Do These Three Things, and You’ll Be Guaranteed Success

About a year ago, I heard a radio interview with former WNBA player and coach Nancy Lieberman in which she recounted an exhibition one-on-one game she played against basketball legend Michael Jordan. Anyone with any sense would be apprehensive about going up against the GOAT. And Nancy was.

Predictably, she got buried. But she emerged feeling successful. Why? Because, rather than shrinking from the challenge, she faced her perfectly understandable fear head-on and did her best even though she lost. As a result, she was able to hold her head high.

Her interview reminded me of a concept I learned on Cru staff many years ago. Athletes in Action (the athletic arm of the ministry) circulated a concept called “Total Release.” AIA’s various teams compete against top collegiate teams, and in the context of those games, they typically have the chance to share about how Jesus has changed their lives and encourage their audiences to consider their own relationships with God.

As top athletes, they of course want to win. But guess what? Sometimes they don’t Does that mean they have failed? Total Release teaches that the sole way you measure success is whether or not you did your absolute best regarding both preparation and execution. Sometimes the scoreboard reflects the desired outcome, and sometimes it doesn’t. But even if you lose the game, you have been successful if you brought everything to the game.

In that spirit, let me offer my three steps that guarantee success.

1.     Set Your Goal at the Right Level – What are you really after? Of course, we’d all love to win the tennis match, get the promotion, or make the big sale. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. But things don’t always turn out the way you want. And it’s often through failure and adversity – as difficult as that may be – that you learn and grow. The “loss” can actually be to your benefit if you let it build your character.

So, if you define success as whatever will do the most to enhance your character, you will even be able to appreciate “defeat.” And as Christians, we can take this one step further by defining success as doing our best to respond to God’s will for us, the best we know it.

2.     Do Absolutely Everything You Can to Prepare – AIA teams don’t win without personal preparation and hard work. Musicians mess up if they haven’t devoted hours mastering their instruments. Moms may be at a loss in trying to help their struggling students without thoroughly researching learning challenges and alternatives. Your desired outcome seldom comes without considerable effort.

3.     Leave the Results to God – If you have set your goal at the appropriate level – i.e., to always seek to honor God in everything you do even if your “lower level” objective is not reached – and you have done all within your power to accomplish the task at hand, you have succeeded if you can thank God for results, even if they’re not what you worked toward.

I hope you don’t see the headline of this article as a “bait and switch.” I advertised “guaranteed success.” That almost implies promising the ideal outcome for the specific venture in front of you. But then I changed the conversation by redefining success as pursuing things that develop character and honor God. I wish I could assure all your quests would turn out the way you want. I can’t. But, if you think about it, I hope you’ll agree that becoming the person God wants you to be far outweighs achievement of other very important – but lesser – goals.