Stop Quitting

‘Every time you quit, someone else gets your prize.’

This profound truth hit me like a ton of bricks. Growing up in Nigeria, many times while sat in traffic, I would imagine a car that could take off and fly and sometimes I would picture even more bizarre ways to get home.

Did I do anything with these ideas? No. They were just wishful thinking, or so I thought.

How many times do we have game-changing ideas that we never pursue? How many times do we implement game changing ideas but quit because it’s not as easy as we had hoped or thought?

How many courses have we started without completing? How many of us know that our children need more hands-on support but we ‘quit’ on the laborious ideas that could help them?

How many relationships or friendships did we ‘quit’ because it required more work than we thought?

The truth is there are people who went ahead to implement the same ideas that we thought were difficult. There are people running the successful businesses we pictured or quitted on. Someone went for that job or promotion we dreamt about.

There are people dealing with the same challenges that caused us to give up on our dreams. Imagine the creative ideas you conceived and abandoned, now you are paying someone else to enjoy the benefit of their own follow-through on the very same ideas.

The truth is, every time we quit, someone else gets our prize simply because they refused to quit.

So it’s time for us to stop quitting and win the prizes for persistence, creativity, and perseverance.

There is the story of a man called Caleb who caught a glimpse of his prize at the age of forty-five. Due to the influence that fear had on his co-labourers, he was forced to abandon his dreams.

Forty years later, Caleb went back to Moses who knew about the history and the prize. He demanded permission to go after the mountain, overcome the challenges and claim his prize. You can read more about Caleb in the Bible.

This man who was forced to wait for his prize for forty years did not ‘quit’. I can imagine how many times that dream kept him awake at night or how the temporary loss of that prize haunted him.

Tempted to quit? Pause and:

Keep your eye on the prize

Remember there is a prize at the end of it all so don’t walk away without a proper fight. Even when you think you are at the end of what you are able to do, look around as there are people who could still help. There is always help to be found in God if you believe in Him like I do.

Take a break but keep your dream alive

Caleb was forced to temporarily abandon his prize but he kept the dream alive and when he felt the time was right, he went and got it.

So by all means, take a break, take time to unwind and re-fire, take time to explore other things, and bring people on board who can challenge your current perspective.

All these could help you to have another thought that moves you closer to your prize.

No one has two heads

As a child, this was a mantra in my house every time we thought we couldn’t do something or perform at a higher level. My father will say, ‘they don’t have two heads’. That was his way of reminding me that I am as capable as anyone else.

It might take a bit more hard graft, more creativity, a lot more commitment and I might need to pay an overall heftier prize but if I pay the price, I will win the prize. Those winning the prizes don’t have two heads.

Stop the excuses

The reality is that most of the excuses we have for giving up are not unique to us so we need to be honest and recognise when we are making an excuse.

24 hours, 7 days! One Life

While lack of time might be the reason we give up on the prize, we need to ask if others going for it have more allotted time. They don’t.

They have just learnt to pay the price of better time management.

This week, take time to write down the things you have given up on. Review them and pick one thing up. Commit to seeing it to a conclusion. Do it.

Thanks for reading my post. Please share it with others and subscribe to get future posts sent directly to your in-box. See you next week.