In everyone's life, there are crucial points of decision. For me, this especially has happened when I was stuck in repeatedly making mistakes. At that point I had the option of acknowledging these mistakes and changing or surrendering to the mistakes and giving up.
To illustrate this point, I was just reading an excerpt from a spiritual book that was discussing the denying of Jesus by Peter. For some reason one of the things that I thought of immediately was Judas Iscariot. Interestingly, both of them denied Jesus to a huge degree. Peter denied Jesus to the point of cursing people who accused them of knowing each other. Judas betrayed Jesus and handed him over to his death. Ultimately at the time of Jesus's death, both Judas and Peter had deserted Jesus. Jesus was dead thanks in part to both of them. They had hit a point of decision. Peter and Judas had the decision. Do they own up to their mistakes and turn to Jesus or give up? If you know the story, they made completely different decisions.
Saturday, August 24, 2013
Friday, August 23, 2013
Why Succeeding in Anything is Hard
I was reflecting yesterday about the process of succeeding in developing a new skill or habit. This can be in developing the ability to connect with new people, master a move in a sport, learn a new subject in school, or something else. Immediately, I was reminded of a talk I heard in January from author and successful businessman Chris Brady called "LifeSaver" and the subsequent CD recording. He clearly articulated this process in a way I want to relate now. He taught the reason why succeeding in anything is hard via the 3 phases in developing mastery in a new endeavor.
I'll start with a question. Have you ever seen someone demonstrate great skill in a field? For example, a profession sports athlete, an accomplished musician, a great dancer, a brilliant mind in an academic setting, person share a message of spiritual significance, etc. Have you ever thought, "I bet I can do that!" or, "That looks like so much fun!" without having any real experience in that field? Or maybe, we are exposed to a great teacher and they make us feel like anything is possible and help us develop some initial abilities. At that point we decide at age 10, "I want to be a theoretical physicist or a doctor or the president of the United States or something else."In this period, we assume that we have what it takes and will probably be easy to accomplish the thing that we see. This is called the Ignorance Phase.
After we are in that phase,
I'll start with a question. Have you ever seen someone demonstrate great skill in a field? For example, a profession sports athlete, an accomplished musician, a great dancer, a brilliant mind in an academic setting, person share a message of spiritual significance, etc. Have you ever thought, "I bet I can do that!" or, "That looks like so much fun!" without having any real experience in that field? Or maybe, we are exposed to a great teacher and they make us feel like anything is possible and help us develop some initial abilities. At that point we decide at age 10, "I want to be a theoretical physicist or a doctor or the president of the United States or something else."In this period, we assume that we have what it takes and will probably be easy to accomplish the thing that we see. This is called the Ignorance Phase.
After we are in that phase,
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