Timing Your Razzle Dazzle Success

Twenty years ago I was supposed to go to Paris on a summer trip with my French teacher and classmates. There was always a pull in me toward this city across the world that I found so spellbinding and sophisticated. My parents had saved the money needed for me to be able to go.

Before the trip, our family’s black lab, Razz (short for Razzle Dazzle) tore her Achilles heel and was going to need surgery. My heart broke for her. I don’t know what in me told me to, but I volunteered my Paris trip money to go toward her surgery.

So it did. Razz had her surgery and Paris was out of my summer plans.

Unfortunately, weeks later, when they removed the cast, the Achilles tore again and Razz had to undergo an amputation. She lived several years as our three-legged love, “Tri-pod” as my Pops called her. How rude!

I never regretted my decision. I loved every minute of extra time I shared with my first Labrador retriever, Razz. I had peace of mind knowing Paris would always be there, waiting on me.

Last fall, I was finally able to make it to Paris. It was all I ever dreamed it to be: alluring, mysterious, and a creative minds wonderland. I now know why so many amazing early 1900’s American writers would go to Paris and spend time “writing”. I also now know the twenty-year delay in my trip was for good reason. Had I traveled to Paris as a fourteen year old, I’m not sure I would have truly appreciated the city and its magical aura as I did this past November.

Like my trip to Paris, there are many things in business where timing is monumental to your appreciation. The most important of which is your success aka Razzle Dazzle!

Three important attributes that happen with delayed success:

1. Awareness. When your success takes a little longer to show up, you have a better chance of being aware of what led you there. There is more time for trial and error and if you are wise, you’ll become better armed to study what is working best and leading you closer to your goals. With this awareness comes the responsibility to take action to help ensure continued success. If you can pinpoint with awareness what led you to finally achieving your goals, you can duplicate it.

2. Appreciation. Instant gratification creates lack of appreciation. There are many people who want to become an overnight success yet they abandon the necessary component of hard work and TIME. There are very few “overnight successes” which actually happen overnight. Their stories, if you do due diligence, include months, years, or even decades of effort, work and failures prior to their moment of success. When you have delayed timing in your success, you appreciate it more, because you know you worked for it, earning what you reap. As much as I would have loved to go to Paris when I was in high school, the fact that I went when I could afford it on my own (not my parents financially sacrificing to send me) made it even sweeter. What successes have taken longer than anticipated yet provided you greater appreciation?

3. Preparedness. Delayed success allows you to be better prepared for when it actually does come knocking. Whether it’s simple maturity or the extra time, it arms you with the skills, experience and knowledge you need to be more properly prepared to handle your success. When you are better prepared, you handle both the positives and negatives of success with more grace and humbleness; emerging a leader. Time works wonders on a human’s soul.

The first night in Paris we had dinner in the Eiffel Tower, cruised along the Seine and then headed off to honor my sweet girl with a one-of a-Parisian kind Razzle Dazzle at the Moulin Rouge. All was as it should be; perfect in timing and giving me awareness, total appreciation and preparedness of the hard work that led me there. Sweet Razzle Dazzle Success!

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