Why We Don't Achieve Excellence!!

The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today. -Franklin D. Roosevelt
What would happen if you drove your car with the brakes on? You'd never go full speed because the brakes would offer resistance. Your car would overheat and break down. If it didn't break down, the resistance would strain the engine. To get to your destination, you would have to make one of two choices: You could either press the accelerator harder and risk damage, or release the brakes to make the car go faster.

This is same happened to our life because many of us go through life with our emotional brakes on. What are the brakes? They are the factors that prevent you from achieving success- fear, procrastination, lack of pride and so forth.

There are so many factors that can cause you to fail. But here i can summarize the most important factors. that can cause you to fail. By working to overcome these factors, you can release the brakes that are holding back your success.

A. Unwillingness to Take Risks
Success involves taking calculated risks. Risk-taking does not mean gambling foolishly and behaving irresponsibly. People sometimes mistake irresponsible and rash behavior as risk-taking. They end up with negative results and blame it on bad luck.

Risk-taking is relative. Risk varies from person to person and can be a result of training. To both a trained mountain climber and a novice, mountain climbing is risky, but to the trained person it is not irresponsible risk-taking. Responsible risk-taking is based on knowledge, training, careful study, confidence and competence-factors that give you the courage to act while facing fear. The person who never attempts anything risky makes no mistakes. However, not making the attempt is often a bigger mistake than making the attempt and failing.

Many opportunities are lost because of indecision. Take risks, but don't gamble. Risk-takers move ahead with their eyes open. Gamblers shoot in the dark.

Illustration
Once someone asked a farmer if he had planted wheat for the season. The farmer replied, "NO". I was afraid it wouldn't rain. "The man asked, "Did you plant corn?" The farmer said, "NO. I as afraid that insects would eat the corn." Then the man asked, "What did you plant?" The farmer said, "Nothing, I played it safe."

B. Lack of Persistence
When problems seem insurmountable, quitting may look like the easiest way out. It is true for every marriage, job and relationship.Winers are struck but not destroyed. We all have had our setbacks in life. But failing does not mean we are failures.

Most people fail not because they lack knowledge or talent but because they quit.The total secret of success lies in two traits: persistence and resistance.

A man is a hero not because he is braver than anyone else, but because he is brave for ten minutes longer.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson

C. Instant Gratification
The desire to make a million overnight has made the lottery a flourishing business. Remember that when going for instant gratification, one never thinks of consequences, only of momentary pleasures. When you think short term, not long term, it is limited vision. With limited vision you will never see any worthwhile goals.

D. Lack of Priorities.
When we don't have our priorities right, we waste time, not realizing that time wasted is life wasted. Prioritizing requires discipline to do what needs to be done rather than taking action based on our moods and fancies. One of the keys to solving this mystery of success is understanding your priorities. Some people set their sights on money, power, fame or possessions. We have to understand our priorities.

Success does not come by reading or memorizing the principles that lead to success, but by understanding them and setting your priorities to apply them.

E. Looking for Shortcuts
Basically, "there is no free lunch," means that you don't get something for nothing. In other words, you get what you put in. If you don't put much into a project, you won't get much out of it. The problem with people today is that they want instant answers. They are looking for one-minute solutions to everything. Like instant coffee they want instant happiness, but there are no quick fixes. This attitude leads to disappointment.

The Easier Way May Actually Be the Tougher Way
Once there was a lark singing in the forest. A farmer came by with a box full of worms. The lark stopped him and asked, "What do you have in the box and where are you going?" The farmer replied that he had worms and that he was going to the market to trade them for some feathers. The lark said, "I have many feathers. I will pluck one and give it to you and that will save me looking for worms." The farmer gave the worms to the lark and the lark plucked a feather and gave it in return. The next day the same thing happened and the day after and on and on until a day came that the lark had no more feathers. Now it could no longer fly to go hunting for worms. It started looking ugly and stopped singing and very soon it died.

The moral of this story is quite clear- what the lark thought was an easy way to get food turned out to be the tougher way after all.

Isn't the same thing true in our lives? Many times we look for the easier way, which really ends up being the tougher way.

F. Selfishness and Greed
Individual and organizations that have a selfish attitude have no right to expect growth. Their attitude is to keep passing the buck without regard for the welfare of others. Greed always wants more. Needs can be satisfied, but greed cannot. It is cancer of the soul. Greed destroys relationships.

Greed comes out of poor-esteem, which manifests itself as false pride, pretence, or "keeping up with the Joneses."

G. Unwillingness to Plan and Prepare
Most people spend more time planning a party or vacation than planning their lives. Confidence comes from preparation. Winers put pressure on themselves. That is the pressure of preparing and not worrying about winning. If we practice poorly, we play poorly; because we play as we practice.

Preparation is the necessary edge to succeed in any field. Preparation means learning from our mistakes. There is nothing wrong with making mistakes. We all do. A fool is one who makes the same mistake twice. A person who makes a mistake and doesn't correct it, commits a bigger one.

Pressure can paralyze you if you are not prepared. Just as water gravitates to its own path, success gravitates to those who are prepared. Week effort gets weak results.

