Some sports have you pitted against an opponent. In others, it seems you’re really just trying to beat your “personal best.”
For most people, I think life is a personal best type of sport.
In Business:
Pick one thing, make that your core strength, and then play to that strength constantly in your marketing. This will set you apart from all the other “pretender” businesses that dare to compete on this particular battlefield.
Let them win on other battlefields where you have no interest engaging. Let them be the low-price leader, for example. Let them enjoy looking over their shoulder all the time, too, waiting to be undercut.
Stake your claim in one area, and be so good that it would be foolish to try and take you on.
In Life:
There’s a difference between saying, “that’s just a fact of life,” and, “that’s just the way I am.”
Accepting a truly unchangeable attribute is a good thing. It allows you to move forward and focus exclusively on playing to your strengths.
The second one shuts you down. It’s another way of saying, “Leave me alone. I give up. Nothing’s going to change here, so forget it.”
Develop the talents and strengths you do have to become the best version of yourself.
So remember…
A mouse survives by being a mouse, and a lion survives by being a lion. If one tries to be the other, it fails.
— Unknown