by Tammy Kling
We started the small adventure travel business and trained to take people on mountain climbing and rafting adventures. We took our first round of executives out on a mountain biking trip across the trails, which reminded me of Toin and Anja.
Through it all, the lesson was not to feel as if we had to look back, but to be free to do so. Not to feel the necessity of having to look forward, but to be free to do so.
The ultimate lesson was to be in the present, to thrive and prosper and build whatever our new life would be.
Lacy and I began to plant an organic vegetable garden on weekends, and we talked about how wonderful it would be to live off the land, to be able to use fresh basil and tomatoes on hand-made pizzas. It was a small dream, but a new one.
Nothing seemed to be sprouting, but we continued on, watering, weeding, and repeating the process once more. After a couple of months, Lacy ran into the house, excited by the new birth of a basil bloom. She held it in her hands, toward me
“There’s magic in ordinary things,” she said.
I imagined Solomon in his garden with giant red tomatoes, working the soil.
AUTHORS’ LETTERS
Dear Reader,
Who are you?
Take a moment to write that sentence down in the center of a sheet of paper. Take a day or two to really contemplate it.
The essence of this book is not only our own personal authenticity about who we are and who we desire to be, but also our connectedness to others and the world. Writing this book took a huge emotional toll on me, and I almost didn’t think I’d make it. I felt the pain and loss of the whole world inside of me—the loss and joy of generations before.
It was at times unbearable, yet it reminded me that Jonathan’s journey is real, for all of us. It represents the peaks and valleys and metaphor of life. It represents the joy that is there for us, if we are willing to find it. We all have a journey.
Make yours matter.
Love,
Tammy Kling
Dear Reader,
We hope you have enjoyed this book and the documentary The Compass as much as I enjoyed being a part of the creation of it.
The documentary took me years to coordinate, create, and film from the moment the idea was first conceived. I was surprised to find that it was an emotional journey for me, and there were times I found myself tearing up as I watched our various guests offer their life-changing wisdom on camera. This is not a project designed to create controversy, or make claims to anything. This is simply a project to pass on the love, wisdom, and knowledge of others.
We are partnered with some phenomenal thought leaders who have made it their life’s work to help transform lives. I hope their advice and words on these pages will reach into your soul.
John Spencer Ellis
If you would like to contact us and share your personal story about how this book has helped you in your journey, please e-mail us or contact us via our websites or blog. We look forward to connecting with you!
Tammy Kling
www.escapesuburbia.wordpress.com
www.Tkling.com
Dr. John Spencer Ellis
www.JohnSpencerEllis.com
www.TheCompass.tv
READER’S KEY
Life Lessons in the book THE COMPASS
In Chapter 1, Jonathan is hollow. He has suffered a tragedy that has set him off on a journey of self-discovery. It led to an escape, a typical fight-or-flight method of dealing with severe trauma. His wife and child were in a terrible auto accident, and he fled his old life. The insight here for the reader is a sense that tragedy can change your DNA. It can turn you into something that you’re not—a hollow and empty shell. You may think you’ll turn to family or to friends for support, but, for some, the only reaction to severe stress is escape. These are coping mechanisms we see in society with our friends and loved ones who go through stresses of all kinds. They range from an escape from society into depression (inward escape) to a literal move (outward escape).
LESSON #1: Marilyn, the first character Jonathan meets on his journey, delivers this lesson. She has gone to the desert by choice to escape one last time because she’s been diagnosed with a brain tumor. It seems ironic that she has chosen to escape to the desert because she has little life left, while Jonathan has simply escaped life itself, choosing not to live it but just to exist. In a sense, they’ve both chosen to escape: Marilyn out of choice and Jon out of need. She’s dying; he’s already dead. She says, “There are no accidents. We may think that there are, but there aren’t.” The lesson here is about the destiny and course of your life amidst its peaks and valleys. How those we meet were often placed in your life for a reason. Why are you reading this now? Is it an accident, or are you supposed to be reading this for a purpose?
INSIGHTS: In Chapter 1 Marilyn notices a wound on Jon’s cheek. We revisit this later in the story as another character makes mention of it. We learn later that this is a wound he received from the aftermath of the car accident, while he was trying to save his family. It eventually becomes a scar, representing the scars we acquire in life.
LESSON # 2: Marilyn delivers a central lesson in this book about our perception of control. We all believe we are in complete control, when really we do not know the beginning, the middle, or the end. She says, “Jonathan, none of us knows anything. We think we know, then we don’t. The universe has a way of intervening. Of changing you. In the end, you don’t know what you’re seeking, and you don’t know what you’ll find.” Much of our lives are out of our control. (But we do not believe this! So we strive to erase fear, eliminate the unpredictable, and control outcomes.)
