Life is like a camera. Focus on what is important and capture the good times. Develop an optimistic attitude which never includes dwelling on the negatives, and if needed, take another shot.
Expecting every minute of our lives to be picture perfect isn’t realistic, but we can create picture perfect moments and experiences along the way.
How have you turned negative experiences into something a bit more picture perfect? Life gives us plenty of exposure to disappointments and heartaches. When we focus on the positive, shoot a few retakes, and keep our eye on the goal, picture perfect moments are the result.
Let’s be candid about reality.
No matter how difficult, it becomes necessary to dig down deeply within ourselves to produce the iron will to continue in a positive direction. Typically, that doesn’t happen in a flash, but takes significant fortitude for a retake on the situation and determination to enlarge our optimism despite setbacks. It is that change of mindset that keeps us moving forward when we face unexpected challenges.
We hit a brick wall and we pick ourselves up and go on.
After all, a successful person is one who can build a firm foundation with the bricks others have thrown at him or her. We experience heartaches and disappointments, and we pick ourselves up and go on.
Our expectations may not pan out as we expected, so once again, we pick ourselves up and go on.
Consider examples of two historically legendary icons who created their lives from negatives.
In 1914, Thomas Edison, inventor of the incandescent light bulb, phonograph and the motion picture camera, as well as improving the telegraph and telephone, lost his factory to fire. Edison watched his lifetime effort go up in smoke and is quoted in The New York Times as saying, “Although I am over 67 years old, I’ll start all over again tomorrow.”
Edison failed 10,000 times before perfecting the incandescent electric light bulb. Don’t worry if you fail once. Edison had an extraordinarily positive perception of life that greatly enhanced his ability as an inventor.
The good news is that Edison does not own the patent on optimism! We each have the ability to develop the same mindset.
At 65 years old, KFC Colonel Sanders found himself penniless. It was then his international fame and financial success story began. Having retired in his 60s, he was determined to sell the world on his new chicken recipe. He traveled to different restaurants and cooked his fried chicken on the spot for restaurant owners. If the owner liked the chicken, they would enter into a handshake agreement to sell the Colonel’s chicken. Legend has it that Colonel Sanders heard “no”1009 times before he heard his first “yes.”
He struck up a deal that for each piece of chicken the restaurant sold, Sanders would receive a nickel. The restaurant would receive packets of the Colonel’s secret herbs and spices in order to avoid disclosing his proprietary recipe. By 1964, Colonel Sanders had 600 franchises selling his trademark chicken. Did you know that his first franchise was in Salt Lake City, Utah? In 1976, the Colonel was ranked as the world’s second most recognizable celebrity. Sanders wouldn’t let anything or anyone defeat him.
Don’t you find it amazing how Colonel Sanders started at the age of 65, the age when most people retire, and built a global empire out of fried chicken?
Neither of these famous men allowed negatives to stop them from creating their picture perfect lives and nor should we!
To succeed we must focus on the good times, develop greater determination to succeed from the negatives, and when things do not work out like we expect, we take another shot!
Excerpts taken from www.britannica.com. Other information found from snagajob.com and en.wickipedia.com.
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