I wrote an article nearly a year ago titled, If I Were 22, it was inspired by a hashtag and a series of posts I had read coming on LinkedIn talking about what advice you would give your 22 year old self.
It’s nearly a year later, I’m now a decade older than my 22 year old self and re-visiting that article I realised that the same is still try today and probably will be forever. TRY TRY TRY is more important than looking back and thinking, where did it all go wrong, why did I never…
Lewis Caroll said it best:
“IN THE END… We only regret the chances we didn’t take, the relationships we were afraid to have,and the decisions we waited too long to make.”
The truth is trying something and not succeeding to the level we want far outweighs the regrets we will have years down the line when looking back at what we could have tried, what we should have tried and ultimately (in the future) what we WISH we tried.
The same applies to business. We often talk a great game, and the future version of me is amazing. If you’ve never read the Wait By Why blog, you really need to. This article; The Procrastination Matrix made me realise how many of my goals were great to talk about, but that ultimately I was doing NOTHING to achieve. Why? Well Future Chris has it covered, and let me tell you, future Chris is AMAAAAAZZZZINNNNGGGGG.
As you’ll find out in the article, Future Chris (probably just like Future YOU) never actually arrives. That’s the problem. You need to actually make Now Chris (and Now YOU) do the things you need to do, regardless of fear, problems, your limiting beliefs or any other version of what is actually an EXCUSE for fear.
I think it’s so important that as human beings we try new experiences. We try and fail at business. We apply for jobs that we think are out of our reach and we don’t get that position. Why? Simple! This is the only thing in our lives that will help us to grow. If you’re not trying, you’ll never succeed.
There’s nothing wrong with failing or falling down. The important part is getting back up. Think about children. No parent in the world has ever gone through 4 weeks of their toddler trying to walk and said, “screw it! Little Jimmy will never be able to walk, let’s give up funny!” EVER!
If we could grasp the same tenacity as the toddler, we would achieve great things. In fact some of the most successful people do exactly that. They try one way, it doesn’t work, they try again another way. Regardless of what people might think of them or what failure might feel like. The biggest issue is usually FEAR, and if you let fear stop you, then you’ll never do what you really want to.
Elon Musk was quoted as saying:
“If something’s important enough, you should try. Even if you – the probable outcome is failure.”
Thomas Edison long before Elon said:
“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”
