In this week's article, I share some of the events that have have transpired—and the lessons I have learned—in between my first and 400th blog article, a time period of nearly 11 years, from October 2013 to July 2024.
It has been quite a JOURNEY!
TODAY I recollect and reminisce upon some of the highlights of that journey. In addition, I will pay SPECIAL TRIBUTE to three (3) very special persons (VIPs) who have, more than any others, made it possible for me to have gotten this far as a writer, entrepreneur, and visionary.
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| With my Doctoral diploma in 2013. Note the two small, circular "Tucker tracks" (baby spit-up stains) on the right side of my shirt. |
Just seven months previously, on March 12, 2013, my first child (a son) had been born. Three weeks after that, I defended my recently completed 1,149-page Doctoral Dissertation on Self-Action Leadership and graduated with my doctoral degree in Education (the Ph.D. equivalent in the field of Education).
A few days later, my wife and newborn son and I moved into our first home in the northern suburbs of Houston, Texas, where we would live for the next seven (7) years. Suffice it to say, the early spring of 2013 was a momentous period for the Jordan and Lina Jensen Family!
After graduating from doctoral school, I immediately set to work turning my dissertation into the 4th Edition of the SAL Textbook, entitled Self-Action Leadership: The Key to Everything. In September 2013, Lina and I self-published the completed work through authorHouse publishing. |
| SAL Textbook (4th Edition) Published by authorHouse Publishing in September 2013 |
That inaugural blog was entitled: Welcome to Freedom Focused.
It was not as well written or as effectively formatted as later blog articles, but that is a good thing because it is a sign of my improvement as a writer and blogger.
Practice doesn't always make perfect; but it does always makes PROGRESS!
And progress—steady and continual—is a never-ending goal of self-action leaders.
Click HERE to read Blog Article #1: Welcome to Freedom Focused, published on October 8, 2013.
Publishing consistently and prolifically on this Freedom Focused, SAL-centered blog has been one of the greatest fulfillments, joys, and satisfactions of my life and career.
I love to write!
I love to teach!
I love Freedom, Self-Action Leadership, and Serendipity!
This blog has empowered me to synergistically synthesize these LOVES in an enormously rewarding way that has also benefitted others. I am so grateful to my Boss for blessing me with the opportunity and freedom to pursue these lifelong passions of mine and to serve others in the process. I absolutely love my work, which means it really isn't "WORK" in the traditional sense of the word.
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A very skinny JJ shortly after arriving in Atlanta in 2003. I have always been a journaler of my life's journey. I have also always been a student (or autoethnographer) of that journal. The goal of this blog is to continually study that ongoing journal and then expand upon what I've learned in hopes of helping others. |
In truth, I don't expect to ever completely retire from writing, teaching, and speaking. I love it too much, and for better or for worse, I'll probably always have something to say, write, or teach.
I'll let YOU decide whether that is "for better" or "for worse"!
With that said, the time will come down the road 15-20 years from now, when I will likely turn the task over to someone else who is as passionate about SAL, FREEDOM, and writing as I am.
TODAY, I wish to express my gratitude and appreciation for YOU, my DEAR READERS, along this journey I have been blazing now for nearly a dozen years (as a blogger) and nearly three decades (as a writer, teacher, and entrepreneur).
I've said it before and I'll say it again: if a writer has no readers, you can argue he or she is wasting one's time writing.
So THANK YOU!
While my readership has not yet grown to become anything particularly noteworthy or newsworthy—I recently hit 150,000 lifetime views (1)—I truly value those relatively few souls who have and do tune in on either a regular or sporadic basis. Moreover, I am confident that my readership will continue to grow according to the will and timing of my Boss.
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| JJ & Lina; South Beach; March 2007 Here I am back when I apparently knew what I wanted and how to get it. |
As Lina once commented to me back when we were dating:
"Jordan, YOU seem like the kind of person who knows what he wants and how to get it."
