Archive for the ‘Motivational’ Category.
Permanence, perseverance and persistence in spite of all obstacles, discouragements, and impossibilities: It is this, that in all things distinguishes the strong soul from the weak.
~~ Thomas Carlyle ~~ (1795 – 1881)
Perseverance and persistence is very important in achieving any goal. No matter what you set out to do, it’s almost guaranteed that you will face obstacles, discouragements and difficulties in your pursuit and at times it may even seem impossible to attain your goal. The person with a strong soul and commitment to his or her goal will persist in the face of obstacles and will try to find solutions to overcome such obstacles whereas a weak willed person will abandon his or her pursuit.
Self-pity is our worst enemy and if we yield to it, we can never do anything good in the world.
~~ Helen Keller (1880-1968) ~~
It’s so true. Self-pity, by its very nature, is negative; it has no positive to it and we must never yield to it.
Sometimes we may find ourselves in trying circumstances when everything around us seems to be falling apart and we may be inclined to indulge in self-pity but such indulgence will not help us rectify the situation. Only determined, positive efforts can do that.
So always treat self-pity for what it is: An enemy. And don’t allow it to control your life.
Dance like nobody’s watching; love like you’ve never been hurt. Sing like nobody’s listening; live like it’s heaven on earth.
~~ Mark Twain ~~ (1835 - 1910)
That will be the way to live a happy life! Most of us are always too conscious of what we say or do as we are looking for approval from others about everything we say or do. And we concentrate so much on our problems, disappointments and failures that we usually ignore the moments of happiness that come by.
Considering that each of us is here on earth for a very short period of time (most of us live less than 100 years which is negligible compared to earth which has been around for billions of years), we should heed Mark Twain’s advice; keep our spirits uplifted in spite of disappointments and failures we may encounter and enjoy the ride of life with all its ups and downs. After all, it’s only a short ride! :-)
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
~~ Winston Churchill ~~ (1874 - 1965)
It’s true; life is a sum total of successes and failures. After one or two or even some successes, the life does not stop; it keeps on going. Same applies to failures. The only difference is that it’s a bit easier to carry on after success than it is after a failure.
Failures act as valuable lessons and experience for those who have the courage not to give up and continue their pursuit. They analyze the causes of the failure so as not to repeat the same mistakes again. Success and failure go hand in hand; almost every successful person fails a few times and some fail several times before they finally succeed. So one must always keep the courage to keep on going forward and expect that successes and failures will be encountered along the way.
Goals allow you to control the direction of change in your favor.
~~ Brian Tracy ~~
It’s important to define our goals as precisely as possible. Without a goal, most of us are very likely to get distracted and even forget about our goal. That’s why it’s best to write down our goals. Once we know our precise goal and commit to it, it forces us to act in that direction and produce desirable results.
Most of us fall into the trap of not defining our goals and not making a toatl commitment to attain the goal, and as a result, we soon abandon our pursuit. That makes us bounce from project to project without any concrete results. If we can muster the discipline to define our goals and work towards it everyday with resolute determination and commitment, positive results are bound to follow.
I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened.
~~ Mark Twain ~~ (1835 - 1910)
We frequently fear of the worst and unnecessarily limit our chances of success. Most of the problems and troubles that we think we are going to encounter if we embark upon such and such venture never actually come to pass.
It is obviously a good idea to try to foresee any problems that we may encounter in our endeavors but the possibility that such problems may be encountered should not deter us from pursuing our goals. A better approach will be to figure out as to what will be done - a sort of back up plan - in case we do actually face the problem. But most of the time the perceived problems will never be encountered.
For everyone who has stumbled but stood right back up, and for everyone who works hard and never gives up, this one is for you.
~~ Hillary Clinton ~~
After losing straight 12 contests to her rival, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton won both in Ohio and Texas. Many political pundits had predicted that her bid to become the Democratic party nominee for the US presidential election will collapse as it was widely predicted that she will lose one or probably both of these contests. She fought back hard, proved her detractors wrong and injected a new life in her campaign by winning contests in both these states.
