Start with what you have, not with what you don't have. Opportunity is always where you are, never where you were. To get anywhere you must launch out for somewhere or you will get nowhere.  Hamilton Mabie said, "The question for each man to settle is not what he would do if he had the means, time, influence and education advantages, but what he will do with the things he has." God will always give us an ability to create what we need from something that is already there.

Each person tends to underrate or overrate that which they do not possess. Ed Howe said, "People are always neglecting something they can do and trying to do something they can't do." I agree with Teddy Roosevelt when he said, "Do what you can, with what you have, where you are." The only way to learn anything thoroughly is by starting at the bottom (except when learning how to swim). To be successful, do what you can.

Ken Keys, Jr. said, "To be upset over what you don't have is to waste what you do have."  The truth is that many are successful because they didn't have the advantages others had. People with enterprise accomplish more than others because they go ahead and do it before they are ready.

Epicurus said, "Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; but remember that what you now have was once among the things only hoped for."  Henri Amiel observed, "Almost everything comes from almost nothing."

No improvement is so certain as that which proceeds from the right and timely use of what you already have. Mike Murdock said, "Whatever God has already given to you will create anything else He has promised to you." Everyone who has arrived had to begin where they were.

The truth is, you can't know what you can do until you try. The most important thing about reaching your dream is starting right where you are. Edward Hail said, "I cannot do everything, but I still can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do something I can do."


Source: Conquering An Enemy Called Average by John Mason.
Excerpt permission granted by Insight Publishing