Any business or personal activity undertaken in the proper season, and combined with the passage of enough time, will produce a predictable result. The reason for the seasons is productivity, and the purpose of our activity is results.

Results are the harvest that comes from our past efforts. If the farmer has planted only a handful of seeds in the spring, he cannot expect to reap a very bountiful harvest in the fall. Likewise, if a person has engaged in only minimal activity in the past, he should not expect significant results in the present.

Results are always in direct proportion to effort. Those who rest in the spring do not reap in the fall, regardless of need and regardless of desire. Results are the reward reserved for those who had the foresight to seize an earlier opportunity. If the opportunity was missed, the reward will be withheld.

The opportunity of springtime is brief. Opportunity approaches, arrives and then quickly passes. It does not linger; nor does it pause to look back. 0pportunity merely presents itself, and those who respond to its arrival with intelligent activity will realize a full measure of the desired result.

All that we do determines our future results. Like the farmer who tills the soil in preparation for planting the seed, we must work to develop a sound philosophy. Like the farmer who cultivates and fertilizes his crop to destroy the weeds and nourish the growing seeds, we must strive to develop a new attitude. And like the farmer who tends his crop from morning until nightfall in anticipation of the future harvest, we must engage in labor -- in daily activity.

If our past labors have produced a poor harvest, there is nothing we can do about it. We cannot alter the past. We cannot ask nature to make an exception to the rules no matter how hungry we are. Nor will nature permit us to ask the soil for an advance. The only thing we can do is to prepare for the inevitable arrival of another spring -- another opportunity -- and then plant, nourish and tend our new crop as diligently as possible, remembering the painful consequences of our past neglect. In remembering the consequences, however, we must not allow ourselves to be overcome by them. Their lessons must serve us, not overwhelm us.

Throughout our lives we will experience a number of springtimes and a number of harvests. Our future happiness is seldom the product of any one harvest. Rather, it is the result of scores of individual opportunities which are either well-used or sadly neglected. For our happiness lies in the accumulative effect of our past activity. This is why it is so important to study results. Checking our results on a regular basis provides us with an excellent indicator of how well we are using our opportunities. Our current results are an early indicator of what the future will likely hold in store as we continue along our present course. If our current results are satisfying, then the future will likely produce the same bountiful harvest. If our current results are not as we would like them to be, then we need to take a closer look at those factors that may have nudged or even pushed us in the wrong direction.

How To Measure Our Results

The results of our past efforts can be measured in several different ways. The first way to measure our results is by looking at what we have. Our homes, cars, bank accounts, investments, and all of our other tangible assets are a good measuring rod of our material progress.

Our assets reflect one aspect of our current value. To measure our value, we merely examine our assets. Now this is not to suggest that the only way to measure value is by a list of our material possessions. There are all kinds of wealth, and the greatest fortunes in life — joy, health, love, family, experiences, friendships -- will always outweigh the value of any material possessions we might acquire. But what we have accumulated over the years in the form of material assets can be a good indicator of past efforts and possible future results.

If we currently have a significant accumulation of money and material possessions, we are probably well on our way toward achieving that dream known as financial independence. By the same token, if our list of assets is rather meager despite our efforts over the last ten, twenty or thirty years of labor, then this may be a good indicator that something needs to change. We may need to make some major changes in our current level of activity in order to increase our results. We may need to increase our skills or our knowledge or our awareness in order to take better advantage of life’s opportunities. Or we may need to make a few adjustments to our philosophy about money and to our attitude about spending.

If we are not satisfied with what we have achieved at this point in our lives, then now is the time to fix the future. Unless we change how we are right now, what we have will always be about the same. The same seed sown by the same sower will inevitably produce the same harvest.

For the harvest to change, it may be necessary to change the seed, the soil, or more likely than not, the sower. Perhaps the sower insists on using a plan that simply cannot work. It may be that the sower believes that sowing should be done in the summer instead of the spring. When winter arrives and the sower’s need is great, he or she may be found standing in the barren field condemning circumstances for the failure of the soil to yield its promised harvest. This would be the ideal time for the misguided sower to measure – to assess the reasons why the soil did not cooperate with an ill-conceived plan. But instead of measuring and assessing, the sower complains and compiles yet another list of reasons for his or her unfortunate dilemma.

Everything we have acquired is a result of past efforts and past thoughts. We gather intelligence or we gather ignorance, and our future will produce rewards commensurate with what we have done with the past. We must use our time to plan, to labor, to measure, to invest, to share, to refine past activity, and to add to our storehouse of knowledge. These are the seeds we must gather along the way so that the quality of our results will improve with each passing year.