INSIGHT: We hint at Jonathan’s inability to forgive, a big problem in his life and future. We see that he is stuck in three stages of grief: sadness, despair, and forgiveness “without any hope for the last.”
LESSON # 3: In Chapter 2 Marilyn says, “We come into this world feeling entitled, as if we have been handed a manual for life with a certificate for a hundred years.” The truth is we all expect to live forever, or live out our hundred, but we aren’t guaranteed that. Make the most of each day! Realize that we have no control over our number of years on earth.
INSIGHT: Another insight we give the reader with the introduction of this character is that there is more to life than we can see.
LESSON # 4: Jonathan next meets Pete, an old man living in the Adirondacks. Pete teaches Jon that “We don’t always need to get things. Sometimes there’s mystery in life, and we just have to embrace the not knowing.” This is one of the most difficult lessons for humans to accept, yet the most evolved humans have embraced it as truth and live their lives accordingly.
LESSON #5: In Chapter 4 Pete tells us that “Sometimes it takes a season of brokenness in order to find the true joy and beauty that can lead to transformation.” Tragedy is hard to define, but if you look at some of the world’s greatest leaders, teachers, and philosophers, their lives have been marked by it.
LESSON # 6: This is perhaps the most critical lesson in the book. Pete asks; “How many summers or falls do you have left Jonathan? Maybe twenty? Thirty? There’s no time for warring emotions. We must make a decision to be happy despite the death of our dreams. We must be willing to create new ones.”
Life is short! Realize your dreams, but also accept the death of a dream that didn’t come true or one you need to change, in order to live a new life and create a new dream. Some people are so tied to their old, outdated dreams without giving intentional, conscious thought to whether those dreams still serve them. God has a plan for your life.
INSIGHT: One of the most important things to understand is that people are placed in our lives for a season. Some come, some go, some stay. It’s fluid, like a river. Pete is a breath of fresh air because he does not demand anything and does not ask questions. Jonathan really has nothing to give emotionally because he is spent. Sometimes it’s important just to be with someone side by side.
LESSON #7: Even though Solomon
is just a young boy, he teaches Jonathan many things. He’s an old soul, and one of the lessons he teaches us is that we are not what we do, but we are who we are. American society defines most of us by what we do. And we, in turn, define our identities as adults in large part by what we do and what we achieve in our professional lives.
INSIGHT: In Chapter 7 we see Jonathan observing Solomon in his garden. It is at this point we see our main character waking up to the world, emerging from his cocoon of numbness and pain. He is beginning to see others and connect with them. It is this connectedness with the world that will save him. Jonathan could have sunk into depression and isolation and ended his life. Instead he is rising out of it and connecting with those in his path. Slowly, he is regaining his life.
LESSON #8: When Jonathan gets to Holland and meets Toin and Anja, he discovers his first lesson on his own, which is about following your own compass. He thinks “sometimes the most powerful force you can feel is between one space and another in that moment of time between the next step and now.” This is where he is in his life right now, but there is value in the “limbo” or “purgatory” moment.
LESSON # 9: At the end of the book after Jonathan and Lacy have reconnected, Jonathan discovers another lesson on his own. How can you rebound after a deep valley in your life? How can you reconnect with the world after a tragedy? Jonathan comes to this realization: “In it all the lesson was not to look back, but to be free to. Not to look forward, but to be free to. The ultimate lesson was to be in the present, to thrive and prosper and build whatever a new life would be. Sometimes it’s a series of baby steps, one day at a time.”
LESSON #10: Finally, on the last page of the story, the final lesson comes from Lacy: In this life, despite the things we cannot control, there can be magic in ordinary things. There are times in our lives that we become too inward and introspective, focusing on our errors, our lives, our challenges, and our growth. It becomes a spiral thought pattern, and we get stuck. Bad things happen, and we have to find a way out. Even in the absence of tragedy it’s easy to continually quest for self-improvement and achievement; yet sometimes we just need to be still, and let God work in our lives. At the end of the story, Lacy arrives at a place of stillness. There can be magic in ordinary things.
AFTERWORD
Words That Will Move Your Compass
and Transform Your Life
Elie Wiesel once said that we are all connected by pain. Wiesel is the Nobel Peace Prize-winning author of the book Night, and he witnessed the murders of his friends and family in the Nazi concentration camps, yet went on to talk about it from a survivor’s point of view.
We are all connected—by love, by pain, and, sometimes, by major events.
The philosophy that we are all connected is a major thread within the story of The Compass. Each one of us travels a very specific and unique journey, yet we are all connected, and, in this connectedness, there is life.
