A lot of us have been asked the question, "If you had one wish, what what you would wish for?". People can ask for more wishes, because they know they want more than one thing. Some of us can answer that question, where we believe if we just get that one thing, we will be happy. Say you do get that thing you wanted, it may be a new phone, or a new house, or an advance in your salary. What happens next? Well, you will start thinking of other things you want. I strongly believe that the human mind has unlimited wants. If I gave you 24 hours to create a "Wish List", and you were given everything on that wish list, your mind will still find a way to think of other things you want.
We must set goals in order to achieve what we want, but once we achieve those goals, we must set new goals for ourselves. My first goal going into high school was to make the freshman basketball team. Since 3rd grade I have been playing basketball and I wanted it to pay off. When I got to tryouts, I realized how much better I was than most of the players trying out. I was sure that if I worked hard and showed I belonged on the team, I was going to get a spot on the roster. Me believing that I was better than most of the players, was not going to be good enough, I had to prove I was better and show what I can bring to the team.
Since then, I have constantly set goals for myself. I wanted to make JV, make Varsity, be a captain, play college basketball. I wanted to pass my classes, get a 3.0 GPA, get straight A's, go to college. I want to be a coach, I want to be a head coach, I want to coach at a college, I want to coach in the NBA. With setting these goals, I know that I have to work for them in order to achieve them. Being on a team last year, does not mean you are guaranteed a spot on the team next year. Getting a good grade on one test, does not mean you will get a good grade for the class. You have to continue to work hard on a consistent bases.
God has given you a plan, a purpose rather; along with that purpose, He has given you UNLIMITED potential. Not one human being is limited by their circumstances in order to fulfill God's plan. You are able to overcome being poor, you are able to overcome being small, you are able to overcome school. I believe there is no greater achievement, than doing something that no one has ever done before and doing something people told you that you could not do. In able to achieve that, you have to overcome an obstacle where you had to prove you are worthy. People will write you off with an eye test. If a coach sees that you are short and skinny, he or she will probably think you will not make the team or cannot help them. So what do you have to do? Show you belong and prove your worthy. If you dress a certain way, a teacher can see that you do not care about school and are not intelligent, but yet you can show by your hard work, that no matter what, you will prove that you are smart!
We will all fail and we will all have success, but the way you respond to both failures and achievements, will determine how you live your life. When we fail, we can easily get down on ourselves and give up. The greatest successors have failed because of how they responded to their failures. After you fail, the best thing to do is get an even stronger passion to get better. Whenever I lost a game, or I received a bad grade, I would get a really bad feeling. So I would do everything I could, to learn from my mistakes and get better, so I would not have that bad feeling again. Will I lose again? Will I fail? Most likely, but in order for me to become successful, is for me to not accept I am a failure. The people that have success, have failed MANY times, but they do not call themselves failures. The ultimate fail, is failing and calling yourself a failure.
Responding to success can give a lot of people a sense of entitlement. What I mean by that, is that with success, people will begin to think that they are better than everybody and they do not have to work hard anymore. When you get a good grade on a test, that does not mean you do not have to work hard to get a good grade on the next test. You must learn that, the reason why you received a good grade on the test, is because you worked hard and studied for it. So that means if you want the same or better result, then you have to work hard and study. If you win a game, if you win a championship, that does not mean you do not have to work hard to win the next game and defend your title. If anything, you will have to work even harder because it is a lot harder to defend a title than it is to win it. Because once you win a championship, next year other teams will step their game up to take that title away from you. Just like we are supposed to learn from our mistakes and failures, we are to learn from our achievements as well.
Do not dwell on what you did yesterday, because you can achieve a lot more today. Losses and wins, are not to be thought about, they are to be a learning experience. Never get too down about a loss and never get too high off a win. Because it will effect your next game. You see it all the time in sports, a team can pull off a great upset, but then lose to a team that they are better than. Why does this happen? Is because a team can dwell so much on a big win, that they are distracted in game planning for the next game.
This is how life is, we can achieve great things, but if we dwell on those things, it will be harder to achieve even greater things. In order to build good character, you have to continue to do the right things. You cannot do something bad for your company, then tell your boss that it should be excused because you did a great thing for the company a few weeks ago. This life is not based on what you have you done, it is on what have you done lately? And what you have done in the past, should have the same qualities as to what you have done lately.
That is what showing you belong is all about. Showing each and every day that you are worthy and not dwelling on the past.
Hall of Fame running back Walter Payton told us that if you are good, you will tell everyone. But if you are great, people will tell you. Let the success be your noise, not your words. Work hard in silence, because the times when I got better, is when no one was watching me. There is extra work I did that my teachers did not know about and there are many hours I put in the gym that my coaches did not know about. But when I had to show that I belonged on the team, I was prepared because I worked hard for those opportunities. Along with my hard work in silence, teachers and coaches would and still do, talk highly of me and recommend me to colleges, teams, and jobs. Like I always stress, look at the bigger picture while you are painting the small details. In order to get the bigger picture, you have to start out by creating these little details.
Thank you all again for reading and I hope this helps with any situation you are in! Enjoy the holidays!
Chris Perez
Twitter: @C_P_2
Instagram: cperez02
Facebook: Chris E Perez
