You can beat your best prior achievements
The person who says it cannot be done should not interrupt the person who is doing it.
You know your best score at golf or bowling and fastest marathon time. You also know quite a bit about the combination of work, practice, luck, and perseverance that helped you achieve it.
There are two elements at work here, measurement of results and competition with yourself. Rather than setting a high goal and when it is accomplished setting a higher one; the personal best concept brings a victory with each incremental improvement. Of course you can use both goals and personal best metrics.
"A winner is someone who recognizes his God-given talents, works his tail off to develop them into skills, and uses these skills to accomplish his goals." - Larry Bird
A personal best attitude brings this attitude to your entire life. Have you had better in any area than you have now?
Exceeding your personal best? - Why not?
Barriers Created From The Mists Of Ignorance
"It's not what you are that holds you back, it's what you think you are not." - Denis Waitley
Denis has the basics right, but there is more.It can also be what you think you are not, and how knowledgeable you have convinced yourself you are, that hold you back.
In fact perhaps we can reshape the entire statement.
What you think about yourself and your environment determines the limits of your accomplishment.
This is where we scare off the college professors. The honors they have received, and those they have taken upon themselves, blind them to this following true perspective.
We know very little, and much of what we think we know is just plain wrong.
It may have been Zig Ziglar that said "If you think you can't, or you think you can, you are right."
That is why belief is so much stronger than currently accepted facts. Our educational systems are constantly setting boundaries. Only through faith and desire have individuals again and again extended those boundaries.
In the early 1950's Roger Banister announced to the world that he would run the mile in under four minutes. Everyone thought he had lost it! The sports "experts," the medical establishment, everyone! In 1954 he did it. It has been reported that within one year, over 30 people ran faster than Banister himself. When asked how it was possible for so many people to run that fast so soon, Banister said: "It was never a physical boundary, only a mental one." - source unknown
You have the ability to accomplish much more than anyone has ever let you believe - including yourself.
Find your passions, find your own four minute miles -- break them all.
We are all surrounded by solid looking barriers that limit our achievement. Such walls are erected using mists of ignorance - run right through them.
Gain A Step In Your Performance
books to inspire your next performance increase
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement. And at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat." - Theodore Roosevelt
The Greatest Salesman in the World
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My Personal Best : Life Lessons from an All-American Journey
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My Life and Work (The Autobiography of Henry Ford)
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The Rapture Of Maturity: A Legacy Of Lifelong Learning
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The Taste Of Humble Pie
It is so easy to get an inflated opinion of ourselves.
we might be a bit smarter than most - good grades may come easily.
Maybe we are better at sports or with tools than others.
We can find our attributes easily - and other's faults even easier.
The difference in all of us is exceedingly small - when measured against the optimal. Much like we are all about the same size - when measured against the size of the Earth.
Today I overheard a couple of laborers talking. They were discussing Christianity in partial sentences, labored thought apparent in their conclusions. Their conclusions however were drawn from the Bible and were solid. They might not have known the proper theological terms for what they were discussing - they didn't need fancy words.
I realized these thoughtful laborers could be closer to God than myself, and have a better understanding of who they are in Jesus Christ than I do.
We are human and full of faults and errors, it is our very nature. God works with each of us as individuals, and helps us according to his plan for us.
He works on my faults according to his time table in his order. He is smarter and wiser than I am, and he loves me more than I love myself - I do not come close to his attributes - but I can follow his advice.
That is true for all of us - we all fall far short of the measure of God - in that we are all very close to each other.
We did not make God in our image - he made us in his image.
God is who he is - we can learn how to grow closer to him - he has already paid the adoption price.
Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up. James 4:10
It is easier to be humble if we realize how close we are to each other, and how far we are from God.
The Bastiat Free University Journal
It is no longer as important where you learned your knowledge; it is now more important that you have integrity, that you enjoy learning new things, and that you seek to accomplish great things.
Before you started school, life was spent 24/7/365 pursuing the joys of discovery. Once again enjoy the pleasures of self-directed learning that motivated you as a child.
"The mark of a great player is in his ability to come back. The great champions have all come back from defeat." - Sam Snead
Fetching RSS feed... please stand byYour personal best is still in front of you
"Begin to be now what you will be hereafter" - Saint Jerome
Cultivate your natural abilitiesYour adult life is largely a result of events, some of which you influenced; and your responses and actions, many of which you controlled.
Determine to control more of your thoughts and you will control more of your responses. Saturate your being with a determination to accomplish specific goals and act in a specific manner toward events and you will greatly influence the rest of your life.
"I have learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not on our circumstances." = Martha Washington
What is it you desire to do, and where do you desire to do it in one, five and ten years? Your journey to what you will become starts right now with your dedication to creating yourself as the person you wish to become.
ABILITY is what you're capable of doing.
MOTIVATION determines what you do.
ATTITUDE determines how well you do it.
Lou Holtz
Each effort to contain your thoughts and direct your desires will yield actions that steer you toward your personal goals. Don't try to change the whole world all at once, instead change your thoughts from this moment to the next.
Then do it again.
"When you dance, your purpose is not to get to a certain place on the floor. It's to enjoy each step along the way." - Wayne Dyer
What does the Internet have to offer us?
We will let YouTube decide.
Personal Best
Tell us about your personal best
If there is more than one you are striving to exceed, let us know about that one also.
You can keep the challenge growing, excel as you know you can.
Found enough? Or would you like to read more about achieving your peak performance?
These featured lenses may provide additional insights in your search for excellence.-
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