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Welcome to the Impact Podcast. I'm Eddie Wilson, here to help you visualize what others cannot see, create opportunities where others have failed, and push you to build empires where once there was empty space. Let's embark on this journey together and make a difference in this world. Welcome to the Impact Podcast with Eddie Wilson. Really excited to come to you today with a new concept and this idea of that a truth that most people won't tell you, the truth that most people won't tell you is that God can give you an opportunity, but he won't make you ready for it. Your job as an entrepreneur is to be ready for the opportunities in this podcast. And I want to say, just as a way of introduction, I just want to say thank you for all the listenership and the viewership and all the shares. We've had over a million downloads in the first 45 episodes, and it's just been an awesome opportunity for me to share the insights and the stories and the lessons that I've learned along the way. And so, as we share this one today, I hope that you will help me with this, that you will not only listen to it for yourself, but also for those that could need it. And if you wouldn't mind, share that with somebody. If a person pops in your head, as you hear these concepts or thoughts or ideas, make sure you share that with them. And then also, again, continue to communicate with me and let me know the things you'd like for me to talk about. One just quick thought as we jump in is that a lot of you, I get a lot of feedback where people will binge watch these shows. They'll tell me, oh, I watched, you know, the last 10 episodes, and I'd like to kind of warn you about that and say that really, these are intentional with the thought of developing leaders in leadership, developing, you know, entrepreneurs, developing people. And so one thing that I would suggest is that you don't binge watch them. You listen to them systematically. Systematically. You listen to them for the week, and then you apply. You listen to it for another week, and then you apply. I think sometimes when you binge listen to these, it's good because you pick up all the information, but then you miss the application. And every single week, I'm giving you something to apply. I'm giving you a challenge to. To try to implement in your life, almost as if you were one of the leaders on my team speaking to you as if you were a part of my team. And I'm mentoring you and teaching you and guiding you and trying to help develop you. And so instead of just like, you know, a shotgun approach, I'd love for you to take them systematically and make application each and every week. So the concept today is that you can have all the opportunities in the world, but if you, if you don't and are not prepared to take advantage of them, there's a real tragedy here. There's a tragedy in the fact that you're not able to handle it when it comes. The real tragedy isn't not having a chance. Most people have chances in their life. Very few people go through life without chances or opportunity. But many people go through life when the opportunity or chance hits. They miss the opportunity that is right in front of them. You, you want to make sure that, that as these opportunities reveal themselves, that you are mature enough and charactered enough to handle them as they come. You don't rise to the level of your calling. You fall to the level of your character and your systems. And you hear me talk about systems and character often with regard to Empire. But I want to give you just two quick stories and then I'll give you some principles to apply this week. The first story is I'm five years old and want a dog really, really bad. I don't know if you've ever been there before where you, you have a desire. Well, my, my dad was one of those dads that really didn't want the, the responsibility of a dog, right? He didn't want to feed the dog. He didn't want to pay for the, the food for the dog. He didn't want to have to walk the dog. He didn't want the mess in the yard from the dog. And so my mom, however, loves animals and was all about it. And so, you know, for a while I would just pester my dad about, can I have a dog? Is there a way I could get a dog? I'll take care of it. And a lesson that my mom taught me, I think I was actually six at the time, she said, you know, you keep asking your dad for a dog. And she said, but do you think that you're really prepared for it? She said, you know, your dad has a lot of reservations about you getting this dog because he doesn't want to care for it. He wants to believe that you can care for it. And she said, in preparation for getting one, what if we just acted as if you had one? And I said, okay. So we went to the store and, and we bought a dog dish and we bought food and we bought a leash. And she said, act as if you have this dog every day in front of your dad. She said, put the food in the bowl and show your dad that you're willing to feed it. She said, dump the food back in. She was like, literally, just walk through the practice of having a dog every day and show your dad for a long period of time that you're willing to do this. She said, in preparation for what you want, she said, act as if it's already there. And so, you know, one of those amazing lessons as a child at six years old, I literally would have a dog dish, and I'd pour the dog, you know, food in a dish, and we, you know, I would walk outside and have the leash and all these things, and I would do all these things in preparation or showing my dad that I was willing to do all the work that it took to actually get this dog. Long story short, I got a black cocker spaniel named Satin, and I had to take care of it every single day. And it was a lot more work than what I expected. But it was the preparation that allowed my dad, my father, to go ahead and take that chance with me. And I think that that simple story is so important because oftentimes we find ourselves wishing and praying and thinking and meditating on the things we want. And instead of spending all that energy on desiring, thinking, praying, wishing, what if we spent