The Challenge Has To Be There

As you may know if you have been reading my blog for any amount of time I play basketball almost everyday of the week.

I do it to keep in shape, make friends, and its a lot of fun too. The strange part is I somehow seem to find marketing lessons in basketball all the time and recently I discovered something that I’d like to share with you.

So last week I was playing basketball and my team clearly was the better team on paper. More size, speed, and talent. We play games to 11… and in the first game we found ourselves down 8-2. We weren’t playing particularly hard and it was painfully obviously we took this team we were playing very lightly.

Next thing you know it was 9-2 and we quickly realized as a team we were in danger of losing. My entire team me including all of a sudden got this fire in our eyes and started playing really hard. It was almost subconsciously happening.

We were hustling up and down the court, playing lock down defense, getting rebounds etc. etc. It was clear as day we were amazingly motivated by the challenge of winning the game even though we were down 9-2.
Next thing you know its 9-4 then 9-6 then wouldn’t you know it we were actually winning 10-4!

We went on to win the game and all of this because the challenge was in front of us and we embraced the challenge and made it happen. It was almost like, to a man, nothing was going to stop us from winning that game, and I mean nothing.

The way I can relate this to business is personally I am in a comfortable situation. I have the skills, talent and resources to be an amazing marketer and to make boatloads of money but I am just being a bit complacent while other marketers are passing me by.

Don’t get me wrong, i’m still doing great by many peoples standards, but i’m certainly not where I want to be.

So like in that basketball game, I am going for it. I am re-dedicating myself to my business and to my customers. I can’t be stopped, I won’t be stopped. I will succeed and I will achieve my goals.

In business and in life you have to keep the pedal to the medal or you will get passed by… and it can happen faster than you can imagine. That’s my lesson for you today.

No matter who you are or what situation you are in, keep working hard and don’t get complacent. If you follow these rules like I plan on doing you will be successful beyond your wildest imagination. Carpe Diem!