The Parable of the Talents is the primary cause of success or failure.
Reasons for Success or Failure
Why do the few achieve success and the majority live in failure? This question has challenged me since I was a young boy. It has also enthralled academics, speakers, philosophers, and lay people.
We have all heard of the folks who started with little and went on to achieve massive success. Surely there must be a set of action steps or "laws" that you and I could apply to achieve our own success and Live Our BEST Lives.
Who Becomes Successful and Why
I think that I have found one of the doors to all the success we could hope for. The key to this door is found in the Bible's Parable of the Talents (Matthew 24: 14-30). In this Parable
it says, "To him that hath, shall more be given, and he shall have abundance.
Making The Most of What You Have Will Bring You More of What You Want
How does the Parable relate to success achievement? On the playgrounds, I always heard, "If you want some, you better bring some!" Growing up I would always hear adults say that, "the rich get richer and the poor get poorer." And of course, all of us have heard about the folks who win the lottery ending up with little to no money just a few years after their great lucky win.
As we look around these days we can see that - generally speaking - those folks who have lots of money keep making money. And on the flip side, those folks with little money are always scrapping by, financially. I grew up in an area where "living in lack" was just the way it was. As a child, I wondered why it was like that for everyone I lived around. In addition, as a teen I was a counselor at a summer camp that catered to the children of very well-off - even wealthy - families. I noticed that the people I encountered at the camp were not any smarter than those I grew up around.
Thus began my years of study to understand why success disparities happen. And here's where my study has taken me --- an explanation of what drives success and failure among individuals, families, businesses, countries and even cultures. Here it is all rooted in the Parable of the Talents: We become/achieve what we dwell on/think about, consistently. The more you dwell on what you want, the more you will get what you want. You have what you need to take your life to tremendous levels. You need to believe and then take this one powerful step.
Achieve All Of Your Goals
What Does This Mean For You?
Quite simply - You have the opportunity to define, generate and attract all of the success you really want if you can think about the things that you really want, and think about them in the right way.
As a Life & Executive Coach to successful people I can tell you that the most successful people I know think about, talk about, day-dream and even dream about being successful, achieving more, reaching their goals, and solving their problems. They are literally obsessed with realizing their best life.
Because they dwell on their success, they leverage the tremendous power up their Reticular Activating System.The Reticular Activating System is the attention center in the brain. It is the key to "turning on your brain," and is thought to be the center of motivation. It is the part of your brain where the world outside of you, and your thoughts and feelings from "inside" of you, meet. Most important for you, your Reticular Activating System makes you incredibly attuned to all the things - goals - that you have decided are important.
Use Your Reticular Activating System For YOUR Maximum Good
Let's say that you buy the latest, greatest-looking cell phone. Immediately after you walk out of the store with your totally unique looking cell phone, you will begin to see other people who have the same phone. The truth is that lots of folks were walking around with the phone before you thought to get yours, but your brain was not attuned to bringing them into your consciousness. Now that you have your fantastic new cell phone and you're thinking about how great it looks, your Reticular Activating System goes into full power-up mode and make you aware of all the other people and their cell phones that are just like yours! Your Reticular Activating System is hugely powerful and can be controlled --- by YOU. It's yours to use.
First - You Must Continuously Think Like The Successful Among Us Do
The successful among us don't spend time dwelling on failures. The successful DO think about their goals, their action-steps in pursuit of those goals, and all the other things they will do to Live Their BEST Life. So should you.
Second - Release Dwelling On Failure
I can tell you that my study reveals that those who are not habitually successful think and talk consistently about failure, lack, pain, scarcity, money woes, past defeats, and not being able to have what they want. This is why their lives remain less than satisfactory. What they think about is what life gives them. Don't let this happen to you!
About computers they say, "Stuff in equals stuff out." The same applies to your life.
What Winners Think
One of my favorite approaches to life can be summed up with the following saying: "Stolen from the best with pride!" Applied to today's topic, I would say that you can achieve the success you seek if you find out what it is that successful people do, what they think, why they think as they do, what they read, how they spend their free time, and apply your learnings about their actions to your life. On the flip side, avoid doing, saying, and thinking the way that failures do, speak and think. My book shelves are packed with the stories of successful people throughout history. These stories motivate me, engage me, and enlighten me as I go on my journey. The sooner you get your thinking properly aligned, the sooner you will bring the success you seek into your life.
Next Steps
To get cooking on thinking your way to the success you desire, I have four steps for you. Put the Parable of Talents to work in your life starting right now!
1. Write up a list of the 10 key thoughts you must have in order to bring the success you want into your life. Do some homework on what successful people think If you need to do so.
2. Determine the people in your life that you can talk to about your goals. Make the decision that you will talk more with those people than you have been. On the flip side, determine that you will stop talking tio those people in your life who love to talk about problems. Get them out of your mind! Don't dwell on the negative.
3. When faced with a challenge that you need to deal with in order to reach your dreams, make a point of asking yourself, "What would it take in order for me to overcome the challenge?" This one question can change your life overnight.
4. Take action in pursuit of your new thinking. Action plus your New Thoughts are powerful!
Enjoy Life!
Darryl L. Mobley
The Parable of the Talents