I’d like to start this post off with a question that has puzzled me over the past few weeks. “Why do we think that if we were to go back in time and change something (even something small), that it would drastically change our future? Yet, we do not believe that if we were to make small changes in our lives today that it would have drastic consequences to our lives in the future?”
We also believe that our past, our skills, and gifts we were born with determine our future. This is partly true but I believe we have a choice. There are those who would argue against this point and would have many reasons and I retort with the following references: – Jadav “Molai” Payeng creating a forest in 30 years. Something that even the most affluent of kings has not been able to do. – Mike Nicholson who at the age of 77 has accumulated 30 degrees: two associates degrees, 23 master’s degrees, three specialist degrees, and one doctorate. – Helen Keller, despite the disability of both deafness and blindness, she learned to read and write, becoming a champion of social issues and helping to improve the welfare of deaf people. – Lastly, to argue the converse, I would sight Lewis Terman’s Termites, 1500 genius children, all with IQs above 150, landed up living pretty ordinary lives. Much less impressive than everyone expected and hoped. There are many more examples, and we always look and marvel at these amazing people. But they are very similar to us. Very similar but with one small and decisive difference. They have made the choice to make a change and stick with it. Not major earth breaking steps but rather very small but continued, deliberate steps which built up and at the end of the day resulted in major changes. This is not a new thing, in fact, many people have sighted this and are well aware of this. Einstein called it the 8th wonder of the world – compounded interest. If you don’t believe me then let’s take this as an example. If you were to perform just 1% better than the rest of the market, would you expect a big difference? 1% doesn’t sound like a lot, does it? That said if you get 1% more than the average then over 10 years you will have about twice the amount than the average. Now if 1 % can do that then what could 2% do? Well if you performed 2% better than the average then over 10 years you will beat the average about 4 times. If you performed 3% better than the average over 10 years you will beat the average about 9.6 times. I think you get the point. I am loosely quoting Marianne Williamson when saying, “we are powerful beyond measure.” If we simply make the choice to do something and stick to this then great things can be done. Whatever that might be. There is a Chinese proverb that goes as follows: “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” Ask yourself this: What should you have started last week, last month, or even last year? Where would you be if you had started last week? Where would you be if you had started last month? Where would you be if you had started last year? It’s very simple but not easy. If you’re serious about making your future better than your past then you must face the reality that it comes with choice and then the follow-through of that choice – hard work. I leave you with one of my current favourite sayings – Your dreams won’t work if you don’t either.
