Mikes Blog

Achievement happens
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Every great thing that’s ever been done has been achieved by people who were less than perfect. Everyone has flaws of some sort, and yet people continue to make good things happen all the time in countless ways. 

All the value that’s ever been created has come about in circumstances that were far from ideal. With limited time, with inadequate resources, in the face of complex challenges, achievement happens nonetheless. 

Achievement happens when someone decides to make it happen regardless of what the situation may be. Achievement happens when someone stops criticizing the opportunities and starts acting on them. 

The path to failure is broad and easy while the path to achievement is narrow and much more difficult to follow. Yet achievement happens all the time because people just like you choose to make it happen. 

What would you attempt to achieve if your skills were perfect, if conditions were ideal, if resources were plentiful? Whatever it is, if you wait for all those things to line up perfectly, the opportunity will fade away. 

Achievement happens not because of what you start with, but because of what you’re willing to put into it. Be willing to do what you must with what you have, in the face of imperfection, and achievement will happen for you. 

— Ralph Marston

Take the first action
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When you attempt something ambitious and make a mistake, you can fix that mistake. But if you never make the attempt, you can’t go back and reclaim the wasted opportunity.

Act, create, speak, build, write, sing, dance, explore, even if you do it badly at first. You’ll get better and better as you go along.

Be willing to be a fool and you’ll be able to be a genius. The greatest achievements are those that have never been done before.

What have you never done before? What purpose have you avoided fulfilling because you didn’t know how or where to start?

The place to start is precisely where you are. The way to start is to do whatever you’re able to do, without any further delay.

Write the first draft, and then you’ll have something to edit. Take the first action, and suddenly you’ll be on the path to achievement.

— Ralph Marston

To Live life fully take big bites. Moderation is for monks

You cannot have life without some adversity. What you can have is strength in the face of adversity, and that’s a much better bargain. 

You cannot make progress without encountering challenges. What you can have, though, are the courage, determination, and persistence to push through those challenges. 

Do not wish for life to be easy, because that is a wish for life to be empty. Seek instead the strength and fortitude to live a life filled with meaning and substance. 

Awaken again each day to the wondrous reality of your problems, your possibilities, your limitations, courage, gratitude, disappointment, generosity, and love. Life is a rich bundle of powerful forces and varied directions, with so many great options for living it well. 

Find solid confidence in knowing that whatever you encounter, you can encounter with grace, with integrity, with a commitment to add more goodness to life. Though you cannot choose the strength or direction of the wind, you can decide precisely where it propels you. 

Welcome that wind as it teases, as it shifts, as it howls, and revel in the awesome energy that is life. You have much good to do, and here is your day, your opportunity, to do it. 

— Ralph Marston

Aim far and focus near
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When the details of the moment confound and frustrate you, draw inspiration from the goal, the purpose, the vision you seek to fulfill. When that vision seems hopelessly far away, find solace in your ability to take small yet meaningful steps toward it from right where you are. 

Set your aim high, and set your focus on the moment. Keep yourself aligned with your most treasured dreams, and keep yourself busy with the practical, useful, effective efforts that will bring those dreams to fruition. 

Keep your aim far ahead and keep your focus upon all you can do right now. Let your work benefit from and be inspired by your purpose, and enable your purpose to be fulfilled by your work. 

The big picture will motivate you to keep going. The small details will create the pathway for you to get there. 

Many people dream but never fulfill those dreams, and too many others stay busy but never really are headed anywhere. By aiming far and focusing near, you can be both a dreamer and a doer, someone who follows a dream and actually reaches it.

Give purpose to your actions and actions to your purpose. Aim far, focus near, and work your way to exactly where you want to be.

— Ralph Marston