After her victory in Ohio, she delivered a speech containing the above motivational quote to her cheering supporters. It was an excellent way to uplift the spirits of her loyal supporters and prepare them for contests coming up in other states.
In politics, as in life in general, fortunes can change very quickly. Not too long ago, Hillary Clinton was considered a shoe-in for the Democratic party nomination. Time has shown it to be anything but; the contest is so close that, at this point in time, nobody knows who of the two contestants will eventually win the nomination.
The important message in life is to get up when you stumble, keep working hard with courage and determination towards your goal and never to give up.
Hope is a feeling that life and work have meaning. You either have it or you don’t, regardless of the state of the world that surrounds you.
~~ Vaclav Havel ~~
We definitely hope that life and work has meaning though nobody has been able to establish for sure as to what that meaning might be. Perhaps we can say that work has meaning - to survive one must work! LOL. Life, on the other hand, does not lend itself to such a straight forward meaning. Nonetheless, hope makes the world go round; it’s a staple of life, everything revolves around hope. I don’t think one can even live without any hope in spite of the fact that many of our hopes get dashed to the ground.
I agree that hope is not dependent on the state of the world around us; we cling to hope even when the world around us may be falling apart. But I don’t agree that you either have hope or you don’t. Most of us have hope most of the time but all of us pass through moments or may be even days when we feel totally helpless and hopeless. Fortunately, most of us soon work our way out of that state of hopelessness and start hoping again.
Hoping for the best and dreaming big are really important ingredients for leading our lives, and we must liberally use them throughout our lives. Without hope and dreams there can be no progress, no achievement.
It is necessary to try to surpass one’s self always; this occupation ought to last as long as life.
~~ Queen Christina ~~ (1626 - 1689)
It’s true; in life one always has to try to be better today than yesterday. Life is a journey that does not stop at any given destination or point in time. It keeps on going until the end. The ultimate destiny of each and every life is death; the only unknowns being when, where and how.
That should give us great incentive to do good deeds; try to make ourselves better today than we were yesterday and to live life fully as we don’t know if we will be around tomorrow. We must keep on going forward, always, till we meet our ultimate destiny.
Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. Aim at earth and you get neither.
~~ C.S. Lewis ~~ (1898 - 1963)
I only partially agree with this quote. While it’s important to aim high, the aim should have a reasonable chance of getting achieved. The trouble with aiming extremely high is that most people will give up when they find themselves no where near their aim in spite of their best efforts. Aiming extremely high or pursuing an unattainable goal may turn out to be nothing more than day-dreaming.
A good example of an aim that is unlikely to be achieved is Ralph Nader’s efforts to become president of the United States of America. This is his fourth attempt and his chances of getting elected this year or in the foreseeable future, if he decides to try again, are next to nil. This doesn’t mean that he won’t make a good president if elected; indeed he might make an excellent president. But the political reality is that his aim is unattainable.
I don’t think anybody in this world ever really knows where exactly they want to go. However, one can charter one’s journey of life as to what direction one wants to go. That can be done with setting a reasonable and realistic aim or goal, persistently working towards that goal and overcoming any problems that will inevitably arise.
This is what change looks like when it happens from the bottom up. This is the new American majority.
~~ Barack Obama ~~
Barack Obama is certainly making the change happen from bottom up in America. Starting as the underdog, lately he has won many decisive electoral victories and is now ahead of Hillary Clinton, in committed delegate count, in Democratic party’s nomination process for the president. Even though he has a long way to go before actually getting nominated, he is an excellent example of what one can accomplish by dreaming big and working towards your dream. I don’t think many people took him seriously when he entered the race for the president. After all, he didn’t have much experience in Washington.
Now the possibility exists that Barack Obama, a black man, may actually become the president of USA. It also shows that average American voter (at least those belonging to the Democratic party) is not concerned about the color of a presidential candidate but rather they care about as to what a candidate has to offer and how he or she is going to solve the problems facing the nation. That is exactly the way it should be.
In any case, the contest between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton has become very interesting, with no clear winner. Time will tell if Barack Obama can keep his ‘from the bottom up’ change happening. I think that either one of them will make a great president. It may be in their interest that whoever wins the nomination for the president chooses the other as the running mate for vice-president.
Genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains.
~~ Thomas Carlyle ~~ (1795 – 1881)
I think the use of the phrase, ‘infinite capacity for taking pains’ is an exaggeration to make a point. But almost all the people we consider as genius, tell us that their success is more the result of their persistent hard work (taking pains) and resolute determination not to give up in the face of failures rather than their intellect. Failure is always painful; what sets the genius apart from the ordinary is their enthusiastic willingness and capacity for enduring the pain in the pursuit of their objectives.
Not everybody has the discipline, the willingness or the capacity to be a genius. However, we have within ourselves to develop these qualities by making conscious efforts and become better, if not an outright genius, at whatever we do in life.
By the way, what or who is a genius? The American Heritage Dictionary defines genius as ‘A person of extraordinary intellect and talent’.
Now intellect and talent are qualities that anybody can improve upon if they so desire.
I have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere to go. My own wisdom, and that of all about me, seemed insufficient for the day.
~~ Abraham Lincoln ~~ (1809 - 1865)
What a classic quote! All of us experience days in our lives when everything seems to be falling apart, nothing seems to work and we feel helpless as if we have nowhere to go. The quote above is proof that some days even great ones like Abraham Lincoln feel helpless. But that did not prevent him from becoming a great President.
Life has a habit of throwing curves at all of us; that is just the way how life works. We must never give up in despair, no matter how trapped we might feel. Instead we must carry on with the hope and determination that this too shall pass. We lose only if we give up and stop making concerted efforts to change or rectify the difficult circumstances that we may find ourselves trapped in.
Life is essentially a sort of a battle with its little ups and downs here and there. I think there is no need for us to worry too much about such ups and downs; when one door closes down usually another door opens up. We just need to look around a bit harder.
Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence.
~~ Helen Keller ~~ (1880-1968)
In a way, hope and optimism are interconnected; you can’t feel optimistic if you feel hopeless. Hopes and dreams act as the foundation of life. When one loses all hopes and dreams then one is as good as dead. Therefore, it’s essential to have hopes and dreams with an optimistic outlook to achieve success.
To realize your hopes and dreams, you need to act on them with confidence and conviction. Each and everyday you must make persistent efforts to move towards your goal. You’ll invariably run into difficulties, setbacks and problems when you move towards the goal of realizing your dream. An optimistic attitude will view these obstacles as learning experience, figure out ways to overcome such obstacles and, with hope and confidence, will continue to make efforts in the direction of realizing the dream. Without hope, optimism and confidence coupled with persistent and strenous efforts, nothing can be achieved.
I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.
~~ Thomas Jefferson ~~ (1743–1826)
Having knowledge of our past is good if we want to learn from it. Apart from that, there is not much in the past. Brooding over past failures or disappointments will accomplish nothing. Nobody can change the past, ever! Also, many a times the history is quite unreliable in recording as to how and why the events occurred in the past.
However, we have the ability to mold the future to our dreams if we dream about the future and put in dedicated efforts to realize those dreams. So it’s definitely preferable to dream about the future than to sweat over the past history.
I used to think as I looked at the Hollywood night, ‘There must be thousands of girls sitting alone like me, dreaming of becoming a movie star. But I’m not going to worry about them. I’m dreaming the hardest.’
~~ Marilyn Monroe ~~ (1926 - 1962)
This is a great quote that illustrates the power of dreaming big and have the conviction that your dreams will come true.
We often discourage ourselves and limit our dreams by harboring thoughts that there is too much competition, too many players in the particular field we are in. Considering that Marilyn Monroe faced heavy odds set against her right from her childhood and, unfortunately, lived a very short life, she still managed to attain great success in her life and became a big movie star.
As she herself mentions in the above quote, she was fully aware of the fierce competition in her chosen field but that did not deter her to follow her dream and attain it. Like every other successful person she had convinced herself that she will attain her dream as she was dreaming the hardest!
People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don’t believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they can’t find them, make them.
~~ George Bernard Shaw ~~ (1856-1950)
It’s true; you can blame your circumstances all you want and it may make you feel better but it’s not going to take you anywhere. To reach anywhere, you’ll need to make an effort yourself in that direction.
