Adversity

Adversity is the diamond dust with which jewels are polished – Robert Leighton


As much as we hate adversity, this is where our character is shaped.    Adversity is where the wheat is separated from the core.  When the going gets tough, the tough gets going.   

Very few successful people are born into successful families; most of them accomplished their success through sheer hard work, overcoming stumbling blocks and despite set-backs.

Best friend or worst enemy?

You may find the worst enemy or best friend in yourself – English Proverb

Are you your own best friend or your own worst enemy? 

There is enough people who would not think twice walking over you, so don’t be nasty with yourself too. 

Be kind to yourself.  Believe in yourself.  Trust your own abilities and don’t forget to celebrate your successes.

Striking fire

It is with many enterprises as with striking fire; we do not meet with success except by reiterated efforts, and often at the instant when we despair of success – Francoise de Maintenon

Too often we give up just before we would have succeeded. 

Three kinds of people

There are three kinds of people in the world, the wills, the won'ts and the can'ts. The first accomplish everything; the second oppose everything; the third fail in everything – Eclectic Magazine

Which position would you take up on the podium of life?

Being wrong

 “Confidence comes not from always being right but not fearing to be wrong”

If you don’t do anything, you can’t make mistakes.  If you don’t say anything, you can’t be wrong.   If you don’t disagree, you are not upsetting anyone.   

“I have never in my life learned anything from any man who agreed with me.” - Dudley Field Malone

Ouch!

 “Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michelangelo, Mother Teresa, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein.” – Life’s Little Instruction Book, compiled by H. Jackson Brown, Jr.


Ouch!

Great minds

“Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.” ~ Eleanor Roosevelt


What or rather who is the topic of your conversations?

Dare to realize your dreams

“All our dreams can come true – if we have the courage to pursue them.” – Walt Disney

What is it that prevents people from pursuing their dreams?  Money, opportunities, a partner, specific skills, existing responsibilities…  These are realities, but successful people don’t allow realities to stand in their way.  Successful people always find a way to make it happen. 

 “It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that things are difficult.” – Seneca

Life has no remote

“If what you’re doing is not your passion, you have nothing to lose.”

Does your job excite you or are you just there because you can’t find anything else?  Talking to others, quickly make you realize that very few people in the work place are doing what they enjoy.  Maybe it is because you feel you never had the opportunities others had or maybe you were unable to further your studies. 

Talking about what could have been or your ‘one day’ dreams are not going to make it happen, you need to make it happen.  The time is now.  .    

Life has no remote.  Get up and change it yourself – Anonymous  

Just another plan

“The trouble with not having a goal is that you can spend your life running up and down the field and never score.” – Bill Copeland

None of us plan to fail; it’s just that we fail to plan.  To plan is to have a clear vision of where you are heading; what you are aiming at.   However, plans without action, just remain plans. 

 “Everything you want should be yours: the type of work you want; the relationships you need; the social, mental, and aesthetic stimulation that will make you happy and fulfilled; the money you require for the lifestyle that is appropriate to you; and any requirement that you may (or may not) have for achievement or service to others. If you don’t aim for it all, you’ll never get it all. To aim for it requires that you know what you want” ~ Richard Koch

Take control

“The best years of your life are the ones in which you decide your problems are your own. You do not blame them on your mother, the ecology, or the president. You realize that you control your own destiny.” – Albert Ellis

The ability to blame someone for your failures is like a security blanket for a child.  While you are blaming, you don’t have to take responsibility.  Whoever you are blaming, whether they played a role or not, might not even know that you are keeping them responsible for your failures, but the negative thoughts are holding you back.

Leave the past behind and move forward.  Once you realize the truth, you are liberated and able to take control.   

Live your own life

When I came to the end of my life, I don’t want to find out I lived your life. – Unknown

How many of us, sit down and plan our lives; make conscious decisions of what we expect of the future?  It might not always be easy, but it is possible to live your own life. 

Sadly, in many instances, we end up doing what will make others happy.  To avoid confrontation, we follow the dreams that others have for us. 

If you don't want to regret living someone else's life, you need to start living your own life today.

Because I have to

Whatever you do, do it with all your heart and soul – Bernard Baruch

Doing something just because you have to do it, results in inferiority.  If you do it with all your heart and soul, it results in excellence. 

The distinction between the two is not necessarily more effort, but the fact that you gave something of yourself.

Find a better way

If there’s a way to do it better… find it – Thomas A Edison

Complaining seem to be a national sport.  However, what are we doing to make things better? 

