Tag Archives: Risk

Afraid of Mistakes?

When I was a kid I loved popcorn.

Both making it, and eating it.

Once I tried to make some, but I couldn’t find any oil.

I found some other stuff that looked like oil, but wasn’t oil.

Only I didn’t find out until I’d mixed it with the popcorn and heated it on the fire.

Instead of getting a bowl of popcorn, I got a gooey inedible mess.

Now, at the time, I was pretty disappointed. Not only did I didn’t get what I wanted, but I had a huge mess to clean up.

But at the same time, it was kind of fun to experiment. To try and see.

Something else I used to love as a kid. Most of the time, the results were neutral, or good. Sometimes they backfired. Once I almost caught my room on fire.

Consider what your life would be like if were impossible to be curious. Impossible to wonder “what if.”

You’d only be able to do stuff that was “safe.”

Only stuff that others had tried and succeeded. Always be a follower, and not a leader.

Sure, you’d never catch stuff on fire and you wouldn’t have any expected messes, but it would be pretty boring.

Some people are happy to live a boring life.

Some people would RATHER live a boring life.

Think of the most magnificent thing you’d like in life, right now.

Are you willing to make tons of goofy mistakes in order to get there?

Because that is what it will take.

Nobody went from normal to king or queen without plenty of mishaps along the way.

Two steps forward and one step back. All the way to the top.

Accepting, owning, and learning from your mistakes is the singular most important thing you can do.

If you are afraid to do this, you’ll be stuck right where you are.

If you’re willing to mess up BIG, and keep on rolling, you’ll be fine.

After all, you’re only a “failure” when you stop moving forward.

What do YOU want to learn?

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Stop Waiting and Start Doing

When you were a little kid, you learned by copying.

And if you’ve ever had kids, or are ever around them, you know they tend to copy whatever you do.

Sometimes it’s cute, sometimes it’s embarrassing.

Even for most of human history, most “learning” came from copying.

If you wanted to learn a trade, for example, you had to find somebody that would let you be their apprentice.

Slowly learn the trade, all the ins and outs, and how to do “it” as well as them.

This forms the basis of NLP modeling.

You find somebody that does what you want to do, and then “model” them, which is basically copy them.

Only you have to copy EVERYTHING.

Their beliefs, attitudes, history, EVERYTHING.

Naturally, the more complicated the skills required, the more difficult it is to copy them.

One thing that you will NEVER get rid of is the NEED to make mistakes.

Because no matter WHO you are modeling, they can’t have achieved any level of success without a SIGNIFICANT amount of trial and error. Or as they say in NLP, “Trial and Feedback.”

Unfortunately, many people like to be told EXACTLY what to do in hopes it will relieve them from making ANY mistakes.

“I’m ready for success! I’m open to receive! Just TELL ME what to do and I’ll do it!”

But they discover the “secret” is to simply keep trying until they get it right, they don’t like this idea so much.

Sure, modeling can help. It can accelerate the process. But being willing to accept any “result” no matter how “good” or “bad” is required for any kind of real success.

Which may be the reason why most people are always looking for the next “big secret.”

They’d rather wait they’re ENTIRE LIVES for somebody to tell them what to do than simply make a move and see what happens.

Sure, this can be terrifying. But also incredibly liberating. As you’ve likely realized from time to time, most of our deepest fears NEVER materialize.

So when you do “wing it” just to “see what happens,” it’s rarely even close to what you feared the most.

And every single time you try something, and accept whatever happens as valuable feedback, you WILL learn something.

Sure, often times you’ll learn what NOT to do, but you’ll also get experience.

And a deep KNOWING that trying and “failing” isn’t so bad.

It can be kind of fun.

So long as you have a clear idea of where you’d like to be EVENTUALLY, and the persistency to keep going no matter what, you’ll not only get there, but have a lot of fun in the meantime.

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Look Silly For Maximum Success

Isaac Newton once made the remark that he could only do what he’d done because he was standing on the shoulders of giants.

Meaning his scientific discoveries were only as good as those that came before him.

And those that came before him were just as largely based on those that came before them.

The study of human advancement over the centuries is pretty amazing.

Sure, there are plenty of dark spots, but the long trend is generally upward.

Collectively, we seem to have this drive to keep advancing.

