War fatigue. Charity fatigue. Famine fatigue. Compassion fatigue. Just like every other fatigue that is out there we can suffer from rioting fatigue. The images have been spread far and wide, I am currently in Australia where the rioting has been branded ‘civil unrest’. I have contacts in America who thought I was back in London and emailed to see if I was okay. We have had open letters to David Cameron’s parents. We have had the comedy of rioters vs photoshop. We have had the the angel volunteers via riotcleanup. We have had those who are raising money for those who want to raise money for something nice for Ashraf and those who want to Keep Aaron Cutting. So many people, have said so much that it is easy just to start to switch off but, seriously, what the hell is going on?
Like many I have heard the racist arguments referring to rioters as “ethnic dole-ite scum” (when a millionaire’s daughter and a school mentor got arrested for looting). I have equally read Nina Power’s Guardian article entitled, ‘There is a context to London’s riots that can’t be ignored‘. So much has been said and, in all honesty, there is an element of truth in most of it as people speak from their own perspective.
We can hunt these kids down and we can lock them up but, in my opinion, this will cause a greater number of young people to rise up en-mass with an even bigger revolt. Maybe not this week, or next week, but at some point. I have heard many comments referring to consumerism and greed and how are young people want what they can’t have or can’t afford as a symbol of status and so they take it. Perhaps it is even the taking of the object that adds to the status. Nevertheless, in my opinion there is this deep, deep feeling of dissatisfaction, of emptiness, a lack of vision, a lack of understanding of worth and potential.
It took a very personal, powerful event in my life for me to realise that we ‘live life, once’. I truly believe that if we can grasp the reality of the concept that we live this life only once then we will realise that our potential knows no bounds. This potential is not based upon what we have or have not got. Our potential is not based upon where we were educated, our upbringing or the mistakes that our parents or even government may have made. But when we grasp the reality of the fact that we are on planet earth, merely once – dreams are within our reach, ambition is endless and our potential is unlimited.
Imagine a country in which the very same young people who put effort, energy, attention, drive and focus into rioting and looting placed the same amount of energy and dedication into the discovery of their potential. We would see new businesses, new opportunities, new employment, new world records, new sports champions, new olympic hopefuls and on and on.
Of course these are my thoughts, based upon my belief of what could truly happen if understood that we are not futile but grasp the power of our potential with both hands and not stop. I don’t know how we get there, I don’t know how we educate, how re-educate, from the ground up. These things I don’t know.
The one thing that I do know is that humanity has been created with awesome potential and if we could just tap into that, in these young people then something damn well powerful could take place.
The potential of human beings is incredible, it is far bigger and far greater than we can ever fathom or comprehend. The potential that we possess is literally incredible.
The sad, real truth, is that many of us fail to ever reach the heights which we are capable of rising too. We look up to our hero’s – those of days gone by and those of today – we are inspired but we feel that we could never achieve anything great in the same way that they have. We remain in a negative state of mind for many reasons, I am not a psychologist and I am sure that there are hundreds of reasons that we could compile. However I want to focus on 4 reasons that I have been thinking about: 1) We fail to see our potential 2) We don’t think big enough 3) Our problems weigh us down. 4) We are afraid to fail.
1) We fail to see the latent potential which exists deep within.
I firmly believe that when we watch or listen to individual with whom we admire, something within our spirits and their spirits connect and we become inspired. I watch Oprah and she inspires me – something about her makes me go ‘hell yeah, I want to live my best life’. I watch Simon Cowell and study the way that he has built his business and I think, ‘Damn, this dude nearly went bankrupt, look how he re-built’. Quite simply, we like who we like because there is something about them that we admire, there is something in them that we know that we too could be. However, when it comes to the crunch, our low self-esteem jumps on us, attacks us like a wolf in the night and tells us that we only want to be like the people we admire for the fame, the glory, the money and the power. We tell ourselves that if we were to ever dare to become what we believe that we can be – we back off, we back right down and we focus out attention onto something else – the kids, the husbands, the chores, the office work – or anything else, anything other than staring what we could actually become right in the eye and going for it. Many of us will never achieve the life changing things that we were supposed to achieve because we fail to see our potential.
