Trusting to instinct

Author Rob Starr asks: is success luck, hard work or a mixture of both?

 

I am 56 years old, have been married for 25 years and have three incredible children. My business is now in its 35th year, with offices in the UK and South Africa.  I also set up a children’s charity, Starr Trust, 17 years ago, and we have helped over 6,000 young people to date.  On top of that, I have written and published four books, swum the English Channel, completed Ironman events and even been honoured with an MBE. 

 

When I read that back to myself, it all sounds far too grand for someone who left school at 16 years old with no qualifications to his name and having been told I would not accomplish anything in life.  Apparently, I spend too much time daydreaming.

 

The question I am asked a lot by people, which is a very fair question, is how on earth did all that happen to me when I am seemingly not that smart.  I have to answer that truthfully, and the only way I can, which is to say, probably it’s 99% luck. Or perhaps it’s 99% hard work.  Or perhaps it’s a decent mixture of both.

 

My life is simply filled with unexplainable events that lead me in directions I could never have planned.  And this, I believe, is the true secret. I have spent my entire life, since when I was a child at school, to the present day, following my instinct rather than the obvious, and concerning myself only with what I want rather than how I can get it. 

 

I have always been a bit of a dreamer, writing stories in my head about the things I might do, and most of them seemingly unachievable and far outside my skill set.  Because my dreams are always big, I simply have no way of knowing how to achieve them.  That road is just too long, too hard and far too daunting. 

 

So I just focus on the end result and enjoy that feeling rather than stressing on the how. And guess what happens, the how suddenly presents itself, often in the most bizarre and unexpected way and usually it’s so off point that I have no choice but to either ignore it or just trust that the universe is somehow putting all the pieces into play for me.  It is at that point when I have to trust my instincts, as otherwise, like most people, I would miss what’s staring me straight in the face.

 

All my focus up to that point has been on the end result rather than on how to get there.  I would go so far as to say that when I first start daydreaming about what I want, I actually believe 100% that it will happen.  

 

Think about it like this – when you go online and order something on Amazon, you never hope it will turn up, and you never question how it will come to you.  You put in your payment, press buy now, and then you are 100% certain it will come to you.  You give no thought to how it will happen, and you never doubt for a second it will arrive. 

 

Well, that is what I do with my daydreaming.  I fixate so much on where I want to be that I don’t doubt for a second that it will happen.  That kind of positive thinking is so powerful that it moves all the pieces into place.  

 

But it doesn’t stop there, I still have to do my bit.  And that is to spot the signs when they arrive in front of me, trust that it’s all part of the process and follow my instincts.  I truly believe that we all get opportunities in life, but most people don’t see them, or they ignore their instincts and disregard them.

 

My job is to trust that my instincts will not lead me astray.  I should say that you do have to be brave to follow the unexpected, and also be patient enough to let it come to you.  And you do need to stick at it, which is the hard work bit.  But if you concentrate on what you want and trust that the how will follow, then you will be amazed at what is waiting in the shadows for you.

 

I have so many real stories I could share about how this has worked for me, from starting my company to expanding it overseas to everything else I have achieved in my personal life.  All of them have been that beautiful mixture of luck, instinct and hard graft.  But it all starts with that dream and belief that anything is possible if you dream hard enough.

 

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Rob Starr is the founder of SEICO Insurance & Mortgages and author of Black Gold, published by Just Once Publishing and available to buy now

 

Main image courtesy of iStockPhoto.com ans Zolak