Do you want to achieve your most
important goals in 2004? In my opinion it gets down to two
simple words, "easy" and "neglect". People often ask me how I
became successful at the early age of 31, while many of the
people I knew did not. The answer is simple: During that 6-year
period of time (age 25 to 31), the things I found to be easy to
do, they found to be easy not to do. I found it easy to set the
goals that could change my life. They found it easy not to. I
found it easy to read the books that could affect my thinking
and my ideas. They found that easy not to. I found it easy to
attend the classes and the seminars, and to get around other
successful people. They said it probably really wouldn't matter.
If I had to sum it up, I would say what I found to be easy to
do, they found to be easy not to do. Six years later, I'm a
millionaire and they are all still blaming the economy, the
government, and company policies, yet they neglected to do the
basic, easy things.
In fact, the primary reason most
people are not doing as well as they could and should, can be
summed up in a single word: neglect.
It is not the lack of money -
banks are full of money. It is not the lack of opportunity -
America, and much of the free World, continues to offer the most
unprecedented and abundant opportunities in the last six
thousand years of recorded history. It is not the lack of books
– libraries are full of books - and they are free! It is not
the schools - the classrooms are full of good teachers. We have
plenty of ministers, leaders, counselors and advisors.
Everything we would ever need to
become rich and powerful and sophisticated is within our reach.
The major reason that so few take advantage of all that we have
is simply neglect.
Neglect is like an infection.
Left unchecked it will spread throughout our entire system of
disciplines and eventually lead to a complete breakdown of a
potentially joy-filled and prosperous human life.
Not doing the things we know we
should do causes us to feel guilty and guilt leads to an erosion
of self-confidence. As our self-confidence diminishes, so does
the level of our activity. And as our activity diminishes, our
results inevitably decline. And as our results suffer, our
attitude begins to weaken. And as our attitude begins the slow
shift from positive to negative, our self-confidence diminishes
even more... and on and on it goes.
So my suggestion is that when
giving the choice of "easy to" and "easy not to" that you do not
neglect to do the simple, basic, "easy"; but potentially
life-changing activities and disciplines.
