An Enemy called average author says each of us has been given a certain mixture of abilities and opportunities that make us unique. No mixture is insignificant. Those matchless qualities that God has placed within all of us cause us to yearn to be above average and extraordinary.
AN ENEMY CALLED AVERAGE BY JOHN MASON
Book : An Enemy Called Average By John Mason
Summary of An Enemy Called Average By John Mason
LOOKING INWARD
Exciting, innovative, transforming, productive…words that will never be associated with beige. Rather, beige implies lukewarmness, indifference, neutrality…attitudes no one wants to be around.
Here’s a great opportunity: choose to be a person who is on the offensive, not the defensive. Never try to defend your present position and situation. People who live defensively never rise above average. Decide to be on the offensive, to take the initiative. Lukewarm, indecisive people are never secure regardless of their wealth, education, or position.
When you choose to act on the offensive, keep all your conflicts impersonal. Fight the issue, not the person. Speak about what God within you can do, not about what others are incapable of doing. You will find that when all of your reasons are defensive, your cause will almost never succeed. A basketball team that never takes a shot never wins a game.
Persistence
Persistent people begin their success where most others quit. Here’s a simple key to success in any area of your life: be known as a person of persistence and endurance. One person with commitment, persistence, and endurance will accomplish more than a thousand people with interest alone.
Never worry about how much money, ability, or equipment you start with; just begin with a million dollars’ worth of determination. Remember this: it’s not what you have, it’s what you do with what you have that makes all the difference. Many people eagerly begin “the good fight of faith,” but they forget to add patience, persistence, and endurance to their enthusiasm.
Many times our dreams and plans appear to be faltering. We are tempted to give up and quit trying. Instead, let’s continue to water and fertilize those dreams and plans, nurturing the seeds of the vision God has placed within us. We know that if we do not quit, if we display perseverance and endurance, we will also reap a harvest.
Time
All great achievers understand the value of controlling their time. They know that we human beings have been created equal in this respect: every one of us is privileged with twenty-four hours a day. What we do with each day matters.
Give your best time to your most challenging situation. It’s not how much you do that matters; it’s how much you finish. Here’s a key: Say no. Saying yes when you should say no is one of the biggest reasons for wasting time.
We all have the same amount of time each day. The difference between people is determined by what they do with the amount of time at their disposal. Don’t be like the airline pilot flying over the Pacific Ocean who reported to his passengers, “We’re lost, but we’re making great time!” Remember that the future arrives an hour at a time. Gain control of your time, and you will gain control of your life.
Never Lie
Hope built on a lie is always the beginning of loss. Never attempt to build anything on a foundation of lies and half-truths. It will not stand. Never expect God to bless a lie.
Lying easily becomes a habit. A person who lies once will lie again with less effort. Lying is a trap. No one has a good-enough memory to be a successful liar. T.L. Osborn said, “Always tell the truth, and you never have to remember what you said.”
Don’t Quit After Victory
The two most common times people quit is after a defeat and after a victory. If you recognize this fact, you will stop less and go farther. Robert Schuller says, “Don’t cash in; cast into deeper water.” Do not stop after a success; keep the forward momentum. Don’t stop after a failure; dust yourself off, learn the lesson, and start up again.
One of the great prizes of victory is the opportunity to do more. The trouble is that small doses of success have often inoculated us from catching the big victory. Picture a large boulder at the top of a hill. This boulder represents our lives. If we rock the boulder back and forth and get it moving, its momentum will make it almost unstoppable. The same is true for us.
Those who Don’t Take Chances Don’t Make Advances
People whose faith runs ahead of their minds make all the great discoveries. Significant achievements have been obtained by taking large risks on important issues, and not the other way around. Never waste time planning, analyzing, and risking on small ideas. It’s smarter to spend more time on decisions that are irreversible and to spend less time on those that are reversible.
Choose to dream big, to strive to reach the full potential of your calling. Choose to major on the important issues of life, not on the unimportant. H. Stern said, “If you’re hunting rabbits in tiger country, you must keep your eye peeled for tigers, but when you are hunting tigers, you can ignore the rabbits.”
Security and opportunity are total strangers. If an undertaking doesn’t include faith, it isn’t worthy of being called God’s direction. Direction and faith go hand in hand.
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