At points in time, we feel that we have everything figured out in life, as if we know exactly what we want and how do we want it… Yet we would NOT be willing to do what it takes to get what we really want… It’s probably one of the most mysterious concepts in human psychology…

When I was very young, I have always have admiration to those tiny ANTS who taught me more about determination than probably all the business schools I have ever visited and attended… Those tiny creatures, that NO MATTER how much the 6 years old kid tried to keep them away from their path… They keep going back… And they Won’t Stop!

…Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there.

~Steve Jobs

In this week’s tip, I’d like to highlight something very important, it’s about being determined to get what you really want… What you really want to achieve in Life… That’s why you have to do EVERYTHING THAT YOU NEED TO DO in order to get there… I can list countless examples from productivity to life lessons to economics and even to literature… That shows how most of the times you would NEED to do something you don’t like to get to something you want.

I have done so many talks about motivation to people who really wanted to listen… So many times I can’t even remember, and Yet I can almost still recall every individual talk I’ve had with someone who NEEDED to hear me out..

And I can’t illustrate it better than sharing with you the monologue from a very nice talk between Sean and Will (Robbin Williams and Matt Damon) in the movie Good Will Hunting.

So if I asked you about art you could give me the skinny on every art book ever written… Michelangelo? You know a lot about him I bet. Life’s work, criticisms, political aspirations.
But you couldn’t tell me what it smells like in the Sistine Chapel. You’ve never stood there and looked up at that beautiful ceiling.

And if I asked you about women I’m sure you could give me a syllabus of your personal favorites, and maybe you’ve been laid a few times too.
But you couldn’t tell me how it feels to wake up next to a woman and be truly happy.

If I asked you about war you could refer me to a bevy of fictional and non-fictional material,
but you’ve never been in one. You’ve never held your best friend’s head in your lap and watched him draw his last breath, looking to you for help.

And if I asked you about love I’d get a sonnet, but you’ve never looked at a woman and been truly vulnerable. Known that someone could kill you with a look.
That someone could rescue you from grief. That God had put an angel on Earth just for you.

And you wouldn’t know how it felt to be her angel. To have the love be there for her forever. Through anything, through cancer. You wouldn’t know about sleeping sitting up in a hospital room for two months holding her hand and not leaving because the doctors could see in your eyes that the term “visiting hours” didn’t apply to you.

And you wouldn’t know about real loss, because that only occurs when you lose something you love more than yourself, and you’ve never dared to love anything that much.

I look at you and I don’t see an intelligent confident man, I don’t see a peer, and I don’t see my equal. I see a boy. Nobody could possibly understand you, right Will?

So wherever you are right now, whatever you are doing, when you get the chance… JUST OPEN Your Heart and LISTEN…

Enjoy your Week!

SC

Samer Chidiac is a Sr. Strategist, Author & an International Innovation Expert.

The Monday Tip Weekly blog is part of the “Influencing the Life of Others” project