When you are knocked down or feeling down is the best time to STEP UP and keep going for your success. One of the most dramatically differentiating factors that sets successful people apart from the failures and the also rans is their willingness to get back up one more time than they get knocked down.
Often, when we look at people at the top of their game, we see only that…them at the top of their game. We don’t get to see the years of deep practice prior to their breakthroughs. We can easily slip into the assumption that they are gifted or lucky and simply destined to a league of their own. The truth is they overcame more adversity, set backs, embarrassment, ridicule, and failure than the rest were willing to endure. It’s not any easier for them. Were they lucky? Well yes…if you agree that luck is preparation and opportunity coming together. They prepared and lasted long enough to be available to opportunities that came about.
Working with and studying many successful people I find there seems to be a formula they follow. Here is the formula for how they STEP UP from setback to success
S – See themselves already having achieved their goal with the realization that the temporary current setback is just that…temporary and a necessary part of the path or bridge to where they are heading.
T – Test their limits. They feel the fear just like anybody else might and they do what must be done anyway to make progress. Those that excel don’t wait for fear to subside. They forge through the fear with a trusting that the ultimate reward awaits their greeting on the other side. They know everything great they want is on the other side of the fear.
They see fear as the gateway to their greatness.
E – Emulate. Just about every person that has achieved something great has had a role model or two. Until they find their way to the balance of ongoing success, they often checked in with themselves and imagined as to how their role model or hero may address a new or challenging situation in which they find themselves along the way to their own greatness. Most pro athletes will tell you, while in little league they imagined themselves to be a big leaguer of their generation. They borrowed and duplicated the brilliance that went before them. That mimicking released and honed their own greatness. It’s no different in business or raising a family. We can borrow the brilliance of others by taking on the traits and characteristics of those we imagine are succeeding at what we want to achieve.
They borrow the brilliance of others and make it theirs.
P – Push through the resistance. In sales it is a common understanding that to be successful in sales one must be willing to overcome a “no” or an objection seven times, on average, before getting a “yes.” There is more energy expended in the last 10 yards (the red zone) of the football field trying to score a touchdown than the entire length of the rest of the field. More concentrated energy and effort is focused during the last few hours of labor than anytime during the entire pregnancy. In order to get what we want we must push through the resistance to bring about what we desire.
“Failure is not falling down, but refusing to get up.” ~Chinese Proverb
U – Unhook from the negative. There will be those people that project their limitations onto those that are looking to accomplish the impossible. We are lucky that people like the Wright brothers, Thomas Edison, Roger Bannister, Henry Ford, and Steve Jobs didn’t tolerate the naysayers. They stuck to asking the empowering questions, “How can we do?” rather than, “Why can’t we do?” They embraced those that were around to help and dismissed those that doubted. Who is going be benefit from you unhooking from the negative?
P – Party. Those that succeed find their way to celebrating and acknowledging their wins and accomplishments. They don’t rest on their laurels however. As they achieve the mountain top they breath in the sweet air of victory and as they do they set their sights on the higher mountains they can now see in their future.
This week start to make the STEP UP your new practice with everything you do and you will construct the success habits and patterns of those that continually reach the top. It won’t be easy. However, the more you STEP UP the more you increase your capacity to endure all that which doesn’t feel like success. As you increase that capacity you will thereby create a greater container within yourself to experience the joy of the greater success you crave and will achieve.
Make it up, make it fun, and get it done!