Far more important than figuring out how to achieve something, is figuring out how to think about it in a way that empowers you.

There are many things that can seemingly be accomplished with enough sacrifice and hard work. But when you achieve something through sacrifice, you’re merely trading one resource for another. It’s about as much of an accomplish as buying a loaf a bread.

On the other hand, when you achieve an empowering new perspective, you multiply the value of everything around you. Each thought carries you closer and closer to previously imperceptible solutions. It’s like inventing sliced bread and instantly seeing a few applications for it, which soon lead dozens—and then hundreds—more as your singular idea gives birth to a myriad of million dollar industries.

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(This is post #4 in the Finding Success Where Once You Knew Only Failure series.)

When you ask someone for something you take the ball out of your hands. You give them the power to decide yes or no. And it can feel like you’re giving your power away. But is that really such a bad thing?

Is the mark of a strong individual to never ask for anything? Or is that the mark of someone so insecure in their power that they’re afraid to exercise it out of fear that may not come back?

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(This is post #3 in the Finding Success Where Once You Knew Only Failure series.)

The problem with appreciation is that you can’t really appreciate appreciation without appreciating first. And when I think of appreciation like that, it comes off sounding like a pyramid scheme. If appreciation doesn’t work unless I buy into it, then why not just skip the middle man and buy into what I really want?

Oh the vexing logic of over-thinking everything.

The Plain and Simple Truth About Appreciation

Appreciation is simply a choice to focus on what you want instead of what you don’t want.

For example, it’s a lot easier to head north by simply walking north, rather than trying to NOT walk east, south and west. Read More

(This is post #2 in the Finding Success Where Once You Knew Only Failure series.)

Remember Peter Petrelli from the TV show Heroes? A character with seemingly no superpowers of his own, until he discovers that his power is to absorb the superpowers of others?

In the beginning of the show he is completely useless without another superhero around. But, by the final season, he can fly, see the future, control the space/time continuum, read minds, instantly regenerate, go invisible, phase through objects, talk to electronic machines, control radiation, melt objects, astral project, create/control electricity, and use telekinesis—completely independent of other superheroes! All with the help of a single mentor who showed him how to find the strengths he saw in others within himself.

The bad news is that you probably don’t know too many people with the skills listed above. The good news is that you don’t need to hang around superheroes to adopt the strengths that will supercharge your results.

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