What Keeps Me Going When I Need Inspiration
December 19, 2007 by Kristen King
Filed under Business
After BCR won last week’s Challenge, I’m feeling pressure to make a meaningful entry this time around. Here’s the assignment:
Everybody loves a success story. New business owners find them inspiring. Tell Kay [our fictional entrepreneur who's the subject of the Business Channel's Apprentice-like challenge] a success story that inspired you – it could be a famous person, a company, a family member. No restrictions on length – as long or as short as you want.
It got me thinking about what has inspired me to keep going with my career. And maybe this isn’t a success story, but it’s real and it’s what I really want to say, so I hope you don’t mind too much.
There’s one particular person in my life who leaves me frustrated every time we talk careers. “The problem,” I say, “is that you’re so afraid of failing that you won’t even let yourself make the attempt.” “It’s less scary that way.” “Yeah, but it’s also guaranteed failure.”
Last week, I shared the best business advice I ever received. This week, I’m going to share the best life advice I ever received:
It’s better to regret something you did than to regret something you didn’t do and spend your whole life wondering if it would have made a difference.
I wish I could tell you who shared that with me — maybe I just dreamt it and it stuck with me when I woke up — but it is a driving force in my life. Making mistakes is part of the process, and if you’re too afraid to try, it means you’re never going to succeed. Fear of success is almost more terrifying than fear of failure sometimes, and it’s okay to be scared. But you have to work through it. It’s what makes us strong business women.
The biggest inspiration I get in my business is when other people tell me that I have inspired them. It happens every now and again, and it takes my breath away. I’m just me, just this girl who’s figuring it out as she goes along and letting the world in on the story. How is that possibly inspirational? But what I hear over and over again is that trying and not being afraid to fail and tell other people about it gives THEM the confidence to try something new for themselves. To try striking out on their own or making that career move they have always dreamed of. And that, as far as I’m concerned, is the biggest success story I have ever heard. Knowing that by just trying I can do what others did for me, give hopefuls the confidence to become actuals, is amazing.
I don’t care where you get your inspiration so long as something you experience moves you. Whatever it is, a religious moment or a magazine ad that just grabs you or some stranger’s ramblings on a blog, it’s important. And the fact that you try, well, that’s what inspires me. And reading about other people’s experiences and attempts is what gave me the courage to do my thing, so maybe it’s not that hard to understand after all.
What inspires you? Leave a comment with your story.
Contents © Copyright 2007 Kristen King
(photo via SXC.hu)
Tags: women and business, inspiration, advice
As a fairly new innkeeper, have been frequently asked “how were you able to leave the comfort and security of the “known” and open a bed and breakfast” Early everyone dreams of moving to the country, but few people are crazy enough to actually do it. I’m one of those few. Actually when I was “knee high to a grasshopper “as they say, I had said I wanted to live in Montana because of its sense of adventure and limitleness. We finally had enough of the left coast and came up with the Montana move plan. Armed with an overenthusiastic sense of adventure, and lots of naivete, we ended up in our dream log home . It subsequently became the “dream home” after much renovating.
A combination of “feel the fear and do it anyway” and “The greatest of all victories is to be victorious over yourself” inspire me Along with Teddy Roosevelts ”
Far better it is to dare mighty things to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered with failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that know not victory or defeat.” inspires me.
That is an awesome story! Thank you for sharing it, and congratulations on following your dream. :]
Kristen
Hi,
Re what keeps you going I’d like to mention a Leadership Film just out via the UK Institute of Directors which has a number of inspiring contributors.
You can see it on http://www.business100.co.uk
Declaration of Interest: I have a cameo role in the film as the author of ‘Sex, Leadership and Rock’n'Roll – Leadership Lessons from the Academy of Rock’ – Business Leadership and Personal Development ‘tamed’ with popular culture!
Happy holidays
Peter
What inspired me was my son Branden. I was in the Army for about four or five years. I was going no where. I had no plans, goals or desire to move up in the world. Then one day it hit me that I has 23 years old, about to get divorced and I had a baby boy. I had grown up very poor. We lived in a shack. I was so embarrassed of where I lived that I never brought any one home. Just to give you an idea of what a shack it was, in my bedroom there was bunkbed where I shared a room with one of my four brothers. There was a washer in my room that I used as a desk to do my homework. The house was only two bedrooms and one bathroom. In the bathroom you could see the ground from all the holes in the floor. We were poor. No air conditioners, not even window units or a heater in the winter.
It just hit me one day. I had always felt like I was dumb. My Mother had always told me out of all the kids she had I was the dumbest. Having my son inspired me to break all kinds of barriers I thought I never could. No one ever talked to me about promotion. I had to beg and plead on my own to find out information on how to move a head. I had made it to E-4/Specialist, and that was it. Like I said I had been in 4-5 years already. Now that I had a son I knew I had to get my life together. I started going to school at night and studying to go to the promotion board. I had to nag my boss just to get recommended to go. Several people told me I wasn’t cut out for the Army. I didn’t let that hold me back because when I looked into my son’s eyes I knew I was all he had and he was all I had. I could not fail him. I went to the promotion board and got recommended for E5/Sergeant and continued with college. With in one year I made Sergeant. Six months after getting promoted I said I am not stopping there. I once again had to beg and plead to go to the SSG/E6 board. With in two years I was a Staff Sergeant. I knew I couldn’t stop. I had to keep going. I wanted my son to have the childhood I never did. At twelves years in service, I finally got selected for E7/SFC. I was so proud of myself. I felt like I had finally come to a place where my son and I could finally be comfortable. He has always been my inspiration to do better. He was my inspiration when I was dead tired from working all day to struggle to get babysitters and go to college at night. I finished my AA degree and I still continue to work on my BA. I owe everything to him.