When I was younger, my brother and I used to shoot hoops for hours in the driveway. He’d always say “GOTTA END ON A MAKE!” before we would go inside. We’d take however many shots it took until we both made one final shot, and then we’d call it a day.
Little did I know just how much of a massive lesson this would teach me about life.
We didn’t know how long it was going to take us to make our shot. That simply didn’t matter. Success to us, was a decision to take however many shots we needed to in order to make our final shot.
You see, nobody knows how long it’s going to take to achieve anything. Success and time have no direct correlation. Success is simply a mental choice, a commitment if you will, regardless of the duration of time and regardless of the failures. You either want it or you don’t.
You can’t make a shot that you don’t take, so in order to be on a path that even lends you the opportunity to succeed, you have to at least take a shot.
How many people do you know, who are selling themselves short because they won't go after something simply because of a fear of failure? Maybe that’s you, who knows.
Well, to clear something up, failure is not losing.
Failure is the fork in the road that presents a gut-check moment for you:
Keep Going - this is worth it
Quit - this isn’t worth it
Failure does not mean that you’ve lost. Failure is simply a sign that you’re still playing in the game…a game to see how badly you want your goal.
To bring this full circle, I mentioned that success is a mental commitment. If you want something and can make a commitment to yourself to chase that goal, regardless of what happens until you succeed...you’ll eventually make your shot.
Simply put…you can’t succeed at something if you allow the possibility of failure to prevent you from ever taking a shot.
End on a make.