Persistence
According to Michael
Smurfit, ‘Never accept failure, no
matter how often it visits you. Keep on going, never give up’. This
particular challenge was fully taken up and covered in the article Consistency: Why Still water runs deeper.
Life tends to pick the strongest exactly how nature deletes the weakest. Nobody
knows or cares about the time the business was going up and down like a
pendulum bob. All the moment you were burning the night candle and trying to
pass that particular exam, yet, all they see is the success.
Anyway, whether people care about your
hustle or not, whether they know how much you spent in money and strength to get
to where you are now, one thing is certain, the success belongs to you and not
them. Robing Sieger says, ‘When enthusiasm and commitment take root
within a project, that project comes to life’.
See also: The Great Men's Cross: Cristiano Ronaldo
Discipline
The British novelist, Charles Dickens says, ‘Subdue
your appetite my dears, and you have conquered human nature’. Also, the
strong words of Jesse Jackson, a
U.S. clergyman and politician on hearing that he had not been selected as a
running mate to Dukaki in the 1988 presidential election said that, ‘I am too controlled, I am too clear, I am
too mature to be angry’. This particular point of reflection was well
explained in the 3 Power Packs of Life,
which includes Maturity, Emotional
Intelligence and Self-Discipline.
A man without discipline is never going
far. One of the ways business men remain on the highest platform and most
times maintain their wealth rank is self-discipline.
At least, with billions of dollars in cash and assets, they could afford almost
all the luxuries of life, yet, they won’t. Never would the mirror show when
they were managing little money to meet up with demands, when they would suffer
their appetites, douse their wants and satisfy their needs, to avail them the
opportunity to save. Truly, mirrors
can’t be trusted.
Courage
The Roman
poet, Sextus Propertius says, ‘Even if strength fails, boldness at least
will deserve praise: in great endeavors even to have had the will is enough’.
According to Arthur Koestler, ‘If the
creator had a purpose in equipping us with a neck, he surely meant us to stick
it out’. Bill Gates had the
courage to drop out of the best school in the world to face another venture he
was not sure of; I mean this is a great risk. Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg
all dropped out to face a dream that they think is bigger than the one they are
doing. Imagine if they didn’t take the courage to drop out and follow their
heart. Yet you see their success, empire, glory, endowment and wished you had
them.
The question is can you also drop
that particular thing you are doing without knowing why you doing it and face what
your heart thinks it is best for you. Yours can actually be going back to
school or dropping out of school, it can also be establishing that particular
business, learning that particular skill or resigning from that 8 – 4 job and
starting your own establishment. If mirror would not show your courage, at least have it. Adolf Hitler says, ‘The world belongs to the man with guts! God
helps him!’
Doubts
Alice Foote MacDougall says, ‘It is the small doubts of timid souls that accomplish their ruin. It is
the narrow vision, the fear and trembling hesitation that constitute defeat’.
Doubt is one of the ugly sides of the mirror that it refuses to show. Now let
us be realistic, there is no one without a doubt. At a time in our life, we have reservations about some decisions we
make that directly or indirectly affect us. It is not really easy to take
decisive actions and decisions that are very important and significant in one’s
life like dropping out of school, going back to school, resigning out of job,
getting married, setting up a business and so on. However if one doesn’t, one
might not move to the next stage of life or one gets trapped. Just like how Bill Gates had some doubt on Microsoft
as he thought of going back to school if it didn’t work, well, one can also have some doubts, but it
shouldn’t be more than the courage.
Read this: The Great Men's Cross: Lionel Messi
Always
see the end result and not the means. Your regrets would be greater if you
didn’t try than when you tried and it didn’t work out. Doubt in itself is good, it shows intelligence and it helps in
decision making. It shows one is rational and would hardly make a wrong
decision. However, after proper analysis, courage should follow. Scott Fitzgerald says, ‘The test of a first-rate intelligence is
the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still
retain the ability to function’. This was properly followed and used by Bill Gates.
Changes
The
English theologian, Richard Hooker
says, ‘Change is not made without
inconvenience, even from worse to better’. The only constant thing in life
is change. Most of the world known men and the most decorated all started
small, I mean, no great man can come
forward to say he started big. In
the story of Jack Ma, he said, in the first three years he started Alibaba, he
never made a dollar, but he keeps changing tactics and making adjustments.
Of course, you are not expected to start
big, else that big dream will have no strong foundation to stand on and
collapse soon.
Check this: What can stop me
Your starting small and making adjustments till you become
popular and big count for the experience and foundation you are laying to put
your castle. All the same, make sure whether your venture is profitable or not,
whether it is doing well or not, always add new things, always make
adjustments. If one is not working, then try the other; don’t instead give up
on it.
From the lovely words of C.L.R.
James, the Trinidadian writer, political theorist and educator in Beyond a
Boundary, he says, ‘Time would pass, old
empires would fall and new ones take their place…before I discovered that it is
not quality of goods and utility which matter, but movement; not where you are
or what you have, but where you have come from, where you are going and the
rate at which you are getting there’...The Mirror and Mirage of Life 3
Read this: Stop being Selfish!!!!!
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