It's going to take longer than you think...
Don't beat yourself up because you gave yourself a deadline to achieve a goal and it hasn't happened yet...
Happy New Week Everyone,
People often refer to the new generation as the ‘microwave generation’ because of our fascination with instant gratification. With mobile phones and the internet, you can order something from Amazon and it’ll get to you the same day or by the next day. You can order food and get it delivered to you within 30 minutes or a cab can pick you up from your exact location in 3 minutes.
This week I want to talk about patience. When you start working towards a new goal, you’re not going to see the results straight away. Just like when you plant a seed you’re not going to wake up the next morning and see a tree. Anything of value takes time, whether it’s a matter of developing a skill, building a relationship, or launching a business initiative. Being able to remain patient is a huge part of success. When you look at successful people you don’t see the many years of practice it took for them to eventually become an ‘overnight success’. Growth happens gradually then suddenly.
There are many entrepreneurial stories about patience and ‘slow’ success. My favourite is the story of Mailchimp, an email marketing software company that was founded about 20 years ago. They never raised any capital, they actually started off as a web design agency called the Rocket Science Group. They saw an opportunity to do something amazing with Mailchimp and decided to close the agency in 2007 and focus exclusively on Mailchimp. Fourteen years later they have now been acquired for 12 Billion dollars. 12 billion dollars! Your hard work will always pay off but sometimes not as soon as you want it to.
When you stay in the game long enough, you start to find your rhythm and find growth opportunities. You beat the majority of your competitors simply by outlasting them and not giving up. The longer you stay in the game, the less competition you start to face because not everyone has the patience to see their vision come to pass.
It’s going to take longer than you think and you’re going to have to work extremely hard to achieve your goals. You can’t avoid hard work, hard work is also a vital part of success. No matter how much you try and practice the law of attraction, you still have to do the hard work. You have to put in 10,000 hours of deliberate practice, you have to become a master in your field. As humans, we are wired to find the easiest ways to achieve our goals. We are often looking for shortcuts, ways of outsmarting the hard work required to succeed. Stop trying to avoid the hard work, the hard work is what creates a strong foundation for you to grow to unbelievable heights.
To me, it’s a numbers game. Jim Rohn says “if you do something often enough, a ratio will begin to appear”. When working on your business and you’re constantly hitting roadblocks and hearing ‘no’ you have to keep things moving, you have to keep shooting your shot, speaking to more people, and exploring opportunities to increase your chances and ratio. A mantra I constantly repeat to remain motivated is “you’re always one away, don’t give up,” this means that even though it may not be the next one, it might be the one after. Either way, I’m just one away from that turning point so I have to keep going because I may be closer than I think.
It really is a marathon. You have to run at your own pace. Success requires both urgency and patience. The urgency to get things done but patience to allow results to appear. When you go at your own pace, you give yourself room to grow and make the necessary changes to succeed. Be patient with yourself, don’t be frustrated that you’re not seeing the results you want yet. Be patient with others, focus on building long-term relationships rather than getting something from them straight away. Be patient with the process, celebrate the small wins, focus on what you can control, and let time do the rest.
I leave you with this quote from Steve Jobs, “You can’t connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backward.” You need to have faith that things are working out the way they’re supposed to be.