We all feel shackled by circumstances from time to time. The good news is that circumstances can be changed. The key is to carefully analyze the circumstances you find yourself in and visualize the circumstances as you would want them to be. Set that as your goal and work out a plan of action to achieve that goal.
It’s important to realize that no plan of action to change your circumstances will work unless you commit yourself to work persistently and enthusiastically on it. You’ll invariably face hurdles and failures in the execution of your plan. You must not give up in the face of such failures but learn from them; modify your plan of action if necessary and continue in the direction you want to go. Then your circumstances are bound to change.
Any activity becomes creative when the doer cares about doing it right, or better.
~~ John Updike ~~
The key is to get involved in an activity you are passionate about, no matter what that activity may be, so long as that activity is legal. When you are engaged in an activity you are passionate about, you will naturally want to know and learn more and more about it so that you can it right or better. That in turn would challenge, enhance and expand your creativity.
The challenge that most people face is that the activity they are passionate about may not, at least initially, generate enough income to live by. The way around this problem that is most commonly used is to get a “job” on the side to sustain yourself financially until the activity you are passionate about starts generating enough income.
It may also be that you are passionate about your job. In that case, you are amongst a few of the lucky ones as many studies show that most people don’t even like their jobs let alone being passionate about their jobs. They are working on jobs because they have to. That indeed is a terrible waste of human creativity.
If you are lonely when you’re alone, you are in bad company.
~~ Jean-Paul Sartre ~~ (1905 - 1980)
On the surface this quote seems funny but if you think over it, it is very meaningful.
Many people feel very lonely when they are alone. It’s a sign of weakness, a sign of total dependence on others and a lack of spirit of being independent.
It need not be like that. While it is good to have friends, relatives and whatever, one must also develop one’s will, determination and independence so that when you are alone, you don’t feel lonely. Being alone is actually good as it gives you uniterrupted time to think, brainstorm to get new ideas, read a book or whatever interests or hobbies you might have.
If you frequently feel lonely whenever you are alone then, as Jean-Paul Sartre says, you are definitely in bad company and you need to work on it. No one needs to feel lonely and desperate just because they happen to be alone.
All successful people men and women are big dreamers. They imagine what their future could be, ideal in every respect, and then they work every day toward their distant vision, that goal or purpose.
~~ Brian Tracy ~~
It is really important to dream big and to believe in your dreams. It is equally important to envision and devise ways and means to realize that dream.
Just to have a dream or goal is not enough, one needs to work persistently everyday towards the attainment of that dream or goal. If you find that your persistent daily efforts are not leading you towards your dream or goal then you need to reassess and revise the direction of your efforts. Every effort must take you a bit closer to your dream. If you are dreaming of the extra-ordinary, mentally prepare yourself for the challenge everyday as you will face extra-ordinary problems that will require extra-ordinary effort and committment on your part.
If life throws you a lemon - make lemonade.
~~ Joan Collins ~~
Most of us keep complaining about our bad luck but the important thing to remember is that lots of people who went on to achieve success and greatness in their lives had odds stacked against them right from childhood. Some examples of such people will be Helen Keller, Oprah Winfrey, Marilyn Monroe and many others.
These great people, through their determination, hard work and persistence, have clearly shown us that, ultimately, it’s up to us as individuals to decide if we are going to keep complaining about our bad luck or we are going to pull up our socks, set up some goals and proceed with determination and persistence to achieve those goals.
We all have within ourselves to make lemonade from a lemon. Actually, you can’t make lemonade without a lemon; so when life throws you a lemon, consider it a blessing and get busy making lemonade!
There are only two words that will always lead you to success. Those words are yes and no. Undoubtedly, you’ve mastered saying yes. So start practicing saying no. Your goals depend on it!
~~ Jack Canfield ~~
We all frequently experience situations where we don’t really want to say yes but willy nilly say yes because we think that if we say no the other person’s feelings will be hurt or he/she may feel offended etc. Many a times we later regret having said yes to such proposals.
