Drop that Grass Hopper Mentality
Success is a perception affair, people see us as we see ourselves, and when we open our mouths to speak they get to see into our minds. Spend some time with some one you consider Successful, you will notice 3 incredible things about them:
• They think healthily well of themselves.
• They don’t speak in the negative.
• They exude confidence
One of my favorite books by John Maxwell is called “Attitude, The Difference Maker” the main ideas he articulates is that success can be gotten by doing so many things, but the thing that holds it all together is “attitude”. You can call it an aura, you can call it airs, but success rubs off, and does so through attitudes that are communicated by the way people perceive themselves and communicate what they perceive.
A story is told of a group of people that was migrating from a land in which they had been slaves for over 400 years. The land they were moving to occupy was a given, it was already delivered into their hands. In a bid to get an understanding of what they were up against they sent a dozen spies to check out the land.
The land was the most fertile piece of real estate you ever did see, I mean the temperatures were right; it had scenic views and cascading waterfalls. The birds in the land sung angelic tunes. The earth was so fertile in this place that the vine produced fruit too heavy for a single warrior to carry.
The apparent downside of the land was that the inhabitants were giants or champions if you like, the men that went to spy were considerably physically smaller in comparison to the men of the land.
This physical mismatch so intimidated 10 of the 12 men that in their report they said, “We were like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and no match for the giants”. This report spread panic in the whole migrants camp that they begun to scurry around like frightened grasshoppers around the light, in every way paralyzed by fear.
The story ends when over 600,000 failed to enter their promised land save for 2 young men who believed that they had in them what it took to take the land, but they also had confidence in the finished work of God and that he was on their side, hence “mental over match.”
Like the 600,000, I know very many people who sabotage themselves and the potential for success simply because they have no faith in themselves, they think of themselves as inferior, not good enough, damaged goods, not connected enough, not educated enough, not fluent enough, not popular enough, not strong enough, not experienced enough not brilliant enough, too young, too broke.
These perceptions place a stumbling block between us and our dreams and our success, these negative self perceptions arise out of a fear of venturing out to be all you can be lest you fall along the way.
Like the migrants, every success story has a giant in its plot, a goliath in its cast. One of my mentors once told me, “there would be no David without goliath, the two go hand in hand, just like Success and resistance.” The story of King David is a great one in discussing success, but the part that is often forgotten is the attitude of the young man as he approached his enemy, he said, “this day will the Lord deliver you into my hand, and I will kill you and sever your head from your shoulders, and give the corpses of your army to the fowls of the air” 1 Samuel 17:46
The young man went ahead to do exactly as he imagined in his (perception) head and had said (communication). The lesson to take from here in our quest for success is that we must always think ourselves to be, competent enough to do that Job, to have a great marriage, get promoted, land the business deal, affirm and confirm it by what we say, My simple success formula would be: Success {f(perception+affirmation*confirmation)attitude.}
1. Have A Big Reason Why