the exact amount of time in preparation in walking the dog before the dog is there and feeding the dog before the dog is there. There's also a biblical story that I. I love and enjoy and heard so much as a kid. And. And it's this story of. Of. Of Moses and the Promised Land. I don't know if you've ever heard this story before, but you've got Moses who is commanded to take the children of Israel into the Promised Land. And it's both, you know, historical and metaphorical, but God has prepared for his people this amazing place. And. And in the Book of Numbers in the Bible, it talks about. It's a land flowing with milk and honey, and it's. It's just like there. It's picturesque in. In its. In its kind of description. And it's got all the things that you want and all the things that they desired. And so. So Moses decides to send 12 men into the land to go spy it out and see what they're dealing with before they just go into it. Instead of just walking into this land, they believe that God had given it to them, but he wanted to send the men in. So the. They Called him the spies, the 12 spies. And so the 12 spies come back, and two of them, one by the name of Caleb, right, Comes back and says, hey, let's do it. God called us to take it. We, we're ready. Let's go. And 10 said, no, no, there's giants in the land like these people. They're going to. They're going to essentially squish us. They're going to. They're going to kill us. They're going to defeat us. We shouldn't go in. And so 10 come back with the story of, of we can't do it. It's impossible, right? And, and in the end, it's. It's kind of a story. I think it's, it's both historical and in the Bible, but it's also metaphorical for us in that so much of the opportunity that lies ahead of us is met with, you know, a small percentage of desire and anticipation, excitement. And so much of the opportunity is met with fear. And is it going to be possible? And the craziest thing is then the story goes on and progresses. And God, because of their unbelief and their fear and their lack of, of taking what was rightfully theirs and, and taking that opportunity, they end up wandering in the desert, the wilderness, for 40 years, right? And that generation essentially dies off without ever getting to see the promised land. They miss their moment, right? And that's the, that's the story. And so two stories for, for you, it's the story of preparation for the dog, and I end up getting the dog. It's the story of these Israelites wandering in the desert for 40 years, missing their moment. And the point I want to make to you today is, is that fear delays your destiny, and sometimes it disqualifies you from experiencing it. I almost feel like there's a moment, if you think of your life on a timeline, and there's these moments on this timeline that are going to hit, and maybe we call that destiny, right? And it's kind of this moment that's essentially awaiting you, and then you've got this timeline that's just kind of ever increasing, and you're going down this timeline, and the moment of destiny is essentially there and almost immovable. And in preparation for that, we make choices and almost anticipate or desire it or want it, but never actually prepare for it. And so I want to just give you a couple of reasons this morning on why you miss your moment, right? Why you're not prepared for the destiny. And some just kind of Warning so that it doesn't disqualify you from experiencing it. Right? And we've all had those moments where we just weren't ready. You know, whether it was the big game in sports or whether it was the first chance that you got to start as a starter in sports or whatever. It was like this moment, this moment where there was a promotion that was right in front of you in your place of work or business, but you got passed over. And it's all about, what are we doing to make sure we're not missing that moment? Okay, so why do we miss the moment? Number one, oftentimes, in anticipation, you desire it, you pray for it, you meditate on it, but you've never prepared for it. And so instead of thinking and wishing and desiring, like I said, I believe that we should spend the time in preparation. What if instead of sitting there thinking about the job promotion you want or the raise you want, you go ahead and take the steps as if you already have it? You say, well, that seems presumptuous. No, it seems prepare it. It should be something that you are taking those steps for. Like if you want the vice president job, if you want the CEO job, and act as if you already have it today, right? Like, take those initiatives as if it's yours. The second thing is, is that when you're given the opportunity, you still have to walk in it. You still have to walk through it. You can't just experience it by being aware of it, right? Like, you have to walk into the moment. The moment requires readiness, not just a belief now, not just a belief that it's going to happen, not just a belief that I'm going to get the dog, but it's the preparedness. It's the readiness of, here's all the things that I've done for when I do. You want to be the CEO? Well, what have you done to essentially qualify yourself to be the CEO? You want to be the head of whatever department? Well, what have you done? You say, well, I want to do a million dollars in sales. Well, what have you already done in preparation to do the million dollars? You're doing 300,000, 500,000. A million. You say, I want to get to a billion. What have you done in your life to prepare yourself and qualify yourself for the billion? You see, there's something in the energy of our. Of our kind of human experience that if we will just live as if. If we will act as if it's so, then it seems to naturally just come to us. Just seems to Naturally come to us. My, my 19 year old son now we talked a lot about, he wanted to ride motorcycles. And I've, I've rode motorcycles my whole, loved them. And he wanted to get a motorcycle. And you know what I said to him was, is if you intend to get a motorcycle, you desire to get a motorcycle, go do all the things necessary ahead of time to have a motorcycle, right? Like go take the courses, go get your