So to achieve our goals, we need to keep our goals in focus and learn how to say no to other peoples proposals if we feel that those pursuits are not conducive to the attainment of our goals. May be we need to learn to tactfully say no without feeling guilty or without hurting others feelings. Sure it can be very difficult to say no to some people but we have to keep in mind that we can’t sacrifice our pursuits, desires and goals just to appease somebody else.
No matter what age you are, or what your circumstances might be, you are special, and you still have something unique to offer. Your life, because of who you are, has meaning.
~~ Barbara De Angelis ~~
In other words, it’s a question of self-esteem and self-worth. We have to confidently build our self-esteem that each one of us is unique and has something positive to offer regardless of age or the circumstances we may find ourselves in at the moment.
Each one of us has within himself/herself to give our lives the meaning we want to give. That meaning is determined by our own actions. So whatever meaning you want to give your life, you need to believe in it, start acting in that direction and persistently continue to go in that direction.
Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in getting up every time we do.
~~ Confucius ~~ (551 BC - 479 BC)
Herein lies the secret of success. If we are always afraid of falling, we can never reach anywhere. As a matter of fact, falls are to be expected in any journey we may decide to undertake. The key to successfully completing the journey is to get up every time we fall, carefully analyze why we fell, learn some lessons from the fall to avoid similar falls in future and keep going.
My theory has always been, that if we are to dream, the flatteries of hope are as cheap, and pleasanter, than the gloom of despair.
~~ Thomas Jefferson ~~ (1743–1826)
This is one of my favorites. If we are going to dream then it definitely makes sense to dream for hope rather than despair.
I would say one should make it a habit to dream of hope and success. That will help you to keep a happy frame of mind and may even motivate you to set goals and make efforts to achieve those goals. One should always guard against thoughts of hopelessness and despair. Hopelessness and despair can never produce any good results. Hope is the staple of life; without hope there is nothing.
Remember you are just an extra in everyone else’s play.
~~ Franklin D. Roosevelt ~~ (1882 - 1945)
This quote is a classic. On the surface it might seem like a funny dig but it is full of meaning and inspiration. We all think ourselves to be very important but in most other people’s eyes, we are just an extra. However, that should not deter us from doing the very best we can, keep improving ourselves by continuously learning even as an extra. Because the lessons learned and experience gained while playing the extra will be highly beneficial in our own play, where we are the hero.
The trouble with not having a goal is that you can spend your life running up and down the field and never scoring.
~~ William Taylor (Bill) Copeland ~~
I agree. It is very important to have a goal. While some people might have the motivation and the discipline for achievements, most of us lack such motivation and discipline. Setting a goal gives us the needed motivation and discipline to work towards that goal.
It is important to set a realistic, attainable goal because if the goal is unrealistic, you’ll soon lose the motivation and you’ll stop making consistent efforts to move towards that goal. It also helps to set sub-goals or benchmarks to measure progress along the way towards your goal and if you miss some benchmarks, analyze and learn as to why you missed those benchmarks and to avoid similar pitfalls in the future.
Continuous effort - not strength or intelligence - is the key to unlocking our potential.
~~ Winston Churchill ~~ (1874-1965)
This is true and almost all successful people say the same thing in one form or another. We all have great potential but most of us fail to reach our potential as we give up as soon as we encounter some difficulties or problems in our pursuit. But those who persist and continue to make consistent efforts go on to reach new horizons and realize their full potential.
So the key is to keep ourselves motivated and consistently make efforts to achieve our goals.
Where There is a Will, There is a Way.
~~ Author Unknown ~~
This is a very motivational and true quote that prompts us to think hard and be creative in finding ways to achieve our goals and solve our problems.
All the technological, medical and other progress that we see or hear about in the world today has happened because there is a strong commitment and the will to do it. A good example is the space exploration programs undertaken by many countries. They don’t really “need” these programs per se but they undertake them anyways, may be for prestige, dominance or whatever reasons. From time to time, they do run in to problems; serious or even fatal problems but they find a way around those problems because of the will and commitment.
It’s the same way for an individual. If you want to attain your goals you must develop the will and commitment, constantly work towards it and find creative ways to overcome difficulties that may arise.
