Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Inch by Inch

Comebacks are almost always measured in inches.

Overcoming an illness.

Overcoming a bankruptcy.

Overcoming a business failure.

Overcoming a divorce.

Overcoming an addiction.

Overcoming an injury--while training for that big race.

These are recoveries that are seldom quick.

And never easy.

Brains and talent don't speed up the process.

Neither does hard work and dogged persistence.

They keep the process from stopping...or falling backwards.

Inch by inch.

I heard an interview with Jack Canfield, one of the authors of the Chicken Soup for the Soul series, discuss how he and his business partner kept pressing on with their Chicken Soup for the Soul book despite being rejected by over 140 publishers.

One Hundred and Forty.

He said that he and his partner promised each other to do five tasks (no matter how small) each day to reach their goal of writing and publishing their work.

He likened the process to cutting down a large redwood tree.  He said that the tallest redwood tree will fall to the smallest knife if that knife hacks a little bit away at the tree EACH DAY.

Each day.

In other words...inch by inch.

When trying to achieve a goal, we often question if we have the brains, the talent, or the time to achieve the goal we seek.  We look at the size of that metaphorical redwood tree Jack Canfield speaks about and become discouraged.

And stop.

Or never even start.

Perhaps we should stop focusing on the the size of the tree.

And the size of our axe.

And focus on our DIRECTION...forward.

Towards our goal.

Even if it's inch by inch.

AMJ


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