Achievements

On Sunday morning I was in Grangemouth to take part in their annual Round The Houses 10k running event.

The race started and ended at Grangemouth Stadium which was the venue for what I still regard as one of my greatest ever achievements. 

1989 was the year and Grangemouth Stadium was the venue when a football team from Larbert near Falkirk (VIS Colts - formally North Broomage Colts) won the Under 13 Scottish Youth Cup defeating the favourites and well known Edinburgh side Hutchison Vale.


Today was an ideal opportunity to look back on that day but it also got me thinking about why we don't look back on our achievements as often as we should.

We are all caught up in the day to day hustle and bustle of life and for me that is especially true in the business world as I know I don't spent enough time reflecting on the past. We all get caught up in the present and the countless decisions we have to make in the current time that we don't stop and take time to reflect and learn from the past

Looking back at the past and your achievements can have varying effects, one can be the usual "what if" that though is the demon negative that we must banish from our thoughts immediately. I can look back to when I was 18 years old and when I gave up football to concentrate on my electrical career and ask "what if" - what could I have become if I had dedicated all my time to football instead of an electrical apprenticeship.

Or we could look back on our past and our achievements and learn from it but to do that I and you need to set time aside and remove ourselves from the present and allow time to reflect on the past.

So instead of wondering and dwelling on the what if's of why I gave up football, I could look at our teams achievement in 1989 and look at how we defeated the favourite on the day, how as a group of individuals we all played to our own strengths which galvanised us as a team, how we were coached by focused dedicated individuals who got the best out of each one of us to benefit the sum of the team, how by hard work and dedication we deservedly won the cup, how we had to spend many cold winter nights after school in the rain and cold training in the dark to help us achieve our goal.

Taking time out to reflect on those positives of the past will help us make better present and future decisions.

We all spend and yes that still at times includes me, living and getting bogged down in the present but our future can become much more clearer and straightforward by taking time out to reflect and learn from our wins and loses in the past BUT we must allow time in the present to learn from the past which in turn will influence our future.

There's countless more successful people in the world that have achieved much more than winning a football cup competition at 13 years old but the reflecting on the achievement and learning from the negative and plus points of the past is what drives and steers our future success.

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