Author: Rob

What is the value of experience? Experience can be a double edged sword. When we don’t have any experience, we may think it prudent to wait until we have experience to pursue what we most desire. On the other hand, if we already have experience, we may think that we already “know it all” and feel there is no need to continue to learn and take risks to achieve personal and professional excellence. Either of these ways of thinking can be dangerous to our well being.

The amount of experience we have or don’t have isn’t nearly as important as our ability to take action. We will fail from time to time, but the more we try and fail, the more successful we will become. Many of us know the story of Thomas Edison and all of us benefit from his inventions. After more than 2,000 attempts at making a light bulb, he finally succeeded. A reporter asked him, “How does it feel to have failed over 2,000 times?” Edison replied that he had simply learned 2,000 ways how Not to make a light bulb. Experience is important but not nearly as important as what we learn from our mistakes that we often make in gaining experience.

Think for a moment of the first time that we are attracted to someone who rocks our world and makes our knees weak. The question arises, “How can I approach the person to find out if they will go out with me?” We tell our friends of our new found love and they tell us, “Go ahead, what are you waiting for?” In some cases, despite the suggestions and ribbing we get from our friends, we do nothing. We think of the possible rejection and “chicken out.” In other cases we take action and put our best foot forward. Sometimes we are successful and sometimes we crash and burn. Nevertheless, by taking chances and taking action, we gain experience and confidence. The result is of this experience is quite evident. The successes far out weigh the failures and as a result there has been a population explosion on planet earth!

From the time that we are born, we are taught that “no” is bad. A scientific study concludes by the time children reach the age of eight, they have been told “no” over 100,000 times! We rapidly learn we should avoid “no” at all costs and get to “yes”. While this seems to make sense, the real world functions quite differently. We must be willing to fail and to learn from those failures in order to achieve what we most desire.

Let’s remember the following:

1) Failure is an event; it is not a person. When we fail to achieve the results we desire, we should ask ourselves, “What can I learn from what has just happened and what can I do differently next time?”

2) People who achieve outstanding success in this world are not the people who never fail but rather those who fail time and again but who learn from those mistakes to make tremendous contributions to society.

Experience has a tremendous impact on our confidence both on the upside and the downside. The more we learn from our experiences, the more confident we will be in facing life’s challenges. As we face challenges and look for solutions to the difficulties we encounter, we obtain positive experience leading us down a road of personal and professional excellence.

∞ Rob McBride ∞

The road to success has been studied for thousands of years.

How do we achieve it?
What is the secret?

Without a doubt, there are several ways to get there and each of us has a different definition of success. One thing that we do know for a fact is that confidence is a primary factor of success. People who have a high degree of confidence tend to be exceptionally successful. People who are not confident tend to struggle.

Success ultimately does not depend on how much money we have or how smart we are. There are people who have a lot of money but are miserable. There are also incredibly intelligent people who haven’t figured out what to do with their knowledge. Given a choice, rich and brilliant is a great place to start but unfortunately, it isn’t possible for all of us.

Confidence can be obtained by experience, preparation, persistence and a positive attitude. One way to express this mathematically is:

C = EPPA²

The product of experience, preparation, persistence and a positive attitude squared will give us confidence.

Of the four elements, one comes with time and the other three can be controlled. The only way of gaining experience is by getting out there and doing whatever it is we do. There is no substitute. Everything that we do is difficult before it becomes easy. Just think of going to work for the very first time. Terrified is a word describing the experience for most of us. Now it is done without even thinking about it. Often this is exactly the problem.

Preparation is entirely up to us. The more prepared we are for any encounter; whether it be professional or personal, the more confident we will be in handling the situation. Most of us wouldn’t dream of going to the beach with out being prepared with our swimming suit and a towel but how many of us routinely make telephone calls or go into meetings without being prepared? It happens all the time.

Persistence is another factor over which we have complete control. When we are attracted to a member of the opposite sex, what happens to our persistence? We invent every way possible to get that person to notice us and to be close to them. Yet in the work place when a client or a colleague tells us they don’t want our product or service, we often take them at their word and give up trying. Knowledge and persistence lead us to achieve things others believe are impossible.

Attitude is squared in our equation because of its importance. Often times a terrific attitude can overcome lack of experience, preparation and persistence. While all elements in the equation are important, an outstanding attitude can make up for deficiencies in other areas. A Harvard study concluded that 85% of all promotions in a company are directly related to the employee having a positive attitude. That is powerful information.

When thinking about what to do to be successful, we need only remember:

C = EPPA²

Zig Ziglar is fond of saying, “You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help enough other people get what they want.” Confidence will come to us through experience, preparation, persistence and a great attitude. This will enable us to help others get what they want and in turn get everything that we want out of life.

@RobMcBride
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