Woody Allen’s Success Secret

by Brad Isaac on March 28, 2006

"80 percent of success is just showing up"  — Woody Allen

I often think about that quotation.  It may sound easy to shrug off, but not
if you look a little deeper.  It doesn’t just mean show up for job interviews or
to work for an 80% increase in success.  Showing up also means
starting

For instance, did you show up at the gym today?  Just showing up means you’re
80% of the way to a good workout.  The hard part of fighting yourself to get
dressed in workout gear, dealing with traffic and the worry about pain you might
experience is over.  Now all that is left is to just do the workout.  Pretty
simple huh?  Even a child could do it.

Same thing with opportunity.  It’s easier to make significant progress on a
project if you simply show up to do it.  Candidly, one of my hardest tasks of
the day is "showing up" for development Visual Studio.  It seems simple
enough..just double click on an icon.  But if I think too much about about the
seemingly 10,000 things I have to do once I launch it, I am much more likely to
"accidentally" launch my web browser or fiddle with e-mail.

But once I’m in there, the work is typically easy and fun.  Some days I can
knock out more tasks than I planned.  And I feel like a success at the end of
the day.

You can be or do whatever you want just by showing up.  If you want to be an
author, show up to write your manuscript every day, show up to writing classes,
show up to phone calls to editors.   Doesn’t it make sense that someone who
arrives at the door of opportunity has more success than someone just sitting at
home?

So increase your chances by 80%.  Show Up!

 

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{ 4 comments }

Moonbat_One March 30, 2006 at 1:29 am

A lot of my failure can be written up to just not showing up like I had intended. Woody Allen’s proverb is very true.

December 29, 2006 at 12:06 am

exactly… showing up is like an attempt to do something,
like if don’t attempt to take part in race then there is no question of winning.

May 30, 2008 at 10:52 pm

I came across your website today. I love it. Very well done. While reading through it, I am reminded of a saying that I have tried to live by all of my life which is, “If you really want to do something, you will find a way – if you don’t, you’ll find an excuse.” Keep up the good work.

January 19, 2010 at 7:13 pm

I constantly get asked what is my secret – and I always quote Woody Allen on this one. To add further, people who do show up fail to follow-up or show up a second time – so they lose a sale – ouch a $1,1710 commission down the drain…

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