Sure, some people get lucky, and somehow stumble their way to love or riches, but for the most part, people who have achieved greatness in their lives do so simply because they made a decision to do so.
And they stuck with it, no matter what. There’s all kinds of stories and anecdotes, most of which you’ve likely heard, that support this. Every successful business has three or four failures behind it, you’ve gotta get through ten “no’s” before you get to that all important, “yes,” etc.
The idea of “keeping your eye on the prize” has been around for a long, long time. The reason is that this statement is true (keep your eyes on the prize) both literally and metaphorically.
If you’re running a race, for example, you’d be much better of starting directly at the finish line that your competitors.
If you’ve got a big goal in life, it’s MUCH easier if you focus on that big fat juicy goal than all the little problems that WILL come up from time to time.
If you look at those tiny problems in light of the massive accomplishment your life is becoming, they’ll be small blips. But if you lose sight of your purpose, and stare at those little bumps in the road, they’ll likely morph into giant mountains of doom.
Kind of like when I went parachuting for the first time. The guy told me, right before I jumped out, “Don’t look down!” But he also described WHY I shouldn’t look down.
Not because it was scary or anything, but he said that when people tend to look down, they “fixate” on something down below, and miss the wonderful experience of just “floating” in mid-air, which is what it feels like when you reach “terminal velocity.”
And that “floating” feeling something that I completely didn’t expect. Nothing I’ve ever experienced comes close.
Well, almost nothing. The truth is that we all tend to move through life and “forget” about who we are and who’s around us.
The only thing that compares to that wonderful “floating” feeling (besides sex, anyway) is when you get into a conversation with somebody, and it’s just a free flowing exchange of wonderful ideas, each one building up the last, into a self sustaining loop of wonderful creativity and discovery.
Most people rarely experience this, but with the right language technology, you can literally generate that feeling at will.