What Are The Tools Of Life?

“In order to succeed, you must know what you are doing, like what you are doing and believe in what you are doing.” — Will Rogers

In letters or when I’m out speaking to a group, I get asked what motivates me. What makes me do so many things and be so positive? Is it a role model, societal pressures, or divine intervention?

As much as I do have role models and as much as society plays in my life, neither are my motivators. Depending on your religious background, God does have a hand in everything I do, but only to guide. He gives us free will. We make our own choices.

“The spirit, the will to win, and the will to excel are the things that endure. These qualities are so much more important than the events that occur.” — Vince Lombardi

There really isn’t one thing that motivates me, more like many things. I find myself on a continuous quest to learn, to challenge myself. As long as I’m alive, I know I have purpose.

No one ever told me I had to walk, I just wanted to. No one said I had to have a job, I went after a career. If I had an internal engine, it would be in high gear all the time.

“All our dreams can come true — if we have the courage to pursue them.” — Walt Disney

When we were in school, we were asked what we wanted to be when we grew up. Many said things like an astronaut, surgeon, lawyer, fireman or president. I asked my mother what I could be when I was older.

She told me, “Billy, you can be whatever you want to be. As long as you’re willing to try, you will succeed.”

To me it doesn’t seem like I’m trying any harder than anyone else, but I’m constantly told that I am by others. I suppose they think that a certain task could be easier for them than for me. A challenge is just a challenge, nothing more.

“It’s not whether you get knocked down; it’s whether you get up again.” — Vince Lombardi

One time I got knocked down and I had to ask a friend to help me up. He asked me, “Hey, are you the one they coined the phrase after; I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.”

Each challenge in life is an opportunity. An opportunity to share the uniques gifts we’ve been given and how we use them. I may not be able to do certain things the same way others do, but I still do them, in my way.

“For everything you have missed, you have gained something else.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

My mother said I haven’t let much grass grow beneath my feet. My outlook on it is that a new challenge awaits. In any of my challenges, I heed the words of Winston Churchill, “Never, never, never…give up.”