09.09.07
Avocado Pears
My Dad lives in South Africa. On the phone the other day he told me, “The avo’s are falling fast and furious, Boykie.” My family moved into that house in 1968 and almost every year without fail, the avocado pear tree has borne huge amounts of huge avocado pears. These are enormous avos - at least the size of two baseballs each, (three cricket balls), they come crashing down from a tremendous height. At times, we actually erected nets to catch them and prevent them from splitting open on the slate below.
My family has given away thousands of avos to the poor and needy, family and friends, and of course we love eating them ourselves. I said, “Dad, that tree must have borne literally millions of avos by now, and it all started with one avo pip. Amazing!” One seed sown. Millions continually reaped. Thousands of people benefited. One of those avos is almost a complete meal to a beggar. My Mom puts out huge bags of avos that poor people take. She distributes them to old age homes, too. One seed.
It’s the same in business. One idea, nurtured and fed over the years, yields millions of dollars. But only to those who believe and are prepared to work and persist. Thousands of people can benefit. But the dishonest and lazy ones will soon lose interest and move on to get-rich-quick schemes. They think the spring follows the summer. They believe in instant gratification. They don’t understand success. They want to ride on the backs of those who toil and pay the price, but it doesn’t work. They want to reap without sowing. That’s called “theft”. Ask successful people and they will tell you they agree with the following poem:
The heights by great men reached and kept
Were not attained by sudden flight,
But they, while their companions slept,
Were toiling upwards in the night.
Successful people don’t buy lottery tickets and hope to succeed; they create their own success and they make good choices every single day UNTIL they succeed. And because they understand that a price is to be paid for success, they don’t allow others to leech off their labor. If you want to understand the mindset and philosophy required for real, lasting success, read “Atlas Shrugged” by Ayn Rand. Then you will understand why Atlas sometimes has to shrug.
The real reward of success in business is not the money; it’s what you become in the process, the character and strength you build in the process. The understanding you attain. The friends you make. Sidney Sheldon put it this way: “The foolish think the Eagle weak, and easy to bring to heel. The Eagle’s wings are silken, but it’s claws are made of steel.”
There are no guarantees in life, but of this I am certain: If you persist and believe, if you refuse to quit or compromise, and if you insist on the same qualities in your business partners, success is a slam dunk. It all depends if you have what it takes. There’s very little competition when you acquire this philosophy: “If it’s to be, it’s up to me.”
Robin J. Elliott www.DollarMakers.com
