“CHOOSE BETTER. DO BETTER. BE BETTER.” Craig Harper


Welcome to the cyber-home of Motivational Speaker, Craig Harper.This site is a constantly updated inspiration, education and motivation station. Unlike other sites, it is a totally free resource. With over a thousand original articles covering a wide range of subject matter (from fitness to philosophy), there’s a mountain of quality information to help you create your best life. Apart from being one of Australia’s leading professional speakers, Craig is also an Exercise Scientist, Media Presenter, Published Author, High Performance Coach and highly sought-after Corporate Coach. He is considered to be a leader in the area of personal development, having worked with hundreds of teams, companies and organisations on numerous continents over the last twenty years.

Tell Yourself a New Story

Hi. Today, something that will be familiar to some of you (but well worth revisiting). It’s been tweaked and dusted off…

Too Scared to Try

Many people won’t even try because they’re scared of failure.

And because they won’t try, they won’t learn as they could. They won’t grow. They won’t build strength. Or resilience. And they won’t explore their potential. Neither will they develop new skills, insight or understanding. If only they would recognise the value in some occasional failure. If only they would understand that failure is, in fact, a myth. A self-created reality. An experience that we bring to life through our words, thoughts and beliefs. Something that doesn’t exist until we say so.

Just like success, failure is whatever we determine it to be.   

A Story of Two Runners

Kelly completes a 10km Fun Run in fifty minutes. Before the race, she had hoped to finish in less than an hour, so fifty minutes is something of a major triumph for her. She is genuinely happy. Kelly’s friend, Joe, runs the same distance and records the exact same time. However, he wanted to cover the distance in forty-five minutes or less. Consequently, Joe is devastated. He describes his experience as a massive failure and as a result, his psychology and his physiology are both a reflection of his belief; the belief that he has failed. He could have labeled his run many things but he chose ‘failure’.

He labeled it.
He believed it.
He lived it.

Joe was genuinely miserable.

The Power of Labels

He could have called his result a lesson, a surprise, a minor speed hump, an anomaly or simply, an experience. He didn’t. In reality, his misery was not ‘because of’ the run or the time; it was because of him. Specifically, his reaction to, and interpretation of, his result. If the run time (fifty minutes) had caused the subsequent misery then everybody who recorded that time would have ‘failed’ also. Clearly, they didn’t. The time was the trigger (for him) but he was the creator of the misery. The negative reaction.

One result, two very real self-created experiences: misery, joy.

In life, stuff happens and then you and I give those experiences a label. And when we ‘believe’ the label, we create our own personal reality. Good, bad. Hard, easy. Success, failure.

A New Story

But what if we simply chose not to fail? Ever. What if we shifted our paradigm a little to the left? What if we chose to re-frame our picture? To tell ourselves a new story? A better story? A healthier story? What if we removed the word ‘failure’ from our vocabulary and chose to have lessons, opportunities, challenges and experiences instead? Is this possible? What if Joe said “oh well”, shrugged his shoulders and simply let it go, instead of throwing himself into an emotional tailspin? What if failure wasn’t an option for us? What might we try? Do? Create?

And who might we become along the way?

Let’s Consider Babies

When a baby tries to walk but is at the point in their development when they lack the strength, balance and co-ordination to do so, what happens? They fall down. And then they try again. And again. Sometimes they laugh. Or cry. Sometimes, both. And then they keep trying and trying. And laughing and crying. They don’t evaluate or label their experience, they just have it. They haven’t failed; they just haven’t walked yet. Unlike me and you, they don’t label their experiences and they haven’t yet learned the possibility of failure, so they happily keep falling down until one day they take a few wobbly steps. And then a few more. And before long, they’re running. All their trying pays off.

They have fallen but not failed.

So, will you fall down and get up or will you fail?

{10 comments}

Your Best Job

“When your career and your passion collide, you’ll never have to work again.”

Imagine having a job that rarely (if ever) feels like a job. Imagine a life where fun, enjoyment and fulfillment exist both inside and outside of your career. Imagine a job that genuinely excites you. One that, not only pays the bills, but one that also builds wealth on a mental, emotional, spiritual and social level. One that enables you to explore and exploit your potential.

A job that you love.

Well, I can’t tell you what your best job will be or where you’ll find it but here’s what I can tell you.

  • Your best job won’t come looking for you.
  • Your best job probably won’t be my best job. In fact, there is no universal best job.
  • The job that gives you joy might give me anxiety.
  • Your best job will probably change over time.
  • Bitching about your current job is not a good strategy for finding your best job.
  • You’ll probably have a few false starts along the way (if you haven’t already).
  • You might find your best job where you never thought to look.
  • The only person you should ask the “what should I do?” question is… yourself.
  • Sometimes fear masquerades as logic; don’t waste talent, passion, opportunities or time because of fear.
  • Transitioning from your current job to your best job might take significant time and you may need to go backwards to go forwards. 
  • You might need to climb out of your pigeon hole and leave your security blanket behind to find your best job.
  • Those closest to you are rarely the best career advisors (your best job might piss your dad off).
  • The best job won’t always ‘make sense’. Sometimes sense is over-rated.
  • If it doesn’t already exist, you might need to create it.
  • Your best job won’t necessarily be the easiest or most comfortable job.
  • You’ll never have more time or potential than you do today.

Happy job hunting. Or creating. :)

{10 comments}

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