In my last season of baseball, I spent a great deal of summer days down at USC learning from a famous pitching coaching named Tom House.
While Tom had an average career as a baseball player, he became famous because he was the pitching coach for the most historic pitcher of all time, Nolan Ryan.
On a hot sunny day and after about 60-70 pitches in a bullpen, Tom looked at me and said words that I would never forget.
"Evan. 10% of the time you are going to be amazing, 10% of the time you are going to suck worse than imaginable, and 80% of the time you are going to be just average. Champions are made in that 80%."
Absolutely amazing. Not complicated, but still amazing.
Now that may seem like a nasty realization about life, but there's a secret to all of this.
If you are going to wake up feeling "average" most of the time, you truly get to decide whether you become a champion that day or stay with the rest of the pack.
You can become something great or choose to hide in the shadows. The choice is completely yours and no one else can make it for you.
Even though those decisions don't have an audience, they are the foundations to your integrity as a human being. They may seem like small choices, but eventually they add up and make a huge impact on your life.
Most of the time no one will ever witness the decisions you make during the day. However champions always have a fire inside of them that keeps them moving forward.
That's the game of life.
You are the one who knows how much effort you are giving.
The only way you can shape your life and become something entirely different than what you were before is to make completely different decisions than the ones you were making before. It's that simple.
So if you want to get to the end of your life knowing that you gave it your all and that you actually lived your own life, then you have to make the choices that are necessary to do that. You have to live into your dreams.
And I'll be damned if I let the latter option happen in my life.
Make the decision that you're going to be a champion of those 80% days.
While Tom had an average career as a baseball player, he became famous because he was the pitching coach for the most historic pitcher of all time, Nolan Ryan.
On a hot sunny day and after about 60-70 pitches in a bullpen, Tom looked at me and said words that I would never forget.
"Evan. 10% of the time you are going to be amazing, 10% of the time you are going to suck worse than imaginable, and 80% of the time you are going to be just average. Champions are made in that 80%."
Absolutely amazing. Not complicated, but still amazing.
Now that may seem like a nasty realization about life, but there's a secret to all of this.
If you are going to wake up feeling "average" most of the time, you truly get to decide whether you become a champion that day or stay with the rest of the pack.
You can become something great or choose to hide in the shadows. The choice is completely yours and no one else can make it for you.
Even though those decisions don't have an audience, they are the foundations to your integrity as a human being. They may seem like small choices, but eventually they add up and make a huge impact on your life.
Most of the time no one will ever witness the decisions you make during the day. However champions always have a fire inside of them that keeps them moving forward.
That's the game of life.
You are the one who knows how much effort you are giving.
The only way you can shape your life and become something entirely different than what you were before is to make completely different decisions than the ones you were making before. It's that simple.
So if you want to get to the end of your life knowing that you gave it your all and that you actually lived your own life, then you have to make the choices that are necessary to do that. You have to live into your dreams.
And I'll be damned if I let the latter option happen in my life.
Make the decision that you're going to be a champion of those 80% days.
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Check out these Happy Quotes About Life on thebettermanprojects.com and some serious wisdom from Theodore Roosevelt by clicking here to stay inspired and motivated!
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