Took A Beating, Brushed Myself Off And Carried On Anyway
Okay right from the bat I’m going to be man enough to admit that I failed miserably in my quest to become a self-sustaining money-making power-house as I had intended to in mid-to-late 2009 and as the post beneath this one so publicly professes, but with failure comes success. After having gone through a, dare I say, challenging 15 months I’ve regained my foothold on a different plateau and established a better life perspective. I failed in some areas, but succeeded in others and I learned something along the way, this is all that matters…
In June of 2009 I was let go from my previous employer due to the recession, I had intended to make the best use of my time as I possibly could with the end result of regaining perspective in my life. This I achieved. Success at last! But on the way to that conclusion I messed up, obstacles became more apparent than somebody cutting the cheese 10cm from my face, existential issues arose to the surface, why was I doing all of this, for what ultimate reason was I putting myself through the hardship of jumping from one ship to another? All of these questions and more became huge issues I felt I had a need to answer.
I had taken myself completely out of my comfort zone, jumped the gun and went full steam ahead into something I had no clue what the end result would be. The whole idea was exhilarating, daunting and downright scary. The mystery of the unknown beckoned me, what would happen? As it turns out the answer was quite simple, I didn’t end up achieving everything I originally wanted to, but I did gain that very important perspective which had become the foundation for all future decision making. And today it feels fantastic!
Not too long ago a respectable personal associate of mine and I were playing squash together and this marvel of a gem appeared out of nowhere. I was asked, “What is the definition of Good Luck?”, and to that I wittingly retorted, “Well the definition of Good Luck is when something unexpectedly good happens to you!”, and he answered, “No, that’s not right…” and proceeded to say, “The definition of Good Luck is when preparedness meets opportunity.“ I stood there for a few seconds while my synapses fired at trajectories previously unknown to them. It was the literal manifestation of a light bulb going off in my head. Suddenly everything made sense. How could I reasonably expect this mysterious amazing intangible ‘thing’ to happen to me if I were not prepared for it? The realization of this was astounding, truly. I suddenly understood that in order for my life to get back on track I had to be prepared for it. And if I wanted to run a company, I had to prepare for it. I had to prepare for anything which I wanted to reap the rewards from! I moved from a ‘chance’ to ‘choice’ perspective. By that I mean instead of waiting for some amazing thing to happen to me by chance, I had to make the choice of making it happen.
Things I learned:
- Every day that I choose not to accomplish some smaller goal, which is part of some bigger goal, is a day longer it takes to achieve that ultimate goal.
- Sometimes you have to fail in order to succeed. Failure is absolutely mandatory if you want to achieve success.
- Knowledge without action leads to failure.
- My own preparedness will result in the opportunities which will lead to success.
