Stop Waiting, Start Being … Successful!
Stop Waiting, Start Being … Successful!
There are those of us who are always about to live.
—George Sheehan
Why is it that some people achieve success while others seem to stay stuck in average?
Why is it that some people flourish in business and in life regardless of surrounding economic the conditions?
Charles Darrow was unemployed after the stock market crash of 1929. He spent the next few years developing a board game that eventually came to be known as Monopoly. Within a year of registering the patent, Parker Brothers was selling 20,000 units a year, and Darrow became the world's first millionaire game designer.
J.K Rowling the world famous author of the Harry Potter series was actually living on welfare in the U.K while she finished writing her first Harry Potter book. Within 5 years she went from welfare to multi-millionaire.
Whether you’re six or sixty, you have desires, plans, and intentions and yet many people never achieve significant levels of success in their lifetimes. Why?
I’ll Be Successful When I …
There’s a story about a young man who aspired to be a great baseball player. He worked hard at it all of his life. When he was in the seventh grade, the young boy said that he would be a great player if he could just be a starter on the eighth grade team … and he did. As a freshman in high school, he told himself that he would be a great player if he could make it on the senior team … and he did. When he went away to college on a full baseball scholarship, he said that he would be a great baseball player if he could make the varsity team in college as a freshmen … and he did. After four years of college, he was drafted into the major leagues after spending a little time in the minors. After years of playing great baseball for a few clubs, he retired. As he looked back over his career, he thought about all of his accomplishments and awards, but a question came to his mind. “If I was truly a great player, wouldn’t I have been inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame? I haven’t been inducted, so I must not have been a great player.” He died the next year – three years before he was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. He died an unhappy man. Why? In his eyes, he never really knew if he was a great baseball player. He was always wondering, always questioning himself because he was always looking outside of himself for the answer. He was always aspiring to be a great baseball player but never owning his greatness on the inside.
A Long Way Off
Have you ever said to yourself, “I will be a great business owner or sales rep when I …” Or, “I would be a good parent if I could only …” We create “to-do” lists filled with hundreds of tasks that we don’t accomplish or we continuously raise the bar higher and higher, always trying to reach that next level of success. Eventually … someday … I will be _____________ (fill in the blank). Whatever the “it” is that we’re chasing that defines our success seems to elude us because once we reach a certain level of success or a specific goal, there’s always another level or goal we must achieve to validate ourselves. Success is always far off in the distance – something to strive for, to lunge for – but we never quite seem to reach it.
Aspiring to Be “IT”
Have you ever wondered why people are always aspiring to do something rather than actually doing that thing that they aspire to do? Have you ever noticed that many people aspire to be someone but never become that person? They have aspirations of one day accomplishing “IT,” whatever “IT” is for them. As a society, we spend more time aspiring to be someone than actually being that someone. If we have the right car, spouse, clothes, body – then we’ll be “IT.” We watch television shows like American Idol, Dancing With The Stars, and Extreme Makeover, wishing that we were the ones who were being praised, judged, or transformed into someone other than who we are. Some of us spend our whole lifetime aspiring to do something or be someone and never reach our goal. Watching somebody else on American Idol is not being an American idol. Wishing you were successful is not being successful. And some of us are running out of time. Have you ever thought that as you read each of these words, every second that passes is lost … forever?
I know it sounds a little heavy, but it’s true. When we spend our entire lives aspiring to be something or someone, we end up wasting the majority of our lives never being anything.
Being Your Best
There is a big difference between just “showing up” physically to work versus bringing your best, your “A” game to work. Each of you has a unique set of talents, gifts, and skills that you need to bring to your work. For example your talent or skill may be: to be organized, to think through problems, to analyze data, to be a leader, to take care of customers, or to be the “best damn real estate agent” in the country. However you won’t accomplish your goals if you just bring the b-o-d-y to your j-o-b. You have to bring all of you to work, you have to show up mentally as well as physically. What if you stopped talking about all the things that were wrong in your life or at work and you just started being an extraordinary business owner, real estate agent, leader, etc. What if you started being an extraordinary husband, wife, mother, or father instead of wishing you were or that your kid, wife, husband were different. Maybe it’s finally time to start being that extraordinary person that deep down inside when nobody is around you know that you are!
Stop Waiting … Start Being
So how does one go about being their best? First you have to decide. Decide what it is that you want, whether it is the best operator, customer service rep, manager, leader, president, student, spouse, etc. Second decide that you are successful. Sounds too simple? It is simple! However there are those who are addicted to complaining. Others have to make it hard so that it has more meaningful or fulfilling. Sounds crazy but it’s true. Still others get more enjoyment or attention out of complaining about something then actually doing anything about it. What they don’t realize is that their complaining drives people away from them.
The short exercise that follows can help you to refocus, stop the downward spiral, and help you to begin the ascent towards success.
1. Ask yourself: Who are you? Who were you created to be? How do you see yourself (e.g., an employee, an leader, a manager, operator, mom, husband, etc.)?
I am a _____________________ (fill in the blank)
2. Now decide what kind of person you want to be (i.e. successful, world class, extraordinary, great, incredible) then rewrite the sentence (i.e. I am a world class operator)
I am a ____________________________ (fill in the blank)
3. Now start acting like the person you want to be. When you get stuck and you don’t know what to do ask yourself this:
What would a ________________________ (fill in the blank) do in a situation like this?” (i.e. “What would a world-class real estate agent do in a situation like this?”)
4. As Nike says, “Just Do it!”
Chances are you may hit a few snags along the way. Implementing change can be challenging. When you get stuck simply go back to question three and act on your response. If you see yourself as world-class or as successful and start taking the actions that a successful person would take, you will begin to be successful.
So what would be different about your life if you began acting successful? What would change in your life if you decided that today, right here, right now you were a world-class Business Owner, Leader, Manager, Sales Rep, Mom, Husband, or Employee? Yes, you could literally change the company you work for, the community you live in, and who knows, maybe even the world we all live in. So what are you waiting for?
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