Success is a beautiful feeling. Nothing comes close to the sense of accomplishment of your goals. It is a statement of your victory, a testament to your efforts and the glory in achieving them. Failure however is not fun, but its not the worst thing in the world!
Many times, particularly when things feel hard, we tend to blame the circumstances or people around us. Although a part of it might be true, we must ask the question so what? And this is the answer you’ll get for the so what question. Most often, the question – why does this happen to me feels us with sympathy, helplessness and blame. None of these help you find the solution. There’s only one person who can help you with this and that’s yourself.
Champions are different. They are different because they do something beyond what others will. It is not just the physical aspect of doing something. What’s more powerful is the internal aspect – the mind which travels well beyond what others do. Everyone goes to the gym – but the champions are those who do this, but also something beyond that takes them to the next level.
If you refused to be afraid: This is such a powerful quote by Mahatma Gandhi. It talks about the power of control we exert on our fears. When we are so scared, it feels like we have no choice and the immediate response is to hide. But the response to fear also is a choice – if we stand tall against this fear, there’s a different response that our minds will create. It will bring up the other aspects of our personality such as resilience, fighting spirit, desire to move beyond fear etc. It doesn’t suggest us to deny fear, but act on it with diligence and from a position of power.
Satisfaction lies in the effort, not in the attainment: Success and failure is all about the results – this is what most of us are taught to believe. I can see the logic in this because success comes with results and accolades that help us recognise a victory. This quote by Mahatma Gandhi talks about the effort involved in achieving success. Some of our successes can sometimes be fluke events. Although they give us the results, the satisfaction derived from them is small and in some cases disappointing. This quote brings the focus back to the effort involved and the satisfaction derived from this effort.