On my search of useful knowledge I’ve read and watched many biographies and writings of successful people, with the objective of analyzing their success and studying how they achieved their goals.

When I’m studying these role models I try to read between the lines and learn about the environment and circumstances that these people were when doing whatever I see today as achievements. Why? Because this will give me the basis to translate the lessons learned into my world, my circumstances, my life. I don’t really know why, but I’ve noticed that many people don’t do this, and I think doing it is very important.

Before I explain why I think that understanding the influence of the environments is important, let me explain the reasons why I became interested in the topic in the first place.

I was born and raised in The Dominican Republic, a very poor country in The Caribbean that shares an island with an even poorer country named Haiti. If you were born, raised and still live in a developed country you would’t understand or even believe many of the things that happen in these countries, but in summary, most of the things that appear simple in a more advanced place, are very difficult in my country.

I knew this then, and I know it better now that I moved to a developed country and probed my theory.

See all those successful stories you read about? Medical advancements? Incredible innovations in California? There is a whole system behind them that works. There is an infrastructure, working and put in place ever since that person was born, that will somehow influence in the number of possibilities that are going to be available for this individual.

Let me give you one practical example:

In the community where I live today kids are picked up every morning by perfectly working and safe school buses, these kids don’t sweat in the summer because the classroom is correctly acclimated, they also have the appropriate lighting to read, and have access to computers and some other conditions that will facilitate learning.

You may see this as routine, as normal everyday, but I can assure you this is not the case in many places in our planet. In my country kids don’t even have chairs to sit at, not even safe public transportation.

So, where am I going with this? Take two kids, one of each of the environment I described and ask yourself this question: Who will have more chances of succeeding? Please, don’t misunderstand me here? I’m not asking who will succeed, I’m asking who’ll have more chances. To which one is going to be harder? Now, see where I’m going?

Your environment will not determine if you will succeed or not, but it will make it easier or harder, that’s for sure.

Now, based on the 2 important facts that:

1. Our environment influences and facilitates possibilites for our success and…
2. That we don’t choose the environment where we are born and raised

We can arrive to these conclusions:

• This is not an excuse to sit and do nothing. With whatever we have, we must stand and make the best out of it.
• If we are aware of the limitations of our environment we can try to change it, for us or even for our children. In my case, I moved out to a better environment. Left my family and my friends, paid that price with the promise of a better system that will make things easier for me.
• If there is someone you are following and admire, try to study first that person’s environment and circumstances, but not to tell you that you can’t because your situation is worse, but to identify the real challenges and the price you’ll have to pay to achieve the same.

In general terms, every person’s circumstances are different, and every person is different, so to come up with inmutable laws is very difficult if not impossible.

Let’s only understand that we can achieve anything we want in life, as long as we are willing to pay the price to get it, knowing that the price is not universal, maybe higher or lower to different people depending on multiple variables, being “environment” one of them.

I leave you know with a very popular quote from a famous spanish philosopher that summarizes my point very well:

“I am me, and my circumstances” – Jose Ortega y Gasset

You’ve heard it before:

“That guys is so lucky, He got two scholarship offers in one year”

“She was lucky she got that job”

For me luck doesn’t exist, and let me explain you why.

Luck is one time event that doesn’t give credit to the past, which is the whole “process” that happened before that event (considered luck).

So, instead of noticing how lucky was somebody, I prefer to study what have been the actions that person has taken (directly and indirectly) that may have influenced on the results today.

Ask yourself this: How many people you know that would like to become business owners? I bet is a high number, probably even you.

You can hear most of those people saying: “When I have my own business I will do this or that…” And you can ask them: “And when is that going to be” – “Someday”

Now there are those who wish something, and those who wish something, plan how to get it and go for it.

So, take two of your friends who want to be business owners, one of them just wants, and that’s it, the other one starts reading books, blogs, asking people, interviewing other business owners, he decided to watch less TV and spend more time figuring out how to form a business… He is working towards it.

5 years passed, and you ask the first one how it is going about the idea of becoming a business owner and the answer will probably be: “I haven’t had any good idea” or “I haven’t had the time”.

Now what do you think may happen to the other one? Well, it’s not guaranteed but the odds of being closer to become a business owner are much greater that the first example. Don’t you think?

Now let’s say this second person reached the goal and is now a business owner. You can be sure that for the first person this is going to be luck. For him, the guy who made it was lucky because the idea came to him, or because the relations of his family, or because the money he had, you name it, excuses, excuses, excuses. I hate them.

This is just an example, but you can find the same analogy on any situation, it doesn’t matter, you will always find the unlucky ones calling the ones with success lucky ones.

Everything is a process, and the fact that he was able to form his own business was the result of a set of processes before that “lucky” result.

So instead of complaining about what I don’t or couldn’t have, or about my bad luck, I prefer to quantify the price I’ll have to pay to achieve what I want, and if my ambition or passion for it is big enough, there are no excuses. Period.