Today let’s talk about all the odds being against you. Everything points to the idea that you will not succeed. That whatever goal you have set, at least right now, if you take a snapshot, it looks like you’ve pretty much already lost. Why should you continue to move forward? And, despite the odds, you basically tell the odds, forget you. You tell the odds, listen, we’re not going to do this. I’m actually going to win despite the odds. How do you do that? How do you win regardless of the odds?
The odds are going to happen. It’s just inevitable. I’m sure everyone who’s reading this has a specific goal. You have something that you are very passionate about. Either you’ve already started, or you want to get started, and I want you to really focus on that today. I want you to apply what I’m telling you to whatever it is that you are passionate about going after or have yet to go after, and I want you to apply what I’m talking about today.
Because here’s the deal. If it hasn’t happened already, the odds at some point are going to get to the point to where it says, ‘there is little chance of you winning.’ You’re going to hit a wall, and things are going to go downhill. You’ll hit a valley. You’ll hit a plateau. You’ll stall out. A lot of different adjectives and descriptive terms for this, but there’s going to be something where it gets to the point where it’s like, man, I don’t know if I can win. No one is exempt from this. No one! If you haven’t hit it yet, it’s going to happen.
I want you to think about this goal, and I want you to think about whatever it is that you’re working on as a story. Like a movie. That story and that movie that you have, you know the end to the movie already. I want you to keep that in mind as we continue to move forward in this post. As you are reading this, I want you to think about whatever challenge maybe you’ve already overcome or maybe you’re in the midst of that challenge of whatever this thing is that you’re trying to accomplish.
So, there’s this movie that you’re creating. There’s this story that you’re creating, and you know the end to it already. You know how the end happens. And the end is your goal. The end is that thing that you want to be able to do.
Let me tell you how you actually win despite the odds. I’m going to give you five practical, applicable things that you can literally take today and start to implement into your life as it relates to this goal that you have in your mind.
Vision
First thing you got to do is you’ve got to have a tremendous amount of vision. You’ve got to have a vision. What I mean when I say vision, you’ve got to see the end of the movie with crystal clear clarity. It’s got to be so clear; it’s as if you’re living it when you think about it. It is almost tangible. You have got to become so crystal clear that you can see the exact colors of what’s happening at the time that you win, that you accomplish your goal. You can hear the voices. You can sense it. You can taste it. The vision is not just visual; it is an experience that you have to have with crystal clear clarity.
And understand, there are two things that you need to really engage or employee in this vision. You have to have very clear thoughts, but you’ve also got to have emotion. Thoughts coupled with emotion will give a vivid experience of the end of the movie.
But understand You don’t know the middle of the movie because you have to live out the body of the movie. But you have to know what the end of the movie looks like and it must engage your thoughts and emotion. How will you feel when you get there? I want you to do that on a daily basis. Experience the win every single day. That’s the first thing you got to do is have a vision.
Faith
The Second thing you got to do is you have to have faith. What I mean when I say faith is, you’ve got to live your life as if you know the end of the movie already. You have to live your life and go through life, continue to do the daily disciplines and the things that you have to do to accomplish your goal, despite what the external circumstances say, and with knowing the end of the movie already.
Because here’s the deal, when you look at it that way, when the odds are against you, you say, well you know what, I know the end of the movie already. But, imagine if I knew the end and the score of last night’s game. Say I taped the game and then someone just happened to tell me, hey Virginia won. I’m only assuming Virginia won; I don’t know. Well, you can imagine if I watched that game later, and say Virginia is down by 20 points at half time, but you guys verified to me that Virginia won. Well, I’m watching the game knowing that end already. You see, so when they’re down by 20 at half time, guess what? I still have confidence because I’m like, I know Virginia won. You need to live your life as though you know the end of the movie already and you’re simply happening to live and watch and experience the taped version of what we already know the end too.
Knowing the end of your movie gives you confidence. Think about your favorite movie. Most of the movies that you enjoy are movies of triumph. Or the movies whenever someone is stuck in the bottom, and they’re able to work their way up, they’re in a valley, and they’re able to overcome.
Your story is going to be extremely compelling. Don’t you want a really cool story? I would hate for me to be telling my story to someone and it’s just boring, and people are yawning. I want my story to be tremendous, fantastic. All the odds mean is that your story is compelling. That’s all that odds mean to me. It’s like, man, when things are down, I’ll be the first to tell you, I’m going through a bunch of stuff right now as it relates to my business and coaching, stuff like that. But I look at it, and I say, you know what? The odds are just making this a very compelling story. You just have to know the end already and live your life in faith as though you know the ending.
Mentality
The third thing that you have to do is there’s a certain mentality that you have to have. That mentality is this. No matter what’s going on, when the odds are happening, it’s simply one page of the story. It is one snapshot of the story. That’s all it is. You are merely in one frame of the movie. That’s it. All that is happening right now is that you have not turned the page yet. We have not gotten to the next scene. The next scene might be even worse. But you know the end of the movie as we said in the second step. All it is is a snapshot. It’s just that scene of the movie. That’s all we’re looking at, at that one particular time.
