Prepare For Greatness

Some people die with all the potential in the world still inside of them. Never even tapping into or trying to release the gifts and talents within. It never occurs to some that they can be all they can be. They can’t see it and they don’t believe it. They may have paintings on pads that no one will ever see, writings never published, songs never sung, speeches never given, ideas never expressed, dreams never reached for. And it all comes down to perception. Do you perceive your potential? Can you see it? Do you believe it’s real. Before you can believe, achieve or receive you must perceive. It has to be possible to you that what you have on the inside is unique and valuable. Even if you can share it with just one other person. Your gift may not have been meant for everyone but it was meant for someone. This is what you must perceive in order to receive the satisfaction of utilizing your gift. We were not all meant to be on the world’s stage. But that does not lessen the importance of what you were meant to accomplish. The person you touch will go on to touch someone else and on and on. What you do with the time and life you are given is very important. But you have to perceive this first. I love the excerpt from Marianne Williamson’s book Return To Love that speaks about our deepest fear not being that we are inadequate but that we are powerful beyond measure and that we were born to manifest the glory of God that is within us. And that it is not just in some of us but all of us.

But perceiving you can achieve is only part of the battle. Once you perceive it you have to move in the direction of your gift. By that I mean talent is not enough. You have to fine tune your craft. Work hard at perfecting your gift with practice. Train with someone and do not be afraid of critiques. Great athletes and artists do not practice in a bubble. They have trusted people around them to help them hone their craft. I recently watched a press conference where they were speaking with Beyoncé as she prepares to deliver her half time performance at the Super Bowl. This will be the largest audience of her career. She said she was born for this. The reporters asked her was she ready and she said yes I am ready, I am well rehearsed. That stuck out to me because people were criticizing her because she sang along with her own track for the President’s inauguration, which she admitted she didn’t have adequate time to prepare for because she was preparing for the Super Bowl. This artist is obviously a multi-talented performer. This young woman is extremely gifted. She can sing, she can dance and she is beautiful. But she is not relying on any of that to be ready for the performance of a lifetime. She is ready because she is well rehearsed. She is not relying on what she is capable of doing she has practiced to make sure she does it!

So you have to first perceive you are gifted, believe you can do it, and take the necessary steps in preparation to achieve it. If you leave out one of these steps you will doom yourself to failure which in turn will dull your passion and kill your spirit. And in turn you will settle into mediocrity. Don’t fall for that trap! When you find your passion (or get it back) you begin to see the possibilities. Don’t get bogged down with disappointments. Life is full of them. Brush them off because if you don’t they will set up camp in your heart and will not leave room for anything else but a bad attitude and ineffective, unproductive thoughts of what might have been. Live a life of no regrets not a life of no mistakes. We have got to get real on this. Failure happens to all of us. Live, learn and keep it moving forward with new wisdom for a better day. Be the star on your own stage. Be all that you can be in whatever you choose to do. Encourage yourself which in turn will encourage others. And as a professional basketball player once said at a news conference: are we really here talking about practice? we’re talking about practice? we’re talking about practice? practice?…….. Yes Practice! Prepare for Greatness!