Welcome to "SIMPLY SUSTAINABLE SUCCESS" - May 28, 2009:
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Helping You Create What Matters MOST in Life and Work --
With Whatever Life Throws At You!
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"Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan, 'press on' has solved, and always will solve, the problems of the human race."
--Calvin Coolidge
Hi All,
Thanks to all who wrote in to say that tooting my own horn had helped them toot there. I'm grateful for your feedback, and glad to help you bump up your own positive creative core. Toot! Toot!
In all the years I've taught, consulted, coached, and written, I've drawn inspiration from Coolidge's advice about persistence, above. The times I've felt like quitting something are too numerous to remember, let alone share. And, earlier in my life, I did quit things -- usually when they got hard, or, as I'd say "too" hard.
But working with some excellent mentors, I learned the power of persistence and began to "press on" when things got hard. I did what my father had always urged me to do, "stick with it." And when I did, I started to produce the results I wanted to produce.
Of course, there's more to producing results than just persistence. As some wise person once said, "persistence beyond a certain point becomes stupidity." But, combined with passion and practice, persistence is a key to producing real and lasting results.
Generic Skills, Specific Skills
Persistence is a "generic skill", a skill that can be applied across a wide range of "specific skills" such as writing, golf, scrap booking, gardening, polo playing, mountain climbing, entrepreneurship, art, ... you name it.
Generic skills enable you to develop and deploy your specific skills. They increase your resilience and your capacity to create, both of which are, themselves, generic skills.
You've no doubt heard the old line about, "If you give a person a fish, they eat for today, but if you teach them to fish, they'll never go hungry."
Well, try telling that to a cod fisher in Newfoundland or Salmon fishers on the West Coast of North America (south of Alaska) or Norway. Many of them know how to fish, but are struggling mightily to get by, and to put food in the mouths of their children.
Yet some thrive. Some reinvent themselves as electricians, wilderness guides, tour operators, permaculture gardeners, etc.... These lucky few somehow developed transferable "generic" skills that they apply to creating new ways of life and livelihood. They developed resilience and the capacity to create desired results, in spite of difficult circumstances. They learned how to persist and to persevere in the face of adversity.
And, so they succeed. They make their mark on their world.
US President Obama recently remarked that, "Making your mark on the world is hard. If it were easy, everybody would do it. But it's not. It takes patience, it takes commitment, and it comes with plenty of failure along the way. The real test is not whether you avoid this failure, because you won't. It's whether you let it harden or shame you into inaction, or whether you learn from it; whether you choose to persevere."
Patience. Commitment. The ability to learn from failure. Perseverance. These are all generic skills. They enable those who have developed them to shift gears, make change, and create desired results -- in spite of problems, circumstances, and adversity.
One reason I embrace and share the "creating" approach is that it is based on a set of powerful generic skills, integrated within a tried and true system for creating desired results. If you practice this system, persist in the face of difficulty, learn from failure, and follow through, you will produce results.
Creating is not foreign to us; we all do it. However, many don't know how they do it, so they can't do it consciously or deliberately. That's what I help people do in my coaching work. I help them recognize and develop their natural creating skills, and apply them to creating what matters most to them in life, work, and their world.
A friend recently sent me this quote from meditation retreat materials he received. I think it nicely sums up the power and joy in developing generic skills such as creativity, and persistence and applying them to our lives, work, communities... whatever.
"Creativity is natural to all nature. Nature isn't into success and failure. Nature is about finding growth in any given situation. We are embedded in a world that is forever creating. How foolish not to join the party!"
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Video: Persistence Secrets from A Bamboo Tree
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Another short video (less than 3 mins) that shows how persistence over time can lead to awesome results. Very inspiring!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJ3C9SP8xRE
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>This Weeks Quotes:
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"Vitality shows in not only the ability to persist but the ability to start over."
-- F. Scott Fitzgerald
"Inspiration grows into full-scale creation through persistence and imagination."
-- Carol Lloyd
"The ability to persist in the face of obstacles is at least as important a factor in success as talent."
-- Leonard Mlodinow
"Persistence of action comes from persistence of vision."
-- Steve Pavlina
"Getting ahead in a difficult profession requires avid faith in yourself. That is why some people with mediocre talent, but with great inner drive, go much further than people with vastly superior talent."
-- Sophia Loren
"Persistence is what makes the impossible possible, the possible likely, and the likely definite."
-- Robert Half
"You may be disappointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don't try."
--Beverly Sills
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How's your persistence? Are you willing to practice and persevere in pursuit of your passions? If so, keep it up! If not, want some help?
I hope you have a great week!
Bruce |
