Hope Is Not A Strategy (Part Three)

Continuing down the loop today, we’re going to pick up the “end game” conversation from yesterday and run with it.

Since you’re still in the middle of my end game, you may be scratching your head yet, trying to piece all this together.

This is where Joan of Arc comes in. According to Wikipedia:

“Joan asserted that she had visions from God which instructed her to recover her homeland from English domination late in the Hundred Years’ War. The uncrowned King Charles VII sent her to the siege of Orléans as part of a relief mission. She gained prominence when she overcame the dismissive attitude of veteran commanders and lifted the siege in only nine days. Several more swift victories led to Charles VII’s coronation at Reims and settled the disputed succession to the throne.”

When people quote Joan, often it is “I am not afraid… I was born to do this.” But there are two other quotes that I offer today:

“One life is all we have and we live it as we believe in living it. But to sacrifice what you are and to live without belief, that is a fate more terrible than dying.” (emphasis mine)

“Act, and God will act”

Regardless of your religious persuasion (or lack thereof), you have to credit Joan with an incredibly powerful belief. She knew her end game. She even predicted her own injury on the battlefield.

She knew what she had come here for and to her dying breath, she did it without compromise.

Are you living your belief? In your life, your work, your coming and going, your “rising and resting” as some scriptures would say.

Do you even know what you believe?

Here’s a girl that’s been praying hard for years and finally her end game becomes clear. She figures out the steps in the cycle and makes her move. She achieves her end game.

It’s the same pattern you see in powerful leaders throughout history. The details  may be more personal, but the patterns are undeniable. I’ve remarked on more than one occasion about the similarities between the rise of Hitler and one of our more recent presidents. Both were charismatic speakers. Both wrote books about their life that outlined how they’d “change the world”. Both rose to power with a grassroots level of enthusiasm.

Patterns. Cycles.

More recently, you might have heard it called “modeling.” The idea that if you want to be a millionaire, find someone else that has done it, learn from them and model them.

The problem with modeling is that you are NOT them. Your set of beliefs, your core values are probably not the same. Modeling their successes may also mean modeling their failures. Or WORSE.

But finding the patterns… now that’s something that can benefit you. If you want to be a millionaire, don’t just look for one person that’s done it. Look at many people who have done it. What are the commonalities? Where are the patterns, similarities?

Take notes. Lots of them. Then find those commonalities in YOUR life and work.

Then ACT. Take action. Move the ball down the field and see what happens next. See the end game and move relentlessly towards it. If it’s your life’s end game, as it was for Joan, you’ve got to be willing to die for it.

What are you willing to die for?

Are you living that belief?