Preparing for Success

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking this week about success, and how we reach that point where we feel successful.  (Also, there’s a difference between feeling successful and being successful, but that’s another post entirely.)

Say we have a goal in mind. And it’s a tough one that will require a lot of hard work and dedication. And sometimes your goal requires extra efforts that don’t really seem to have a purpose other than that it feels like something you should be doing.

So we do these things, probably wondering why we try so hard, and hoping that someday we’ll understand the purpose behind all our efforts. Hoping that someday, everything we’ve worked for will pay off. We do it to stretch ourselves farther, to widen our boundaries, to make our personal selves better.

And then…

Something comes up. Success falls on your head (with a little help from effort, obviously). And suddenly you see the purpose of all the other things you didn’t know would come back to you. Because, as James Owen once said in a keynote address, our choices are cumulative.

More and more lately, I’m seeing people gain the payoffs for their extra-hard work. And all that unnecessary stuff? Eventually it does become relevant. People remember. Training becomes useful. And even when the brass ring of success moves, you still find a way to reach it.

All you have to do is stretch yourself a little further. 

How are you stretching this week?

Do It Anyway

I've always been into positive thinking. You know, that whole believe in yourself and you can do anything...thing.

And I do believe it. I believe I can, and you can, and my kids can. We all have opportunities to succeed, to do big things, to become better people. We all have the opportunity to succeed, even if that success is preceded a thousand failures.

But we have to take those opportunities, and we have to be willing to fail. We have to try out before we can be cut from or make a team, and audition before we can get the part, and we have to apply for a job before we are hired.

We have to be okay with learning how to pick ourselves up out of a hole of destruction and rebuild our lives. Or our self confidence. Or whatever. You know what I mean.

I am willing. Always. Because this is the way dreams are discovered.




What are you willing to do for your dreams?

Every So Often

We all have dreams. But every so often, we have to take a minute to stop and wonder if those dreams are meant for us, or us for them, or whatever.

Every so often, our dreams take over our lives, and then we wonder what we were thinking when we started dreaming like that anyway.

Every so often, we decide to take a break, turn a corner, or do something differently than we planned.

And every so often, thinking outside the box helps us make more progress than anything else we’ve tried, renewing our sense of creativity, our sense of adventure, our ability to dream big.

Every so often, we are given a lesson in succeeding, rather than one in failing.

Every so often, we win.

And then it all becomes worth it.

When’s the last time you won?

Things We Should Decide For Ourselves

Most of you know I write my blogs on the weekends and schedule them to post. But this past weekend I opened numerous documents, intending to get them all done, and even though I’ve had lots of great bloggish thoughts this month, my mind blanked every time. I think there’s just too much information in there struggling to come out. You know how it goes.

So I decided to share little tidbits of everything going on in my head, in hopes that once I get them all out, I can do something else productive without being distracted. That said, my current thoughts are all over the map, so for this post, I’m making a list of things we have to decide for ourselves, regardless of who tells us differently or otherwise.

Only we can decide:

1.       How success looks to us.

2.       What we have to do in order to find that success.

3.       Whether we should continue to try (or give up), and why.

4.        What is best for us in our current circumstances.

5.       What our gut tells us to do, and whether or not we should act on that feeling.

6.       What we want most.

7.       Who we love and why, and what we do with those feelings.

8.       How we react to things that hurt us or make us angry or sad.

9.       How we react to things that make us happy and/or successful, or other fortune that comes our way.

10.   Who and what matters most to us, and why, and what we will do about it.

11.   What REALLY = success.

12.   What defines us as individuals.

13.   What’s worth fighting for and what isn’t.

14.   When to hold on.

15.   When to let go.

I told you my brain is full. What about you? What needs to be added to this list?

Sometimes Creativity is About Faith

In yourself.

In your work.

In the family and other loved ones who support you and try to understand but don’t always succeed.

In allowing the house to be messy, and letting the kids eat cereal for dinner.

In your creative friends. And your not-so-creative ones.

In the market.

In readers who always want something new to read.

In your original ideas—there will be a place for them.

In publishers who are brave enough to take a chance on something different. Or something similar. Or something else.

In agents who might be in a terrible mood when they read your submission, but decide they like it anyway. Or not.

In a higher power who has plans for you, even though you can’t see the blueprint.

