Why the mind’s a powerful tool that shapes success and failure
Rear view of young woman standing on cliff with her hands raised towards sky and looking at the sea.
What you need to know:
- A successful man sees further than his current struggles.
- Always keep your goal in mind and shut out the noise.
I remember a time when I was told that mentality is everything on your path to success but refused to believe it. Honestly, at 13 what did I know?
Now, three years later, I have come to learn that mentality really does matter a lot when working towards any goal.
Let us begin with a quote by Harry Houdini, one of the greatest known to mankind, “My brain is the key that sets me free.”
In the book “40 Days” by Alton Gansky, he writes of Harry Houdini, quite the legend and of course his one failure to escape a jail cell.
Harry Houdini had accepted an invitation to demonstrate his skill. He walked into a jail cell and was left there. For hours he worked at the lock but couldn’t unlock it.
Who would have thought the great Houdini, his prowess as an escapist suddenly confined, but only in his mind for when he leaned against the door in defeat, it fell open. It had never been locked. Harry Houdini had trapped himself in his own mind.
We’ve all been in situations where we became captive of our own minds.
Take for example the “I’m not ready yet” people.
No pain, no gain
Fear of pain, discomfort and failure are better prison locks than those found on the jail cells in the United States Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility.
The pain-pleasure principle developed by Sigmund Freud suggests that the core of all choices made by people are either to decrease pain or create pleasure.
As the axiom goes, “no pain, no gain”. Tony Robbins said: “The secret to success is learning how to use pain and pleasure, instead of having pain and pleasure use you.”
The decisions you make depend on how you choose to interpret pain and pleasure.
We must therefore redefine pain and pleasure to ourselves in order to break through our mental prisons.
So then we must understand that mentality is directly proportional to your success and that a negative mind can cripple a man.
So, the next time it’s hard to get out of bed, remember that it is all in your head. Get up and do what you love.
A successful man sees further than his current struggles.
Always keep your goal in mind and shut out the noise.
Abigail Nyambura is a Form Two student at Bishop Gatimu Ngandu Girls' high school.
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