Failure Required

If you accept these truths, you will outgrow most people

What do you currently accept to be true in your own life?

You can accept things on different levels. Things about yourself, about life, about your circumstances, whatever it may be.

What I want to talk about today is how you use it to your advantage.

Accept Hard

Whenever you are faced with a choice in life, there are always options. Back in my athletic days, we had a motto. Choose hard. This was not to say be stupid and always take the hard way through a problem. It was a nod at the fact that nothing good comes easy.

Choosing hard and accepting hard are different. In sports, choosing hard is waking up early, working out until you’re exhausted, long hours at the field, mastering your craft.

Life is not as simple as choosing hard every time for the best path to success.

Success is different to each of us, but it’s still never easy (unless you win the lottery, but to some that’s not success, it’s just luck.)

When you decide on a goal of success, you must accept hard. It will be hard to build success. At least I hope it is. If you become successful easily, odds are it’s not that great.

Building wealth is hard. Being fit is hard. Having a loving and passionate relationship is hard.

Nothing good comes easy.

When you accept that the road to your goals is going to be hard, you prepare yourself for whats to come. Late nights, early mornings, problems you don’t want to deal with, phone calls with strangers, long gym sessions, exhausting the body, tough conversations, it’s all hard.

But it’s a hell of a lot easier when you accepted it beforehand.

We all know this to be true.

Being exceptional is quite literally being the exception. Most people choose easy. They want as little friction as possible. Accepting hard and dealing with the difficulties life throws you way is already putting you a step ahead of most everyone else.

Accept that you are alone

Yeah you’re alone in this journey. No one is coming to save you. At the end of the day, there isn’t anyone in this world who is going to care as much as you do. Nobody is going to go through the hell you will be faced with for you.

This is a blessing.

When you accept this fact many things will happen because of it.

The success you do have will be because of YOU.

Life didn’t suddenly get easy. You didn’t get lucky. Someone didn’t randomly notice your potential. The timing didn’t just randomly align.

Excuses will lose their power.

Waiting for the right time disappears.

Responsibility becomes freedom.

You become fully independent. Only relying on yourself.

The power of this is truly remarkable. You suddenly take charge of your own life. When this happens, the speed at which progress is made becomes faster than you ever thought possible. No more waiting for the right time, the right people, the right anything. You create it all. You decide. And then you take all the credit for what an amazing goal you achieved.

Accept that progress is boring

Progress in itself is largely unnoticeable. You don’t notice progress from one workout. One email sent. One post to 3 followers.

This is why so many people quit. The progress goes unnoticed.

But after 1,000 workouts, you look like a Greek god.

After 1,000 emails, you have 100 clients.

After 100 posts, you have 5,000 followers.

The work that changes your life:

– Doesn’t feel cinematic.

– Doesn’t get applause.

– Doesn’t feel productive a lot of the time

But the repetition of these actions is progress

When most people quit, you continue. You push through because you accepted it was going to be boring.

Then one day, it isn’t.

And that day, most will say you got lucky

But you know better than that.

Accept there is no guarantee

With most goals in life we want to have a perfect plan before the first step is ever taken. We want a guarantee that it’s going to work. We want to know the result before we begin.

This is foolish.

There are no guarantees in life. You’re not even guaranteed tomorrow.

This is fear disguised as logic.

Whatever you want to call it, it’s fear at its simplest form. You’re scared to start because you don’t know the outcome.

The most successful people in anything didn’t know the outcome when starting.

We all know someone who “is not as smart as me” yet they are much more successful than you. Why?

They started without guarantees. They accepted that it might fail.

But not starting guarantees failure.

Accept discomfort

Comfort is the killer of growth. When you are comfortable, you are stagnant. It is better to be uncomfortable and moving forward than comfortable and still.

Imagine it this way: you are able to afford an apartment, to eat, to play video games in your free time after work. You are comfortable by most standards.

Your life is at a standstill. No progress.

Now imagine rent is due but you’re short on funds. No savings, mom and dad aren’t going to bail you out. You decide you have to make something happen and fast.

You spend every night after work grinding to find a way to get this money.

All of a sudden you did it. You started something, a business, content, got another job, whatever it may be, but you remember the discomfort of stress not being able to pay so you keep grinding. Soon you have enough saved for a house, you have a business doing well, you travel, meet someone, life is great now because of the discomfort you felt that time rent was due and you couldn’t pay.

Accept discomfort before hand. Allow yourself to be uncomfortable. It’s where real growth happens.

Accept that the world will continue either way

Think about it like this. There’s a fork in the road of your life right now. One road is the easy route, comfort, leads to not much changing from your current circumstances. The other road is hard, gritty, bumpy, it’ll test you every step of the way, but the end of this one is something great. Something that you created. Success.

Here’s the thing. A year from now, despite which route you take, the world will have continued. One of three possibilities arise here:

1. You are exactly where you are now, maybe slightly different but largely the same.

2. You failed at what it is you were trying to do, but you have experience, lessons, knowledge, ready to go again but with a head start this time.

3. You are wildly successful or on track to become wildly successful.

I don’t know about you but 66% of those options seem great to me.

So what exactly are you waiting for? Just accept what comes with the dreams you have.

The goals you set will just remain goals forever without action.

I want to leave this Earth with a legacy, accomplishment. Not with untouched goals, regret, and “what ifs.”

Will you accept, or will you stay where you are for another year?