Given my mixed track record over the years, I'm not sure how true that has been in the short-run of things; but I have a sneakin' feeling that the blessed long-run of things may yet vindicate Lina's complimentary comments rather comprehensively.
Speaking of a mixed track record, I have learned a great deal over time about my many limitations, shortcomings, weaknesses, and other inadaquacies.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: There are a few things I am really good at; but most things I'm either blandly average or appallingly subpar.
In other words, I am NOT a renaissance man!
In one sense, these limitations and seeming negatives have been very frustrating and have certainly tried my patience. However, as I have demonstrated a willingness to exercise patience and wait humbly and submissively on my Boss, I have discovered that Serendipity has a way of compensating for all that I lack—and then some over time. My gradual recognition of this powerful compensatory reality has provided me with no small measure of PEACE and RELIEF, and for two distinct reasons.
Second, I am relieved to have discovered that I don't have to be and do everything; I simply have to be my best and do my relatively limited bit (my DUTY) to contribute to the utmost of my imperfect and limited ability.
If I will simply be and do that, I have found that Serendipity and other people will take care of the rest... and then some.
Approximately 20 years ago, I had a fascinating, incisive, and powerful educational experience with my Boss. The year was 2004 and I was feeling anxious about both my present and future career and life. In the midst of my dating dramas and other anxieties, I'll never forget the Boss burning the following statement clearly and distinctly into my mind and heart.
Said He: "If you'll just be the best Jordan you can be, I will take care of the rest."
That simple formula is the very essence of Serendipity-infused Self-Action Leadership. That is the essence of the message of the SAL Textbook—and all 400 of these blog articles. If YOU will simply be the best person that YOU can be, Serendipity (including other people) will indeed take care of the rest.
Accompanying this message at approximately the same period of time, my Boss also guided me to a personally-tailored message in Holy Scripture.
The verse (Luke 21:19 in the New Testament) read: In your patience possess ye your souls.
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| SAL and Serendipity working together represent a PARADOX, which makes sense since all TRUTH is paradoxical. |
Now that 20 years have passed since I received this wisdom, I can report back with clarity and confidence that the Boss has absolutely kept His end of the bargain—even though it has not always seemed like it in various moments of disappointment, frustration, and unmet expectations along the way.
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| FIFTH Edition of the SAL Textbook Self- Published by authorHouse Publishing in 2015 |
I confess that teaching, tutoring, mentoring, and coaching THREE students up-close-and-personal in the form of my own children was not the career plan or vision I had cultivated growing up, or in college, or when I studied EDUCATION in graduate school. It is certainly a lot less glamorous and prestigious a position than I had envisioned myself occupying.
And I'm not going to lie: in many ways it has been a difficult and trying experience!
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| Jordan R. Jensen Co-CEO of The Ultimate Career With my three major work projects (and personal jewels) in 2019. |
But despite the many challenges, it has also been a WONDERFUL opportunity filled with blissful surprises and unexpected joys and pleasures, both personally and professionally.
As a result of this seeming career deviation, I am so much closer to my wife and children in 2024 than I was back in 2015 when I was traveling away from home teaching seminars for 15-20 days out of the month.
Thus, the God-honest truth is that I wouldn't trade the precious and priceless past 8.5 years with my children for all the fame, glamor, glory, money, and prestige in all the world.I confess that it all seemed really unfair in the beginning.
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| What a comprehensive FORTUNE the Boss has helped me accrue over the years! |
Nay, that is too weak.
It felt more like a cruel, ironic joke was being made, and I was the butt of the joke!
I had worked so long and hard to get where I was in early 2016. I felt strongly that I deserved a chance to make my mark by helping others through SAL after all I had done to prepare myself to become its messenger and leader over the previous 15 years.
But clearly the Boss had other plans!
Moreover, it's no secret that ascending any meaningful mountain requires a long, steep, uphill climb. In the famous words of Napoleon Hill: Before success comes in any man's life, he is sure to meet with much temporary defeat, and, perhaps, some failure. (3)
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| I'm a very WEALTHY man, especially in the ways that matter most. |
That is the POWER of SERENDIPITY magnifying my own, imperfect best efforts the past two decades, and to a lesser extent, the past eight years.
