Someone asked me: “What do I need to do to be just like you? My first reaction was a silent one. “Who am I that you should want to be like me?” But I understood where he was coming from. He wanted tips on how to be successful at work, in marriage, and in his Christian walk, among other things. It reminded me of something very common among people.

Most of us look at someone we consider successful and quickly think: “That person is so lucky,” or “What does he have that I don’t have?” or “I wonder how many people he had to step on to get there?” In other words, we presume that the guy’s success is a result of luck or some kind of double dealing. Normally these questions simply generate a sense of jealousy or make you feel impotent. We feel that life is unfair to us, that we’ve been dealt a bad hand, or that we don’t have friends in high places.

The truth is almost always very different. Today that guy has what few people have because he did what few people do.

For 28 years I’ve systematically followed the advice I received from the Word of God. Some things I read and learned for myself. While other things I learned from good friends and mentors. I even learned from the examples of bad mentors and friends who did what I should never do.

I made mistakes. I was childish. I failed in trying to get it right, but I dusted myself off and tried again numerous times. But if there’s one thing I could recommend and consider a “secret,” though it’s really not a secret, is that you consistently do what’s right.

The months and years of our lives are made up of the decisions we make in the seconds and minutes of every moment. You don’t have the future, neither do you have the hour that will start 60 minutes from now, but you have the seconds and minutes that make up right now. How will you use them? What will you do with them?

If I’ve reaped any success, throughout the years of my life, it’s due to a result of my consistency and systematic perseverance in planting and doing the right thing according to God.

You know what those things are. They’re not difficult to discover. What’s difficult is to see them through, every day, and always.

But it’s not impossible.

That’s how I do things. And if I fail, I just start over again.

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