Start now

“An intelligent person aims at wise action…a fool starts off in many directions.”

Pr 17:24 GNT

Successful people have one thing in common: They’ve developed the habit of doing what unsuccessful people aren’t willing to do. We all want more money, but we don’t all want more work. We’d all like to be slim and trim, but we’re not all willing to eat right and exercise daily. The bookends of success are commitment and consistency. Without commitment you’ll never start, and without consistency you’ll never finish. Getting started is the hardest part, because we come up with so many reasons not to. So: (1) Start small. Take the first step. You can’t take step two until you’ve taken step one. Taking the first step to prioritize your life will focus you in the right direction. But don’t expect to immediately understand all that’s required. “By faith Abraham…went out, not knowing” (Heb 11:8). God guides you when you’re in motion, so “you’ll know as you go.” (2) Start with yourself. If you want others to respond to you differently, give them a different set of attitudes and actions to respond to. (3) Start early. Someone said, “Noah didn’t wait for his ship to come in—he built one.” Hard work is an accumulation of the easy things you didn’t do when you should have. The truth is, the work doesn’t seem nearly so hard once you stop putting it off. (4) Start now. What are you waiting for? Until you finish school, get married, have kids, the kids leave home, you retire, or you die? If you wait long enough you’ll only have one regret—that you didn’t start now.

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