Success is a choice

Restored from the Empower Network archive (2011–2017), lightly edited to meet our current advertising standards. Views are the original author’s.

this blog was written by Bruce Castro.
I thought that everything that he said in it was worth reprinting.

YOU CAN DO IT!
The first thing that most people need to understand is that success is not an accident… It is a choice! So many people look around at their doctor, their realtor, their lawyer, the Restaurant Owner and think “look at the lucky SOB, he’s got everything”. But remember, with few exceptions, we begin at the same starting line. Getting ahead, doesn’t just happen. They weren’t just lucky. They were committed and prepared! They acted.

Opportunity does no one any good if, when it comes knocking, we choose to NOT answer the door.
Your ship coming in doesn’t do much good if you’re in bed instead of the dock!

No matter what your potential, your intellect or how great the opportunity, without ACTION it just doesn’t matter… Your success will be the result of ACTION!

NEVER FORGET! With few exceptions, we begin at about the same starting line.
Your boss, unless she inherited it, probably wasn’t born owning the company that you now work for. Your Real Estate broker wasn’t born with his license or successful brokerage, Your physician with his MD, your attorney with his Juris Doctorate, (I know I wasn’t!). In each and every case they had attitudes and beliefs that led and enabled them to make the choices and decisions that brought them to the esteemed place they now hold. But it still came down to choosing to ACT!

First they prepared via education and then they acted. Preparation and Action is key.

So often we look around and see others with more money, bigger houses, nicer cars and feel envious; jealous that we don’t have what they have. We don’t stop to realize that the main difference in our situations, in what we have accomplished and acquired, boils down to the choices we’ve made. We all have 24 hours in each day. The difference lies in how we choose to use them.

Good attitudes and beliefs are the seeds from which good choices grow. And good Choices create GREAT lives. The good news? ATTITUDES AND BELIEFS CAN BE LEARNED. Learn new attitudes, make better choices… this will always create a better life…

WE START IN ABOUT THE SAME PLACE
Unless we inherit money, marry money or win the lottery, we all started in substantially the same financial place. The main difference in our results are the ACTIONS and CHOICES we make and those are substantially determined by the Attitudes and Beliefs that we hold.

It’s No Excuse- it is our fault!
We can’t chose our past, we can’t change the decisions that brought us here… but we can change the choices that create our future. Right now, today, we can make better choices that make for a better tomorrow. Of course, some people are born into abject poverty, welfare, drug ravaged families, while others, although not wealthy, are middle class families with a work ethic and attitude that was handed down to their children, thus giving them a step up on the poorer kids.

So yes some of us are given a head start by being given a better attitude and work ethic. A better attitude leads to better choices and results. But even this, simply reinforces the statement of the importance attitudes and beliefs. Attitudes can be changed and improved. When they get better, choices and results get better.

We Can Choose Better Choices
Many that are born into poverty, welfare, drug abuse, etc, learn very different attitudes and beliefs than those born into the more successful families. They may have the very same intellect, actually the same “potential” often even more of each, but the internalized, long held and learned beliefs affect their actions and choices. Even though they may have graduated from the same high school the the same intellectual potentials, when it came time to make life choices, i.e. continue the education, get a job, try to start some enterprise, Because of their belief regarding what life can have in store for them, they make drastically different decisions and choices. The doctor’s son heads to med school, the coal miner’s son is off to the mines. Even though he may very well have similar intellectual potential. Same potential, same opportunity, but drastically different choices. It is always the choice that makes the difference, the attitude or belief is just the impetus for that choice.

The beliefs as to what life has in store for them drastically affects the decisions and choices we make. Here’s what everyone needs to understand and believe… Make the right choice, take the right action and you get the right result!
CHANGE DIRECTION
No matter what your background, you or anyone else can start right now, today to begin making better choices that will IMMEDIATELY begin to change their life’s path. The best and most personal example I can give is myself. I am not currently in the same league with Bill Gates. But I plan on rectifying that! And it’s my goal to bring hundreds if not thousands with me… Through ASN, we’ve already made a good start, but I digress… My background could have been a breeding ground for excuses and failure.

What was I born with, where did I start?

I was born to a single mother.
My father died in a car accident before I was born while my mother was 6 months pregnant.
Thankfully, at that time, abortion was not a reasonable option, otherwise, There is a substantial chance that I wouldn’t be here. Instead, I was placed in an orphanage.
After a year, my mother took custody of me, after almost every child in the orphanage had died from meningitis. Actually, I believe I was the only survivor! I still have a picture that was in the local paper of me, in the arms of the orphanage director as the survivor of this tragedy.
My mother was and still is a great and loving mom! But we were poor. I don’t just mean broke, but poor. But because I was so loved, I didn’t even notice. I didn’t even realize the poverty that I had experienced until one day I was thinking about my days in Arkansas, a placed that I absolutely loved…
We lived in a big white 2 story house. In thinking about it I remembered that I wasn’t allowed to go upstairs, because mom was pretty sure I would fall right through the floor!
I remember, one of my favorite Christmases. I was ecstatic!

Having said all of this, I know many had it worse. But the point of the story is that I also know that many would have used the reality of my beginnings as an EXCUSE for failure. The thing that I did have is a mother, who even though poor, was supportive and inspirational. She always told me “I could do anything!“ Objectively, I don’t know if it was true but I do know that it made me willing to always try. Because I believed, I was willing to try. Trying is the key. Because I believed, I achieved! The reality of this universe is that if you try, if you act, eventually you achieve!

Maybe you, or someone you know had it a thousand times worse than I ever did. Maybe it feels as if their upbringing is holding them back. IT’S NOT!
They are holding themselves back! The only thing holding them or anyone else down… are the choices that they are making. It is within anyone’s power to make better choices. They simply must CHOOSE to do so.
An incontrovertible fact of life is that Better Choices ALWAYS produces Better Results!

See Universal principles of success.

WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE?
Attitudes and Beliefs ALWAYS manifest themselves in actions and choices. We are all the sum total of the actions and choices that we have made up to this point in our lives. If you are not satisfied with every aspect of your life, it is because attitudes and beliefs have motivated you to make choices and decisions that led you to where you are.

Within reason, if you, in anyway are less than satisfied with any aspect of your life, you can change it and you can start right now! Not enough money? Imperfect relationship. Want better “things”? It doesn’t matter. It’s all in your hands and it’s all a matter of choice.

Blaming outside circumstances for your situation is simply laying the groundwork for a lifelong excuse for failure. When you truly take responsibility, you begin to understand that you are in control and it becomes easier to see and begin taking advantage of the opportunities that abound.

IT’S A FACT
Realize no matter where you came from, no matter where you are, right now, today you can start making choices and decisions that can dramatically improve your life and your future. But it requires more than just reading and “knowing” these truths, it requires internalizing them so that they are a part of you. The must be internalize to the point you naturally react in a way that comports with them. In a future article we will discuss exactly how to do that.

It doesn’t matter what you know… it matters what you do.

var id = ’596′;
var url = document.location.href;

a=”88347″;c=”black”;r=”dstough”;