license, go do all the things so that when you do have the money and the opportunity presents itself, you're already prepared. Don't wait to buy the motorcycle and then get all the things or do all the things in order to qualify yourself for it. Does that make sense? And so that's number one, you've, you've prayed for it, but you've never prepared for it. Number two, you fear what's ahead more than what you've been created to be or do, right? And you know, it's this thought, if you go back to that Bible story about, you know, these, this, these 12 spies went into the land and 10 came back and said, no, there's giants in the land. We're never going to defeat the people. There's never going to be the ability to coexist in this space. Like there's not going to be room for us. And there's a point here to be made. And that is that the giants in the land didn't cancel the promise that God had already made to the people, right? Like he had already said, this is your place to go. And those giants didn't cancel the promise. You know, the issues that you will face in possessing or acting in that new opportunity, do not cancel the, the promise or the opportunity. What it does is it confirms that it's worth something. There's nothing in your life that has value that isn't worth fighting or striving or, or, or working towards. Think about all the things in your life that you possess that you put or ascribe value to. And all of them came with struggle, with a fight, with work, right? All those things that came easy, you, you lessen their value. And so the giants in the land only prove that that land is actually worth it. Does that make sense? Like why would they be there if the land had no value, if the land was desolate, if the land was not worth it? And all the things that you desire, the things you're praying for, the things you're wishing for, the things you're working and striving for, will only have value to the degree that there Is some level of opposition in it, right? Like to just say, I want to be CEO and be granted it tomorrow and it'd be easy. Is not, does not ascribe value in kind of the human experience. Most leaders fold under pressure because they fixate on resistance. They fixate on resistance, not the vision. If you fixate on the vision, what happens is the resistance is just a part of the experience. When you fixate on the resistance, then the resistance is the experience. You know, get interviewed on a lot of podcasts and you know, maybe stages sometimes and I'll get asked this question and they'll say, tell me about your failure. Tell me about the issues. And I struggle oftentimes to go back to the moment of failure because the moment of failure was just resistance along the way. And I've worked so hard at trying to train my mind and making sure that I'm not focusing on, on this thing that happened that was negative, but yet a focus on the vision of where I'm heading. So that negative or that resistance or that seeming failure is just a stepping stone along the way. If you focus on the failure, oftentimes that's the experience. If you focus on the vision, then the failures along the way are just resistance that actually provides the vision value. Number three, you've surrounded yourself with the wrong voices. And this is important as you grow in your life and in your human development and in your business and all the things that you've got going on in the personal world and in the professional world, that when you put the wrong voices around you, the fear and the problems begin to escalate. Okay, so think about it this way. If you go back to those stories, you've got the 10 spies that are the voice of fear, right? Like, we can't go. We can't do this. And you've got the two that are saying, let's go. What happens if we would have sent different spies into that land, right? Like, what if you would have doubled down on the two that were positive and excited and motivated, right, versus the 10 that were negative and fear based? In your life, are you surrounding yourself with negative fear based, antithetical opposition? Or are you surrounding yourself with people who want to go accomplish something, who are aligned with the vision, who are passionate with where you're headed? You can't just win in life with common people who have no desire or vision. I know that as a leader, what you want to do is you want to essentially put yourself in this pinnacle kind of situation where you are the leader, you're the top and everybody else is kind of leaning on you or resting on you to go to the big, to the big place, right to the vision. And, and I got to say that that is weak leadership. What you need to do is put people around you who push you and drive you and don't allow you to see anything else other than the vision. If everyone around you, there should only be so many times that you allow the negative common voices to speak to the fears that you have. If you notice that if, if, if, for instance, like, if you have a fear, I'm never going to make it, I'm never going to be good enough. I'm not going to have enough money, I'm not going to have enough accomplishments, whatever, those fears are, right? If you notice that everyone around you, the common voice is speaking to those fears, you have the wrong people around you. If the common voice is saying, no, that's not worth dwelling on, that's not worth thinking, let's develop, let's push, let's go. If that common voice is pushing you beyond your fears, not speaking to your fears, now you have the right people around you. If the masses are speaking to the fears that you already possess inside, you've put the wrong people around you. You've surrounded yourself with the wrong voices. You know, in that story, you had two people with warrior mindsets that were wanting to go, possess, take, advance, and you had 10 that were speaking to fear number four. You don't make decisions fast enough. This is a more practical one. So let me just go back through them. You've prayed for it, you never prepared for it. You fear what's ahead more than what you were created to be or created to do. You surrounded yourself with the wrong voices and you didn't make decisions