I obtained an amazing job a few years after graduating from college. It all began when I received a phone call out of the blue. I was enrolled full-time in an MBA program, but this was too good to pass up.
The job opportunity was beyond my wildest imagination; assistant to the chairman of the board of the largest bank in Oklahoma. I'll never forget going through seven interviews, starting in human resources all the way through the chairman and president, and finally receiving a job offer at the only twenty-four years of age. And was about to get an invaluable perspective from the top down.
As I worked directly for the chairman of the board, my responsibilities included serving on many boards for the bank, giving speeches for the president and chairman, teaching other top executives hot to communicate to an audience, sitting in on board meetings, overseeing the executive dining room floor, and running the bank's tennis tournament (which included Jimmy Connors, Stan Smith, Roscoe Tanner and many other of the world's top players.) I didn't fully realize it at the time, but my view of business and leadership would never be the same.
I thought I was thinking "big" before this job, but there was a much bigger world out there. that's true for you too.
Life is too short to think small. Rather, do as Joel Budd encourages us to: "March off the map." Most people could do more than they think they can, but they usually do less than they think they can. You never know what you cannot do until you try.
I agree in principle with Oscar Wilde when he said, "Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess." Charles Schwab said, "When a man has put a limit on what he will do, he has put a limit on what he can do."
The answer to you future lies outside the confines of where you are today. I like to say that if you want to see if you can really swim, don't frustrate yourself with shallow water. Launch out into the deep. Get out of the shallow end of the pool of life.
Any person who selects a goal in life that can be fully achieved without God's help has defined their own limitations. Rather, be as Art Sepulveda says: "Be a history maker and a world shaker."
Go where you have never gone before. Determine to see and do amazing things you've never imagined. You will find that great leaders are rarely "realistic" by other people's standards.
Dr. J.A. Holmes said, "Never tell a young person that something cannot be done. God may have been waiting for centuries for somebody ignorant enough of the impossible to do that thing." If you devaluate your dreams, rest assured no one else will raise the price.
Ronald McNair said, "You only become a winner if you are willing to walk over the edge." The Bible tells us, "The things which are impossible with men are possible with God" (Luke 18:27).
When you climb the tallest tree, you can see farther than you imagined when on the ground. Gloria Swanson said, "Never say never. Never is a long, undependable thing, and life is too full of rich possibilities to have restrictions placed upon it."
To believe an idea impossible is to make it so. Consider how many fantastic projects have dies because of small thinking or have been strangled in their birth by a cowardly imagination. I like what Comte de Mirabeau said. When he heard the word impossible, he responded, "Never let me hear that foolish word again."
Somebody is always doing what somebody else said couldn't be done. Dare to think unthinkable thoughts. Pearl Buck said, "All things are possible until they are proved impossible--and even the impossible may only be so, as of now." John Ruskin said, "Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so you shall become. Your vision is the promise of what you shall at last unveil."
Develop an infinite capacity to ignore what others think can't be done. Don't just grow where you are planted. Bloom where you are planted and bear fruit. Daniel Webster said, "There is always room at the top." No one can predict to what heights you can soar. Even you will knot know until you spread your wings.
(Note: John Mason is one of my favorite authors and I thought of sharing you guys how life changing his articles are. Hope you enjoy it.)