If You Could Turn Back Time

Good Friday morning to you. As our week on the topic of the ideal life comes to a close I hope you have found an ideal and are working towards it. I hope that you have faith life will be getting better, that you are about defining and chasing success and not just more money. Today we are going to finish the week up with the one thing that I like to include in every week’s theme: the setbacks, the failures along the way. I have been looking for a way to bring this across this week and found it thanks to my childhood friend, Jason.

I want to bring up the movie Back to the Future again. In the second film, an older Biff gets an idea when he finds out a time machine has been made, to take a book back in time. He gives the book that tells the outcome of every sporting event from the 1950s to 2000, thus giving younger Biff an idea of what happens in the future and the opportunity to capitalize on it. So I want to use this same concept today and ask you, if you could go back ten years, 20 years, or 30 years, what would you tell yourself to make your present day life better? The answers that were posted on Jason’s FaceBook in response had a wide range: “Don’t get married.” “Stay away from that guy named Phil; he is bad for you.” “Wait for a nice guy to come along.”

Then there were the money ones: “Invest in Google.” “Create FaceBook.” “Don’t buy a house in Florida because prices will drop.” All of the responses were a way for me to view something that most could not see. Most of the people who were posting were actually writing to tell themselves to avoid failure. It was like putting up the warning signs that just around the corner is a wet floor so don’t slip.

Look back into your past. Take a look at some of the failures you have had, then look at some of the results that came from those failure. So you had a bad relationship; you now have a wonderful child or children from it. So you had a business that failed; you look at where the industry went and realize that you got out before you really lost or maybe you learned important lessons about how to run a business next time. You bought a house that is now worth 75% of what you owe on it; well I know people who own two or three homes that are worth less than half what they owe, have no income to pay for them, and the market to rent them is 1/3 what the mortgage payment is right now. Bottom line: even if you were able to go back in time and could fix one bad failure, you would have faced another one just as bad. We are only given in life what we can handle but there is no avoiding some things.

Now I want to tell you what my response was to Jason’s post. I said in mine, “You are going to have some tough times; you will have some great times, you will get your heart broken, you will fail at business. Great news: you will still be alive in 10 years and the world has not ended yet!” Then I put in there some of the important things that are pure joys. I said, “Call your dad and go fishing with him a few times over the next ten years because he won’t be here then. Oh and the girl named, Gwynne, she is the one to look for; she is your perfect match.”

Yes I hate failure just like you; yes I get down and feel that the world is going to end sometimes. Yes I have been hurt and yes I have lost, really lost. But each of those failures when I look at the long term brought me to a far better life. I gained wisdom to know what to look for. I learned how to follow the right trends to invest for a better future, I learned what customers like and don’t like. I learned how you can tell a friend from someone who is just out for themselves. I learned if I work a little harder at a plan that works I have ten times more rewards.  I learned if I worked through the pain, that life had more pleasure on the other side.

I am still in awe over the fact that in the past ten years I have met so many people who are famous, who were rich, who are wise, who are respected. I am still so thankful I got to meet a guy named Zig Ziglar who I have to thank for my present business, my newfound love for what I do with my day. Since losing some very key people in my life over the past ten years I have also learned that many people, right after the loss of a loved one, hold that person so high that they seem to forget even that person had some failure in life. In the past ten years I have lost four closely related people, and six close friends who were mentors. Yet this question my friend posted did not include going back in time and saving someone else; it was about talking to yourself.

In closing if you remember the movie we talked about, when they returned to present day, Biff had made a fortune from the book with information about the future but he had totally misused that fortune. If you were given a fortune, or money, or power, would you have the wisdom to use that money or power to make a better world for yourself, your family, or your community? We are given more opportunities in this world than we ever use. Use what you have to the best of your ability, do the best with the things, the wisdom and the help you have been given. Make your world ideal for you, ideal for your family, ideal for your community. Have a great weekend.

I’m Tim Gillette, the Rocker Life Coach, helping you to live the life you always wanted, teaching you to love what you do and those you share this life with, and making you the RockStar in your world.

Are you ready to take on the future? I can help you learn from your past and put together your Ideal Life. What are you waiting for? Call me at 214.616.8912 or email tim@timgillette.com.