years 20, maybe max, you don't know, time is running out, we only have a certain amount of time. So this little time that we have right now, this little time
that we have in our golden years? What do you want to do with it? How do you want to plant this seed called? Time? What do you want to do with this seed? Now you've got the seed of time, you got to seed of talent? Maybe you got a seed of finance? Maybe you got a seed of something else? Maybe you got it. So you got a bunch of seeds. Now what are you gonna do with these seeds? And you know, you got to do something, you can't hang on to them. They don't grow anything if you don't do anything with them. And you only have a little time to do it in. So what are you going to do with your time? How are you going to spend your time? And if you're already busy? How can you organize your time, so that you do have a little time for yourself, so that you do have a little time for that hobby, so that you do have a little time to enjoy it? So and then sometimes you might have to say no to someone because you need a little time for yourself. So you have the seed of time? What are you going to do with the seed of time, along with your seed of talent? So that's your homework assignment, to think about how you're going to use your time diligently. In other words, how am I best going to use my time? How can I best use the seed of time? And I want you to think about a talent and how can you work that talent along with your time? Until next time, do some thinking about time