Two words to ban for success — I can’t

In the game of base­ball, three strikes, and you’re out. Not so in the game of life. Three strikes and you’re not out. There’s always one more thing you can do to influ­ence any sit­u­a­tion in your favor. All you’ve got to do is think, “What else can I do?” And after that, there’s one more thing you can do! And the more “one more things” you do, the more oppor­tu­ni­ties open up.

–Lt. Gen­eral Hal Moor

You can never give up if you want to be suc­cess­ful. That does not mean that if what you’re doing isn’t work­ing, that you should keep try­ing to beat a dead horse, but you need to change what you are doing. I’m sure Gary Dahl thought about how unprof­itable rock haul­ing was before invent­ing the “pet rock” and mak­ing a for­tune, basi­cally sell­ing the same thing.

I per­son­ally hate the words “I can’t”. My kids get in trou­ble each time they say them. They are ter­mi­na­tion words. The brain ter­mi­nates think­ing of solu­tions, and once you stop think­ing you’re dead like a deer in the headlights.

There are always alternatives.

When I went look­ing for fund­ing, and all the banks said “no”, I looked for other sources, changed the plan, mod­i­fied what I wanted, and kept at it until I found a way. Every time, the bank has said, “this is the last time…”, and each time I go back again. Think­ing up new ways that will ben­e­fit both par­ties, look­ing for the elu­sive “Yes”.

So many peo­ple I know give up on their dreams at the first hint of adver­sity. They are afraid of fail­ure. Fail­ure is part of life, you learn more from fail­ure than suc­cess. For exam­ple, no one is per­fect, my son plays on a very good hockey team which rarely loses. They think they are very good, they slaugh­ter the other teams, but they also begin to believe they don’t make mis­takes. They still do the same thing, game in, game out, because it works…until the day it doesn’t. The teams which lose learn to adapt their game, they change, they develop. My son’s team remains sta­tic, worse they develop an atti­tude which makes change even more dif­fi­cult. When they begin to lose, the prob­lems compound…they try to remain the same, but it doesn’t work, and it’s too late to change…

Life is about change. You don’t have to give up on your dreams, but be flex­i­ble with them. The life I live today is not the life I expected to be liv­ing, but the adven­ture has been along the path I set.

My son may want to be in the NHL some­day. His odds of becom­ing one of the 700+ play­ers are slim, but there are plenty of other jobs in the NHL, train­ers, coaches, staff, etc. His dream may not be exactly what he wants, but it could still become a reality.

What­ever the obsta­cle, there are ways it can be over­come. When you have no money, learn how to make it. When you don’t have the skills,seek out those with them to learn. Never gave into the depres­sion, it’s hard, I know. Forced your will upon the world and made it bend…you may not come out unscathed, but it can bend.

Many give up before they even try. Every­one has phys­i­cal lim­i­ta­tions, men­tal lim­i­ta­tions, finan­cial lim­i­ta­tions, beyond their con­trol. Work within them, your atti­tude and cre­ativ­ity are yours to con­trol. The lim­its imposed by them are your fault, no one else’s.

Those I know who’ve been suc­cess­ful never say “I can’t”. Those who rou­tinely say it, prove them­selves correct.

I chal­lenge you to ban the words “I can’t” from your vocab­u­lary. Make a “swear pot” for the words. Have oth­ers help you by point­ing out when you say it. I bet you’ll be sur­prised how often you use them, and at the same time build up a lot of money for your first investment.

Les­son: Using ter­mi­nal words stops you from find­ing a solu­tion. Don’t allow your­self to stop thinking.

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