Tag: achievement

Little drops of water make a mighty ocean

Today the suwater dropn is shining, yet when I look more closely I can see fine rain.  As with much of life, when you look closely things are not quite as they initially appear….

A few months back someone contacted me concerning a reference I’d made in my newsletter to Edison and the light bulb.  It turns out when you look more closely at this, it too isn’t quite as it seems.  Several people contributed to the process.  An English physician called Sir Humphrey Davy successfully passed an electric current through platinum strips in 1801 but the light lasted only a few minutes. In 1809 Davy created the Arc lamp. In 1840 Warren de la Rue, a British scientist, placed a platinum coil in a vacuum tube and created light that lasted longer. In 1841 Frederick de Moleyns of England was given the first patent for an incandescent lamp, yet it is Joseph Wilson Swan who patented his light bulb in 1878 and Thomas Edison who are generally credited with the invention.  

The reason I mention this is that, like the many drops of water, it often takes a series of events for something really great to happen.  Even though those at the end of the process may get the credit, those earlier steps are often very important. 

So it is with each of us.  Although we may not all be inventors, every day we are involved in a range of activities with a host of different people and every day we have an impact in some way on someone or something.  We can never know exactly what will happen as a result, but each of our actions, thoughts and deeds will make some kind of difference in the world.  Even if we decide to lie in bed all day and do nothing, our absence will have an effect.

Quite a few people I meet at the moment are considering making changes in life such as stopping smoking, losing weight, getting fit, changing jobs.  In each case we might want to wake up and find that a magic wand has just made it happen, but the reality is that it is small steps along the way that will lead to great change.  A healthier lifestyle unfolds one day at a time, a new job is found through a series of actions. 

Sometimes it helps to think ‘just for today I will ……..‘ Then tomorrow you can do it again ‘just for today’.  If you have a bad day and things don’t go so well, that too was ‘just for today’ and tomorrow you can get right back on track. 

We have electric light today because a group of people tried and persevered despite some failures or partial successes.  You too can achieve your goals, you just need to do it one step at a time.

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As always, if you would like help in achieving your own goals, just give me a call, I’d be happy to help.

Is there something you want to excel at?

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit” Aristotle

Of course we all have a range of habits, good and bad.  Some that serve us really well and some that hinder us in some way.  All are formed by repetition.  We brush our teeth each morning, reminded as children by our parents and eventually it becomes a habit.  We don’t even think about it.  We drive the same route to work, hardly noticing the journey unless something new or unusual happens, again repetition has made it habit.

So what has that got to do with excellence?  My interpretation of this is that when striving for excellence we need to keep doing the best we can, over and over.  To give our best one day and give up the next will be unlikely to produce great results.  There is plenty of evidence of this – take musicians or athletes for example, even with great talent, there is always practice.  The orchestra is made up of musicians who each practice daily, over and over again.  The Olympics was full of athletes that practiced daily for years to be able to take part.

Some people believe we are just born with talents, perhaps this is true for some individuals.  However, with or without talent, excellence comes with practice and repetition.  The good news, for those of us not born with some kind of special gift, is that it is still possible to be excellent at something, just by repeated practice.   So what is it you would like to be excellent at?  What would you love to do?

It is said that it takes at least 21 days to make a new habit and that assumes you are doing whatever it is, every day during that period.  So have a go and stick with it.  Keep practicing.  Take the additional step of visualising yourself doing it really well and succeeding (the same way many athletes picture themselves winning).  If “We are what we repeatedly do” then who do you want to become?

Remember, this can be about anything and any aspect of life, even character traits.  For example, if you want to become confident, you could practice doing things with confidence, talking and moving like a confident person; if you want to be more generous you could practice generosity and look for opportunities to give in some way each day.  I’m sure you get the idea.

If you have something you want to achieve, be or do and are finding yourself stuck in any way, please give me a call on 07962 896422 and together we will make it happen.