Gregory Q. Cheek's Blog, page 4

Live Longer with One Easy Step

“My grandmother started walking five miles a day when she was sixty. She’s ninety-seven now, and we don’t know where the hell she is”

Ellen DeGeneres

Walk Your Way to Amazing Health

The New England Journal of Medicine recently reported on the twelve-year Honolulu Heart Study of 8,000 men. The study was conducted by the Kuakini Honolulu Heart Program (HHP) on the island of Oahu.

The study reports that walking just two miles a day cuts the risk of death almost in half. The walkers’ risk of death was especially lower for cancer.

Walking is a great activity and is one of the easiest ways to increase your physical activity and improve your health. Regular walking has been shown to reduce the risk of chronic illnesses, such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, asthma, stroke, and many cancers.

Longer, moderately-paced daily walks are best for losing weight.
Shorter, faster walks are best for conditioning your heart and lungs.

Research has shown that people who walk approximately twenty to twenty-five miles per week outlive those who don’t walk by several years. You improve your chances of protecting the heart and circulatory system by raising HDL, the good cholesterol, and keeping weight down.

Make Walking a Habit—Just Like in Europe

“A vigorous five-mile walk will do more good for an unhappy but otherwise healthy adult than all the medicine and psychology in the world”

Paul Dudley White

I started walking with a pedometer to monitor my goals during my cancer treatment, and I’ve walked ever since. Europe’s walking culture is a main reason why I accepted a position in Germany as soon as possible. The healthy outdoor lifestyle of Europe is what I wanted—that was my “walking happy place.”  I’ve walked off 40 pounds since I’ve been in Germany.

I’m alive today and stage III cancer free because I walk from the time I get up in the morning until I go to sleep at night. I walk amidst eleventh-century buildings, amazing culture, and the healthy and lively people everywhere. Walking is fitness, meditation, circulatory, and it cleanses my mind.

Amazing Daily Preventative Medicine

Research reveals that walking just an extra twenty minutes each day will burn off seven pounds of body fat per year

I’ve lived in Stuttgart, Germany for almost four years—everybody walks everywhere. This is the home of Mercedes, Porsche, and BMW, but the fitness of the citizens comes from walking.  If you include walking in your daily activities, you will make this daily routine a preventive medicine jewell.

Europeans take public transportation everywhere—not a lot of sitting in front of the television and driving cars to work over here! Research shows that for every hour of brisk walking, life expectancy for some people may increase by up to two hours or more. Henry David Thoreau stated:

                  “An early-morning walk is a blessing for the whole day”

The easiest way to walk more is to take action and make walking a habit. Think of ways to include walking into your daily routine.

Walk part of your journey to work.
Take breaks at work and go for a short walk.
Park farther away in the parking lot.
Use the stairs instead of the elevator.
Use public transportation as often as you can.
Go for a walk after every meal.
A pedometer will keep you accountable to your daily walking goal.
Just make it a habit!

Cheers,

~Greg

My #1 Tip to Being Cancer Free

You must Believe ~ The Law of Belief!

I’ve achieved more goals in the past 5 years than the previous 20 years and this technique helped me run cancer out of my body!

Henry Ford did not come from a background of family with money and never got past the sixth grade. Just like the goldfish in the fish bowl believes with all his heart in that he is a shark, Mr. Ford simply had the belief that he could carry out his idea of producing mass production cars that would be inexpensive enough for the average person to afford. He believed this and became one of the most successful businessmen of all time.

Everybody has heard somebody say, “I will believe it when I see it—and until I see it I won’t believe it.” These types of beliefs will keep you from your success and striving toward the future. Every time I’ve had success, I truly believed that I was going to do it—and when I believed I wasn’t going to do something, I didn’t do it. I believed I was cancer free, I believed I would finish graduate school, I believed I would run 8 marathons and I believed I would write a Best Selling book.

If your belief is wanting to be cancer free, you only focus on the end-state. I hate seeing posts like cancer sucks, #uck cancer etc..that is negativity that cancer does not deserve and your body does not need.  You need every healthy cell in your body on the belief bandwagon that we are cancer free and that is all!  It’s done! You are cancer free from the first day of treatment. Now let’s get fired up and use the four steps below to get everything you want in life.

In high school, I had a horrible feeling that I might fail that government class my senior year and not graduate. I had self-limiting thoughts in believing that I couldn’t do something, and that’s exactly what happened. When I believe I will do something, it happens – EVERYTIME. You can do anything you want to do! If you believe this, it will become your reality.  This is the Law of Belief.

Four steps to focus and establish your law of belief

Frequency:   Find a quiet place and visualize your goal and dream.  Find your stillness and focus.
Duration:   Initially, you will focus for a few second bursts, with practice, you will focus longer and longer and feel the power.
Clarity: Maintain clarity to include every detail ~ relax. Breathe ~ soft music time.
Intensity:   Maintain your enthusiastic intensity (the 12.5 way in my book) with a calm nerve. Stay on point with the clear picture and don’t pressure yourself; your belief will come.  BELIEVE!

I go into detail in my book how I used this method and many others to achieve every goal I set out to accomplish in the past 5 years since my stage III head and neck cancer diagnosis ~ I also used this it to run cancer out of my body and turn a 7cm bleeding tumor at the base of my tongue to NOTHING!

Follow these four steps and you will be on your way to establishing a strong belief and achieving all your goals, dreams and unlimited success.  I BELIEVE in you and BELIEVE in yourself!

Cheers,

~Greg

Marathon #8 in Hamburg and Improving your Optimism Daily

This past Saturday I ran my 8th marathon since being diagnosed with cancer, and this time I was in Hamburg, Germany. What an amazing experience! More than 750,000 spectators and 20,000 runners.

