What Stands in Your Way?

What stands in your way of achieving success? Is it immovable objects or roadblocks needing a new solution? Are you done or just beginning? How do you define success? Does success feel out of reach? These are tough questions. I have asked myself these questions many times and in challenging times looked to others for their advice.

When searching for these answers I have found it helpful to look at other models of success and see what advice they can offer. In this case I suggest looking at the accomplishments and career of the professional athlete Michael Jordan.

I had the opportunity to meet Michael Jordan several times as he was in the middle of his career as an NBA basketball athlete and found him to have an interesting perspective on what it took to achieve his success. He was relentless in pursuing his goals, but not every effort was a success.

Undoubtedly, Michael Jordan as a professional athlete specializing in basketball was a success. Take look at some of his accomplishments:

• 6 x NBA Champion
• 6 x NBA Finals MVP
• 5 x NBA MVP
• 2 x Olympic Gold Medalist
• Career Points Scored: 32,292
• Career Rebounds: 6,672
• Career Assists: 5,633
• Career Field Goal % .497
• Career Field Goals = 12,192

(For those of you who are not sports minded, just take away that these are incredible accomplishments)

As I observed his career I kept track of some of his thoughts and ideas on achieving success and in them found a hint of the drive that made him successful. Let’s take a look at some of these together.

“If you’re trying to achieve, there will be roadblocks. I’ve had them; everybody has them. But obstacles don’t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don’t turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.”

–Michael Jordan

This is pretty much on point to the topic we are exploring. From the perspective of being a professional athlete, there was always the challenge of training his mind and body to work together to assert skills beyond the abilities of his competitors.

For us the challenge may be more around acquiring the skills, knowledge and experience to accomplish our wildest dreams, or even just finding a way through the current crisis. The key point here is to recognize that we all have challenges; the road to success requires that we persevere and keep trying new and different ways of overcoming the obstacles.

“I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can’t accept not trying.”

–Michael Jordan

For Michael Jordan, his failure was played out in public in the period he retired as a basketball player and attempted a career in baseball. After several seasons of trying, he was only an average player on a minor league team. However, anyone that was around him at the time knows that he put in more time and effort than anyone else on the team and certainly gave it his best effort. He tried.

Even with the incredible career and statistics that he accumulated in his basketball career, he did not score every time he had the ball. In fact, he missed slightly more baskets than he made. Over his career he missed 12,339 field goals and 1,445 free throws.

We should take away from his experience that even though we are trying and putting forth our best effort, it may not work, this time. Sometimes our efforts will fail. They will. The key is to figure out what happened and move forward and keep trying.

“I’ve always believed that if you put in the work, the results will come.”

–Michael Jordan

Without a doubt Michael had extraordinary talent as a basketball player. However, that talent did not automatically lead to success. Michael was known to have an incredible work ethic, practicing when practice was over and always driving his teammates to achieve their personal best.

It’s the same for us. There is no escaping the need to put in the work if we expect to see the results. The good news is that putting in the work is the key to achieving the results. There are the times when it seems that nothing we are doing is making a difference. Those are the times when we have to just believe that doing the work will bring the results. There is no substitute for perseverance.

“You have to expect things of yourself before you can do them.”

–Michael Jordan

Michael always expected great results from his efforts. He believed he could fly and he did, often gliding right past his defender on the way to the basket. He believed that his team could win a championship, and another and another… and they did. He believed that if he did the work, he would be better tomorrow than he was today, and he was.

The message is clear for us as well. The results come as a product of doing the work and a belief in ourselves. The only race we are running is against our personal best. Nobody else can run that race for us and only we can set those goals. It is not easy and we will experience failure. The challenge is; are we willing to achieve success? Real success will not be given to us; it must be earned, just like six NBA championships.

So now, what stands in your way?

Thanks,

Skip Gilbert