Having potential vs. realizing your potential
What is holding you back from realizing your potential? Do you feel like you aren’t enough? Are you motivated? Do you lack a sense of purpose? The truth is that you have an incredible amount of untapped potential, but just having that potential won’t make you successful. Just believing in yourself and in your potential won’t make you successful, you have to put in the work to develop your potential and you need a sense of purpose to stay the course when it gets difficult.
What do you need to hear?
What do you need to hear to help you realize your potential? Do you need someone to tell you how special you are so that you will feel worthy and pursue your dreams? Or do you need someone to tell you to stop feeling sorry for yourself and get off your butt and do something with all this potential you have? Do you need someone to tell you why it all matters?
The truth is that we each have an incredible amount of potential but we often doubt it. For instance, imagine if a seed doubted it’s potential. We know that if we plant a seed in good soil, where it will get plenty of sunlight and water, it will grow and realize its potential. So, are we any different? If we are ‘planted’ in good conditions, won’t we grow and reach our potential? We can’t change our past, but we can use it as fertilizer to help us grow.
It takes work
If you plant a seed, the growth isn’t automatic. It takes time, energy and resources. The same is true for all of us, it takes time, energy and resources for us to realize our potential. It’s nice to know that we have so much untapped potential, but what good is it if we don’t develop it? You’ve got to put in a lot of work to develop your potential. So if you believe in your untapped potential and that it will take work to develop it, what next? You need to work on yourself. How do you show up in the world physically? How well do you relate to others? What special skills do you have? These are the key areas you need to develop your physical self, how you relate to others and your marketable skills.
What are you gonna do with all those resources?
When a tree grows tall, it consumes a lot of energy and resources and in so doing, it is able to provide a lot of shelter, and resources to its community. The same is true of us, the more you realize your potential and consume energy and resources, the more you are able to provide to your family and your community. People often get caught up in the idea of being worthy of success. However, it’s not a question of being worthy. You are given potential with the expectation that you will develop it. When you develop your potential, you are not only helping yourself, you are helping those around you. It’s not all about you.
Why does it matter?
This is the question we all have to answer for ourselves. I can’t tell you why it matters, only why it matters to me. If you have a strong enough ‘why’ nothing will stop you. If you don’t, you will easily be stopped. Do you want to be unstoppable? You have to come up with a good reason to do the work and stay the course. I believe that life will only get better for all of us, when life gets better for each of us. We each have to do the work of realizing our potential for ourselves and for each other. That is the only way that we can improve the world. I believe in our potential and that there is a lot a stake.
What’s next?
I think the best thing you can do is to develop a long term vision for your life and then develop a daily routine that will help you to create that vision. In other words, consider what could happen if every day you work on your physical health, on your relationships and improve your professional skills. How would that move your life forward, if you learn and grow constantly, share what you learn, connect with others and contribute to the world around you?
It helps to find some mentors that are living the type of life that you want to live and learn from them. There are so many out there. Find someone whose message resonates with you and learn more about them. I have been following Jeff Lerner for awhile now and I really like his training. You can check out one of his videos below to learn more.