As a result, everything that matters most to me is presently in good condition and relatively smooth working order. You can't put a price tag on simplicity of life and peace of mind and conscience; all the fame, glory, honor, and money in the universe is worthless by comparison!
In the words of a famous Country Music song: I've got everything I need; and nothin' that I don't. (3)
This is not to say I don't still have ambitions, dreams, and hopes for the future; it just means I have learned increasingly to be content with the things that my Boss has allotted unto me, as well as His omniscient timing for everything in my life as long as I'm doing my level best along the way. (4)
In truth, He has done more than merely keep His bargain and promise made to me back in 2004. He has granted me blessings and favors that I had never even contemplated or imagined on my own. That's why I often refer to Lina as being "better than the woman of my dreams" as opposed to the mere proverbial "woman of my dreams." In so many ways, Lina has surpassed my own greatest expectations in a spouse; that's Serendipity in action! That's not to say that she is perfect or that we have a perfect marriage. Nobody has a perfect anything in this world. But Lina (and my marriage to her) is pretty darn good! Good enough to write home about, be very happy about, enjoy to the fullest, and be extraordinarily grateful for!
The BOSS is pretty amazing to have brought all this about in my life as I've committed my life to Him and to SAL.
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| The Boss's Ways, Words, Plans and Means are always Higher and Greater than mine. |
Actually, it's more than that; it's a square deal squared, or maybe cubed, or perhaps even to the fourth or fifth power; and that's just in the short-run of things. In the long-run of things, it will, no doubt, be more akin to the 100th or 1000th power or more!
Thus, Serendipity is more than just a doorway to a roomful of finite blessings; it is an escalator ride up to an outer space filled with an infinite cornucopia of exponential blessings!
Speaking of the Boss: the older I get and the wiser I become, the clearer I see the extent to which He really is in control. I am free to be the best self-action leader I can be; and my choice to be so truly makes me the Captain of my own life.
Such is a foundational principle of Self-Action Leadership.
In other words, I really am Sovereign over my life, as the SAL Mantra goes.
But there is no question that the BOSS is the GENERAL, and His ways and words and plans and means have always been greater and higher and wiser (and often different) than my own. Nevertheless, it never ceases to amaze me how much FREEDOM He grants me to chart my own, self-appointed path within the broader framework of His own pathway and plan for me.
Thus, His ways and means are always a pathway to greater freedom, not lesser freedom as we mortals often mistakenly assume. I openly admit that it often doesn't feel that way at challenging junctures throughout the journey; hence, our ever-present need for HUMILITY, PATIENCE, and VISION (farsightedness).
But there is no question in my mind that He is the author of the heaping mounds of Serendipity in which my life has been so abundantly and lavishly marinated. I therefore humbly and patiently await His timetable while falling to my knees in deep, genuine, and sincere gratitude for blessing me with so much liberty, freedom, opportunity, and uniqely tailored favors and fortunes all along the way.
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| Hope Springs Eternal |
I am, however, much less concerned with numbers and timing than I used to be; and oh what a relief that is! In truth, I've always been much more of a teacher, philosopher, poet, leader, and administrator than I am a businessman, marketer, salesman, grassroots organizer, or entrepreneur.
What an immense burden this realization has lifted off of my shoulders!
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| Lina Marie Jensen Wife, Mother, Daughter, Sister, Friend Executive Director (NextEra Energy Resources) And the LOVE of my life |
The first is my wife, Lina Jensen.
In the SAL Textbooks, I teach a principle about relationships that is rooted in one of my favorite quotes from Benjamin Franklin, who once wrote: Be civil to all, sociable with many, familiar with few, friend to ONE, and enemy to none.
Without going into my whole training spiel on the details of this principle, it sufficeth to say that LINA is my "ONE" in Franklin's relationships' equation.
That terse, ONE-word statement sums up the matter.
