A long time ago, Miloš told me: “You have potential! But you know what kiddo, out of the 100% of people with potential, 80% do absolutely nothing with it!”
This sentence was engraved in my memory.
When you’re good – built of good material, and you get a chance but don’t use it – then that’s bad. It’s so bad it doesn’t get any worse, even compared to those who have potential but never got a chance to show it!
So what’s the catch? Work. There’s no secret, there’s no much, there’s no lottery. Work, work and more work! Less sleep, more learning. Less fun, more dedication. Less futile interactions, more quality inputs.
The worst is when you’re young. No. The worst is when you’re young and have potential. Then one day you get a chance, a path shows up and the ascent is quick. Then, when you start stepping up, you think you’re already on top! It’s so great – you don’t believe it gets any better than this. There’s so much pleasure and you have a feeling it’s going to last a long, long time! Just then you start seeing the magnificent fruits of challenge. You’re thinking – all the fruit of the of world is ripening for me! It has ripened just for me. Hey, it’s here now and who know if it will be there tomorrow! So you start picking it! You eat it and you get caught up in this moment of bliss. You overlook work. You face your first fall.
With every new time that you pick yourself up, the getting up part gets more difficult because there’s less trust. The trust from people that give you qualitative inputs. After every new fall there will be less and less of them, and you’ll be more and more alone. I’ve fallen myself. I still fall. I know what I’m talking about!
Then is when you need to work more. The risk of juicy and fruity challenges will come at you again. Years go by. As years pass, if you haven’t worked, worked and work some more there’ll be less and less ripe fruit left for you. There are less and less chances. Slowly you start creeping into mediocrity. You become average. Just like anyone else. There’s no difference between you and the guy who was never exceptional to begin with! You’re the same, with the exception of one thing, you could have done something. But you didn’t. You could have. But you didn’t.
Robert reminded me of something lately… he said to me: I can’t doesn’t exist. It’s either that you don’t want to or don’t know how to, either way it’s you who’s falling on your own sword. Because it is you who has the chance to choose what you desire or what you want to learn.
A day has 24 hours. There’s a lot and too many hours in a year. Or too little. Depends on whether you desire something or not. The thing is, you can do it! It’s just a matter of choice!
