you're a provider of hope

“The No. 1 thing for all leaders: You’re a provider of hope,” [Coach Herm] Edwards said. “It’s a service position. You actually serve them; they don’t serve you. That’s very important. … There are two ways you lead: You lead by your seat, or you lead by your feet. I choose to lead by my feet. I know the people that I work with. I make sure I communicate with people. They want to see you.”

Anna Katherine Clemmons

"ASU Coach Herm Edwards is Preparing Athletes for Football Season - and Life." USA Today.  November 2019

the difference between emotion and passion

Team members need a keen awareness of the difference between emotion and passion. 

“You don’t want an emotional team; you want a passionate team,” [Coach Herm Edwards] said. “When the pressure mounts the most, you want poise and this sense of, ‘We’ve been here before. We know how to handle this.’ There’s this calmness of when things go crazy … what makes a winning team is to get players that hate to lose more than they win. Teams that have discipline, that are tough — those are the teams that win.”

Anna Katherine Clemmons

"ASU Coach Herm Edwards is Preparing Athletes for Football Season - and Life." USA Today.  November 2019

their music still in them

Many people die with their music still in them. Why is this so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it, time runs out.  -  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

I have spent my days stringing and unstringing my instrument, while the song I came to sing remains unsung.  -  Tagore


As quoted in The Miracle of Forgiveness by Spencer W. Kimball. 1969. p.16

a lot of empty yesterdays

You pile up enough tomorrows, and you’ll find you’ve collected a lot of empty yesterdays.

Professor Harold Hill, character in The Music Man (1957) by Meredith Willson and Franklin Lacey, as quoted in Thomas S. Monson, “Finding Joy in the Journey,” Ensign, Nov 2008, 84–87

roots and foundations and organic processes

It is sometimes supposed that men must organize in order to affect their plans. It is sometimes said or organizations that the development must come from the top down. These ideas have their worth, but they lay too little weight on the role of the individual. Strong leadership will always be needed and prized, but it cannot be responsible for all growth. It is not generally responsible for the most important growth. Trees and children do not grow from the top down. Men do not construct buildings from the top down. The growth that counts is based on roots and foundations and organic processes that are hidden from view. What is exposed is less important than what is not. So it is with people. I cannot look to others or to outside circumstances to provide the basis for my work. The vital strength lies within my own will and the grace of God. The most important struggles and achievements in life are not in society but in the human heart.

Dennis Rasmussen

The Lord’s Question: Thoughts on the Life of Response. Brigham Young University Press. April 1985. Chapter Four, “Whom Shall I Send?” p.40