Author Archives: Rusty Rueff

About Rusty Rueff

Rusty Rueff, author of purposed worKING. Rusty Rueff is the former Chairman Emeritus of The GRAMMY Foundation in Los Angeles. He most recently completed the successful 16 month leadership role as Coordinating National Co-Chair for Technology for Obama (T4O) for the reelection of President Obama and ten-years of Board service and President of the Board of Trustees of the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco. Corporately, most recently Rueff was the Chief Executive Officer at SNOCAP, Inc. until the acquisition of the company by imeem, Inc. in April 2008. Before joining SNOCAP in 2005, he was Executive Vice President of Human Resources at Electronic Arts (EA) from 1998 until 2005. He was also with the PepsiCo companies for more than ten years, with the Pratt & Whitney division of United Technologies for two years, and in commercial radio as an on-air personality for six years. Rusty holds an M.S. in counseling and a B.A. in radio and television from Purdue University. In 2003 he was named a distinguished Purdue alumnus, and he and his wife, Patti, are the named benefactors of Purdue’s Patti and Rusty Rueff School of Visual and Performing Arts. He is a corporate director of Glassdoor.com and runcoach. He is the co-founder and Executive Committee Member of T4A.org, serves on the Founding Circle of The Centrist Project and a founding Board Member of The GRAMMY Music Education Coalition. He is also the co-author of the book Talent Force: A New Manifesto for the Human Side of Business. Rusty and his wife, Patti, reside in Hillsborough, CA and Charlestown, R.I.

day 1319: Ridiculous Resistance

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 “Get out of here, Satan,” Jesus told him.

Where we live in the Bay Area we have been plagued for the past 14 months by what the weather service is calling an “RRR”.  RRR stands for “Ridiculously Resistant Ridge” of high pressure.  The RRR has kept all of the major rain storms way north of us and even though we finally got some rain this past week, the RRR continues to make the rain go away.  There many things in our work that we need but because someone else holds back the resources, time, or money we just can’t get things done.  When you peel back all of the reasons it always comes down to one person who has made the decision to be resistant.  Sometimes for good purposes, but other times, it will just look ridiculously resistant.  How do we break through this resistance?  Well, like the droughts and rain, sometimes we just have to wait it out.  Consistency and time have a way of eroding resistance.  In other instances, we have to take a stand against the resistance and do what we can to break through by using influence, creativity, data and persistence.  It may be that we feel like we are up against ridiculous resistance right now.  Use what is holding you back to try new ways to push against the resistance. Don’t fret. Each time we come up against one of these, we learn better ways to move forward.  We get better and strong by using resistance to our strengthening.

Jesus was being tempted with all that Satan could offer Him.  Satan offered Jesus power over everything without having to remain in God’s will and having to face what was to come to Him at the end of his earthly life.  We can thank God for Jesus’ resistance against the temptation and force that could have overcome Him.  He didn’t waver or falter.  He put Satan behind Him and he moved forward with His mission and calling. Sometimes in this world we have to be ridiculously resistant to what we are being offered.  Jesus’ overcoming Satan proves that we will never be put in a situation that we can’t, with His support, overcome.  Try being resistant today to that calling inside of us that tempts us toward sin.  We may be glad that we were ridiculous in pushing back.
Reference: Matthew 4:10 (New Living Translation)