Create Your Own Path

Everyone has dreams; everyone has goals and desires they want to see fulfilled. An important part of achieving these dreams is taking risks, even when the path seems unclear. The journey, whether it’s business related or more personal, is a great opportunity to learn more about yourself and the people around you. No one can tell you how to achieve your vision. Make this journey your own. Success isn’t about how well you can copy someone else. It isn’t about how well you planned out your future since childhood. If your vision is something new and different, you won’t find a well-worn path that leads to its creation. You’ve got to carve your own path.

Here are a few principles to apple so you can carve your own path towards success:

Never Stop Improving!

You may think as you look back into your past and wish you made a better decision. There is no one decision that alters the course of your future. One choice does not determine your destiny. Success depends on what you do over the course of your whole life. To walk on the path to success, you must take a series of footsteps.

Choose to learn from each experience. Take lessons from every failure to gain knowledge and wisdom to improve yourself, the process and your journey. Never get complacent even with success… keep growing and learning so you can only keep advancing your success. There is not such thing as being neutral once you think you have achieved your goal. The moment you stop learning, you become stagnant and begin to fall behind. You either move forward or backward. There is nothing in-between.

Every man must walk his own path. That is why no one can give you a standard, step-by-step instruction manual on how to be successful.

No Two Paths Are Ever the Same!

You can learn lessons from others to apply to your own life, but no two successful people ever took the same exact path. Each person had to carve out his own path, and had to take his own path,

Almost no one ever had a straight path to success; instead it was filled with twists, turns and potholes that were not anticipated or seen. Some may have even wandered off their path a bit. At times there was a step back, and then a few steps forward. This process is shared. The specific experiences are unique to you so embrace your own path. There is no such thing as a conventional road to success; every road is unconventional.

Embrace the process!

The most important thing is not how you started, but how you learn during the process and where you finished. The feeling of not measuring up to who you perceive as your competition should never be a factor.  The longer we let these feelings sink in, the more difficult it will be to shake them off and it will hold you back. Instead, embrace your own and unique adventure so you have your own lessons and story to share when you accomplish your goals.

Find a Role Model, not an Idol!

Chances are, there is someone out there who has accomplished something similar to your dream.  Take a moment to appreciate all of the work they have put in to get to where they are and learn what they have done to get there. If possible, ask if they would be willing to share their story with you. Learn from them vicariously and see how you can apply relevant aspects to your own adventure. If it is impossible to speak with them personally, then imagine roadblocks and difficult years they may have encountered to enjoy their current success.  It is not a matter of measuring up to this person, but rather a matter of allowing them to inspire hope in your own life. You are capable of achieving your dreams as long as you don’t give up. There are so many successful, hardworking individuals out there to look towards for inspiration, and there is no reason that you can’t join them.