Someone this week told me she knows she's not living up to her potential.

 

After going deeper into it she shared "I'm scared, of messing up.  Like in baseball...I don't want to swing and miss. That terrifies me."

 

She couldn't have thrown me a better analogy because it reminded me of something I’ve heard about baseball.

 

An excellent batting average is around .333.

 

In simple terms, that’s about three hits for every ten times at bat.

 

Think about that.

Three out of ten.

 

That means about seven times out of ten, the batter misses.

 

And nobody looks at that player and says, “You just don’t have it.”

 

We call 3 out of 10 hits excellent.

 

Why failure or missing is part of success:

 

You see my client isn't strange; she's like most of us who are afraid to mess up or fail.

 

Maybe that’s because we have never learned or have forgotten something important:

 

Failure isn’t the opposite of success. Failure is a part of the process that creates success.

 

The problem is that many of us don’t see it that way.

 

We try something and it doesn't work and immediately, we make the failure mean something about us.

 

Maybe I’m not good enough, or have what it takes.

Maybe I should quit.

 

But what if the failure isn’t telling you to quit?

 

What if it’s simply telling you that you haven’t gotten there?

 

I’ve learned and taught not to become too attached to either success or failure.

 

As long as we are continuing to take healthy steps, learn, adjust, and try again, something is happening.

 

Sometimes we just can’t see it yet.

 

What's happening under the surface that we can’t see:

 

Think about Chinese bamboo.

 

You’ve probably heard the story.

 

You plant the seed and water it.

 

The first year, nothing seems to happen.

So, you keep watering.

 

The second year, still nothing.

You keep watering.

 

The third year.

The fourth year.

Still nothing that you can see.

 

And then eventually, the bamboo begins to shoot upward to 80 feet in a 6-week period.

 

All those years where it looked like nothing was happening an extensive root system was preparing the growth that would eventually come around.

 

There are things in life where growth is happening underneath the surface.

 

You may be developing discipline, confidence, patience, or habits that you need, and becoming the person who is capable of handling the result you’re asking for.

 

An example of this are clients who are trying to lose weight.

 

Sometimes they don’t see dramatic changes immediately. They seem to be striking out.

 

But what's really happening is that they’re learning how to nourish their bodies, rest, hydrate, exercise, change their thoughts, and develop habits.

 

And those habits take time to cultivate but eventually become far more valuable than simply losing weight.

 

Because when the weight loss comes, they now have the person and the habits necessary to maintain it and therefore they win the game in the end.

 

But there’s something else that’s important.

Knowing your why:

 

You have to know why you’re doing what you’re doing in order to keep swinging at your goal.

 

You have to know that what you’re working toward is aligned with your heart.

 

Because if you’re only doing something for a shallow reason you’ll get a weak result, and the process can become miserable. (and you’ll eventually give up)

 

But when you love what you’re doing and understand why you’re doing it, something changes.

 

The result becomes the cherry on top of the sundae.

 

Taking steps in my divorce and finding meaning:

 

I’ve experienced this in my own life.

 

After my divorce, some people looked at me with pity.

 

They saw loss.

And I understand why.

 

But I’ve been fortunate to have good teachers who taught me to use my experiences for my greatest good and to know my why.

 

I found my why and therefore I don’t see my divorce as a failure.

 

I see it as something I went through that gave me good times, painful lessons, and taught me things about myself and relationships that I couldn’t have learned any other way.

 

And I took those lessons and pointed myself in a more aligned direction to continue to swing and water actions to heal.

 

Did it happen overnight?

No.

 

But I kept taking healthy steps and didn't demand that a particular result happen by a particular date.

 

The Bible says:

“Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”

Notice what it doesn’t say.

It doesn’t say sometimes, or if you’re lucky, or if everything goes perfectly.

It promises us that if we keep going that our success is ensured.

So if you’re in the middle of something right now and you’re wondering whether you should quit, I want to encourage you:

Don’t give up. Keep swinging.Keep watering and the results will come.

And when they do, you’ll realize that the person you became along the way was just as important as what you were trying to accomplish.

Happy swinging.

Much love,

Bert

P.s. If you have a goal or circumstance that you would like to get more clarity, and success around. I have now created a two session opportunity to work with me.

You will leave the session clearer, and with a plan of wise advice and steps you can take.

Just hit the book a free call button at the top right here at bertastacio.com to discuss