The Will to Prevail

The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather in a lack of will. - Vince Lombardi

Tiger Woods, Michael Phelps, Roger Federer - what makes these athletes so much better than their peers? In many ways, they are very ordinary human beings. Yet they dominate their peers - and their peers have distinguished themselves in the midst of the world's finest talent.

How does someone like Tiger Woods remain at the top of his game, beating his competition week in - week out, year after year? How does Michael Phelps prevail in every race he competes in against the greatest competition the world has ever seen? What keeps Roger Federer on top of the competition for so many years in a row?

In every discipline, whether it's a sport, a business or other activity, there tends to be one person who reaches a level of dominance over his competition for a time. No one stays on top forever, but many champions enjoy a long run as the best at whatever they do.

Few have succeeded at the level of Tiger Woods. No doubt he will face a whole new set of challenges when he returns, but if anyone can endure the rehabilitation he is facing now, and re-emerge as a champion, Tiger Woods would seem to be the man to do it.

These champions are super competitors. They take on the challenge of winning in a different way than those they vanquish. Some of their challengers are great competitors as well. in their right.  Yet there is only one, final champion in any sport.

There is some kind of intangible quality, some kind of unique advantage that can't be put in a bottle, can't be taught and really can't even be given away. The stories of Tiger Woods' father are legend. But Tiger's dad wasn't coaching an ordinary mortal either. The young lad had a sense, a desire, an absolute will for winning that could not be denied. He measured greatness differently than others.

The measure of greatness for Tiger Woods was not whether he could win his high school championship, gain a college scholarship or even make an Olympic or Ryder Cup team.  Tiger put up Jack Nicklaus' news clippings, all the major championships Jack had won, and told himself, "Some day I'm going to break all those records."

And that is what he set out to do.  Now, after a long and brilliant career, he still finds he has a way to go to get there.  With the challenge of his recovery from knee surgery, it is anything but certain he will accomplish what everyone has come to believe he will do.  But it is an amazing thing in itself that, years ago,  as a very young man in his 20's, he changed the whole set of expectations that existed in the world of golf's fans. 

Every hacker, club champion, commentator and tour professional came to believe that Tiger Woods would at least challenge, perhaps break, and possibly shatter all of Jack Nicklaus' great records as a golf champion.  By believing so completely in his own abilities, Tiger Woods changed everyone else's beliefs as well.  They came to believe what only he had dared to dream and believe himself. 

This is a powerful message.  Believe in something so strongly, and have nothing but sure will to see it through, and you can affect what everyone who knows you, or is around you will believe as well.  This kind of faith, however, leaves no room for doubting.  Whatever the final objective, you cannot doubt that it can be achieved.  You have to believe in it so much that you will effectively will it into being.

This has many components. 

First, you have to believe that your goal is so worthy that nothing can dissuade you from pursuing it.  It's very unlikely that Tiger Woods will retire because of his surgery.  But there are many athletes who would. Whatever conditions you face, whatever challenges you have to overcome, whatever obstacles are laid in your path, you have to think that reaching the end is so important, you will not quit, no matter what.

Second, you have to believe that it truly is achieveable.  By no means does this commend lowering your sights.  What I am suggesting is that you believe in something that is greater than those around you dare to.  But also that you believe in it because you look at your goal and say, "this can be done."  Bill Gates became the world's wealthiest man in part because he had the audacity to imagine that everyone in the world would need an operating system to run a computer that would be their very own.  In 1978, that seemed inconceivable to most everyone.  Ten years later, it was an afterthought.

Third, as you believe in the worthiness of your dreams, it will help to believe they are bigger than you are yourself.  I know there is this Nietschian ideal, that the super human can achieve great things, for no other reason than he himself is great, and I do not know how the world's greatest achievers each perceive their own greatness juxtaposed against the world's gain from their accomplishments.  But I do know that anyone can test their will to accomplish something simply in believing in himself versus the will that is generated through confidence that the entire world may benefit, and that the motivation for the latter is typically much more sustaining.  And it should be! 

Think of it this way.  The world can be a better place because you were here.  The world is a batter place if you believe you can do something, anything - that will help make it better! 

Finally, you have to believe in the process.  I have often wondered why it was that Tiger Woods so handily dominated his competition in the Masters tournament at the age of 21, then did not win it again until four years later.  As the greatest golfer of his generation, perhaps of all time, how could he  fail to win any tournament. 

But Tiger's goal was bigger than winning every tournament.  He certainly tries.  And he succeeds more regularly than anyone else.  But his goal is a goal that can't be completed at the age of 21, 25 or 33.  It is a lifetime goal and it will still be a number of years before he is finished.  He trusts the process.  He goes out to win every week, and when he does not, he comes back the next week - even stronger, even more prepared to do what it will take to win.  By trusting the process, he gets stronger as he goes -- stronger in the face of defeat.

All of the capacity that exists within Tiger Woods exists within you as well.  No one came away from his birth expecting more from him or less from you.  The heart of a champion is the heart that beats within you.  Find the purpose, the calling, the value in what it is that makes you tick - and pursue it with everything you have to give!