Choosing Personal Power
by Daryl Daughtry, Publisher
– Listen to this article here.
Personal power is a choice. Success, for the most part, is largely about making good choices that produce great results. Whether it’s about your education, your career path, or even your friends; the choices you make determine the outcomes you love or the outcomes you hate.
I want you to think about the most successful person you know. Maybe it’s that rich uncle who lives in a big house up on a hill. Maybe it’s your friend’s dad who drives the latest sports car. Maybe it’s a business person in town who started with nothing and became a billionaire. Regardless of which person you have in mind, I want you to focus on who they really are.
What kind of choices did they have to make to get to where they are now? Of course I’m not talking about people who just simply won the lottery. I’m not talking about people who married a very successful person. I’m talking about people who lifted themselves up from nothing to turn themselves into something.
It doesn’t even have to be all that big or dramatic. Somebody who just came from dirt poor to middle class would also apply. What do they all have in common? The wisdom is they used their power of choice to change their lives. Everybody has this power of choice. That’s right. No matter how seemingly stuck, frustrated or powerless you feel, you still have the power to choose.
The big difference between your life and theirs is most likely that you didn’t choose as well as they did. They made great decisions to achieve their results. The big difference is not whether you have a choice or not. The big difference is how you use that power or gift of choice. I really want you to understand this distinction.
I say this to coaching students and clients all the time… You can change your life with 3 words… MAKE BETTER CHOICES.
I want you to wrap your mind around something because it can lead you to the same conclusion that I have. My conclusion is that most of us have pretty much the same physical attributes. Most of us have two eyes, one nose, two ears, one mouth, you name it. Most of us are pretty much built the same way. It doesn’t matter what the color of our skin may be. The texture of our hair doesn’t matter. When it comes to hardware, we’re basically the same.
Some of you may not be so physically fortunate, and I fully appreciate that life is harder for you, but even you can experience some levels of personal power and success in your life. It may not be easy and it certainly isn’t to be taken lightly, but making better choices can also give even you a better quality of life.
The big difference is the thoughts between our ears. If you’re unhappy in any way with your life, you can choose to challenge your limits and your lack of information. In most cases, being informed and having insight is a choice. You see, we live in the information age and most anything you want to know or learn about is available on the Internet or at some type of school or even in some of the millions of books available to you.
Those people with all that money, power, knowledge, and respect, were not born with it. They also had to struggle like you. The difference is that they are aware of the power of choice. They chose to be better. They chose to learn what they didn’t know. They chose to get in the proximity of people who could help them. They chose to work hard. And, they chose not to give up.
They know that when they make a good decision, sooner or later, what they desire will become more accessible. They know you can plan all you want, but nothing happens until a choices are made and action is taken. Instead of just wishing and hoping that things would get better, they started by choosing to change the direction of their life.
As I often like to say, “You can’t change overnight, but you certainly can change your direction overnight.” The choice is yours.
