Don’t wish for a better wind. The key is to wish for the wisdom to set a better sail. Utilize whatever wind that blows to take you where you want to go. That is the philosophy of success I (Jim Rohn) picked up at the age of twenty-five, and it revolutionized my whole life. Here’s what I found: I found it was easy. I was a millionaire at the age of thirty-one, and I found it wasn’t difficult at all.
Now, here’s my definition of easy: something I could do. I figure, if it’s something you can do, it’s easy. But here’s a little qualification: I worked hard at it. I made sure my disciplines were in line. I made sure my habits were good. I made sure I did all that I could. I found something that I could do, but I worked hard at it. I got up early and stayed up late and worked hard from age twenty-five to thirty-one. But what I did was easy, meaning it was something I could do.
“Well, Mr. Rohn,” you say, “if it was so easy, why during those six years didn’t those other people around you get rich?” Here’s why. It’s also easy not to do. How else would you describe it? It’s easy to keep doing the things that don’t work. It’s easy to keep the bad habits. It’s easy not to develop the disciplines. It’s easy not to. So why did I get rich and they didn’t?
It all comes down to a philosophical phrase: the things that are easy to do are also easy not to do. That’s the difference between success and failure, between daydreams and ambitions.
Here’s the key formula for success: a few disciplines practiced every day. Those disciplines have to be well-thought out. What should you spend your time doing? You don’t want to waste your time on things that aren’t going to matter. But a few simple disciplines can change your whole economic future. A few simple disciplines can change your future with your family, your business, your enterprise, your career. Success is a few simple habits–good habits–repeated every day.
Here’s the formula for failure: errors in judgment repeated every day. All you’ve got to do is have a few errors in your judgment and repeat them every day, and I’m telling you, they’ll spin out of control in ten years. You’ll end up driving what you don’t want to drive. You’ll be wearing what you don’t want to wear. You’ll be living where you don’t want to live. You’ll be earning what you don’t want to earn. A few errors every day, a few bad habits, can be disastrous.
It’s easy to repeat an error in judgment because failure doesn’t fall at the end of the first day. Bad habits don’t show their horrible results at the end of the first day, or the first week, or even the first month. It’s easy to get fooled. If disaster occurred at then end of the first week, we’d change our philosophy right away. But the slide downward is subtle. You get you a little off course, and you keep drifting until all of a sudden, you’re caught way off course.
You’ve got the choice right now of one of two “easies.” Easy to do, or easy not to do. I can tell you in one sentence how I got rich by the time I was thirty-one: I did not neglect to do the easy things I could do for six years. That’s the key. I found something easy I could do that led to fortune, and I did not neglect to do it.
The major reason for not having more of what you want in America–more health, more money, more power, more influence, more everything–the major reason is simple neglect. If you don’t take care of neglect, it becomes an infection. And then it becomes a disease.
So if you’re in the habit of “not doing it,” get in the habit of “doing it.” Do all it takes, and before you know it, success will be yours for the having.
* Source: Leading an Inspired Life by Jim Rohn