For review, here are the first four questions to ask yourself when thinking about your own personal success:
- Q1: Which is easier to accomplish: to make the world adjust to my particular needs or for me to adjust to the world as it is today?
- Q2: Who is best suited to fix my personal problems, politicians in Washington DC or me?
- Q3: Which will ultimately result in a better me: continued dependency or self-reliance?
- Q4: Which is most likely to help me succeed: to pull some other person down or help someone else succeed?
The fifth questions to ask when thinking about your own personal success is the most important question of all because your answer will determine the direction of your life: Am I a victim or a victor?
A victim is someone who thinks the whole world is against him/her, that everything is rigged, that others have it easy, that the reason for their cheerless, unsuccessful life is racism or sexism or ageism or their zip code or anyone or anything else they can find to blame.
At the beginning of this series I told you about a lady who was acting and talking like a victim, that the whole world was involved in a conspiracy to cause her failure and sorrow. Here is a summary of what I told her:
“You need to change the way you talk and think. You need to stop thinking and talking about your problems and think and talk about solutions. You need to stop being a victim and start being a victor. Sure life is tough and it sounds like you have many very difficult problems, but I believe you can solve them. Will it be easy? Heck no, but your life will change for the better when you seek solutions to your problems rather than wallow in them.”
Time was running out and I could see she was tired of my little sermon, so I ended with this:
“Learn to be thankful for what you have. You have a good job, a place to live, a car that runs, food to eat, a bed to sleep in and relatively good health. One of the results of a victim mentality is that it blinds you from the little blessings you enjoy each day. It poisons your spirit, limits your vision, and inhibits personal growth. Your sprit needs nourishment not poison. A good place to begin is to start thanking God for what you have.”
You probably wonder if she has changed her life at all, if she heard anything I said. That may be what you wonder, but it’s not what I wonder. I wonder if you have heard anything or learned anything. I wonder if YOU will change YOUR life.
Let me reprise a paragraph from Question 1: Here is the important lesson: You are designed to grow, to learn, and to improve your lot in life no matter how bad your present reality is. You are not like everyone else; you are not to be a victim of your circumstances. You are to be fully and uniquely you.
Ask all five questions and in answering them you will get the right answers to your life.
©2015 Ronald D. Ross
