In my post "As good as the best", I left a nice little quote at the very end, it says this: ""I would rather have a human friend, than a solid, unbreakable statue". I believe this with all my heart. When you get a mentor, don't just look for all the perfections, look for the imperfections as well - because that's what makes him a human. You will learn a lot more from his mistakes than you will learn from his perfection.
Now to today's article!
The term
resource is often related to things like: money, time, power, house, looks and other materialistic things and often times people will complain that given that they don't have enough resources, they can't move ahead. I was one of those people. I used to tell myself that if I only had more money or a car, I could go out more and have more friends and achieve more. I used to tell myself that if I had a house, instead of an apartment, then I would live better. I used to tell myself that if I was taller, I could get more girls (yes, I'm short) and that if I had better luck, then I would get more things.
Soon enough after joining this journey of Personal Growth, I realized that I didn't need a car to go out more, to have more friends or to achieve more. I realized that I didn't need a big house to live happily. I realized that I didn't need to be taller to get more girls, while being taller certainly would help, it didn't define things. More than anything, I realized that luck comes to those who work hard enough. It's an interesting phenomenon, the harder you work, the luckier you get. For example, the harder I worked on myself, the more business and job opportunities I received. The more I worked on my social skills, the luckier I got with other people - they would offer to take me to places, give me gifts, treat me nicely and so on.
While external resources can certainly give you an edge of advantage, they certainly don't define you - but you already know this, so let's take it a bit farther: External resources were some time along the way achieved as a result of what was done with internal resources, more likely the internal resources from your parents or whoever you live with. Take that line and think about it for a second. If your parents' internal resources were leadership, discipline, gratitude, persistence and so on, and they were also resources at a high level, then you're very likely to have grown up in a house of wealth or at least you're in one now. If the levels of these resources were low or zero, then chances are you have grown in a household that didn't cultivate a lot of wealth. Another example would be living in a household where the parents have internal resources of love, caring, spirituality, respect, hard-work and so on at a high level, then your house hold is very likely to have inspired the same things in you, while the income may not have been so high (or maybe it was), there are stronger chances that the external resources are other things like close friends, mutual respect and so on. While the examples provided above may not be accurate all the time, the point is that external resources are in direct proportion to internal resources. The higher the level of an internal resource, the more joy you will have in your life.
Let's make a list of the two so that we become more aware of the many resources we have. Internal resources would be: Knowledge, Passion, Leadership, Confidence, Attitude, Skills, Creativity, Persuasiveness. External Resources would be: Money, Technology, Assets, People, Team. In all honesty I have more internal resources in me than external resources to my name, you know what I'm saying?
But as time goes I realize that working on my internal resources allow me to achieve more of the external resources. For example, lately I've been congratulated on my ability to deliver speeches in from of High School classrooms and the same people who congratulated me on that, offered me help at any time I needed it. Go over that list of internal resources, pick one that you believe is at a high level within you and write what that internal resource has helped you achieve. For instance, one of the current girls I'm seeing is a very creative person. She's an artist and her creativity just astounds me, so her internal resource of creativity not only gets my admiration and crazyness (and from other guys as well), but also got her a full scholarship paid for university. Do you see how working on your internal resources help you? What internal resource of your own has allowed you to achieve more? My guess is "Passion", if you're a member of this website, there are strong chances that you have a passion for life and improvement, this level of passion (depending on how high it is) is currently allowing you to live better, feel better and do better. Think about the many other internal resources, write them down and evaluate yourself.
I mentioned once that one can't get more money by working more hours in a job, but as a consequence of that you'll have less time to work on yourself. If you work at a retail store and you know you're not gaining any knowledge there that you don't already have, then chances are you're killing one of your most valuable internal resource:
Knowledge. When given the option to decide whether I would stay in sales and make money or simply drop sales and use my time to educate myself - I went for the latter because I
know that it will only increase my outer resources in the future (or at least, I hope so).
Work on your internal resources even if it means to give up some of those external resources, like making a couple of more dollars. If you're getting paid $8.25 per hour and you choose to work 60 hours a week, instead of 40 hours, then you're killing 20 hours of your time. Those 20 hours can be used for 5 hours a week for working out, other 5 hours a week for reading, other 5 hours for your social skills, other 5 for your daily writing. At the end, those accumulated 20 hours will only enrich the person you're - and while you may make more money now, it won't last you too long given that you're losing something else: Knowing how to invest it.
The good news for us is the following -
we already have the internal resources we need to succeed, it's just a matter of cultivating them. Acknowledge your resources and then work on them. Don't deny yourself of them. Don't tell yourself that you don't have the leadership it takes to lead a team into victory or that you don't have the discipline to make a great income or the charisma it takes to get an amazing girlfriend. Don't deny yourself that, acknowledge you have it and make the decision to enrich them. The results you begin to see will convince you more with time, and soon enough you'll find yourself wanting to cultivate them more and more.
Internal resources are also more secure than external resources. While having a job, an income and a dream can entirely destroyed by the words "You're fired", no one can take away what you're made of. More than anything, what you make on your own will be harder to be taken away unless you make a couple of mistakes or someone more astude/evil comes along the way. To get a better understanding of this, check out
this post
In the end, just ask yourself the following question: Is the effort I'm putting into this worth the outcome? If your answer is no, then you may want to consider doing something else.
It was a pleasure writing this, I hope you enjoy it and than more souls are fed.
P.S. Sorry it's late, I got allergies today and spent most of the day sleeping
Internal and External Resources - How much can you get
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