28th February 2011
The majority of men meet with failure because of their lack of persistence in creating new plans to take the place of those, which fail.
Napoleon Hill
In my NLP programmes I talk about the NLP presupposition `there is no such thing as failure, but only feedback'. This means that we have to be sensitive to what we are doing and not merely on what we are getting. If we are not getting what we want, it does not mean that we are wrong, but that our process is not effective. We have to constantly match our process with the changes that are taking place outside us and ensure that we are competitive.
One day we may cease to be effective, our talents can become out of date, our skills may become obsolete, our body may become too weak to sustain our efforts and support our dream. We need to ask a simple question: do I want to be as effective as I have bee? If the answer is yes, reinvent yourself; if the answer is no, quit once and far all!
I recall what I read about how eagles deal with their mid life crisis.
Eagle have the longest longevity amongst the birds and can live upto seventy years. However, in order to live the full life, an eagle has to take an important decision when it reaches forty years of age. At forty its long and flexible talons can no longer grab prey which serves as food; its long and sharp beaks will become bent; Its old aged and heavy wings, due to their thick feathers, become stuck to its chest and make it difficult to fly. Then the eagle is left with only two options: die, or go through a painful process of change that lasts for 150 days. The process requires the eagle to fly to a mountaintop and sit on its nest. There the eagle knocks its beak against the rock until its plucks it out. After plucking it out, the eagle will wait for a new beak to grow back and then it will pluck out its talons. When its new talons grow back, the eagle starts plucking its old-aged feathers. And after five months, the eagle takes its famous flight of rebirth and lives for 30 more years!
Over this weekend, think: in what way your present situation resembles the eagle's predicament and how you are going to reinvent yourself?
N C Sridharan
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