2) We don’t think big enough.
We have the most incredible minds. If we truly delve into our minds and dare to dream, there is stuff lurking about that you never thought was there. Of course there is. Some individual, one day, years back had an idea for an airplane – that something that was made out of man made, heavy stuff, could soar off into the skies. Now heaps of people told this inventor dude that it was a rubbish idea, that it was not possible, but he knew it was, he could see it in his minds eye.
Everything that you see around you, at first, only existed in someone’s mind and it is through their vision that they bought it into physical being – the telephone, boats, mobile ‘phones, ipad, trainers, microsoft, mcdonalds, literally everything. These objects, items, businesses and brands only exist right now because someone believed that they could be.
When an idea takes hold and become popular, copycats creep up. When Alex Tew launched the milliondollarhomepage there was a wave of pixel related projects – not one of them did as well as Alex. As Groupon has got more and more popular there is a mass of groupon-esque businesses that are trying to do the same, only different. We have acquired a mindset that encourages us to be content on being the second best rather than the world changing market leader. If we dare to dream big, we could and would create new enterprises and launch bold and daring businesses, projects and lifestyles.
3) Our problems weigh us down.
Problems can weigh us down or springboard us into an incredible future. We can choose to focus on the fact that we have no money, no time, problems in the family, problems with the job etc etc etc yada yada yada. The result is that our problems weigh us down, crush our dreams and stop us from being everything that we were created to be. Damn, I have had some tough times in my life. In 2005 at the age of 24, my marriage was over. I entered into a serious state of depression and felt like a serious failure until I changed my mindset and began to realise that I had been on planet earth for 24 years but I had merely existed, I had never truly lived. This mindset gave me a springboard to get creative and seek to achieve my potential – as a result Tribewanted was born, hit the media around the world and as a result of an idea in my mind, bought into reality, marriages took place and babies were born.
Do a 360 with your mindset, turn it around, see your problems as one big trampoline and allow them to launch you into the most incredible future that was always meant to be for you.
4) We are afraid to fail.
I have family. I have responsibility. I have bills to pay. I have no time. I have all these reasons as to why I cannot dare to dream and seek to have the lifestyle I know deep down, inside me, the thought of which keeps me alive. You know what, sod it. Leave your fear of failure to one side and dare to dream.
I have had many failures in my life, ideas, relationships, near bankruptcy, I have endured a miscarriage, for years I was scared of the person who I actually knew I was and, during these periods I merely existed. My character, my attitude, my personality was not a true reflection of me because I was simply afraid to fail.
The thing that keeps me alive, that keeps my heart beating is possibility, the possibility of what could be. There are heaps of people out there who are not on track to do the great things that they were destined to do and it drives me insane (I am not preaching, don’t get me wrong, I am still in this place myself). But, if we took a risk, if we went for it then I KNOW that many of us would change the world in ways that we could never even imagine, but always, deep down, knew that we should.
This is a slightly passionate blog post, because I am in that mood tonight. I hope that it inspires, whoever may read it, in some way.
I just want to encourage you to think big – whatever your dreams are, you can achieve. Whatever your problems are that are getting you down are actually significant. The life that you, and you alone possess is the most incredible opportunity for you to do something great. Remember, we live life, once.
Think Big
Walter D. Wintle (Adapted)
If you think you are beaten, you are.
If you think you dare not, you won’t.
If you like to win, but don’t think you can,
It’s almost a cinch that you won’t.
If you think you’ll lose, you’ve lost,
For out in the world you’ll find
Success begins with a person’s will;
It’s all in the state of mind.
For many a game is lost
Before even a step is run
And many a coward fails
Before his work is begun.
Think big and your deed will grow;
Think small and you will fall behind.
Think that you can and you will;
It’s all in the state of mind.
If you think that you are out-classed, you are;
You’ve got to think high to rise.
You’ve got to be sure of yourself
Before you can win the prize.
Life’s battles don’t always go
To the strongest or fastest man
But sooner or later the person who wins
Is the person who thinks she can.
