No Apologies, No Excuses, No Second Chance

Years ago, while playing basketball, I had an important realization. I apologized constantly. I apologized for bad passes,errant shots and missed opportunities. Worse than that, I also realized I apologized when someone else would make a mistake by telling them that it really was my fault. When I wasn't apologizing I found myself making excuses for poor play. I was tired. My foot hurt. I sprained my finger. The day I realized my behavior I felt sick. This was not the person I wanted to be. So, I adopted a mantra for myself and how I would play on the basketball court, "No apologies, no excuses, no second chance." Let me briefly explain. "No apologies." Apologies are often empty words that are thrown around after someone is caught, or in my case a distorted belief that I wasn't supposed to make mistakes, or miss. Yes, occasionally apologies have to be made, but what is more important is changing behavior. Nothing says I'm sorry like changing my behavior and doing something different. So, I put aside apologizing all the time and moved on to changing behavior. "No excuses." When I step on to a basketball court, I step on to play. No one cares if I am tired, hurt, or distracted. They just want me to play the best basketball I can or get off the court. "No second chance." Many times the places I play basketball there are teams waiting to get on the court. Once you lose, you may as well go home. There is no second chance, so I've learned to put it all out on the court. Years later I realize that this mantra applies to life. So many of us spend too much time apologizing for what we've done instead of making up and moving on. We all make mistakes, but we are by no means the sum of our mistakes. Sometimes the best gift we can give to ourselves is to unlock the chains with which we bind ourselves and let us go free. So too excuses. I've got a million of them. Reasons why I can't write my next book, or be the speaker I want to be. No one cares, and the only person I'm excusing is myself. And finally, there is no second chance. This is it. Every moment of every day we choose how our lives will unfold. If we are waiting for something to happen it has probably passed us by. "Life- no apologies, no excuses, no second chance."

Pickup Basketball, Grit and Greatness

Ever play pickup basketball? You go to a gym, meet people, pick up teams and play. You never know who you will get on your team, or how your team will do and it changes every time. Last night I was reminded of a critical factor in greatness that any of us can leverage: grit.

Arriving early I was the tenth player so we chose teams and started playing. Since there is only one court, if you win you stay on. As the game progressed more players started arriving at the gym. I knew them. They were bigger, stronger, and more talented than anyone we had on our team. Though we won the first game I thought our time on the court might be short lived. However we won the next five games against far superior teams until we finally lost by a point (I think we were exhausted by that time). Why did we do so well? Our team worked harder, fought harder and wanted to prove ourselves much more than the other teams.

Research on grit, which is perseverance in the face of obstacles, has proven to succeed over talent and IQ. Our cultural challenge is that many of us want instant gratification. Instant gratification will never lead the way to greatness. Those who are willing to continue in the face of obstacles fight against challenges and even fight against their own lethargy will succeed in whatever they want to achieve.

So, what do you want to achieve? What are you doing about it on a daily basis? What do you do when you encounter obstacles? The answers to these questions reveal the likelihood of your success. Any of us can succeed, but it may not happen tomorrow, or the day after, or for quite a while. But if you are willing to make the journey, you may find your success at the end of the road.