But remember, it’s a movie, it’s a story, and whenever these things are happening, I look at it like this. I say, well, you know, life is simply making room for new things to come. Life is making room for new things to come — particularly when things start going downhill. You’ll hear people say, man, I can’t stand my job, or I need to do something new, and I need something, or I really want something fresh in my life, and they’re positive, and then they happen to lose their job. And they’re like, man; I was being positive, I thought I was supposed to be positive through this whole time, why did I lose my job? Well, to me, I’m simply thinking, first of all, we’re just looking at one page in the story. We’re just looking at one scene in the movie. And the other thing is, room is being made for something new. Room is being made for something better.
I want you to write this down. New things can’t happen in the old way. New things that are happening in your life can’t happen the old way it did, or else it will continue to happen the way it did in the past. New things don’t happen in the old way. Sometimes it means that you got to experience something that might seem bad at first. But for new things to happen, it won’t happen the old way. Start to embrace some of the things that are happening during the challenges because it means new things are coming. Don’t turn around and head backward. You’ve got to continue to move forward.
Environment
The fourth thing you have to do is you have to create an environment that’s conducive to having faith and be able to continue to move forward. A lot of people might have someone in their life that’s saying, you know what man, the odds are bad right now and I think you just need to cash it in. I think you need to turn around. This is costing a lot of money. Or, this is far too much time for you. You’ve got to look at your reason why you’re doing it. You’ve got to evaluate the situation and say, you know what, I’m doing this for a reason.
But you got to put yourself around people who are going to be able to encourage you through these times. Because you can’t do this alone, I’ll be the first to say; I was the guy who would never listen. I thought I could do everything on my own and I would put this burden on my back like it was a badge of honor to do all the things on my own. I started seeing it was much easier to carry my weight with other people. To be able to have people encourage you, inspire you, speak life into you during those times where you really need some help. That environment will be with people.
Also, create a routine of reading something every single day that is going to encourage you. Personally, I like the Bible, but there’s a lot of other books that instruct and inspire in terms of routines that you can do that will also create a mindset that you can continue to move forward. That’s also part of your environment, is your mindset. The things that you’re reading are the things that you’re inputting. These people who are speaking to us, they’re putting an input of belief into our brain, and that’s really what we’re trying to do is create an environment to help us believe despite the odds.
Prayer
Then last but not least, you guys know I’m a person of faith. You got to pray. I mention prayer oftentimes whenever I’m talking on these Tuesday Topics, but, you have to understand what prayer is. Prayer is really a request. Oftentimes, and I’m not talking about thanks, we definitely pray, and we thank God. But I’m talking about praying for strength, praying for something and having a very strong request for something.
I want you to think about it this way. We oftentimes ask our friends for things, like, hey, I really need you to do this for me. It can be something you’re very passionate about. I’m running late, and I need you to do this for me. Can you please do this? I need a favor. Can you help me? Can you please? Oftentimes, we will plead with people for the things that we want and need. But for some reason, when we pray, it’s extremely nonchalant.
I want you to think about it this way. If you really saw what you’re trying to accomplish as an absolute request, it is a request to the person, to the God who can make anything happen, why would your request not be on the same order of passion and desire as you would a human being for some of the more trivial things that we need on a daily basis? It should be with extreme passion the things that you’re going for, that you’re praying for and with absolute belief. And if you believe that what you are doing, that you are helping and serving people more, then you would say listen to my prayer, I’m offering up with an extreme amount of desire and passion. So as you pray, I want you to think about it that way. It’s a request, and you have to think about the request that there is an actual answer. There’s a possibility for an answer. So you got to pray with a certain amount of desire and heart and enthusiasm as you ask for that request.
To summarize the five things that you need to do to be able to say, you know what, Not today odds. The odds are against you, and this is how you’re going to say, forget the odds. I’m going to win, regardless.
First thing you got to do is you got to have a vision, Crystal clear vision with thought and emotion.
The second thing you got to do, you got to have faith. Live your life like you know the end to that movie already.
The third is, you got to have a mentality. This is the part where I talk about controlling your thoughts. You got to be able to control your thoughts and say, know this is all maybe not going good, but instead of my thoughts of negativity and fear and worry really just makes me feel terrible. And by the way, worry and fear aren’t going to make things happen any faster. The third part is the mentality that, you know what? It’s just a snapshot. I’m just in one scene of my movie here. And, new things can’t happen the old way, so life is just making room for me.
The fourth thing is, you got to create an environment around yourself, people, a routine, reading.
Then the last thing is prayer.
As always, I hope this helps. Make sure you share this with someone. These are principles that not only have I learned but through the grace of God, helped a lot of people in their life be able to have more success, more fulfillment, live life at a higher level and be the person that they deserve and that really you deserve to be. If that’s the case, make sure you share this information with someone so that it can affect their life.
