Fate for the Future
By Dr. Guy Riekeman, D.C.
President, Life University
Lewis Carroll wrote, “If
you don’t know where you’re going, then any path will get you there.”
I’ve watched this phenomenon played out my entire adult life. I’ve
seen unsuccessful chiropractors bounce from program to program, city to city,
even profession to profession because they don’t have a plan. Successful
chiropractors, whose plan wasn’t big enough to dedicate their life spirit
for a lifetime, end up getting involved in other activities and programs only
to awaken one day to an unsuccessful practice. There are also individuals who
become icons because they have a plan, a big plan, a lifetime of work plan,
and are not distracted by boredom or seduced by popular culture. Their plan
is always based on the “knowing” that they were chosen to be a chiropractor,
and fulfilling this calling is ultimately satisfying and powerful.
In the last few months two dynamic insights have renewed my appreciation and
curiosity about how plans evolve and what kind of leadership it takes to accomplish
a powerful destiny. The first insight raises the question “What is the
foundation of the plan?”
I watch, like many of you, the culmination of individual lives: Mother Theresa
reaching sainthood, Nelson Mandela redefining a continent, Lech Walesa and Vackov
Havel being named presidents of their post-communist countries. What do this
nun, lawyer, shipyard worker and schoolteacher have in common? I question whether
any of them had a 40-year master plan. Rather, I believe they were steadfast
in the fulfillment of their respective commitments and adapted their actions
to the daily circumstances of each day, month and year. In short, they were
the plan. They didn’t have a plan, they were the plan.
The second insight I’ve been reminded of in the last few months is the
question of FATE versus CONTROL. I realize that there is a place for both, but
at any given time we must know which will play a greater role in moving our
commitments forward. CONTROL requires self-directed activities such as setting
goals, keeping statistics, managing statistics, maintaining personal intensity
and motivating other people. FATE is more about faith, acceptance of the universe’s
time-frame, amazement at the unfolding of limitless possibilities and outcomes,
acceptance and management of your innate talents, and the willingness to be
submissive to following the path as it emerges. This serendipitous state is
hard for those of us who like to control our environment, but the willingness
to accept it when it is present is empowering.
No one, myself included, would have thought 90 days ago I would be leaving Palmer
and arriving at Life, FATE. Who would have planned that Bill Harris would step
up and commit $1.25 million to an institution strapped for cash and then to
be followed by others who have given $3.5 million in six weeks? We will raise
$10 million this summer, FATE. No one in Georgia politics or legal circles would
have given Life any chance to save a campus that was already sold to another
university. Yet today, as I write this essay, we received word that the Georgia
University System Board of Regents, against all odds, had rejected the contract
for the sale of Life University’s campus. Life not only has its full campus
back, but it also has groups bidding to refinance our bond issues with the added
benefit of two or more years of no loan payments as we rebuild student enrollment,
FATE.
The chiropractic profession needs a healthy Life University that is committed
to the highest ideals of academics, clinical training and scholarly research.
We are committed to integrating ourselves into the profession and supporting
its future. This is not only the commitment of the men and women at Life, but
it appears that FATE has created powerful momentum to make it so. Perhaps it’s
time for you to join us with your time, efforts and money. Perhaps it’s
your FATE. Walt Whitman said, “We convince people by our presence.”
We’re expecting you to “show up.” We have faith you will do
just that.
About the author: Dr. Guy Riekeman, serves as president of Life University,
and is the former president and chancellor of Palmer Chiropractic University
System. He is also a former vice president of Sherman College of Straight Chiropractic,
a noted lecturer in the chiropractic profession, and a 1972 graduate of Palmer
College of Chiropractic.
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