100 Pedals

Significant Outcomes in the Face of Adversity

## Five simple steps to creating change in your life

December 2, 2025 by Dave Cooke Leave a Comment

When you find yourself at that place where you are not celebrating the outcomes you desire in your life, you have two choices — do something or do nothing. Ultimately the situation will not change until you decide it must. The easy part is knowing what to do; the hard part is making the commitment.

Rather than getting all hung up on an overworked action plan, here are five steps you can take to change your future outcomes:

1. Declare: “I am not satisfied with where I am.”
2. Inquire: “What can I do differently?” or “What can I do better?”
3. Explore: “How will this change the outcome I am experiencing?”
4. Confirm: “This is what I need to do!”
5. Act: “I will…” Make the commitment, challenge yourself, do the work!

Whatever the situation, there is a solution. Everything begins with embracing personal responsibility for the outcomes in your life. Once you openly, honestly, and receptively explore the options you will find the answer. Armed with the solution, the only step remaining is taking action and making it happen.

The answer is usually quite obvious. What holds us back is not the solution; it is the work, the risk, and the task of implementation. Have the courage to trust your path and embrace the challenge. Successful and incredible outcomes to change are just around the corner.

On Sunday, December 1, I challenged myself to step up and make some changes in my life. This challenge reflects behaviors and activities that I were once part of my life routine and that I had fallen out of. I have challenged myself to actively focus on making the necessary changes in my life to get back into those routines for the next 100Days. I will be sharing comments from my daily experiences on my 100Day Challenge Facebook Group. Please join me and follow along with my experiences and thoughts on this journey.

Filed Under: Make A Commitment, The Four Wheels of Personal Leadership Tagged With: change, change behaviors, commitment, creating change, embracing change, focus, personal responsibility, The 100Day Challenge

## The Most Powerful Force In Inspiring Change

April 22, 2025 by Dave Cooke Leave a Comment

Motivation based on beliefs, choices and actions is more powerful and lasting than motivation based on feelings and emotions. ~ Mark Sanborn

It took me a few reads before I felt like I understood the message in this quote. I am a big believer in the power of emotion. I have encouraged many people to embrace the calling of the heart — the heart being the emotional intellect that exists within us. Connecting with and embracing this component of thought is the place where logic — fear, doubt, experience, worry, past history — is not as strong.

The emotional intellect — the heart — is where our dreams live. The mind is where our dreams go to die. They die in our minds because our mind only has the ability to embrace what it knows as true or possible; hence, it limits the options in our future because it is references only what it knows about the past.

At first I struggled with the notion that there may be a more powerful motivator than our feelings and emotions. The more I thought about it, our feelings and emotions are most powerful when they are driven by what we conceive and believe and what we choose to do to take action toward it. Feelings and emotions can inspire us to take action; however, the intensity of that action is defined and driven by the passion, energy and commitment we bring to it.

One of the Four Wheels of Personal Leadership is “Live with Passion.” To live with passion means that we discover and embrace our D.I.G. Our D.I.G is what drives, inspires, and guides us. The energy that comes from this point of consciousness is far more powerful than simply having a feeling. It is more powerful because there is something more tangible about this inspiration — it is a conscious commitment to live or create a life that is driven by what we value, love, enjoy, and get energy from. This level of awareness and the related commitment is an incredible force because it is well defined, uniquely personal to us, and reflects what is at the core of our value system and personality.

As you seek to create change or begin a transition in your life, focus first on your D.I.G. Clarity here will provide you the confidence and the inspiration to drive forward with greater passion and commitment.

Filed Under: Focusing On Your Vision, Inspirational Perspectives, Live With Passion, Living Your Purpose, Seizing Opportunity Tagged With: change, effective outcomes, effective results, embracing change, Mark Sanborn, The Four Wheels of Personal Leadership, transformational change, transforming change

## Change Starts With A Challenge

July 9, 2025 by Dave Cooke 2 Comments

“Challenge yourself! Success is not defined by achieving a big goal; it is realized in pursuit of a clear vision and the consistent celebration of little accomplishments!”

Most recently I kicked off a 100Day Challenge through a Facebook Group. The purpose for the Challenge was twofold: to discover how a community of like-oriented people would engage around sharing their vision and commitments and to learn more about what accomplishments are inspiring people.

The response has been very exciting. While there are a smaller percentage who have shared their commitment to the 100Day Challenge, I am convinced there are some private participants who have not yet shared their objectives with the group. And, there is a third group, that haven’t stated their intents or interest whatsoever. I am curious as to where they are.

As people started to explore a 100 Day Challenge and the commitment associated with it, I enjoyed the coaching conversations I participated in. There were about three main themes associated with these conversations:

1. “I don’t know how to set a goal like this“: The first aspect of the 100Day Challenge is to pay close attention to the 100Pedals mantra — define your vision for accomplishment in your life. I have shared my perspectives on goals in the past. Goals are a wonderful benchmark of progress. They can often be the tangible measurement of achievement, like a defined outcome. A goal, however, means nothing without a vision of what achievement of that goal looks like. Simply losing weight, making more money, getting that new job is a defined outcome. It means nothing unless you know how it benefits, impacts, or improves your life and the lives of those around you. Instead of setting a goal, focus on a vision of peace, joy, happiness, or success in your life. It is that vision that gets you thinking about what needs to occur in your life -actions, behaviors, activities- that make this change possible and the effort worthwhile.

2. “I have so many, how do I choose which one?“: Focus on the aspect of your life that is fundamentally most important to you. In many of my conversations, people were dividing between personal and professional; or, health and intellectual. They are all important. Only one transformation project is most important. Moving toward your vision for the one component that is most important will facilitate progress toward realizing accomplishment in the others later. Start with the most important, essential element first — the rest will follow.

3. “What if I don’t really have anything?“: If you do not really have anything to improve, tweak, or change — that is great!! Since you are in a place where you are at peace and happy, celebrate that. There is an opportunity for you to remind yourself and celebrate those aspects of your life are in alignment. As we often lose momentum when we are working through a storm, we can also lose momentum in a place of peace and accomplishment. Celebrating your gratitude for your life is a great and productive activity. Make that your “challenge.”

One of the great discoveries on my 100Pedals journey is that I am never alone. Whether I am celebrating or struggling, there is a huge community of people who are also on their own personal journey. They are looking for what I have to offer and they are offering what I am looking for. The 100Day Challenge was created to create and build a community where this interaction would be visible, accessible, and productive.

Leverage the opportunity to challenge, to grow, to learn, and to share. Your path to accomplished change involves making a commitment — take the 100Day Challenge to help you get there!

Filed Under: Celebrating Accomplishment, Focusing On Your Vision, Live With Passion, Make A Commitment Tagged With: celebrating accomplishments, change, Facilitating change, The 100Day Challenge, transformational change, transformative change