"I've come to believe that all my past failure and frustration were actually laying the foundation for the understandings that have created the new level of living I now enjoy."
-- Anthony Robbins
"See things as you would have them be instead of as they are."
-- Robert Collier
"Picture yourself vividly as winning, and that alone will contribute immeasurably to success."
-- Harry Emerson Fosdick
"Imagination is more important than knowledge."
-- Albert Einstein
We have so many opportunities to learn and to do. Sometimes we do things that don't work out, and sometimes they stick in our thinking a long time into the future. They need not. You can change the outcome in your mind and leave it as a success instead of the way it was.
A long time back in late 1979, I started a business full time. I opened a musical instrument store. It ended up that my wife and I both worked the store full time, giving up our previous incomes and relying on the store to take care of that loss. The store did well, and grew. Of course, growing has a cost, so we got through, but struggle was a word that described much of the process. After a year and a half, I gave up. There is more to that part of the story, but we sold everything off, paid everyone and came away with a little left. It didn't fail, I gave up. Quitting was the only failure.
The main problem was that I didn't have a big enough vision of the business. I thought I did, but I didn't. I know this now because I looked back and have made it a thorough success of it now by changing my thinking and making different and more effective and productive decisions. This is a really good and fun way to change your thoughts of past events: relive them, but revamp them! So, today, I went back and did it differently and I got a much improved and different result. Essentially, I repaired the memory.
Before, I only wanted to be in the store and run it. Truth is, that means I bought a job. That's not necessarily bad, there are hundreds of thousands of businesses that do that. Now, going back and changing, I have hired a manager to run the store, while I supervise periodically and keep it growing while I do what I need to do to move forward. I take less for myself, but I now can multiply my efforts over and over again. Now it is like a separate entity whereas in the past I was so closely tied to it, there was no separation. And now, it is a chain of successful stores.
Sure it isn't what actually happened in the past, but it sure is a great way to learn from it instead of feeling crappy about it, don't you think? Heck, you can do this with any memory of events or circumstances in your past. Make it the way you want it. Forget reality and make your own, and do it well.
The reason I share this is that it is all in how we think about things. It isn't what we're doing or what is happening to us, or around us. It is how we think about those things.
Do we see opportunities or do we see the lack of them? Do we see a business growing as an entity, or do we see ourselves doing a business? Do we stop short of success? Do we learn from what we call mistakes?
If not business, I know these same thoughts apply to every thing else we do. How we think about what we do is everything. It has everything to do with what we do in the future as well.
I see hope, opportunity, love, success, abundance, joy. It's the way those words make me feel. They make me feel good. That's as good a reason as I need.
This Time I Won't Stop. I Will Expand My Thinking!
Spread Some Joy Today--Who can you encourage today? It is the sweetest thing to receive. It costs you pretty much nothing but thought energy. Let's spend it lavishly since you're a Billionaire in thought energy! You have more than you could ever need.
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