Another important way to measure our results is to take a closer look at what we have become. What sort of people have we attracted into our lives? Are we well-respected by our co-workers and neighbors? Do we honor our beliefs? Do we try to see someone else’s point of view? Are we listening to our children? Do we express sincere appreciation to our parents, our spouses and our friends? Are we honest and ethical in our business transactions? Are we known for our unwavering integrity among our peers? Do we still march to the beat of a different drummer? Are we happy with who and what we have become?

What we have become is a result of all of our past experiences and how we have handled them. What we have become is also a result of the personal changes we have either voluntarily or involuntarily made over the years. It we are not happy with what we have become, then we must change what we are. For things to change, we must change... that is one of life’s fundamentals.

We Attract What We Have By The Person We Have Become

In designing a better future the major focus of our plan should be on becoming more than we already are. If we are not happy with our current results, then the place to begin is with ourselves.

Everything we have in life – the tangibles as well as the intangibles -- is a direct result of who we are. The answer to the good life lies in becoming more than we currently are so that we can attract more than we currently have.

If we lost everything tomorrow, we could easily replace it all. Why? Because we acquired those things as a result of what we are. Assuming “what we are” has not changed, in time we will attract back into our lives everything we may have lost. The same applied knowledge, the same attitude, the same effort and the same plan will always produce the same results.

This fundamental should give us cause for both elation and alarm. The elation comes from the fact that any day we choose, we can begin to make changes within ourselves that will attract even more good things into our lives. The alarm comes from the fact that unless we make those necessary changes, unless we convert our errors into new disciplines and our dreams into well-defined plans and intelligent, consistent activity, we will always have exactly what we now have. We will always live in the same home, drive the same car, know the same friends and experience the same frustrations and set-backs that we have always experienced because we have not changed. The results will always be predictable because results are always determined by what we are in the process of becoming.

Doing more is only part of the answer. The real answer lies in becoming more than we are so that our increased potential becomes an integral part of everything we do. That is how life gets better -- when we get better. We cannot have more without first becoming more. That is one of the basics.

Success Must Be Attracted, Not Pursued

Personal value is the magnet that attracts all good things into our lives. The greater our value, the greater our reward. Since the solution for having more is becoming more, we must be in constant search for new ways to increase our value. Self-control, the practice of discipline, patience, planning, intensity of effort, the wise investment of a good portion of our results, the development of a well-balanced attitude, consistent activity, the gathering of knowledge, frequent reading and a sensible personal philosophy are all examples of ways in which our value can be increased.

It is the acquisition of more value that we must pursue, not more valuables. Our objective must be to work harder on ourselves than we work on anything else. By giving careful attention to our philosophy, our attitude and our activity, we are making a positive contribution to what we are becoming, and in the process of becoming more than we now are we will attract more than we now have.

Better Results Come From Being A Better Person

We become and then we attract. We grow personally and then we advance materially. Unfortunately, the vast majority seems to have the plan reversed. Their philosophy is “If I had more money, I would be a better person.” But that’s not the way life is designed to work. Having more doesn’t make us more. It merely magnifies what we already are. Those who cannot save a few pennies out of meager earnings will never be able to save dollars out of future fortunes. The same discipline it takes to put a few coins in a jar every week is the same discipline it takes to open a savings account or manage an investment portfolio.

Conversation about our intended progress will only take us so far and promises about the future will only buy us a little time. Promises must soon be matched by performance. If the results do not appear in a reasonable amount of time we run the risk of losing the trust of others in addition to our own self-respect. We may find that those who once believed no longer believe, and we will one day be left only with our well-intentioned, but unfulfilled pronouncements.

A loss of this magnitude is worth preventing. It is on the day when we discover our losses that we will taste the bitter pill of neglect. It is on that day when we will finally experience the agonizing consequences of self-delusion, procrastination and unkept promises. 

Will we read the books, make the plans, make good use of time, invest a portion of all that we earn, polish our current skills, attend classes to develop new skills, and get around better people in order to improve our chances for success? Will we tell the truth, improve our ability to communicate, use our journals, and give careful attention to all the virtues that success requires? Or will we be content to let the time slip through our fingers like grains of sand while we slowly lose self-confidence, the respect of others and perhaps even the few possessions and valuable relationships that our past efforts have managed to attract into our lives? Will we go on sitting idly by while our dreams diminish to memories, as hope gives way to remorse?
Surely not.

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 Copyright © 1991, 2002 by Jim Rohn.  All Rights Reserved.