The distance between dreams and doing...

I was a talking to a local businessman and as part of our conversation he said something to me in Italian. As I laughed and commented my Italian was rusty, he offered the English translation.

“The distance between dreams and doing is an ocean”

I looked at him, nodded knowingly, and we went on with our conversation. Like the next person, I love a good pithy saying and this stuck with me.

It almost screams, “Create a meme out of me and put me on Instagram. I’ll get so many likes”.

I have seen it first hand — the first place people with a good idea go is to visualize enjoying cocktails by the horizon pool as their bank account fills up from the profits from their idea. They seem to overlook the ocean they need to cross to get there.

I’m not here to debate the ocean or even explain it — other than to say this is a truism (and definitely meme worthy). I will say it’s an analogy of grand proportion and something to think about if you want to tackle a dream:

• The ocean is vast and takes time to cross

• The ocean is unpredictable

• Smooth sailing and unpredictable seas are part of the journey

• Sometimes your ship will take on water and even sink — only you can decide if you want to rebuild and head out into the open seas again

• and countless other ocean references

For all those who dream — watch out for the riptide.

iamgpe

PS — I don’t plan to put this on Instagram.

The first (and maybe only) core principle for success...

I will have to say blog writing has become a little more difficult of late — the reasons when I look in the mirror seem to revolve around my inability to come up with a topic, sensing I have said it all before, being too busy (a lame excuse to be sure), possibly a lack of imagination on my part to expand out of my current way of thinking, or maybe the weather; all valid in my mind to varying degrees.

Maybe there’s a natural life expectancy for writing 500 work blogs around whatever I have some sort of opinion on — what I’m experiencing could simply be the natural order of things. However, maybe it’s possible that after writing blogs for such a long time I’ve naturally boiled everything down to what is most important — the key principles for whatever I think I know. And in that, naturally limited myself.

In effect through my blogging, I’ve identified what is at the core for increasing your chances for success, and now I have nothing else to say.

How you define success is your business, but it’s probably best to define it as achieving your goals. I suppose i could have titled this “The first (and maybe only) core principle for reaching your goal…” but frankly the word success offers more food for a person’s imagination (and interest).

As I reflect on past blogs, such as “A man who carries a cat by the tail…” and “The most effective way to do it, is do it”, I’ve come to the realization that I’ve incorporated many pithy sayings on the topic of action into my blogs over the years.

“Your beliefs don’t make you a better person. Your behaviour does”

“Talk is cheap”

“SSFFS” (Sell Something For Fuck Sake)

Et Certera

It seems, in one form or another (and I’ve started to tire of saying it), my perspectives revolve around the importance of taking action and doing something — by taking action you will progress, expand your knowledge, experience, and if you’ve linked your actions to your goal there’s a very high likelihood you’ll be successful. Don’t dream about it, don’t think about it, don’t eventually get to it, don’t wish it, and don’t talk about it. Action is everything, and based on all my blogs, it seems to be the only thing.

The first core principle for success — take action and do something that is aligned with your goal(s).

This has been a core theme over the years, and now there’s a realization that it’s either very, very important or maybe there truly is a lack of imagination on my part to expand out of my current way of thinking.

Either way, I did write a blog and I now have something important to think about.

iamgpe