June 24, 2021

CANMORE, ALBERTA – Last week I copied you an email by Mat Furey and asked you if you had discovered the principles of success contained within it.

This week I bring you a story of my own that illustrates the power of these principles even though I had no idea they even existed at the time.

When I was a teenager, one of the sports I gravitated to was long-distance running. Probably because I was smaller and skinnier than most boys my age.

In my region,  the fall season for our sport is cross-country running and the spring is reserved for the track events. Interestingly, when I was in high school, the longest track event was the 3000 meters, whereas in cross-country (XC), it was probably more like 8 to 10 kilometers.

The former – naturally completely flat whereas the latter often contained hills, narrow paths and tricky footing.

I recall coming to the finish of one of my early races, blood running down from a knee due to a fall and my dad turning to the coach saying; “is this sport really good for my son?”

Nonetheless, during my last junior year, I had improved from being a middle-of-the-pack guy, to finishing regularly in the top 10 for XC and placing on a couple of podiums on the track. Not bad.

But the next autumn would be my first and only crack at the senior level. And I wanted to do well. I knew I had to train consistently on my own, something I had never done before as school ends in June and there really was no support over the summer.

So I asked my coach for a training plan for the 2 months of holidays. And I began visualizing the city championships that would be held in October.  

Once a week I drove to the trails where I knew the race would be held. Ran all of them so I knew them well. Imagined how the race would go, where I would make my move.

Some days I would delay training, not keen on the monotonous, out and back route from my house, which was the only option most of the time. But the desire to succeed would finally get me to move, and after a mile or two, I usually feel great.

Finally, the fall term begins, team training is back and the racing season begun.

The early results were OK, top five, but certainly not what I had hoped for. And one of the top guys was a teammate who was almost a year older than me.

The day of the city championships arrives and I am hardly even thinking about winning. The gun goes off, and my top 2 rivals sprint ahead and at the first hill trail and I soon lose them. I am in my own rhythm – running my own race.

It’s a big hill in the forest, loose rock and roots. At the top, the trail flattens out with a small downgrade. I lengthen my stride. And I glimpse the two others up ahead.

Before I know it, I close in and without thinking, spurt past and pick up my pace. I am now running full tempo and we are only 1/3 into the race with one more big hill climb to boot. What am I thinking?

That day I ran the best race of my life to date and beat my rivals by close to a minute. My coach was beside himself. Hardly anyone could believe it.

But to me, once I had come up onto my rivals and made the move to win, everything played out exactly like I had envisioned. The pace was hard, faster than I had ever gone before, yet it all felt well within my capability.

City champion! What a feeling.

I went on to become a very good athlete and repeated similar feats many times afterwards. But it wasn’t until nearly 3 decades later that I learned the formula that gave me that success.

Very simply:

• Have a concrete goal
• Plan out the steps to achieve it
• Work your plan consistently every day
• Visualize the result you want constantly

That’s it!

Oh, one more thing. It helps if you have a mentor/coach to help you create both the plan and help you work it consistently. Even better, if you can be part of a “team” working at achieving a similar goal.

It’s why we created Street Smarts MBA. Check it out here.

To your health and success,

- Hugh
The “Profit Accelerator” Expert
HughTafel.com

P.S. If you are frustrated with the results you are getting from your business, I recommend you join us. You can even try it for it free, for 2 weeks. -> http://StreetSmartsMBA.org