Motivational and inspirational advice goes from the calm, to the insane. This post is on the calm side, looking over at crazy. 
Some motivational speakers make extreme examples of what you will have to if you want to have success. You may have seen this type of motivation. The speaker gives a story or example of an awesome, huge challenge someone went through, successfully, in their life. But its too extreme for most people to use.
The point of this post here is not to find fault with any specific idea. The people who give these ideas are correct, from their point of view. But the statements sometimes fit into the fake example below:
“You can do it – reach your dreams – you just have to try harder!
If you didn’t succeed, then you didn’t really try hard enough, or smart enough. “
It’s broad advice. And while we should keep trying, the reason why people don’t succeed are complex, and luck and timing can be involved. There’s also the issue of how hard we want to reach the top.
In one video found online, there is a story of a guru who takes someone out into the water, deeper and deeper. Then when the person is in very deep water, up to their nose, the guru pushes them under the water, and makes the point that you have to want success as much as you want to breathe air. It is a powerful example of what type of motivation can make you successful.
But…
…it is not the only type of motivation that people have used for success. If you are not in a crazy frenzy of desire for a goal, you may still be able to be successful if you calmly plan, then work, your goals in life. You can have tremendous passion, and use that in many ways. Your passion will help you have important qualities, such as focus and energy, in your life.
Money does not mean success, but it is an easy way to measure it for many people.
In preparing this post, a search quickly found different examples of advice, some in the same industry:
- Rapper Curtis James Jackson III, known as 50 Cent, is seen in an interview on success on the 4 qualities of success. He also implies that luck happens – some artists reached success “by accident”, and some tried hard but didn’t get “their shot”
- Grammy-winning rapper & successful entrepreneur Sean Combs is heard saying he was “probably crazy” (in a positive way), and that for success, that you have to believe in yourself.
- If you’re a kid, you might think “easy” if you are 15 years old selling on eBay, or simple hard work if you are 16 years old making a million online.
- You can do as billionaire investor Warren Buffet does often – you can pick the right stock to make “a lot of money” by being patient.
- Steve Jobs communicated in a video clip that you have to love what you do, or you have to be crazy to keep going if you don’t love it.
In general, when someone tells you what you need to do in order to be successful, they may be right. And, they may be wrong, or wrong for your personality and your situation.
There you go. Choose your insanity, if you must. Just enjoy the ride to your personal success.
[ side note: some of the videos referenced above were posted in 2010 and 2011, with links to internet domains that are not active sites now (successnetstory.com and burntheships.org). Hopefully the owners have moved onto success somewhere, but those ventures did not appear to work out, with or without insanity ]