In your ability to continue producing.

In your need to take breaks.

That what your gut tells you is the right thing to do, even if no one else—even the person you trust most—agrees.

Faith that you will be successful. Eventually.

And until then, faith in the power of chocolate covered marshmallows, Cadbury mini-eggs, black licorice candies, Black Forest gummy bears and Dr. Pepper. When creativity fails, these things will certainly see you through.

Dauntless

You know what I’ve discovered in all my thoughts about success and failure? Both require a large amount of bravery. Serious bravery. Because in order to succeed, you have to be willing to also fail. In order to fail, you have to be trying to succeed. (Unless you get into something deliberately planning to fail, but seriously, who does that?)

Whichever way you look at it, the only difference between the two is the end result and how we react to it.

Every success story is told with an interesting sequence of failure-type events which drove the story forward. They’re probably the most thought provoking, interesting stories you’ll ever hear, because they tell about how one person set out to succeed and FAILED, then failed again, and then a few more times, before finally reaching a level of success. And then they probably failed a few more times before making it to the top. If they ever made it to the top. Maybe they made it to a completely different location and decided that was where they should have been going all along. You never know. The point is they made it somewhere great. Somewhere AMAZING.

That’s how success goes. It’s how every game is won. It’s how every plot is driven. It’s what keeps us pushing on and shooting forward with a mad desire to get to the other side.

I am not afraid to fail. (Say it with me.) I AM NOT AFRAID TO FAIL.

But I’ll tell you what I am afraid of. I am terrified of never reaching my arms out and trying to pull myself higher. Because that is when I’ll realize how many times I’ve fallen down. No one wants to have to face that.

I am not afraid. I am NOT AFRAID. I AM NOT AFRAID! I. Am. Dauntless.

The question is, are you?

Why?

When it comes to being told no, writers are probably the most steadfast, forge ahead, move-on-type people I know. If I didn’t know better (and believe me, I KNOW BETTER) I’d think we actually thrive on rejections of one type or another (consider: agent/publisher rejection, difficult critique comments, negative reviews, etc.). And yet, we write anyway. We submit anyway. And we get feedback anyway.

Why. Why do we try so hard? Why do we keep writing, submitting, critiquing, blogging, and social networking to the point of giving up other important things in our lives—like sleep?

For me, I think it’s because even when I’m miserably disappointed, deep down I remember how happy I am when I get into a rhythm and actually unfurl my creative wings. That happiness is why I write. It’s often why I smile. Sometimes, it’s even why I breathe. And I believe, truly believe, that if I keep working, keep believing, don’t give up, that eventually I will jump the hurdles currently holding me back and finally face the next hurdle.

But what’s true for me might not be true for the rest of you. So tell me. Why do you keep trying?

The Other Side of the Failure Forest

Remember this post when we talked about how success changes people? I’m still thinking about that, and it occurs to me that there’s another side of this coin. Not everyone succeeds. Some people change their goals completely, go in different directions, or flat out fail altogether.

Let’s face it. Just because we want something doesn’t mean we’re supposed to get it. Just because we hope doesn’t make our desired outcome best for us. And just because we fight doesn’t mean we’re going to win, or even that we should.

When this happens, when we adjust our thought processes, daily habits, and goals in order to reorganize the paths our lives are taking, how much does this change us?

I mean, yes, obviously we should (theoretically) be stronger for the lessons we’ve learned along the way. But after we discover that maybe we’re not cut out for that thing for which we’ve been reaching, or maybe that we’ve been reaching in the wrong direction—do you think that changes us too?

We all have a different purpose in life, different talents, different needs and desires and abilities, so it makes total sense that we’d have individual paths to success. And along the way we ALL experience failure of some sort or another.

The question is how will we deal with it?

Will we let our disappointment swallow us whole? Will we let hurt bury us? Will we allow heartache to still our hands and minds and creative process until we work no more?

OR.

Will we rise above it, set a new path, pick ourselves up, and start again?

Once again, I think it comes down to choices. We get to choose how we react to these circumstances. We get to choose what we do next. We get to choose which road to take at the next fork.

Me? I have decided that just because I only see two roads doesn’t mean I can’t forge my own path. And that, my friends, is EXACTLY what I intend to do.

See you on the other side of the forest.