It’s a serious mistake to allow yourself to get caught up in the “what-if” and “how-to” trap before taking action. The reality is that no one can ever hope to know all the problems in advance, let alone all the solutions.
Further, most of the things people worry about never even come to pass. Or, if they do, they end up being not nearly as bad as envisioned. Even better, some of the most minatory circumstances often turn out to be nothing more than disguises for great opportunities.
I thought about this a couple of weeks ago when my son asked me to take him to a University of Maryland football game on a perfect-weather Saturday.
It was quite a request, considering:
1. I had never been to Maryland’s Byrd Stadium, and was not certain how to get there.
2. I estimated that the University was at least an hour away in modest traffic.
3. It would take us about an hour to get ready to leave the house.
4. It was 10:00 a.m. — two hours before kickoff.
5. We had no tickets.
Nevertheless, seeing a chance to be anointed Father of the Week, I replied, without hesitation, “Sure. Let’s do it.”
Some might call this impulsive. Others might refer to it as abject stupidity. I would argue that a fair and enlightened individual would recognize it as nothing more than temporary insanity.
But something just felt right about it. It was a beautiful, sunny day. I felt like I could run a marathon backward. And I saw it as one of those great Steve Martin-type bonding opportunities (as in Father of the Bride).
We pulled out of the driveway at 11:00 a.m., an hour before game time. Surprisingly, traffic was light, even as we began to near the campus. Even more surprising, the stadium came into view about 40 minutes after we left the house. I still haven’t figured out how that was mathematically possible.
Now for the not-so-small matter of parking. Cars were jammed into every square inch of space on the side of every road anywhere within sight of the stadium, so I frantically looked for a parking garage. But before I could locate one, would you believe that a parking space suddenly appeared on the side of the road — about a five-minute walk from the stadium?
After I parked the car, my son and I jumped out and joined the crowd walking toward Byrd Stadium. At this point, I was thinking what a shame it would be if it were a sellout and we’d have to turn around and go home.
Amazingly, however, as we approached the front gate, two men were standing right in front of us, one of them holding up a pair of tickets. He said they were his season tickets, but that he was going to be sitting elsewhere with his friend that day, so he just wanted to “get rid of them.”
He told me they were on the 50-yard line, and I braced myself for his asking price — $75? $100? $150? Another surprise: Almost apologetically, he asked if $20 a ticket sounded reasonable to me. I refrained from hugging him, and quickly peeled off two $20 bills from the cash stash in my pocket.
Thus far, I had been wrong about every dire thought that had crossed my mind before agreeing to take my son to the game. But I felt certain I would be right about one thing: No way was I holding 50-yard-line seats in my hand. Scalpers are hardworking entrepreneurs, but they have been known to shade the truth a bit.
Surprise again: Our seats were, indeed, smack-dab on the 50!
At halftime, since we hadn’t had time to eat lunch before leaving the house, we were starving. Perusing the menu board at a garbage… er, concession… stand, it became evident that our substitute lunch was going to be a hotdog, an ice cream sandwich, and a Pepsi.
To avoid apoplexy, I reminded myself that what we were about to eat was at least healthier than cyanide-laced Kool-Aid… though not by much. Besides, the dogs were only $2.50 apiece, which wouldn’t even buy you a bun at a pro football game.
After we finished “lunch,” we stopped by one of the restrooms for a little relief. How pleasant. It made the restrooms at Washington, DC’s RFK Stadium look like the Ritz-Carlton. Shows how easy it is to please college kids.
The bottom line is that it was a great day, a day when everything that seemed like a problem ended up being a plus. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that things turned out so well, because I’ve witnessed the playing out of this type of scenario so often over the years.
The moral is that when you really want to do something — but are apprehensive because you see so many “problems” on the horizon — do it anyway! Don’t worry about it. You won’t bat 1,000 percent. But if you continually fail to take action, you’re guaranteed to bat zero.
And even when things don’t work out, you’ll find that, in a vast majority of cases, the fallout won’t be nearly as bad as you’d imagined.
The many wonderful, unexpected things that will come into your life as a result of taking action will more than offset any pain you might endure from your few missteps.
[Ed. Note: To learn how to survive and prosper during the turbulent years ahead, check out Robert Ringer's powerful audio series Succeeding in a World of Chaos. And be sure to sign up for a FREE subscription to his one-of-a-kind e-letter A Voice of Sanity in an Insane World.]
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Become the Next Depression Millionaire - The only condition we ask when using the “Multiplier Effect” is that you limit your profits to $10,000 a week. We don’t want the “good old boys” to get wise and change the rules again.
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