Almost everything that’s ever happened in your life has been the result of a choice.
A lot of it has happened because of your own personal choices.
But even those things that have happened to you completely and totally outside of your control have usually resulted from a choice…
Someone else’s choice in that case. And it created circumstances, good or bad, that affected you.
Interesting, and quite sad, to think about.
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Sometimes we have a choice between what is correct and what is right.
What’s “correct” is often bureaucratic or compliant with rules and regulations. Often those same rules and regulations fly in the face of common sense, decency, and the dignity we owe others.
When a customer’s computer catches fire with no fault on their part, obviously due to a manufacturer’s defect, we have a choice. We can do the correct thing: quote the manual and say there’s nothing we can do. Or worse yet, we can say:
“You should have bought the warranty.”
Or we can do the right thing: acknowledge the problem and take responsibility. We can help the person who put her faith in us and our product or service.
Correct or right—it’s a choice.
We must improve our ability to make the proper choice when the time comes.
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The best teacher in the world is failure. Nothing teaches us more or faster than trying and failing at something.
It’s how we learn to walk. It’s how we learn to speak.
What keeps failure from becoming success is a lack of perseverance. We fail once and assume we’ll fail if we try again.
Thomas Edison failed more than 10,000 times in creating the incandescent lightbulb. But he failed differently each time.
When asked about this by a reporter, Edison said, “I have not failed 10,000 times. I have found 10,000 ways that don’t work.” He implied that each failure got him closer to his eventual success.
Had he tried making his lightbulb the same way 10,000 times, he would have been living out Einstein’s definition of insanity. But he didn’t. Instead he chose to keep trying 10,000 different ways.
Failure is a reality, but it’s also a choice. We can choose to learn from it, change things up, and try again. That option will eventually lead to success.
Or we can choose to fail and accept it as a permanent part of our lives.
You’ll find life is much better when you look at failure and success as learning experiences.
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“My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world.”
—Jack Layton
Feelings becomes actions.
We cannot always control our emotions, but we can control our actions by choosing which feelings and emotions we feed.
We always have a choice.
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Successful people are normal. They have no superhuman abilities, no extreme discipline honed by years of meditation or special operations training. However, they do something the rest of us don’t always do:
They choose.
Successful people choose what is important to them; they choose to prioritize what is important throughout the day; and they choose to carry out those things regardless of feelings or external triggers.
You must plan to do the things that matter – the things that will get you where you want to go. These are the achievements, contributions, and attributes for which you want to be remembered at your funeral.
Before you can plan them, however, you must define them. How will you achieve what’s important if you don’t know what is important?
You won’t.
But even if you lay out what is important and plan your day accordingly, it will not matter unless you choose to carry out the items of importance. This is what separates successful people from the rest.
“The successful person has the habit of doing the things failures don’t like to do….They don’t like doing them either necessarily. But their disliking is subordinated to the strength of their purpose.”
E.M. Gray – “The Common Denominator of Success”
Even if something is important, and you are aware of its importance, you will find times when you really don’t want to do it. You won’t want to exercise; you won’t want to read your kids to sleep after a long day at work. If you don’t, that’s fine. But you are making a choice based on feelings or circumstances, relinquishing control of your own life.
Every action you take or don’t is a choice. Choose to do the things that further your mission, rather than choosing to let other people, feelings, and circumstances choose for you.
Choose to be successful.
Define what really matters most to you.
Plan your days based around what is important.
And most importantly, choose to act regardless of how you feel, what other people do, or what is going on around you.
What is courage? It is the same thing as bravery?
Courage might be doing something even when you are terrified.
It might also be one’s readiness for action when a situation demands it.
Either way, courage is a choice. It is the act of deciding to act when the need arises.
Be courageous. Choose to act.
You cannot move forward until you accept the reality of your current situation.
Things absolutely should be a certain way. Some people should still be alive.
But they aren’t.
Your current reality dictates what is possible in your future. But that realization equips you with a great power: the power to turn what you think should be into your future reality (to a certain extent. I’m in no way insinuating that you can bring back the dead).
Accept what is, then act accordingly.
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Everyone you interact with on a daily basis is a volunteer in your life.
Don’t believe it? Try an experiment:
If you have children, a spouse, or any sort of significant other, order them around, withhold affection, neglect the small kindnesses and courtesies that make relationships so strong and fun.
If you do it long enough and often enough, they will quit.
(Please don’t actually try that experiment.)
The same is true in any organization: simply because someone is employed by another does not mean that person is not a volunteer. You would never neglect the needs and wants of a customer or disrespect her. Why not? Because a customer is a volunteer – she is choosing to do business with you, and that choice can be revoked at any time.
There seems to be some disconnect when money is involved – because the person is paid, she does not deserve the same level of care and dignity given to a customer. This could not be further from the truth.
The employee might be reliant on that money; she might need it for her survival, but she is still a volunteer.
Your friends and family members are volunteers; they are customers. They are choosing to do “business” with you, and at any time, that choice can be revoked. Your employees are volunteers; they just happen to be paid.
Treat everyone with whom you interact as a volunteer customer, and you will seldom be disappointed.
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You are free to do anything you want. You are not free to choose the consequences.
Every choice we make has a natural consequence associated with it.
You can choose to eat McDonald’s three times a day (I’ve done this), but you cannot choose the consequences of this decision (I gained 40 pounds in a year, added 8 inches to my waist, and felt miserable most days).
You can choose to put your finger on a hot stove (why would you?), but you cannot choose whether or not you get burned. The natural consequence is a burned finger.
When you pick up one end of the stick, you pick up the other. – Stephen R. Covey
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I had a moment of clarity today when I was re-reading a definition of proactive behavior.
This definition stuck out today because I read it right after finishing my lunch, which I had ordered with absolutely no forethought.
How many times have I walked into a restaurant and placed an order without thinking? How many times have I ordered something because that was what I had always gotten?
My choice of what to eat might be predictable – it’s what I always get – but it certainly isn’t predetermined. So this means I am not making a choice between stimulus and response.
Between stimulus and response is our greatest power–the freedom to choose. – Stephen R. Covey
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Stimulus: walk into a restaurant for lunch.
Response: order the thing I always get, usually with less than ideal effects on my health.
I have a moment, in between arriving and ordering, where I can make a conscious decision about what to eat. This means I can choose to add value to my body, or I can choose to indulge in something less than ideal.
This is not a discussion of nutrition – it is a discussion of problem-solving. Think of all the decisions you make automatically each day, then pick one and imagine how you can respond between the stimulus and your automatic response.
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