Why Do Smart People Sometimes Find Success So Difficult?

You're working your tail off trying to create a business that will make a profit. Maybe you're even working smart and not just hard, but yet you constantly feel like you're on a treadmill and not getting anywhere. How many times have you watched as someone else thought up the same ideas as you had, ideas that you could never find the time or money to act on, ideas that you knew would not only work but be extraordinarily successful, how many times have you watched as others took those same ideas and made them a reality, their reality? It's frustrating, very frustrating. Kind of like watching your best friend always get the girls you like.

I've not conducted any study on percentages of people who have this problem, but I'll bet its pretty high among those people who actually try to better their situation in life. What's more, I'd wager that it may even parallel, or track, intelligence. In other words, smarter people may experience this more often than average or even less than average people. Why? I'll answer that in a second, after I make a somewhat educated guess at the cause.

What do I think causes this?

• Lack of focus on one project,


• Trying to do too many things at once,


• Thinking you're superman or superwoman

That's why smarter people may suffer this problem more often, because they think they can juggle all their different projects and keep all the balls in the air - they try too hard. A person of lesser smarts may know that they can't handle it and may naturally choose to finish one thing at a time. And they come out ahead.

You think I'm nuts? I'm not. I know a lot of really smart guys who should be rich, wealthy beyond their wildest dreams, but they're not. They have had some great ideas. They have the ability to create and implement. Yet they still just scrape by. I also know a lot of people who may not be as gifted intellectually, yet they have succeeded.

Get your shovel
Picture two people who each have to dig a long ditch. They only have one regular shovel each. The first guy spends an hour or so each day digging and the rest of the time trying to invent a better shovel, or build an excavator out of an old riding mower and spare parts he found laying around. The second guy spends all but an hour or two of each day digging. He spends a little time each day looking around for a better digging device and sharpening the edge of his shovel, but most of his time he spends digging. Who do you think finishes their ditch first? Guy number two wins. Heck, guy number one may NEVER get his ditch finished!

Which type person are you, guy number one, or guy number two?

Guy number two finishes his ditch and by doing so allows water to flow from a pond to his corn field. He now can grow a much larger crop of corn than he could before, enough corn that he has more than he can eat and can even sell a sizable amount. This gives him enough money to plant more corn and some other vegetables. He clears more land, digs more ditches, buys a tractor, buys a pickup truck, and hires a few helpers. The cycle continues until he has created a very successful business and lives a good life. All because he focused on getting one thing accomplished and accomplished well, and then moving on to the next thing.

Each step leads to another and another and another.
I remember going on long hikes in Boy Scouts. We'd always ask the Scout Master how much longer until we're there. If he'd given us the full answer, we probably would have sat down and given up. Instead he would say just over that hill or just up around that bend. It's amazing how much ground you can cover when you're not worried about how far you have to go. By concentrating on small steps you can achieve anything.

While it's tempting to try and act on every idea you have that you think might be successful, it's not the smart thing to do. Write them down so you don't forget them, but, as painful as it may be to let that new idea just sit there, let it. Finish the ditch you're digging now before starting the next one.

Until next time,
Fred

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