Success is a Decision

Success is a decision. It’s not an accident or a coincidence. At least the true and meaningful kind isn’t. Success doesn’t come to those who just sit around and wait for life to happen and opportunity to fall into their lap. Life doesn’t work that way. Sure you might get lucky from time to time, but luck isn’t going to allow you to achieve sustainable success or your full potential. Only planning and hard work will.

Of course, even with all the planning in the world, there are no guarantees on the path to success.  It’s a journey that’s filled with doubt and uncertainty as well as struggle and disappointment, but if you let it, it can also be quite rewarding and fulfilling. The problem is many people get so focused on the former, they never get to experience the latter. Part of the solution to this problem is recognizing:

1. Doubt and uncertainty are inextricably linked with the journey to success.
2. By and large the journey you take in life is one of your own choosing.

Doubt and uncertainty will never completely go away. You can let them lead you down the path towards indecision and away from success, or you can recognize that indecision is, in and of itself, a decision and that important decisions have to be made in the face of doubt, not the absence of it. If you wait until you don’t have any doubt, you’ll never get started. It is for this reason, achieving success takes courage. As Mark Twain said, “Courage is not the lack of fear. It is acting in spite of it.”

It’s also been said, “A journey of 1,000 miles begins with a single step.” The question then is, do you have the courage to take that first step? The decision is yours.