Become an innovative thinker.  Think of solutions and alternatives.  You might just be pleasantly surprised by your own abilities.

If you can dream it...

Don’t be afraid of the space between your dreams and reality.  If you can dream it, you can make it so – Belva Davis

Even though most of the big inventors dreamt big and their dreams seemed far-fetched, they never allowed the space between the two to get in their way.  

They bridged the gap with hard work and a dogged determination.  Every door that was closed in their faces, enthused them to try again, and again, and again.  Every time they were turned down, they were one step closer to success.

Your legacy

Your legacy should be that you made it better than it was when you got it – Lee Iacocca

If you ate a packet of crisps or sweets do you throw the paper in the bin or do you chuck it away wherever you are, maybe even out of the vehicle’s window? 

What happens to that half eaten apple, bubblegum or cigarette butt?    

Do you leave the bathroom in the same state that it was before you entered, with all the taps closed properly? 

All of us have a responsibility towards the environment.  What is your contribution?

Everything is a miracle

“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.” ― Albert Einstein

When you watch people at a robot, you hardly ever see them smiling.  It seems impossible for those fierce stares to ever notice a miracle.  Yet, every breath you are able to take is a miracle.  All those little muscles working together to blink your eyes...  the ability to distinguish between a cacophony of sounds... the miracle of the brain receiving and processing images into recognisable pictures... the fact that arms, legs, eyes, ears and brain work in synchronization to stop at the red robot and get going when it turns green... and all of this happening waiting at a robot, but we don’t see the miracles. 

Miracles are real and they are all around us... in everything.

Take a step back

Sometimes we have to take a step back to jump over – Gerrit Burger

We don’t like to move a step back or even sideways.  Especially in our careers, we want to move up the corporate ladder.  However, often we have manoeuvred ourselves so close to the wall, that we will never be able to get over it. 

Take a step back…

The same old same

“You are on the road to success, when you realise that failure is only a detour…” ~ Anonymous

You take the same road to work day after day.  You arrive at the same office, sit at the same desk, and perform the same monotonous task which bores you out of your mind.  You wish you can find another position, one which will make you feel as if you have arrived; one that will make you feel successful.

It’s time to take a detour.  One can’t keep doing the same thing and expect a different result.  Nothing is going to change if you don’t make a change. 

Life is what you make it

 “Life is what you make it, always has been, always will be…” ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

You get those who wait for their ship to arrive and then you get those who will swim out to fetch their ship.  Nobody is responsible for you, your happiness, your successes or your failures, except you.  You may depend on some people to help you make it, but nobody is going to make it on your behalf. 

Sometimes it’s easy, sometimes it takes a lot of hard work – by yourself.  Sometimes you will succeed, sometimes you will have to try again… and again… and again… 

“Life is all about timing... the unreachable becomes reachable, the unavailable become available, the unattainable... attainable. Have the patience, wait it out it’s all about timing.”  ~ Stacey Charter quotes

A life without love

“No fate is worse than a life without love…” ~ Mexican Proverb

   Love never gives up.
   Love cares more for others than for self.
   Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.
   Love doesn't strut,
   Doesn't have a swelled head,
   Doesn't force itself on others,
   Isn't always "me first,"
   Doesn't fly off the handle,
   Doesn't keep score of the sins of others,
   Doesn't revel when others grovel,
   Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
   Puts up with anything,
   Trusts God always,
   Always looks for the best,
   Never looks back,
   But keeps going to the end…”

Nothing is impossible

“Nothing is impossible to a willing heart…” ~ John Heywood, 16^thCentury English Poet

Jessica Cox is a beautiful young woman who can write, type, drive a car, brush her hair, talk on her phone, has a double black belt in Tai Kwon-Do, is a formal dancer, proud of a Psychology degree… 

The only difference is that Jessica uses her feet because she was born without arms due to a congenital disease.  Her license is unrestricted and she even flies a plane… with her feet. 

Admittedly it took her a little bit longer, three years instead of six month, to acquire the lightweight aircraft licence.  Today she is the first pilot with no arms.

“Challenges are what make life interesting…  Overcoming them is what makes life meaningful…” ~ Joshua J Marine

Live as if you'll die today

“Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today…” ~ James Dean

A palliative nurse who has counseled the dying in their last days has revealed the five most common regrets they had at the end of our lives:

·         I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

·         I wish I hadn't worked so hard.

·         I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.

·         I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

·         I wish that I had let myself be happier.

What is your greatest regret?  Now ask yourself:  "What are you going to do to change this?"

Resource: Internet