Why are some people successful at anything, whilst the rest of us are mediocre at best?
Given a level playing field, of average intelligence and reasonable health, every man and woman should theoretically be able to excel at anything they turn their hand to, shouldn’t they?
Add into the mix the fact that we, in the modern world, are living in a golden age of opportunity, it would seem that there is really no excuse left for any of us.
Perhaps we should examine our subject a little more closely. After all, what is success to you may mean nothing to me, and vice versa.
We have all heard of the person who seems to have everything and yet takes everyone by surprise by taking their own life. Achievement isn’t everything, it seems, or we could speculate that Elvis might have lived to a grand old age and that John Belushi might not have felt the need to take a fatal dose of heroin and cocaine at just thirty-three years of age.
By contrast, Nelson Mandela spent twenty-seven years incarcerated in a terrible jail and went on to change the world.
Success, then, is in the mind of the beholder, isn’t it?
Money, fame or some other kind of glory may not feel like to success to the one who has those things.
Being happy, in love and freedom from worry and stress … now wouldn’t that be closer to the mark?
If you don’t agree with that, then I’d love to hear your argument, because it seems to me that peace of mind is what everyone wants.
The problem is that we have fallen for a big, BIG lie.
There’s no one to blame. It wasn’t perpetrated deliberately. In fact, for the most part, as far as I can tell, it has been spread with the best of intentions.
What is this LIE?
The lie is that you can have happiness, freedom from worry and peace of mind if you first fix everything that’s not working in your personal outside world.
“When you make so much money you can pay every bill … then you’ll be happy.”
“If I could just write books as good as Joe Blow’s I’d be a good writer…”
The strife and the worry comes from trying and struggling to fix things in the outer world.
Whereas, in fact, all that’s required is that you make peace with yourself first. It’s always been available to you.
In my own life, this truth took about three decades to dawn, but once it did everything changed.
Where once I’d been poor and struggled from paycheck to paycheck, money rolled in without my asking for it.
I spent years being lonely or heartbroken.
Then I figured out that a simple tweak or two to the way I saw the world would fix everything at a stroke.
It sounds ridiculously simple – and it is.
I captured the foundation of this entire idea in a self help program I called “Knowing Where To Knock.”
In it I teach you how to be selfish! That’s not the same as being mean – I don’t advocate that!
Selfishness in this context means looking after your SELF first – because when you’re filled up (= fulfilled), then you have plenty to give.
Strangely enough, the more you have to give, the more seems to just fall in your lap.
Instead of “wanting” I now have “having.”
Instead of long lonely times, I now have love and laughter.
Rather than struggle, I now have excited anticipation, like a child on Christmas Eve.
To me, that’s success. How about you?
If you’d like to know how to be successful in the same kind of way, feel free to check out “Knowing Where To Knock” – click here. (As I write this, there’s a $40 off offer … but that may have ended depending when you’re reading this.)
What do you think about the ideas in this post? Please enter your comments below …
