Today’s quote: “Forget about the fast lane. If you really want to fly, harness your power to your passion. Honour your calling. Everybody has one. Trust your heart, and success will come to you.”  – Oprah Winfrey

There’s a thought provoking article by Earl Nightingale about the river or the goal.

If goes like this…

If you’re going to be a success as a human being, you have to fit into one of two groups, or belong to both of them.

The first group belongs to what I call “the river.”

These are men and women who have found, often early in life, although not always, a great river of interest into which they throw themselves with exuberance and abandon.

They are quite happy to spend their lives working and playing in that river.
There are some physicians, for example, who are so wrapped up in medicine that they hate to leave; even after a 16 hour day, they can’t wait to get back to it.

These people are happiest and most alive when they’re in their river in whatever business or career or profession it happens to be.

Such people don’t have to ask, “What will I do with my life?” Their work is a magnet for them, and they can’t imagine doing anything else.

We all know such people, or about such people.

Doing what they do is even more important to them than the rewards they earn for doing it.

The second group of successful people are those who are goal-oriented.
These people have not found a particular river, necessarily, and can be quite happy doing a number of things.

It’s the goals they set that are important to them, and they’re quite aware that there are many roads that can lead to their goals.

Someone once said, “People can have anything they seriously make up their minds to have. The trouble is most of them never make up their minds about anything.”

Goal-oriented people do make up their minds about what they want, and they keep their eyes and their enthusiasm on the goal they’ve established until it becomes a reality in their lives. Then they set a new goal, if they’re wise.

One of the problems with this latter group is that after achieving a number of goals and becoming quite successful, they can run out of goals and become listless and unhappy. But not the river people. Their interest in what they’re doing never fades.

So if you’re going to be a big success, chances are you need to be a river person or a goal-oriented person, or both. The two groups are not mutually exclusive.

Something to think about…