I saw a pretty cool video the other day of the first rocket that blasted off, flew around in the upper atmosphere, and then landed, but in the reverse of how took off.

Right back down on the launch pad. Like watching a lift-off in reverse.

For a long time, a few people have been trying to create a business of tourist space flight.

Yeah, it would only be for rich people, but it’s always that way at first.

Long, long time ago, travel by rail was only for rich people.

Now regular folks can fly all over the world.

It’s possible to live your own life like this, but it’s not guaranteed.

It’s all based on the habits you cultivate.

If you have some really big, really specific goals, way out there, and you make it a habit to do SOMETHING on a daily basis, you can build a pretty impressive life.

On the other hand, if you just hope you get there “somehow,” you might get lucky, but then again you might not.

Most people are terrified of risk. Which is why they are afraid to take action.

Many people want some kind of guarantee that what they are trying will eventually pan out.

Unless they are SURE, they don’t budge.

But in reality, they are ignoring the biggest risk of all.

And that is to get to the end of your life, look back, and say, “Wow, what happened?”

The great paradox is that the more consistently you take small risks, they less likely you’ll end up with nothing.

Meaning the most effective way to make sure the BIGGEST risk of all doesn’t happen is to take a bunch of small risks.

Imagine if you were on a golf course. And you could wait and take one HUGE swing, or you could take a lot of little swings.

But you were so embarrassed to look goofy taking a bunch of little swings, you waited until the last moment to take that one big swing.

If the ball goes in the hole, you’d look pretty good. But if your ball flies off into the lake, well, game over.

But if you take small shots, ten or fifteen yards apiece, you’d almost be guaranteed to get into the hole eventually.

Of course, in golf, the number of strokes is important.

But not in life.

In life, it’s the final result that counts.

And all the intermediary results in between.

Small actions daily build up.

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The Biggest Risk Of All

I was driving somewhere the other day with an Australian friend.

We were going to some restaurant, she knew where it was, I didn’t, so she was giving me directions.

She said, “turn left up there after the zebra crossing.”

And I immediately thought, “What? I don’t see any zebras?”

See in the states, where I’m from, we call them “cross walks” or “pedestrian crossing.”

And if you’re driving in the mountains you might see a warning sign that says, “Deer crossing.”

So when she said “zebra crossing,” it sounded like a place where zebras cross the street.

Of course, a second later I realized that the “zebra” was a description of what it LOOKED LIKE, rather than a description of what it was USED FOR.

The old, “form” vs. “function” argument.

Some things are described by how they look, others are described by what they do.

In Japan, they say that “every meal is enjoyed twice.”

Once when you look at it, and once when you eat it. This means when they prepare meals, the PRESENTATION is just as important as the TASTE. Sometimes more so.

Now, personally, I’m the type of guy who’d rather pay ONLY for taste. I don’t really care what it looks like. But that’s just me.

I’m NOT the kind of guy who takes photos of his meal before he eats. In fact, I’m usually FINISHED before everyone else has started! (But I digress…)

The point is that if you spend TOO MUCH time worried about what you LOOK LIKE, you’ll impact what you are able to DO.

Form is fantastic, so long as it doesn’t impede function.

Now, what is the FUNCTION of your life, you may ask?

The truth is that YOU are the ONLY ONE who can answer that question.

Of course, since very few people take the time to determine the purpose of their own lives, it generally gets decided by others.

Bosses, spouses, kids, parents, TV commercials.

It seems that people are desperate to find meaning ANYWHERE but within themselves.

The problem is if you look OUTSIDE yourself for meaning, YOU, and YOUR LIFE will eventually be DEFINED by those outside sources.

Not yourself.

And since this happens very slowly, you run a HUGE RISK.

And that is you’ll get to the end of your life and wonder what the heck just happened!

And guess what? Why do people look OUTSIDE themselves for answers?

They are AFRAID of choosing on their own. And making a mistake. And having to “do over.”

So instead of living through several “short term” and “low consequence” risks, they leave ALL THE RISK to the end of their lives.

Hoping it will end up OK!

Well, I don’t know about you, but screw that noise!

Of course, living ON PURPOSE requires courageous introspection. You MUST be willing to question things about yourself most are too scared to.

But if you do, you’ll get things MOST NEVER KNOW.

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