How many of us know how to ride a bike? Probably, all of us. But nobody thought it was easy to say goodbye to the training wheels. After multiple falls and bruises, we think of surrendering, not continuing, and finally we successfully maintain balance and keep pedalling on our own. Thanks to our perseverance we reach our objective. It is our constant fight to reach our goals what makes us keep going on.
However, determination implies lots of things. One formula that summarizes this is the one Victor Küppers mentions; V=(K+S)*A, this is, that value is equal to knowledge plus skill times attitude.Knowledge, skills, talent… all of these are important, they make the job easier. That being said, attitude multiplies the value, meaning it is the most important factor when it comes to facing a problem. It’s not your aptitude but your attitude which determines your altitude. Lots of people search for the key of success in wrong places, leaving out that what it is essential is attitude. Without perseverance, only having talent is worthless. No matter the challenges you have on your brain, you will not be able to carry out the majority of them. Without perseverance, when an obstacle comes into our path we will stop and we will not be able to continue.
We know we have to fight for what we want. We know that talent by itself is not going to give us everything we want. We know we need to fall to be successful. However, how can we be perseverant? First of all is knowing what you are fighting for: define your objective. If you have a vague idea of your long term objective, in reality you are fighting for nothing. On the contrary, if you wake up every morning with the correct mentality, this mentality of keeping it up no matter the failure because, for example, you want to be a professional tennis player, knowing the amount of time you have to spend, then the motivation is clear.
It is also important not falling into procrastination, not doing something because laziness beat you and you decide to do everything except fulfilling your apparent dream. If you dedicate to something you don’t love, that activity won’t probably be what you really want to do in the future. If there really is an existing motivation in you to reach a goal, you should not let laziness beat you. The fight to fulfil a dream also implies an inner fight to be constant.
Determination is passion and perseverance to reach long term goals, stick to the future and not sticking to next week, next month… and doing it because the objective is worth it, not because of ambition or wanting to reach the goal at all cost. Determination is not avoiding difficulties, as the path to success is full of them, but to know that stumbling is not determining. We determine if a fall is an obstacle or a lesson. This is why determination implies accepting failure.
To conclude, going back to our example, we must not be scared to ride a bike without training wheels. We should take the risk of falling, and if we fall, stand up and try again, because this is the only way of learning. To sum up, we must persevere, chase our goals so that we can finally pedal alone for a long time.