While they were saying among themselves it cannot be done, it was done.
~~ Helen Keller ~~ (1880-1968)
This is definitely true. Many, many times dedicated individuals, with their determination and perseverance, have accomplished tasks that nobody thought could be accomplished. There is a great lesson here for all of us. We can accomplish our goals if we believe in them and are prepared to make determined, persistent efforts even though others around us may say it can’t be done.
The story of Helen Keller’s life in itself is a great example of what can be accomplished. She was left blind and deaf at the age of just 19 months due to an illness. In spite of all these odds stacked against her since such an early childhood, Helen - with the help of her dedicated teacher Anne Sullivan, made astonishing accomplishments and went on to become world famous.
Chop your own wood, and it will warm you twice.
~~ Henry Ford ~~ (1863 - 1947)
Funny and yet so true! You get warmed twice if you chop your own wood because you get warmed when you chop it and you’ll get warmed the second time when you light fire with it.
So what does it really mean? It means that when you apply yourself to accomplish tasks, you feel better just like you get warmed when you chop wood. And what you accomplish today will be useful in future as well.
The only way to keep your health is to eat what you don’t want, drink what you don’t like, and do what you’d rather not.
~~ Mark Twain ~~ (1835 - 1910)
It’s very true and even more true now-a-days. We like to eat goodies like chips, ice cream etc. but these are definitely not good for our health. And what is good for our health like fruits and vegetables, we don’t like to eat. We like to drink pop but that again is no good for our health. Water and milk are good but not too many of us are fond of these drinks. Same goes with doing; walking and exercise is good for our health but we would rather take a car even if the place we are going to is only a 5 minutes walk.
I wonder why it happens: Why we end up inventing things that are injurious to our well-being? Is it because at the time of invention we don’t have the foresight or the ability to predict what long term effect of a particular invention will be? No, I think that even if we could predict that a particular invention will adversely affect our health in the long run, we will still invent it and use it anyways. The inventor would justify his/her invention by saying that if he/she doesn’t invent it, somebody else would; moreover nobody is forcing anybody to use it.
So ultimately it’s up to us as individuals to develop the self-discipline to stay healthy by eating what we don’t want such as fruits and vegetables and do things that we don’t want such as walking and exercise.
If you’re going through hell, keep going.
~~ Winston Churchill ~~ (1874-1965)
This quote is funny but quite sensible and motivational. If you are or you think you are going through hell then it makes sense to keep going. Because if you stop then you are destined to stay in hell but if you keep going you might get out of it.
On a more higher level, this quote is really to motivate us not to stop making efforts to improve our situation, no matter how hopeless the situation might seem. As a matter of fact, if you don’t give up and keep making efforts to improve the situation, you can be almost certain that the situation will improve.
The real secret of success is enthusiasm.
~~ Walter Chrysler ~~ (1875 - 1940)
In my view, this quote is only partially true. First of all, I don’t think there is such a thing as ’secret’ to success. Enthusiasm is definitely a required trait to succeed at anything but enthusiasm alone won’t cut it. To succeed, one definitely needs to set a goal or at the minimum a general direction, a plan to attain that goal and work enthusiastically towards it.
While working towards that goal, one needs to continually check and analyze if one is making any progress towards that goal or not. If not then why not; what problems or hurdles are blocking the progress towards success and find ways, means and solutions to resolve those problems and or hurdles.
Of course if you are enthusiastic about your goal, you’ll spend time and energy to find solutions and try to succeed. And if you are not enthusiastic about your goal, you’ll abandon the goal as soon as you start facing problems. That’s what happens to most of us anyways; we quickly give up! :-)
The distance between you and your dreams is often the length of a single idea.
~~ Vic Conant ~~
Remember how Google founders made a fortune from just one idea? And it wasn’t even an original idea. There were lots of search engine players before them like InfoSeek, AltaVista, Yahoo and a number of others some of which don’t even exist any more. But Google florished because they kept exploring ideas to make their product better than anybody else and they still continue to come up with new ideas.