Indeed, most of the blessings I've enjoyed as a freelance writer and stay-at-home Dad can be traced directly back to the resources and time freedom made possible by Lina's successful career.
I simply couldn't have done it without HER.
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| Dr. Christopher P. Neck Professor of Management Arizona State University |
The second person I would like to pay special tribute to is my closest, dearest, and sincerest friend and colleague: Chris Neck of Tempe, Arizona.
Christopher P. Neck, Ph.D., is a Full Professor of Management at the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University.
A gifted—and award-winning—teacher, author, and researcher at ASU (and formerly Virginia Tech), Dr. Neck is one of the highest profile scholars in the 41-year old field of Self-Leadership (S-L), one of the four academic forerunners of SAL.
I first became acquainted with Chris in 2001 when, as a freshman in college, I purchased a textbook he had co-authored. Dr. Neck's textbook was assigned reading for a leadership class I had enrolled in at Brigham Young University that summer term.
Nine years later, in 2010, I began using an updated version of this same self-leadership textbook in my doctoral studies.
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| This is the textbook I used as a student at BYU. It was my introduction to Dr. Chris Neck's work. |
Over the course of the past 14 years, Chris and I have exchanged several thousand pages of email and text correspondence and I can say without reservation that only Lina (My ONE) sits higher than Chris in my Inner Circle, both personally and professionally.
Like Lina, I have paid tribute to Chris on many occasions in past articles and books, so I will not lay it on too thick in this article. Suffice it to say, Chris is an incredibly accomplished professor. More importantly, he is a kind and loving husband, father, teacher, friend, human being, and a VIP to me both personally and professionally. I know of few (if any) people with more class, integrity, kindness, and professionalism than Dr. Chris Neck.
Although only nominally religious denominationally speaking, Chris is a true and sincere Christian believer and a very spiritual person. Although we are not members of the same religious sect, I nevertheless look to Chris as a spiritual leader and mentor in addition to his professional mentoring and personal friendship. More than anyone else in the entire world, Chris has been there for me during the many ups and downs of my unorthodox career trajectory and personal life. To have such a person in one's life and career is to enjoy one of the greatest, purest, and sweetest GIFTS of the BOSS.Thus, to the Boss—and to Chris—my gratitude knows no bounds. |
| Dr. Chris Neck is an LSU alum and avid Tigers fan. |
Intuitively, I always knew he was right; but inwardly I continued to struggle.
On one memorable occasion in particular, Chris felt inspired to say the following to me, and I quote:
"Jordan, I really believe that God wants YOU to be at home raising your kids right now."
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| Chris Neck's dad—Tom Neck—was a member of LSU's 1958 National Championship football team. He later played professional football for the Chicago Bears. |
And I unequivocally BELIEVED him!
The rest is, as they say, history—or perhaps "present."
A thousand THANK YOU's to my Boss, Chris, and Lina. I will forever be in your debt, and greatly look forward to the journey yet to come that we will continue to travel together!
To learn more about Dr. Christopher P. Neck, click HERE to view his professional academic website.
I should also note that Dr. Neck is the only other author of an official Freedom Focused blog. I have always intended to open up the blog to other authors (in time); but to date, Chris Neck has been the only one who has risen to the occasion and opportunity. I'm always curious to see who else might replicate this privilege in the future.
Click HERE to read BLOG #260: Parenting Teenagers: A Lesson in Leadership, By Christopher P. Neck, Ph.D.
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| Different Editions of the seminal Self-Leadership Textbook Authored by Dr. Chris Neck and his Colleagues. |
And now an update on Freedom Focused's gradual, steady, and appropriate timing and progress...
We are currently almost ONE YEAR in to the serial publication of the 7th Edition of the SAL Textbook. I began this online publication on September 6, 2023, right here on the Freedom Focused blog, and will continue publishing this mammoth Life Leadership Handbook—one chapter at a time—until it is available in its entirety online sometime in 2026. Once the online edition is complete, I will self-publish the 7th Edition in a brand new, never before formatted, 8.5 x 11-inch, double columned, traditional hardcopy textbook.