I shot this quick video when I finished, in which I talk about daily exercises to improve your optimism, as well as Hunt the Good Stuff (#htgs) and University of Pennsylvania’s Army Master Resilience Training (taught by Dr. Karen Reivich).

Approaching the day with optimism can be as simple as writing down three things you’re thankful for, an exercise I did for the 30 days leading up to this marathon.

Give it a shot: what are three things you’re thankful for today? Write you responses below in the comments section, I’d love to hear from you.

Have a Great Day and Live the Three Points of Contact!

Cheers,

~Greg

Prepping for Marathon #7 in Kiel, Germany

This Saturday, I’ll be running my seventh marathon since being diagnosed with cancer. Yesterday, I finished my last long training run before heading up north to Kiel, and shot this quick video. Enjoy!

Some of the marathon training references I talk about in the video are Trevor and Angie from Marathon Training Academy, Jeff Galloway’s Run Walk Run method and the training timer I use is Gym Boss.

You can live ANY goal you set out to achieve.

Have a Great Day and Live the Three Points of Contact!

Cheers,

~Greg

Do you want to feel great and improve your health today? Just say, “Thank You.”

I’ve contemplated for weeks with eager anticipation about the topic for this first blog. I’ve got literally hundreds of topics to discuss and will get to every one over the next couple of years. The immediate focus will come from the over 50 topics contained within the manuscript of my upcoming book, Three Points of Contact.

The Pink Elephant in the room is “Cancer Treatment” and this topic surfaces during most of my discussions on radio interviews back in the states and around Europe. The topic of “Cancer” surfaces in my motivational presentations and is assuredly the center pole in the tent and the Grand Finale of Three Points of Contact. I just mentioned some insightful cancer deterring methods in the taping of my iTunes podcast named the Communication Concierge and I promise to cover all those areas in the upcoming blogs.

I narrowed the non-cancer related topics to: goal setting and dreams, travel, communication, enthusiasm, resiliency, mentorship and the universal law of belief.    I finally decided on Giving Thanks and the Art and Amazing benefits you will get from giving thanks for this first post. Three Points of Contact has one chapter focused directly on giving thanks named, Integrate Thanks into you Daily Life.

Obviously giving thanks comes in the form of verbal and non-verbal thanks. The power of giving verbal thanks is just as powerful for your health and well-being as the traditional thank you note. This particular blog will focus on the hand-written thank you note. We will keep in mind the close neighbor – the verbal gratitude of thanks.

Your life will turn around when you get used to giving thanks in the way of the handwritten note. I’ve written three thank you notes a day for the past 10 days in preparation for this introductory blog. 25 notes in the mail and 5 notes hand delivered. I enjoy the immediacy of the smile and the reaction from the hand delivered note. If the note is for thankful services rendered, I will hand deliver to the supervisor or boss to ensure the employee recognition and thanks is received by both verbal and a written note. The 25 notes in the mail are fantastic because I get energized from everyone I send.

I’ve pasted below some notes from my upcoming book, Three Points of Contact, on: (1) the benefits of sending thank you notes and (2) some tips on how to write the perfect thank you note ~ Enjoy!

1. The Benefits of Sending Thank You Notes

Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn’t learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn’t learn a little, at least we didn’t get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn’t die; so, let us all be thankful.

Buddah

The benefits of sending handwritten thank you notes are endless. You are doing far more than distinguishing yourself from anyone else in the business world or your competition. Business is about making contacts and the thank you note is the best way to make an impression and also make you feel amazing. Your client, future employer, or just a close friend may have met with a couple hundred people today, you will be remembered for leaving the thank you note and most of all you will feel great! In a selfish way the biggest recipient of giving thanks will be for yourself. You will feel joy, happiness and the accomplishment of knowing that you are making someone else’s day very special. Let me share a few tip from my upcoming book on this unique skill.

Advantages of the thank you note:

Feel great about yourself – try one today – and see how you feel.
Relieve stress, which makes you a happier person. Proven stress reliever ~ inner bliss.
Relieve the recipients’ stress, thus making them healthier.
Create a positive impact to those receiving your thanks, making you more memorable and making you stand out from others.
Put a smile on someone’s face. In most cases you will not see that big end result and smile…but you know and that makes it all worth it.

Try sending out thank you notes at every opportunity you get: Thank someone who hosts you at his/her home for dinner, when you receive a gift, when someone provides a particular good service ….the list goes on and on. Starting with the first thank you note you send, you’ll notice a difference in the mental, emotional, and spiritual quality of your life.

2. How to Write the Perfect Thank You Note

If the only prayer you ever say your entire life is thank you, then that’s enough.

Meister Eckhart

My first thank you note was to golfer I caddied for when I was thirteen years old. Since then, I have written thousands of these wonderful notes. I have my own personal techniques I’ve learned over the years, and you will develop your own style. There’s actually a recommended tactic to assist you in writing the perfect thank you note. Diane Gottsman, a national etiquette expert and the owner of the Protocol School of Texas, recommends:

A hand written note is always special.
Use a dark colored ink, preferably black, when sending a professional thank you note.
Address the card carefully; making sure the name of the person is spelled accurately.
Mention something specific about the gift, if applicable, and how you plan to use or enjoy it the future.
Don’t mention a denomination of money; rather, say your “generous” gift.
Purchase nice, seasonal stamps or invest in forever stamps.
Create a thank you note cache that is easily accessible when you are ready to sit down and write a thank you note. Include nice card stock, stamps, and a variety of writing pens and note cards.

Start by writing at least one handwritten thank you note a day for the next week. When you’ve made it through the seven days, write me a comment below and let me know how you feel after giving written thanks. Everyone who responds will get a thank you note from me personally from here in Germany!

Enjoy and LIVE the Three Points of Contact!

Go Get Em’

~ Greg