Hero (7 page)

You might think, “I’ve got time to follow my dreams.” You don’t have time. Life is short. The current life expectancy is 24,869 days. While some of us will live more days and some fewer, either way you have only a precious number of days to live this life, and so you do not have time to put off your dreams. It is now or never. If you don’t do it now, you will keep putting it off, and you’ll never do it. The time is
now!

“‘Someday’ is a disease that will take your dreams to the grave with you…”

Timothy Ferriss

Author of The 4-Hour Workweek

Simply realizing that no one else is going to make your dreams come true is a big step. Your boss, friends, partner, family, and children cannot live your life for you. You are responsible for creating a life that makes you happy and fulfilled. No one else can do that for you.

MICHAEL ACTON SMITH

The most important thing people need to do is take responsibility for their actions. It’s very easy to blame your upbringing or lack of money or lack of this or that. But if you stop and say, “You know what? There is no one ultimately responsible for my life but myself,” that is the really important step you can take to realize that you have to shape things up. You have to change your mind-set. You have to change that job. You have to change whatever it is to make things happen.

LIZ MURRAY

When we’re kids we’re onto something that adults lose. Everything is new and exciting, but also anything’s really possible. Then something happens. We fail, we get rejected, we get disappointed. We atrophy that part of ourselves, and we get way too serious. But what if you woke up every day and you just said, “What if I went for the things that I want? My dreams?” You hit the alarm clock, you put your feet on the floor, and you just go for it. To have that magic back in your life... to live for the sake of possibility.

You might be afraid to go after what you want in life because you think you could fail, but remember that you will never receive the call to follow a dream unless you have the wherewithal to accomplish that dream and turn it into a reality.

LAIRD HAMILTON

The fear of failure stops people from doing a lot of things. My mom used to have a saying, that we’re each our greatest inhibitors – that we stop ourselves.

Another way we can stop ourselves is to think that there are no good ideas or opportunities left, and use that as our excuse not to make anything of our life. If you think there are no good opportunities, look at how easily Paul Orfalea found a golden opportunity.

While standing in a line to use a library photocopier, Paul Orfalea saw something that nobody else saw. He thought to himself, “If there’s a line here, there must be lines in other places.” And from that simple observation, the idea of Kinko’s was born.

PAUL ORFALEA

If I have any good attributes, I know how to be in the present. You can’t see opportunity if you are not in the moment.

MICHAEL ACTON SMITH

A lot of people look at successful people and just shrug it off and say, “Oh, they’ve been lucky.” But in life you make your own luck, and when those opportunities come you are ready to jump on them.

ANASTASIA SOARE

Opportunities are in front of everybody every day. It’s almost like a train station; everybody is in the station, there are trains that stop in front of people, but they have their eyes closed. They don’t have their eyes open to see and get onto that train. Opportunities are everywhere.

G. M. RAO

You do not need a big dream to do a big thing. Just be open to life’s opportunities.

“People will try to tell you that all of the great opportunities have been snapped up. In reality, the world changes every second, blowing new opportunities in all directions, including yours.”

Ken Hakuta – Dr. Fad

Inventor

The Illusion of Security

Don’t let money and security dictate your choices in life. Life continually changes; companies change hands, go bankrupt, or relocate overseas, jobs are lost, or economic collapse brings about massive cutbacks. You can lose your job, your savings, and your house. Marriages can end, health challenges can appear, and circumstances can arise that throw the security you thought you had out the door. I chose financial security over following my dreams, and when I was fired, I was clearly shown that the security I thought I had was all in my mind. Real security means knowing there
is
no security, because then you will make sure you live every day of your life to the fullest.

MASTIN KIPP

Family and friends, while they love you and while they want what’s best for you, unless you have a kick-ass mom or dad or a kick-ass environment that you grew up in, generally they’re going to want you to take the financially safe path where there’s certainty and safety.

MICHAEL ACTON SMITH

As painful as it might be in the short term to step away from the security and a job that is paying well, you’ve got decades of life to live. You might as well suffer a bit of short-term pain to find something you love, even at a lower salary. Because if you do a job you love, you will end up being successful in so many other ways.