Apparently I have inspired someone. I received a ‘tweet’ telling me so. Little did I realise that this tweet would result in me spending a heap of time on this individuals blog, and, being incredibly inspired myself.
I like being inspired. People who inspire me include Richard Branson, Maya Angelou, Duncan Bannatyne and all the other successes you would expect to see on a list of books read by any entrepreneur. However, I also love learning from people who have not quite made it yet, but probably will.
Scott S Barlow is one such person, he is the dude that messaged me. Scott’s ‘thing’ right now is that ‘failure is not fatal’ and he is right. Yeah he took the quote from someone or others book (well actually Rachel Elnaugh’s) but he is still right. Scott has explained to me that he has had a list of failed businesses but, he still has ambition and a dream that he is chasing. Respect!
Scott’s blog is flippin’ awesome, it is packed full of inspirational comments, inspirational video’s and inspirational stories of people who failed at many things but, ultimately became a success. The example I really love is of Walt Disney who was told by a teacher that he was not creative and lacked imagination! Awesome!
Some people love to sit on the sidelines, watch on, and throw in a comment every now and then aimed at bringing you down. Reality is that such people are not going anywhere in life, and fast. However, there are people like Scott who completely and utterly understand, they are in the ring with you, fighting, drawing air, packing a punch and refusing to go down until they have achieved what it is that they believe that they are on planet Earth to achieve. Scott is one of these people.
I like Scott. I think you will like Scott too. If Scott inspires you tweet him and tell him.
Awesome waking up at 5am this morning, albeit with jetlag, and seeing this video. If you need a dose of inspiration, check this out!
How many times did it take Edison to make the light bulb? I don’t think even he could answer that.
How many attempts have there been to find a cure for cancer? Hundreds.
How many businesses start as one business proposition but end up as something completely different? Many. One recent case in point is Groupon, which started off as business, which was not working and turning into the highly successful Groupon.
One of the most commonplace attitudes in the UK is that of how ‘failure’ is somehow negative, that because an individual has got off their ass, has chased a dream, a vision or a business idea and it did not work out results in that individual becoming less of a person.
The population of the UK loves programmes like ‘The Apprentice’, ‘Dragon’s Den’ and ‘The X Factor’. We love our heroes, the one’s who make it and, even more so, we celebrate the one’s who ‘fail’. There is no celebration of the fact that they have actually attempted to chase their dream, no, they simply ‘fail’!
Perhaps, deep down our failure parties are more reflective of a common conscience, one that hates to see the success of other people, because we so desire to be out of our own personal financial situations and ‘living the dream’, but we haven’t got the balls to do it. So, we scoff at those who try to elevate themselves and ultimately fall. These are the ones who thought they would be clever, who thought that they were better than ‘us’, but they came to a realisation that they failed and fell back down to Earth with a massive and painful bang. For that reason we place them lower than ‘us’.
We are proud of the Lord Sugar’s, the Branson’s, the Peter Jones’ and the Duncan Bannatyne’s and yet we fail to realise that in many of these cases it is their failure that helped them to refine their process and ultimately become a success. Indeed, the Branson’s of tomorrow will not appear one day with an overnight, triumphant success, it does not happen. The Branson’s of tomorrow will have a list of failures to their name and it is their perceived failures which will help them to refine their success.
Personally, I have had one relative success which gained a bit of attention and a handful of awards, in the grand scheme of things it is not much, but it is a start. I have had many more ‘failures’ and, undoubtedly, there will be more to come. Now, I am not saying that I will ever become a Branson. But, what I know for sure is that I will never look back on my life and wonder ‘what if?’
The greatest tragedy is this. We may find a cure for cancer quicker, we may discover life changing inventions faster, we may grow bigger companies which will be able to bring increased employment opportunities that will get this Country out of a difficult financial period, if only some would not be so afraid of failing and would simply give their dream a shot. It is this fear of failure which is, indeed, the biggest failure of all.
It may not be your first idea that is successful, it doesn’t matter. Your first, second or third dream may fail. However, what I have learnt is that true success takes ‘blood, sweat and years’ and it is a consistency in these three areas that will turn your failures into successes changing your life and the lives of many more.