"In life you can never be too kind or too fair; everyone you meet is carrying a heavy load. When you go through your day expressing kindness and courtesy to all you meet, you leave behind a feeling of warmth and good cheer, and you help alleviate the burdens everyone is struggling with."
- Brian Tracy
Some will always think you a sucker for being so nice. They may even criticize you and try to take advantage of you.
Too bad. Jealousy will do that to people.
They hate to see others who do good works, who do charitable acts without expectation of reward, who try to help others, because it doesn't conform to their miserable and depressing viewpoint of humanity.
They are so focussed on themselves and the dirty tricks and misfortunes fate has played on them that they can't look at the world from anyone else's point of view.
If you can't think what life must be like inside someone else's skin, you can't appreciate the hardships that others endure. Those who can and do look at life from another's point of view usually (in my experience, always) find that they wouldn't trade their life and their troubles for those of anyone else.
That's a strange phenomenon. When we only look at our own problems and consider how hard life is on us, we seem to have the worst problems in the world. When we seriously think about the problems that others must endure--really learn what they are and how other people struggle to cope with them--we never want to trade ours for theirs.
Think of any famous person you know, especially someone whose life you may have studied to some extent. Not just the good stuff, but the bumps, potholes and sinkholes of that person's life as well. The more you learn about the real life--the inside story that the public doesn't usually learn--the more likely you will be to be thankful you don't have that person's problems.
Look at the people you meet every day, the people closest to you, with the same eyes. Every one of them struggles with problems and almost every one will hide them so that you learn nothing. Everyone wants you to think they are fearless, until proven otherwise. Everyone wants you to believe they never make mistakes, until they are caught.
Everyone wants you to believe that they can make it on their own, no matter what their problems and no matter how little help they have with them, until they break down.
Sometimes that breakdown is emotional. Sometimes it shows up as an addiction. Often it appears as unusual or antisocial behaviour, though this is usually done away from the eyes of others these people know. Sometimes we learn about that person's problems as a result of suicide or murder, or both.
If you are only thinking about your own problems and not those of others around you, when they go over the edge you may not be prepared. You may not be able to help.
You may miss the signs and live to regret it for years afterward.
Other people have it worse than you. If you dig deep enough, you may find that everyone else does. Be gentle. Cut them some slack. Forgive. Offer a shoulder, or some time to listen.
You may save a life. You will certainly enrich your own in the process.
Bill Allin
Turning It Around: Causes and Cures for Today's Epidemic Social Problems, a guidebook for people who want to teach others, especially children, how to cope with life's problems and how to help them understand the vulnerability of others they know.
Learn more at http://billallin.com
Showing posts with label Tracy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tracy. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Saturday, March 03, 2007
Overnight Success Takes A Good Decade
"You have to put in many, many, many tiny efforts that nobody sees or appreciates before you achieve anything worthwhile."
- Brian Tracy, business writer
In almost all cases, "overnight success" required years of devotion to improving whatever the skill, craft or athletic endeavour was involved. The usual rule of thumb is one decade.
That means that the "average" person who has found success and some level of notoriety slaved for endless hours, usually deprived of sleep, with a minimum of food and often in accommodations that leave much to be desired, before being "discovered."
Overnight success is a myth except in the sense that widespread recognition may come suddenly. In many cases, the work could well be called labouring in the trenches.
Why don't more people gain such recognition? Most people are not prepared to devote so much of their lives to reaching the objective of their dreams. To work extra hard at one part of your life, you must sacrifice some others. Often than means family, friends, career or income.
Some don't know that extreme devotion, perseverance and hard work for a long period of time will eventually help them to realize their dream. Or they feel that they will break down and give up along the way.
Some don't even have a dream they could pursue. They don't even see themselves as being outstanding at anything. They don't dare because they don't believe in themselves. They don't realize that their dreams are in their own hands, not in the hands of others they believe have considerable control or influence over their lives.
Artist and sculptor Michelangelo Buonarroti said "If people only knew how hard I work to gain my mastery, it wouldn't seem so wonderful at all." It would have been equally correct for him to say that his immortal works of art would never have come into being if he had not worked so hard to earn the mastery he had. He worked hard enough and made the necessary sacrifices.
Oh, Michaelangelo, your mastery would seem wonderful. On a tour of St. Peter's, in Rome (technically The Vatican), I stood transfixed and slack-jawed for ten minutes staring at your Pieta (Madonna and Child), camera dangling from my neck ignored because I refused to take my eyes off the most magnificent piece of sculpture I had ever seen. Then the group was called to move on to see St. Peter's tomb, a disappointment by comparison.
Brian Tracy referred to the many tiny efforts one must put in to achieve success in the business world, as that is his area of expertise and interest. But the advice applies to anything in life that we want to become expert in. We are each capable of fame.
Bill Allin
Turning It Around: Causes and Cures for Today's Epidemic Social Problems, striving to make the complexities of life a little simpler to understand.
Learn more at http://billallin.com
- Brian Tracy, business writer
In almost all cases, "overnight success" required years of devotion to improving whatever the skill, craft or athletic endeavour was involved. The usual rule of thumb is one decade.
That means that the "average" person who has found success and some level of notoriety slaved for endless hours, usually deprived of sleep, with a minimum of food and often in accommodations that leave much to be desired, before being "discovered."
Overnight success is a myth except in the sense that widespread recognition may come suddenly. In many cases, the work could well be called labouring in the trenches.
Why don't more people gain such recognition? Most people are not prepared to devote so much of their lives to reaching the objective of their dreams. To work extra hard at one part of your life, you must sacrifice some others. Often than means family, friends, career or income.
Some don't know that extreme devotion, perseverance and hard work for a long period of time will eventually help them to realize their dream. Or they feel that they will break down and give up along the way.
Some don't even have a dream they could pursue. They don't even see themselves as being outstanding at anything. They don't dare because they don't believe in themselves. They don't realize that their dreams are in their own hands, not in the hands of others they believe have considerable control or influence over their lives.
Artist and sculptor Michelangelo Buonarroti said "If people only knew how hard I work to gain my mastery, it wouldn't seem so wonderful at all." It would have been equally correct for him to say that his immortal works of art would never have come into being if he had not worked so hard to earn the mastery he had. He worked hard enough and made the necessary sacrifices.
Oh, Michaelangelo, your mastery would seem wonderful. On a tour of St. Peter's, in Rome (technically The Vatican), I stood transfixed and slack-jawed for ten minutes staring at your Pieta (Madonna and Child), camera dangling from my neck ignored because I refused to take my eyes off the most magnificent piece of sculpture I had ever seen. Then the group was called to move on to see St. Peter's tomb, a disappointment by comparison.
Brian Tracy referred to the many tiny efforts one must put in to achieve success in the business world, as that is his area of expertise and interest. But the advice applies to anything in life that we want to become expert in. We are each capable of fame.
Bill Allin
Turning It Around: Causes and Cures for Today's Epidemic Social Problems, striving to make the complexities of life a little simpler to understand.
Learn more at http://billallin.com
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