When the game is over, the locker room is empty and the fanfare has come to a halt, there’s a moment of deafening silence…the silence of one’s own heart facing life head-on. From the stadium walks not an athlete, but a man; a man who stands in his street clothes – just him, his personality, his character. When it’s all said and done, he has nothing else. Whatever he owns, whatever limelight is shining on him now, will eventually dim and all he will have left is himself.
The trappings of life; the gold, the glitz, the glitter, and the glamour can fade at a moment’s notice. Just ask one of the 78% of NFL players who find themselves traveling to the intersection of broke and busted within five years of retiring. Only those who are ingrained with a sense of personal accountability will drive to post-career satisfaction and personal victory.
But what about you, the entrepreneur? Without your business, without your enterprises, who are you? What identifies the core of your character?
Maybe it’s time to take an assessment of who you are today, at this moment. Every key person and each key circumstance in your life has helped shaped you into the person you’ve become. You may have chosen to allow bitterness and anger, or self-pity to take root due to life circumstances. Or, you may have chosen to allow life to empower you and strengthen your inner resolve.
Have you been stuck at the intersection of broke, busted, and disgusted? Have you cruised on the highway of gold, glitz, glitter, and the glamour of a successful career? Some of us have driven in both worlds.
I think most of us have in mind what emotional, spiritual, physical, financial, relational, and vocational destinations we see ourselves arriving at; where we’d like to be at a certain stage in our lives. Sometimes I think we focus entirely too much on the destination and forget to enjoy the everyday moments that teach us the lessons that will help us value and cherish those destinations. So, take some time to evaluate where you are right now and who you have become.
“Our business in life is not to get ahead of others, but to get ahead of ourselves, to break our own records, to outstrip our yesterday by our today, to do our work with more force than ever before.”
Stewart B. Johnson