G. Not Learning from Past Mistakes
People who do not learn lessons from history are doomed. We learn from failure if we have the right attitude. Failure is a detour, not a dead end. It is a delay, not a defeat.

Some people live and learn, and some only live. Wise people learn from their mistakes- wiser people learn from other people's mistakes. Our lives are not long enough to learn only from our own mistakes!

H. Inability to Recognize Opportunity
Opportunities can come disguised as obstacles. That is why most people don't recognize them. Remember, the bigger the obstacles, the better is the opportunity.

I. Fear
Fear results in insecurity, lack of confidence and procrastination. It destroys our potential and ability. We cannot think straight. Fear ruins relationships and health. Fear of failure is often worse than failure itself. Failure is not the worst thing that can happen to someone. People who don't try have failed even before attempting. When infants learn to walk, they keep falling; but to them it is not failing, it is learning. If they became disheartened, they would never walk it. it is better to die on ones fet than to live with fear on one's knees.

K. Lack of Knowledge
Knowledge is awareness of areas of ignorance. The more knowledge a person gets, the more he realizes what areas he is ignorant in. A person who thinks he knows everything has the most to learn.

Ignorant people don't know they are ignorant. They don't know that 'they don't know'. In fact, more than ignorance, the bigger problem is the illusion of knowledge, because when you think you know something-but don't-your decision-making will be flawed.

L. Fatalistic Attitude
A fatalistic attitude prevents people from accepting responsibility for their circumstances. People with fatalistic attitudes attribute success and failure to luck. They resign themselves to their fate. They accept the predestined future written in their horoscope or stars. They believe that ragardles of their effort, whatever has to happen will happen. Hence they never put in any effort and complacency becomes a way of life. They wait for things to happen rather than making them happen. Success is a matter of luck, ask any failure.

Weak-minded people fall easy prey to fortune-tellers, horoscopes and elf-proclaimed Godmen who are sometimes conmen. They become superstitious and ritualistic. (Some people consider a rabbit's foot lucky; but it wasn't lucky for the rabbit, was it?)

If you want to fail, believe in luck. If you want to succeed, believe in the principle of cause and effect, and you will create your own "luck". As Samuel Goldwyn said, "The harder I work, the luckier I get."

The only way to overcome a fatalistic attitude is to accept responsibility and believe in the law of cause and effect rather than luck. It takes action, preparation and planning rather than waiting, wondering and wishing, to accomplish any goal in life.

M. Lack of Purpose
When people lack purpose and direction, they see no opportunity. If a person has the desire to accomplish something, knows the direction to move to achieve his objective, has the dedication to stay focused, and has the discipline required to put in the hard work, then success follows. But if you don't have purpose and direction, it doesn't matter what else you have, you won't succeed.

Desire is what made a paralytic Wilma Rudolph the fastest woman on the track at the 1960 Olympics. winning three gold medals.

At the age of five, a polio victim started swimming to regain strength. Because of her desire to succeed, she went on to become a word record holder at three events and won the gold at the 1956 Olympics at Melbourne. Her name was is Shelley Mann.

Great minds have purposes, others have wishes.
-Washington Irving

N. Lack of Courage
Successful people do not look for miracles or easy tasks. They seek courage and strength for overcome obstacles. They look at what is left rather than what is lost. Wishes don't come true; believes and expectations supported by conviction do. Prayers are only answered when they are supported with courageous action. Courage and character with courageous action. Courage and character are the critical combination for success.

O. Rationalizing
Winner may analize but they never rationalize-that is a loser's game. Losers always have a book full of excuses to tell you why they could not. You hear excuses like:
I'm unlucky.
I'm born under the wrong stars.
I'm too young.
I'm too old.
I'm handicapped.
I'm not smart enough.
I'm not educated.
I'm not good looking.
I don't have contacts.
I don't have enough money.
I don't have enough time.
The economy is bad.
If only I had the opportunity.
If only I didn't have a family.
If only I had married right.
The list can go on and on. There are two things determine whether a person will be a success: reasons and results. Results don't count while results do.

Illustration
How They Catch Monkeys in India
Monkey-hunters use a box with an opening at the top, big enough for the monkey to slide its hand into. Inside the box are nuts. The monkey grabs the nuts and now its hand becomes a fist. The monkey tries to get its hand out but the opening is big enough for the hand to slide into, but too small for the fist to come out of. Now the monkey has a choice, either to let go off the nuts and be free forever or hang on to the nuts and get caught. He hangs on to the nuts and gets caught.

We are no different from monkeys. We all hang on to the nuts that keep us from going forward in life. We keep rationalizing by saying. "I cannot to this because..."and whatever comes after "because" are the nuts that we are hanging onto that are holding us back.

Successful people don't rationalize. Good advice for failure is; Don't think, don't ask, and don't listen. Just rationalize.

A CRASH COURSE FOR SUCCESS
Play to win and not to lose.
Learn from other people's mistakes.
Associate with people of high moral character.
Evaluate your strengths and build on them.
Always think long term.
Give more than you get.
Always keep the larger picture in mind when making a decision.
Never compromise your integrity.
Don't look for something for nothing.
These are the principles you must apply in your personal, marriage or professional life. I assure you you will definitely succeed. Good Luck!! and thanks for visiting my sites.

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