The Choice:
A. An abundant universe of untapped potential
B. A universe of scarcity, opposition, and limited opportunity
Your answer to this all-important question, whichever it may be, points you toward the "A" corner of Sandler's famous Success Triangle – your attitude, also known as your self-concept.
Your attitude is a "complex mental state" defining, moment by moment, the interactive dynamic between yourself and your company, your product, your market, your relationship with others, and so on. It can be positive (for example, answering "A" to the previous question), leading to an outlook of possibility; or it can be negative (answering "B" to the previous question), leading to an outlook of limitation. That's up to you.
In other words, you can choose to see all the ways to make something happen, or you can choose to see all the obstacles that would prevent it from happening. A powerful quote often attributed to Viktor Frankl, the Holocaust survivor and founder of logotherapy, is relevant here: "Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."
This insight emphasizes the human capacity for conscious choice and self-determination. It highlights the reality that our attitude, our self-concept, is not predetermined, as we might imagine. Nor is it settled into a specific pattern based on habit. Instead, it is the result of our own deliberate, moment-by-moment decision-making in the instant between stimulus and response.
You really can choose which outlook you will maintain—one of possibility or one of limitation. The choice you make has a greater impact on your ability to reach your goals than almost any other element. Why?
Because we human beings tend to develop beliefs that are shaped by our outlook. From those beliefs, we make judgments about which actions are appropriate and which are not. And it is from those actions that we achieve outcomes which, by the nature of how they evolved in our world, usually serve to reinforce the original outlook.
You always have a choice. Success is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Most of it happens between the ears.
Here's an interesting thought experiment. Grab a sheet of paper (or open a document you can write in). Identify two or three areas of your life where your chosen focus now tends to lean more toward limitation than possibility. For each, describe the potential benefits of refocusing your thoughts on positive outcomes.
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