What does that say? In my view it says that to realize your dreams you need to think and explore ideas. Ideas as to what you need to do to realize your dreams, how to do what you need to do in a better and more efficient way than others. Not every idea is going to pan out. But you will never know unless you try. Even if an idea doesn’t work out, we learn valuable lessons as to why it didn’t work and how to avoid such pitfalls in future endeavours. And if one of your ideas pans out that may very well be the realization of your dreams.
Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out.
~~ Robert Collier ~~ (1885-1950)
This is so true. To achieve success in any venture one need to make a start and then repeatedly keep making efforts in that direction; no matter how small the effort may be.
This quote very much ties in with the Confucius quote A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. You got to start with a single step and then keep taking steps in that direction to reach the destination.
The reason why most of us fail to achieve great success is that whenever we start any venture, we keep at it for a little while and then give up because:
- We faced a problem, setback or failure
- We just lost interest or
- We became just plain lazy
It’s important to remember that most successful people initially fail at least once or twice before becoming successful. Did you know that Henry Ford failed twice in his ventures before becoming a success?
So, success is indeed the sum of small efforts, not giving up, learn from past mistakes and keep on going in the chosen direction.
I claim to be no more than an average man with less than average abilities. I have not the shadow of a doubt that any man or woman can achieve what I have, if he or she would make the same effort and cultivate the same hope and faith.
~~ Mahatma Gandhi ~~ (1869 - 1948)
I think Mahatma Gandhi is being modest when he says he is no more than an average man. However, his advice is a good one. An avearge person can achieve a lot provided he or she is committed to the goal, continues to make efforts in that direction and doesn’t quit when the going gets tough.
Gandhi himself was physical beaten and imprisoned many times by the British authorities but he never wavered from his principle of non-violence, continued to persistently devote his energy to realize his dream and ultimately achieved his goal of freeing India.
Einstein said of Mahatma Gandhi:
“Generations to come will scarcely believe that such a one as this walked the earth in flesh and blood.”
Sometimes, we just don’t know enough about what we are trying to achieve.
~~ Stuart Wilde ~~
Not just sometimes, I would say a lot of times we don’t know what are we trying to achieve. Many a times we just don’t know where are we going and why we want to go there? But to achieve anything we must define as precisely as posiible what it is that we want to achieve. Even if at the beginning we may not know the exact goal, we should still define it and make adjustments along the way.
Aerodynamically, the bumblebee shouldn’t be able to fly, but the bumblebee doesn’t know that, so it goes on flying anyway.
~~ Mary Kay Ash ~~ (1915 - 2001)
It is not known how the myth that aerodynamically bumblebee shouldn’t be able to fly became popular, but there is a perfectly good scientific explanation as to how bumblebees fly. So this quote is not strictly factual. Nonetheless, I think it is still a good quote as it emphasizes that we should not limit ourselves by underestimating our capabilities. In other words, we should get out of our comfort zone and try things we think can’t be done. We are all capable of doing more than what we actually do.
Some people fold after making one timid request. They quit too soon. Keep asking until you find the answers. In sales there are usually four or five “no’s” before you get a “yes.”
~~ Jack Canfield ~~
I can relate to that; I myself have done that many a times. I would say not just some people but lots of people give up after just one or two half-hearted attempts. But the key to succeed at anything is to be persistent and, if necessary, to refine or modify your approach and go at it again.
If we study the lives of successful people, we find that most if not all of them, initially failed at least once and some of them failed several times, before becoming a success. And one common factor they all share is that they had a goal or a vision they believed in and they persistently kept going at it in spite of the initial setbacks.
Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.
~~ Henry Ford ~~ (1863 - 1947)
That’s exactly right and Henry Ford knew what he was talking about as he himself had a few failures before making it big. As a matter of fact most succesful business people fail in at least a few ventures before they succeed. The key here is to learn from the failures, not give up, start again and apply the lessons learned.
My motto was always to keep swinging. Whether I was in a slump or feeling badly or having trouble off the field, the only thing to do was keep swinging.
~~ Hank Aaron ~~
This quote is a good lesson. Even though Hank was referring to his baseball game, the same can be applied to life in general. You got to keep swinging during all the ups and downs of life and doing your best to score as many runs as you possibly can.
