The media is filled with stories on a daily basis about the best of the best in the boardroom and on the field. We know a lot about them because they win championships and earn numerous accolades.
There isn’t a person among us who doesn’t know the achievements of Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg, Tom Brady and Kobe Bryant, or many other icons just like them. It’s easy to keep score by counting how many billions of dollars they’ve made or how many championships they’ve won.
But if you want to be like them and experience your own personal brand of high-level accomplishments, you’ve got to look past the scores and stats and figure out what drives these people to be who they are. You’ve got to understand what it is that motivates them to develop their personal brand of burning desire.
And then you need to find a way to uncover your own “burn.”
Not all high achievers are great athletes. But all high achievers do share one thing in common. It’s their mental mindset, their burning desire, that fuels them constantly to focus on what it is they really want in life.
Using Your Inner Motivation Is Not Always Enough
What separates champs like Bezos, Zuckerberg, Brady and Bryant from most others is an internal drive that has become razor-sharp through years of refinement. Legacy is a by-product of their efforts, but they are driven by more than just purpose. We all have purpose, after all.
They are driven by the “burn.”
Burn is the next level of purpose. It resides in every one of us, including you. You may know it or not know it. You may just need help uncovering it and optimizing it to make it work for you.
Early in your career, perhaps even while you were in college, you may have sought out mentors. Or perhaps it was a more seasoned colleague who took an interest in you and your career. If this was the case, you engaged with one of the best performance coaches you could ever hope to connect with.
Because you were smart, you quietly listened most of the time. Then you asked questions that were thoughtful. From this, you developed a value system and applied that value system to your future career endeavors.
When combined with your own inner burn, the synergy produced by these two forces probably propelled you to a level of success that you may have had trouble envisioning when you first started out.
Mentors And Coaches Are Everywhere
If you pay attention, you’ll find life’s lessons and ways to develop your burn can be gleaned from almost anywhere.
When I was much younger, my mother was diagnosed with a terminal disease. She was given two to four years to live. A similar diagnosis would have easily crushed a lesser woman. But my mother chose to turn it into something more positive. And it left an indelible impression on me that continues to this day.
Even with 24-hour, round-the-clock care for the last year of her life, she developed razor focus and purpose. She determined to live her best life and take care of her children the best way she knew how. It remained her burning desire until the day she passed.
I remember her, weak and in pain, with a rolling IV strapped to her, slowly but assuredly wheeling herself to the dinner table each night. It was anything but easy. Those memories are forever imprinted on me. But what was also imprinted was how my mother overcame the challenges in her life to accomplish what was important to her.
That makes her no different than Bezos, Brady and the others. With the right mindset, my mother was a high achiever in her own way.
With the Right Mindset, Purpose Will Overcome Pain
If you think Tom Brady or Kobe Bryant didn’t step onto the football field or the court when they were in pain, guess again. Both have played through injuries throughout their careers. They set aside injuries and made up their minds through mental toughness that their purpose in life would overcome any physical pain they had to endure.
Zuckerberg and Bezos are no different. If you think they’ve gotten to where they’re at without facing their own brand of adversity, you haven’t been following their careers at all.
How did they do it?
With a clarity of purpose — so locked in that it was unshakable.
If you’re wallowing in your job, your relationships or your life, perhaps it’s because you are not yet zeroed in on your burn, your passion, your real reason for rolling out of bed in the morning.
To live your best life, you must build momentum daily through introspection, with the help of others, by reading and absorbing new ideas and being mindful of positive reinforcement.
When you do this, you will start to chisel out your true purpose in life. You will create energy and draw others to your purpose who will help you. But first, you must help yourself.
If you are not locked in on a destination, how can you possibly know where you’re going?
At age 42, Tom Brady still wants to win Super Bowls. Kobe Bryant played for 20 years and won six championships. Equally amazing, he scored 60 points in his final game, refusing to give it anything but his burning desire to be the best, right up until his last game.
It’s not easy, and if you consider it a sacrifice instead of an investment to immerse yourself and connect with your personal burning desire, you’re on the right path, but you still have a ways to go.
Find your burn. Start now. And once you find it, never look back.
