You can’t ensure success, but you can deserve it. You can’t guarantee results, but you can put in the effort to achieve them. – Bob Myers
Bob Myers is the general manager of the Golden State Warriors, a professional basketball team based in Oakland, California. A year ago they won the National Basketball Association championship and are in the playoffs again this season after winning an NBA-record 73 games in the regular season.
Myers did not play for John Wooden at UCLA – Coach had been long retired – but like any UCLA player who wanted to, he knew Coach and drew inspiration from him. Anybody with even a passing knowledge of Wooden can see his influence in today’s quote.
You can’t ensure success…
Life is too random to ensure anything except dying one day. This is tough to accept sometimes. You set a goal and work to make that goal happen and then something completely unforeseen that you have no control over happens and you are denied what you worked for. Or, perhaps, fortune conspires to reward your efforts with what you’ve always dreamed of. Both happen daily. It’s the way the world is built.
There are no guarantees in this life. All we can do is have a plan, preferably one in concert with our talents and ambitions, and try our best to execute that plan.
You can’t guarantee results, but you can put in the effort to achieve them…
The effort required to be our very best, to get the results our hearts hold dear, is immense. Usually, however, it is not the actual labor itself that is the hard part. If we are following our hearts and trusting our instincts we are doing something we have a knack for and the work is usually enjoyable.
The hard part is doing what needs to be done every single day. Because success demands singleness of purpose. We cannot be on our path a few days a week, or only during the summer. We must do what we were meant to do every day. We can’t expect more, but we must demand nothing less.
If our goal is based on external factors – money, fame, status – then we may never be completely satisfied. We deserve better. Everyone is entitled to a satisfying life and when our goals come from the inside, when we put the effort in to accomplish what is important to us, then we will find the life we are looking for.