fast enough. Oftentimes in the hesitation is the gap in which you miss your moment, you hesitate, and you lose it. Opportunities are often time sensitive. If you don't move in alignment, the moment will move on. One thing that I've noticed in my own life is that, let's just say the moment, this opportunity is going to be given to someone or something. You know, if you think about it in the context of, let's just say sports, you've prepared, you're ready, you're sitting on the bench, and the coach finally calls your name. If all of a sudden you take off the warmup and you realize, like, oh, I forgot to put on my jersey because I'm so used to not playing, and you just end up thinking, I'm not gonna play, so I'm just gonna put the, the warm up over the over a T shirt versus a jersey and begin to take it off. And you realize I don't have the jersey on. What's your coach gonna do? Next person in line. That's life. That's the moment, right? Like when you miss it because of preparedness or whatever it is, a lack of preparedness, what happens is that moment just moves on to the next person. Think about the times you've been passed over. Think about the times that you've missed your shot or your opportunity. Think about the times that you've been given the chance to actually succeed and grow and take that next step up and when you miss, moves on to someone else. Be prepared, right? And then also make sure that in the time sensitive nature that you step into it. Hesitation kills momentum. Hesitation kills momentum. I've watched so many people that as I've tapped them on the shoulder like, okay, it's time to lead, they hesitate. What you need to do is when you're tapped a leader, the moment comes, it's time to take a breath, it's time to think back. It's not time to hesitate and then make a conscious choice as to what you want to do, right? And so opportunities are time sensitive. You don't move in alignment, the moment will move on. So here's a couple of things that I want you to do. Here's the challenge. Number one, Build while you wait. Build while you wait. As you are waiting for the opportunity, you're praying for it, you're thinking about it, you're meditating on it. Build, make sure you're prepared for it. Systems, teams, messaging, right decision making frameworks. When I have the opportunity, this is the choice I'm gonna make. When I get the chance to lead, this is what I'm going to do. Dream and think about those moments and prepare for them. Number two, train your fear response. When, when the pressure hits or the opportunity hits, will you shrink or will you strike? Will you, will you begin to pull back? Will you wince? Will you hesitate or will you lean in? And when you think through those processes, when you're building, while you wait, when the opportunity comes, you're prepared and you begin to lean in. Practice decisive leadership in small things. When you are given opportunities to make choices, practice decisive leadership. Practice decisive decision making. Don't always wait for the collaboration. Don't always wait for the group. Think, step into it, make decisive decisions and lean on them. Fear is always a part of the journey and that's just a natural place. But you have to train that fear response. Leaders do not ever act in fear Leadership and forward momentum and fear are at opposition. There's two great emotions in, in life and we've talked about this on previous podcasts. There's fear and love. Fear is. Is essentially resisting something or running from something. Love is passionately moving towards something. We need to move as leaders in, in love. And then number three, you better know your the people that have the warrior mindset. Make sure that you are aligning yourself with people who are moving forward, who are taking advantage of the opportunities. Keep people around around you that remind you about where the vision is. Keep people around you that remind you what you're striving for. Do your dear friends, do your friends amplify your fear or do your friends amplify your faith? Right? Like is are your feet, are your friends around you cheering you on and saying, look, let's go for it, let's do it, or are they amplifying your fear? Here's the last piece, and we'll close with this, is that there are moments in front of you right now. There are moments that are beginning to present your themselves. There's a conversation that you're avoiding right now. There's a deal that you're hesitating on. You know that you've. You've got a potential opportunity, but you're hesitating. There's a leadership change that you know is due and right, but you won't pull the trigger. All of these things as they come to mind right now, are preparation for what is about to come. Where are you headed? What, what dream is inside? What passion are you pursuing now? Let's step into that. Let's take one step this week. Let's begin to walk into that place. Don't be the 10 that say, you know what, based on all of this fear, all this opposition, I'm going to resist. Be the two that walks in. Be the, be the person that is buying the dog food, that's buying the leash that's walking in life as if it's already. So I think that you are not waiting on clarity right now. You're avoiding responsibility. We all have a responsibility in this life to act on the abilities to act on the gifts and the talents we've been given. And for you, a little bit of just kind of push is that it's not about having enough clarity to take the next step. It's about walking in responsibility for all the opportunity you have. Think about every person around you that has less than you have, think about the person that has less experience, less opportunity, less, you know, ability, whatever it is. Now, walk in what you've been given. Take that step, Be a responsible person. Make the move, build the system. Take that, that territory, right? Like, take that space. Let's walk in it and let's make sure that we're not missing our moment. Thanks so much for being a part of the podcast and for listening today. Love to connect with you further. And you can connect with me on social media at Eddie Wilson, official on any of the social media channels.