Get Rice: Ronnie O'Brien Rice, Ph.D., Lawyer

Ken Brown said it best, “life is about choices, challenges, and change.” However, he has a different way of employing these words into everyday life. I took these words as an enactment of thought to behavior. First, we make a choice to live our life in a certain manner:   Goals. Then, we are face with challenges (or I like to call them puzzles) based on our overall goal, e.g., choice. And then we make a behavioral or thought change to accomplish those goals. This all sounds simple! And the truth of the matter is that it is simple. It takes evaluating your life to see where you are currently and where you want to be. This self-evaluation includes short-term and long-term goals. Ask yourself what it takes to get from where you are today to where you want to be in 30 days, a year, 5 years, and 30 years. After you’ve made your decisions, you know you will be faced with challenges (or puzzles). I do not believe there is such thing as a challenge. You just must find a way to be...

No matter how much you love or hate the 45 th President of the United States of America, Donald Trump; either way you must respect the man’s ability to promote himself. I’ve often heard that the difference between marketing and public relations is that public relations is more about branding and marketing is about direct revenue. I believe Trump’s successes is due largely to his branding, legal team, and social media engagement. Branding First, Trump has licensed his name for various real estate properties, apparel, and home furnishing. To the average person, this sounds crazy, but Trump licensing has created a sense of ownership for the respect that the names carries. Some of his properties were in Las Vegas, Toronto, Dubai, and Honolulu. According to an analysis by The Washington Post, there are more than fifty licensing or management deals involving Trump's name, which have generated at least $59 million in yearly revenue for his companies. What this means is that T...

Imagine standing at the altar at 21 years of age and at your home Catholic church reciting your marriage vows to the ‘love of your life’ with no one in your family present. Not even your mom, your dad, your siblings attending. Imagine years later receiving documents from a stranger asking you to sign that you’ve received a divorce paperwork from that very same ‘love of your life.’ And imagine again, years later you and the love of your life decide to cancel the divorce proceedings publicly. Yes, we are talking about Kobe Bryant. The same person who has achieved great successes on the court as well as off the court. I believe that there are at least 3 core lessons we can learn from an ‘all-star’ of man even through his ‘ups and downs’ of life:   Focus, family, and legacy. Focus:  First and foremost, Kobe Bryant had a level of focus that was displayed across ever area of his life. He has been married to one woman since he was 23 years old. He was a devout catholic an...