Sharing our wisdom, gifts, and words with the world can literally save or change a life. A child who has no mentor can read a book and develop a value system and beliefs given by the words of a stranger. That child can grow into a healthy and strong adult who creates a thriving business and life that touches the life of another, and yet another. It’s a process of connectedness and sharing that leads to transformation.
Words are the greatest currency we have to empower a life, build up a soul, and create change. Words transform lives, yet some are afraid to give them, fearful of what someone might think, and others are afraid to receive them. They are afraid to risk, yet there is no transformation when you are locked in fear.
Telling someone you love them, talking about the ways in which someone can transform, or sharing the word of God, life lessons, and your own personal wisdom and knowledge are all things that take a great amount of courage. Share the wisdom, as the greats before you have been doing for centuries.
Socrates was a profound thinker who was sentenced to death for his words, yet his words live on today. In the following pages, please find a gift of profound words from some of the world’s most powerful thought leaders, most of whom are our partners in the documentary The Compass.
“Most people dabble at life and never commit totally to what they’re doing, and, as a result, they never really discover what they want to do in life.”
—BRIAN TRACY
AUTHOR AND SPEAKER
“To those who have had any kind of trauma in your lives, quit piling up empty yesterdays. The Lord has given you one get-go in the world; let’s go out kicking and screaming!”
—JEFF LEWIS
QUADRUPLE AMPUTEE
“If you have a goal that’s important enough at a spiritual level, the rest are just details.”
—AL SARGEANT
NEURO PSYCHO-EMOTIONAL RESEARCHER
“Life is for living. As you make your goals and dreams, make your move before you’re ready.”
—LES BROWN
LEADING MOTIVATIONAL SPEAKER
“I think that we have the power as human beings to choose to have the past define us, or we can choose new chapters in our life, and not let the past determine our future.”
—LES BROWN
LEADING MOTIVATIONAL SPEAKER
“All real and lasting success takes a long time, and you’ve got to build the foundation within yourself and become the kind of person who can enjoy the kind of success you want to enjoy.”
—BRIAN TRACY
AUTHOR AND SPEAKER
“Visualize it as if it’s already happened.”
—DEBBIE ALLEN
THE SHAMELESS SUCCESS EXPERT
“We are most powerful when we open the doorway of our heart through gratitude. It’s a powerful state.”
—DR. JOHN DEMARTINI
PHILOSOPHER
“The most important attitude to hold when moving toward your life goal is to recognize love.”
—BRUCE LIPTON
BIOLOGIST
“My greatest success is behind what I fear to do.”
—JOE VITALE
METAPHYSICIAN
“Go out and find out what you love. Set a goal, go after it, and stick with it. Chances are you’re going to be so much happier doing that than whatever it is you’re doing today.”
—BURTON ROBERTS
Survivor CAST MEMBER
“Think about being alive. That is magic in itself and the beauty of creation.”
—JOHN ASSARAF
ENTREPRENEUR
“The people that you want around you are igniters.”
—TIM RALSTON
ENTREPRENEUR
“Nothing that I do ever proves me worthy; nothing that you do will ever prove that you are worthy. We are worthy simply because we are.”
—CHARLIE GAY
HUMANITARIAN
“There’s a purpose behind every choice we make. If you feel as if you’re doing something that’s not good for you, be aware, be smart, and make a different choice. It’s that simple.”
—DR. ROBI LUDWIG
PSYCHOLOGIST AND GUEST HOST
FOR LARRY KING
“The big learning sometimes is in the pause. On the hard days when you’re getting thrashed and life is hard, just pause and breathe.”
—ERICH SHIFFMANN
YOGA MASTER
“When you start giving, you become a part of a community of givers, and you start attracting people like you. Givers have a much bigger vision because they are here to change the world in a big way.”
—MARIE DIAMOND
FENG SHUI MASTER
“You have everything you need inside of you to get what you want. You know what it is that you need. Listen to the voice that’s been silenced by the outside noise. I promise you, you’ll find the peace and happiness you’re after.”
—MARILYN TAM
BUSINESS EXECUTIVE AND PHILANTHROPIST
“Feed your faith and your fears will starve to death.
Make sure you’re not going thro
ugh life malnourished.
We do get into places where we find ourselves mentally,
emotionally, and spiritually malnourished. Listen to
something positive every day; read something that will
nourish your spirit. There is power in the spoken
word.”
—ONA BROWN
SUCCESS COACH
“Sometimes the best lessons we learn come only after brokenness. People who survive the brokenness of their hearts and souls are often the most interesting and evolved people in the world.”
—TAMMY KLING
AUTHOR OF The Compass AND
COACH TO THE COACHES