Hackney's Houses

This past weekend I was fortunate enough to have qualified for and participated in the 1/2 Ironman triathlon World Championships.  Held in Clearwater, Florida the event consists of a 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, and a 13.1 mile run.  Many might recognize the full Ironman triathlon as the one they show on NBC each year from Kona, Hawaii.  This is half the distance and the counterpart to those World Championships.

I sent out an email earlier today to new agents that I train in an attempt to draw a few parallels between my experience there and our business.  Maybe you too can pull a full golden nuggets in your pursuit of the Good Life. 

• A year ago I honestly wouldn’t have thought I’d be racing in the World Championships of anything. I was putting in the time and training, but that seemed like an extremely lofty goal to consider.
• When I arrived in Florida, it became quickly apparent that I was amongst some of the fastest talent in the world. I will admit that I felt like a child amongst extreme greatness.
• It was easy to let the self talk start questioning myself and letting the nerves get to me.
• I felt slow. I felt embarrassed being there. I felt like I snuck in the back door. Who was I to be there?

Then, I reeled in some of my thoughts, took a deep breath, and here’s what I walked away with...

• Our goals are meant to be lofty and it is really only the thoughts between our ears that hold us back from whatever we truly want to achieve
• I stepped out of my comfort zone racing with some of the greatest athletes around the world and as a result was pushed to my fastest ½ Ironman triathlon time ever.
• Having surrounded myself with greatness, but it still boiled down to me, the water, and the pavement. The distances were the same, my bike was the same, my shoes were the same….all I had to do was go out there and go for it.
• Success doesn’t always feel like success when you’re in the midst of it. During the race, my “success” hurt and wasn’t always the pleasant Colgate smiles of the infomercials.
• On “feeling” slow. (personal record by over 16 minutes); On “feeling” embarrassed being there (I was in the top 50% of my age group at the World Championships); On feeling like I snuck in (top third overall out of 2000 athletes)---take away is that our “feelings” can sometimes be deceptive. Success doesn’t always “feel” like success until afterwards.
• Don’t measure your success (however you choose to define it) by how you feel during the process. Measure your success by something other than how you feel.
• As much as I hurt coming down the final stretch I took a few looks around at all the people cheering and just took it all in. I kept repeating to myself “I’m racing in the World Championships…how cool is this?”

I was asked several times by people on the airplane home if I won. Did I win? One person in the entire world crossed the finish line first that day, but we all won.

It really was a celebration of a great deal of hard work and I’m glad I had enough people pound that into my head so that I would take the time to soak it all in.

Hopefully you can take a nugget or two from this experience and apply it to your life/business. I’m looking forward to the rest of our class and seeing you on Monday

Cheers to finishing the year strong and setting the tone for an exciting 2008!