Paying the Price of Action

Pay Price of Action

Becoming proficient at anything is not easy. You have to pay the price, what Dan Pena calls, price of action.

Forget all those motivational speakers that say you can have everything at the same time — when you chase two rabbits you catch none. Most of the world’s successful people paid their price whether it was price of not seeing their family for a long time, price for staying after-hours and working on the project or sacrificing parties with their friends for the sake of completing their job at hand.

World’s top athletes are the best example of people who are willing to pay price of action.

If you want to be at the top of javelin thrower and get your gold medal at the Olympics you better throw that stick day and night. You better ignore your friends’ invitations to go and have some fun and stick to throwing javelin. You might even consider stop using alcohol and minimizing the time you spend with your family and the loved ones, even if they don’t like it and they probably will.

So what is the price of action that you are willing to pay?

I’ve just noticed what I sacrifice in order to get where I’m going and I’m totally OK with it, even if my friends and my family sometimes get mad that I can’t spend as much time with them as I did before. But as I said before it’s OK, I’m fine with it, this is what is supposed to happen.

I am even fine if people will start calling me a Geek because I spend most of the time in front of my computer working after I come back from work. I understand that this is what I must do and this is the price that I must pay to get where I want to get.

But sometimes I see people who can’t decide what they want. They try to take a bite of every pie flavor. I see them going from one place to another, not daring to look into the eyes of the fear and say “F*ck You! I’m doing it anyway!” All they try to do is fool themselves that everything is going to be “just fine”, that somebody, maybe their mom, will come and help them out.

Forget it! The cavalry ain’t coming, you have to do it on your own!

Don’t understand that I am fearless. I still shit my pants when I think of a time when I will have to quit my job (March-April 1st) and start earning money online or… No, there’s no “OR” here.

In 204 B.C., the Chinese general Han Hsin led his army to a position near the camp of his enemy, the army of Chao. In sight of the fortified camp, he aligned his army along the length of a river bank, placing their backs to the deep, swift waters. Sun Tzu, in his classic, The Art of War, relates that the soldiers of Chao enjoyed a good laugh watching their enemies line up along the river. Then almost immediately the army of Chao left its fortifications and attacked Han Hsin’s army. With their backs to the turbulent water, Han Hsin’s men fought so fiercely they overwhelmed the army of Chao, put them to flight and killed their king.

After the battle, some of Han Hsin’s officers questioned his strategy. The general replied, “It is written, ‘Place your army in deadly peril, and it will survive; plunge it into desperate straits and it will come through safely.’ If I had not placed my troops in a position where they were obliged to fight for their lives, but had allowed each man to follow his own discretion, we would have suffered a rout.”

Jim Newman is a behavioral scientist who coined a now so popular phrase “comfort zone.”

An individual’s comfort zone is the area in which he or she performs most capably, because that person is comfortable in that area, or that level or that intensity of activity or pressure. One’s comfort zone is not fixed forever, like a locked thermostat. You can expand your comfort zone by pushing its limits, by having experiences beyond its perimeter. The problem with many people, mostly with those who tell you that you can’t do this or that, is that they stay encased in the limited zone they’ve created just by continuing to breathe.

Don’t be one of them — expand your comfort zone. Find your biggest fear and look straight into its eyes! Understand that you have to pay the price of action to get what you want and start paying it today! Think and dream BIG! And be willing to die for your dreams, because if you are not willing to die for your dream, you are not worth living it.

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