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Florida-Times Union Shorelines
Saturday May 3, 2003
Ponte Vedra Beach motivational speaker and restaurant owner Jon Gordon puts his body into one of his positive energy seminars.
-- Diane Uhley/Staff --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Speaker helps people tap positive energy
By Susan D. Brandenburg
Shorelines correspondent
Replacing negativity with optimism is Jon Gordon's mission.
"Life is all about leading with your heart and discovering the positive energy within," said the Ponte Vedra Beach motivational speaker, author and entrepreneur.
Known as The Energy Addict, Gordon appears weekly on WJXT TV-4's Morning Show.
"Jon's fabulous," said WJXT News Director Maureen "Mo" Ruddy. "He packs a powerful punch. I get pumped up watching him every Tuesday morning. When he gets on Oprah, I hope he remembers he started at Channel 4."
Sharing his Energy Addict success seminars with groups as large as 10,000 and as small as 10, Gordon is becoming a familiar face on the First Coast. Cingular Wireless, The Jacksonville Jaguars, New York Life, State Farm Insurance Company, Zurich, PGA Tour and PPR International are among his clients.
On April 10, Gordon gave a speedy, one-hour seminar to 60 employees at the PGA Tour in Ponte Vedra Beach.
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Employees at the PGA Tour react during a seminar by motivational speaker Jon Gordon.
-- Diane Uhley/Staff
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It was an excellent seminar," said Mike Cooney, director of human resources at the PGA Tour. "Jon promised to keep it at an hour and he did. He packed in some excellent information on how the body regenerates itself with good nutrition and healthy habits. He used humor and commonsense action steps for maintaining a high energy level. We all came away with some doable energy tips that will make a positive difference."
Robin Wahby, managing partner of New York Life, said: "Jon's like a lightning bolt of pure, positive energy. He gave a great seminar to about 35 members of our new sales team last year. He's all about controlling the way you react to life's dilemmas.
"My team came away from his seminar with new consciousness of their strengths," Wahby said. She said Gordon's Energy Addict seminar will be on her company's agenda once or twice a year from now on. "We can all use that extra boost of energy."
Owner of Moe's Southwest Grill restaurants in Tinseltown, San Marco and Jacksonville Beach, Gordon considers his restaurants one more avenue for positively impacting the community.
"I'm using my restaurants as a vehicle to raise money for youth-focused charities," he said. The grand opening of his first Moe's in Tinseltown centered on a fund-raising event for Take Stock in Children, a communities-in-schools college scholarship program.
"I will never charge any non-profit agency for an Energy Addict seminar," Gordon said. "With the recent budget cuts, non-profits need an infusion of positive energy now more than ever before."
A native of Long Island, N.Y., Gordon graduated from Cornell University and has a master's degree in teaching from Emory University. At 26, while employed in the marketing department of a technology company, he opened his first restaurant, The Park Bench, in Atlanta. There, Gordon also founded the Phoenix Organization, a non-profit volunteer group in 1996. Since then, it has raised about $1 million for youth-focused programs, he said.
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"I've discovered that when you harness your energy for good, amazing things happen," said Jon Gordon.
-- Diane Uhley/Staff
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I've discovered that when you harness your energy for good, amazing things happen," said Gordon.
When he ran for Atlanta's City Council, knocking on 7,000 doors during his campaign, Gordon took his defeat as just another positive step toward the future.
Energy steps
Here are 10 steps for increasing personal energy recommended by Jon Gordon, "The Energy Addict."
- Say yes to everything.
- Get out of the house and meet new people.
- Attend the new play or movie that just opened.
- Go to a museum.
- Try a new dinner recipe.
- Take up a new hobby.
- Buy a new CD.
- Drive home a different way from work.
- Learn a new word each day.
- Take trips and visit new places.
"My wife, Kathryn, and I decided we wanted to raise our children near the ocean," he said. "We pored over brochures and found that North Florida was where we wanted to be."
Two years ago, he sold his Atlanta restaurants, gave notice to the technology company and moved his family to Ponte Vedra Beach.
The Gordons, including 4-year-old Jade and 2-year-old Cole, are now entrenched in the Ponte Vedra community. Recently, during his daily morning workout at the Winston Family YMCA, Gordon shared some of his action steps that have been featured in his free weekly Energy Addict Online and his Tuesday morning Weekly Energy Tip segment of the Morning Show:
Think optimistically. The more positive you are, the more mental and physical energy you will have. Negative energy weighs on you like a ton of bricks, whereas positive thoughts and words help you flow and excel.
Exercise. You don't need expensive equipment or a gym membership. All you need is a pair of shoes and a place to walk. Studies show that even as little as five minutes of exercise increases your energy and helps reduce tension.
Eat a healthy breakfast every day. If you eat breakfast, you are more alert and you perform better at work. Try to eat foods that are closest to nature, since they give you the most energy.
Add the "energy of play" to your day. The more fun you have, the more energy you will create. Children teach us this every day.
Gordon's book, Become an Energy Addict, is slated for publication by Longstreet Press on Sept. 1. In the book, he outlines 100 strategies for increasing physical, mental and spiritual energy.
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