A Path With Heart.

Today's Marketing Cookie requires courage.

Steve Jobs once said, "Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most importantly, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary."

Your heart wants to make choices without logic or concern for the outcome, and following your heart will require taking risks. Meanwhile, your head will try to point you toward making the safest and easiest choices. Your head will give you advice, guidance, and instruction, while your heart will most likely give you a feeling. Your heart is focused on living, while your head is focused on survival. It is this internal conflict that makes us innovate, overcome challenges, and it makes us quite uniquely human.

My wife and I were married in Nyack, New York, and soon had our first daughter, Alexis. At that time, my mother and sister were sharing an apartment down in Wilmore, Kentucky where my sister was attending college, and I really missed them terribly. One day, I called my mother to see if she could help me find an apartment in the town where they were living. She called me back a short time later and told me there was a vacancy in a 1,200 sq. ft. duplex that would soon be available for $250 per month. I called the landlord and took the apartment without even seeing a single picture.

The next day, I started packing up my family, and we moved to Kentucky.

I didn't have any prospects for getting a job, I didn't have much money, and I didn't have a backup plan. I did, however, in my heart, want to be near my mother and sister again, and my heart led me to them. It doesn't make any sense, but that's how following your heart works. If you think that I'm crazy, just consider what my wife did in following her heart.

This girl meets this guy with big hair (me) in a play, and barely a year later, chooses to marry him. The guy doesn't have a career, doesn't have any money, and yet she decides to bet the rest of her life on him. Then they immediately have their first child, and he decides to uproot and move the family to the middle of nowhere to live near his mother, whom this girl has only met twice. Yes! This New York girl was going to leave the comfort and support of her amazing family to live among pickup truck-driving rednecks and slow-talking farmers. Why in the world would she ever do all these crazy, illogical things? Because she was following her heart!

I am grateful that we followed our hearts on that wild adventure. It turned out to be the most amazing experience I've had in my life, and I never would have found my way into a marketing career had I not gone to Kentucky. But of course, you already know the story of the hot dog! All I can say to you is, pick a path with heart. Have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want. Everything else is secondary.