Mental magnificence gets it. To be successful at anything means you quit wasting time and energy looking around at everyone else, buckle down and get cracking. Sure, it’s good to take examples from the best of the best. See where they excelled and lock in on the top two or three most helpful ideas.
That’s just good sense. Even if you don’t like ’em, swallow your pride and learn from them.
There’s a point, though, where you decide it’s your dream, your belief, your vision, your passion.
Your responsibility. Thoreau wrote, “Live your beliefs and you can turn the world around.” For our purposes here, emphasize that word, ‘your’.
Live your beliefs and you can turn the world around.
Think about it. Listening to someone speak, it’s not hard to sense whether their heart is in what they’re saying. There’s a snap to their delivery, a pizzazz in their step and a sparkle in their eyes as they expound on the huge benefits of yogurt siding. Pasta hammers. Spray-on Bug Jackets.
It may sound profoundly ridiculous to you, but there’s no doubting THEY BELIEVE IN THEIR PRODUCT OR SERVICE. Those who live somebody else’s beliefs are known as employees. Those who live their own beliefs are known as entrepreneurs and owners.
So, when The Dream becomes yours, really yours, the need to weigh in on others’ successes goes out the window. Yeah, probably along with the patent for the Bug Jackets. You no longer fret about how well the other guy is doing. If you even pay attention, you applaud his willingness to stick with HIS dream and follow HIS passion. You publicly praise her for having courage to hang in when detractors did their best to dampen her resolve.
Strong-minded mature thinkers celebrate excellence no matter where they find it.
That’s a fact, Jack. People who do well deserve your praise and attention – for about 5 minutes. Then your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to get your eyes back on your own dream and keep at it.
“Well, I know what I really want and feel I should be doing, but I’m not very good at it, yet.”
Jim Fannin says, “A single thought can reverse the outcome of any situation, condition or circumstance. It takes less than 90 seconds to change your mind and reverse your course of action.”
Think about that. In fact, that’s a real good question to ask yourself or anyone else stuck on the horns of less-than-stellar choices: “Well, how long does it take you to change your mind?”
90 seconds.
“That’s it?”
That’s it. Don’t worry about the previous decisions that didn’t work out so well. Make some new ones and press on.
Then you won’t have time or interest to worry about who else is ‘making it’ or not. It’s proactive, it wastes less time and energy, and it gives you time to check out the Youtube of that goofball trying to get those bugs to hold still long enough to model the jackets.
Here’s to your continuing pursuit of excellence!
© D. Dean Boone, February 2014