pportunity Doesn't Always Knock

ome time ago Baron Von Lodge was the head of a small country near Switzerland known as Lilliland.

The Baron and his fiancée, Lady Angela of Alpine Castle, were having their regular meeting with Professor Hamblin. The topic they were discussing was success and how some people had it, and others who very much deserved it, didn’t have it.

The Professor’s point of view was that as opportunity availed itself to people, they just did not recognize it as an opportunity. They somehow expected that opportunity, when it came, would knock on their front door and it be delivered to them on a silver platter. However, the successful person saw opportunity around every turn on the road of life while others did not see it at all.

An example of this might be a worthless pile of old furniture ready to be picked up and thrown away. In the pile sits an old bench with some of its parts laying elsewhere in the pile. The opportunist sees the bench with all its parts reassembled and glued together and a fresh coat of paint added, sitting in their yard under a tree. They pick up the bench and put it back together and paint it, just as they envisioned it, and there it is. The successful person acted.

A more complex example would be a successful businessman who knows of two businesses that are failing. The two businesses do not know each other and there is no relationship between them, except that they are both failing.

The successful businessman determined that if the two businesses were combined, they would have a product that would be in great demand. He would reorganize the two businesses and his vision of success would come true.

Examples of success can be found in failing relationships where one person wants one thing and the other person wants something else. The successful person will offer a compromise and the relationship may turn out to be successful.

The Baron added that some people build limits for themselves and as a result they do not try anything above their perceived limits. As a result, their goals and greater success may never be achieved because of their own self-imposed limitations.

Lady Angela thought that people who were successful simply tried hard and did not become easily defeated.

They all agreed that Success Begets Success. Successful people almost always have a habit for being successful.