Blog Post: Yes, You Can

This post examines the obstacles to success and ways to overcome them.  At the end of this post there are instructions for the ordering of a free résumé kit, and information about an upcoming Executive Networking Event.

This post is going to share a bit of personal information, which I don’t usually do in my blogs, but it is necessary to help folks understand where I’m “coming from” in the things I’m about to say.

I was born with numerous birth defects.  Now, while some people say that the birth defect is that I was born without a personality, that isn’t it.  I was born with lung damage causing severe asthma, broken ankles, seeious hip dysplasia, diabetes and a very compromised immune system.  My first three years of life were mostly spent in the hospital.  My parents were told I was unlikely to live past my first year of life.  Throughout the years I’ve been told many times that my days are very numbered.  Well, I’ve proved the doctors wrong for 52 years, and will probably meet my goal of dying at the age of 112, shot by an insanely jealous husband.

The other things I’ve been told have included that I would never work at a job, be able to have a family, or live a normal life.  And they’re partially right.  I don’t have a job.  I have a very successful and very full practice/business.  My wife, daughter and I laugh consistently at the prediction that I wouldn’t have a family.  They’ve been right about one thing, though.  I haven’t led a normal life.  I’ve led an extraordinary one, instead.  Were I to die tomorrow, I would have lived a life that most men would envy, as I’ve had more wonderful experiences than most people would get in 4 lifetimes, as well as an incredibly happy marriage, and a fantastic child.  So much for the medical community.

The point here, however, is not to point and laugh at the medical community, (as much as they sometimes deserve it) but to offer encouragement and a bit of sage advice.  The advice is simple.  When someone tells you that you can’t do something, your response should involve waste material from a bull.  Yes, you can.

Regardless of your situation in life, if you simply understand one thing, you transcend it.  The simple understanding that will allow you to win consistently is that life is spiritual in nature and not restricted by what people term “natural law.”  There is no physical condition or circumstance that can be more powerful than the power of the human spirit and our thoughts.  Our thoughts control our world, not the circumstances that surround us.

If we look at the word “circumstances,” see can see that it comes from two Latin words.  One means “around.”  The other means “to stand.”  So, in other words, circumstances are simply things that are “standing around.”  Things standing around don’t have a prayer against an individual who is moving and making things happen.

I’d be the last person to say that life is easy.  I’ve had an extraordinary life, but hardly an easy one.  I don’t want to minimize whatever pain or trouble you’ve had in your life.  But I want to tell you that none of that is equal to the power of who you are or what your thoughts and spirit can accomplish.  I’m not saying that it will be easy to overcome whatever it is that you’re facing.  I’m saying that it is possible.  And if it is possible, then it can be done.

In fact, I believe that those of us who start out with a “bad hand” of “cards” in life really have been dealt the best “hand” of all.  The failure of those born to wealth and privilege is almost a proverb, as is the success of those with disabling disadvantage.  We can choose to be a victim or we can choose to be a victor.  It is entirely up to us.

Yes, you will lose sometimes.  Yes, you will get kicked where it hurts again and again.  But, as the Japanese proverb says, “Fall seven times, get up eight.”

 This is neither whistling past a graveyard, nor wearing rose colored glasses, nor heroic.  It is pragmatic.  Each instant you have a choice to let your circumstance (and the people who wish to keep you down — of which there will be many) win, or to get up once more and truly live another instant.  In fact, you will be a target for the jealous, the lazy, the liars, those with no integrity, and the cowardly.  They will have an investment in your failure.  You just need to have a stronger investment in your success.

Now, I’m no Pollyanna.  I know that the good guys don’t always win.  I know that there are many people in this world who are dishonest and even evil.  I have met many of them.  I know that, in the end, it might NOT turn out all right.  There are no guarantees.

And yet, which is the better way to live?  I could have given in many times.  I’ve refused to.  And I’ve had many more wonderful experiences.

In the end the question comes down to how we’ve decided to live our lives.  Have we squeezed every drop of life that we can out of each precious instant, or have we let the hours and days and years go by without truly living?  Any of us might die tomorrow.  The question is not whether or not we’re going to die — we are.  The question is how we have lived.

When you come to the end of your life, how have YOU lived?  Have you given in to those who say that you can’t?  Or have you said, “Yes, I can?”  That is, in the end, the really important question.  I hope you choose to live.

John Heckers, MA, CPC, BCPC, is an executive coach and transition coach in Cherry Creek, Colorado .  He has been helping people with their careers for over 25 years.  He welcomes your contact at 720.581.4301 or jheckers@heckersdevgroup.com.  www.heckersdevgroup.com.  For a free résumé kit, send a request email to resume@heckersdevgroup.com.  For information about our free Executive Networking Events, please go to www.heckersdevelopmentgroup.com/Events.html .  Please read our other blogs at http://employmentskills.blogspot.com and http://executiveexpert.blogspot.com.  Please write us for information on our Spiritual blogs.