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| Some of the textbooks I used in college and doctoral school. |
To this day, I have scores of textbooks lining the shelves of my 1000+ volume home and office library. I am not an overly materialistic person in general; but as my wife Lina will attest (somewhat to her chagrin), I do LOVE and cherish my books!
Over the past 22 years, I have taken this love of textbooks to the next level by carefully and painstakingly creating seven different editions of my own! Now entering its SEVENTH complete iteration, the SAL Life Leadership Textbook is really starting to come into its own, and I am very pleased with its results and shape, lingering imperfections notwithstanding.
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| First, Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Editions of the SAL Textbooks. |
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| Winston Churchill 1874-1965 One of my SAL & Historical Heroes |
I once read a statement by Winston Churchill whereby he spoke about what one could achieve (as a writer) if one was willing to be self-disciplined and stick to an ambitious compositional task and see it through to completion.
His words in this regard—like so many of his other stirring statements made throughout a truly outlying and special life—greatly inspired me. Many people know about Churchill's unparalleled wartime speeches and leadership greatness, but most do not know that he was also a prolific author and a Nobel Prize recipient for literature in 1953, and a war hero (as a soldier), and an accomplished painter, and an animal lover, and an amateur bricklayer, etc.
All hail the mighty Winston Churchill!
In this and other positive ways, I strive diligently and tirelessly after the kind of greatness that Sir Winston so amply exemplified over his imperfect, but unusually remarkable 91 years in this world.
Aided by further forces inside and out which have obsessively and passionately moved upon me to ply my pen to teach and influence others, I have felt an ongoing and pressing drive and motivation to write, write, and write some more. Along the way, I have been blessed to complete a variety of significant and substantive literary works of my own. Doing so has been enormously satisfying and fulfilling to me personally, and I give thanks to God for blessing me with so much talent, drive, and commitment to honing my skills to the utmost degree.
I sincerely hope that this, my focus and commitment has in some way blessed YOU, and will yet bless countless others.
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| Our VISION of the FUTURE is glorious! And it focuses on the personal leadership and character development of individuals, of the ONE; even me and YOU! |
Lastly, I hope that if you feel impressed to do so, you will share our blogs and books with others who may be in a position to disseminate the message to others, and especially young people who are in such desperate need of wise counsel and principle-centered direction in their lives and careers.
At Freedom Focused, our ultimate VISION of the future is simple, but will not be easily accomplished. Our vision is to change Western Culture in profound and measurable ways that are marked more fully by Personal Responsibility, Character Development, and Self-Action Leadership. The SAL Textbook and this Blog are the literary guides that undergird our movement.
Here's to our first 400 articles and the thousands of pages they represent.
And here's to many hundreds/thousands more!
—Dr. JJ
Author's Note: This is the 400th Blog Post Published by Freedom Focused LLC since November 2013 and the 210th consecutive weekly blog published since August 31, 2020.
Click HERE for a compete listing of the other 399 FF Blog Articles
Click HERE for a complete listing of Freedom Focused SAL QUOTES
Click HERE for a complete listing of Freedom Focused SAL POEMS
Click HERE to access the FULL TEXT of Dr. JJ's Psalms of Life: A Poetry Collection
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Tune in NEXT Wednesday for another article on a Self-Action Leadership related topic.
Click HERE to buy the SAL Textbooks
Chapter 1 Notes:
1. This number counts automated bot hits and many of my own visits as I've updated the page, which account for about 35% of the overall hits. So realistically, I probably have somewhere in the neighborhood of 100,000 authentic, original hits.
2. Hill, N. (1990). Think and Grow Rich. New York, NY: Fawcett Crest. Page 23.
3. Homegrown by the Zac Brown Band. Produced by Zac Brown and Jay Joyce. Written by: Zac Brown, Nico Moon, Wyatt Durette.
4. See Alma 29:3 (The Book of Mormon).
