Last week was thanksgiving, an american holiday that has always passed me by without notice. The distinct lack of pilgrims in my part of the world means that we were never grateful for turkey and other deliciousness… which is a shame, because the underlying message of a day for gratitude is a fantastic concept.

Gratitude is one of my favorite topics. I talk about it with every client. I observe it, in action, amongst the pioneers and tycoons of business with whom I’m fortunate enough to rub shoulders.

Gratitude is one of those qualities shared universally amongst successful people. It takes gratitude to achieve the trifecta of entrepreneurial success – wealth, freedom & sanity. More importantly, it takes gratitude to live through adversity and come out the other side happy.

The path to entrepreneurial success is one fraught with challenge. In my ebook Demystify Your Fear, I talk about the insanity of entrepreneurs. The statistical odds of big time business success are so low, when one considers the ratio of wannabes to winners, that even attempting an entrepreneurial journey should be grounds to be hospitalized!

But you do it anyway. You shoot for huge goals despite your friends and family thinking you’re nuts. And, it feels great!

Then you hit your first obstacle. The dreams you had collide with reality, resulting in the gut-wrenching realization that this may not be as easy as you thought.

When an entrepreneur overcomes such an obstacle quickly, they feel like champions. When it takes them a little longer, a sort of depression starts to set in. As frustration with the obstacle grows, progress grinds to a halt. The feelings of bitterness, anger and despair creep into your life.

As the shrink for entrepreneurs, I see people hitting these obstacles at various levels of the entrepreneurial journey. Having worked with CEOs of publicly traded companies and people starting out with just an “idea”, I’ve come to appreciate that the entrepreneurial journey is a series of steps. No matter what level you’re playing at.

You hit an obstacle, get stuck, find a solution and transcend the problem. Then, you hit another one. Rinse and repeat.

Here’s the honest truth: The complexity, challenge and commercial risk of the problems tends to grow as you progress… not diminish.

How then do mega-successful business owners keep growing their companies? Why does their journey accelerate, even as it becomes more difficult?

The answer is gratitude.

When newbie entrepreneurs transcend their first problem, they party hard. They feel like they’ve accomplished something major and celebrate accordingly.

Then, when problem number two rears it’s ugly head, they panic.

The newbie entrepreneur naively assumed that life was only going to get easier, once that first problem had been vanquished. The second hurdle catches them by surprise, often while they’re coasting on the high of the last problem’s resolution.

The wicked imp of frustration, depression and bitterness starts whispering in the entrepreneur’s ear. The recent high of the last victory is forgotten in a crushing wave of despair.

This is where most people give up.

Seasoned entrepreneurs never forget

Experienced, successful entrepreneurs always remember the success of the past. When new, difficult obstacles arise in their lives they adopt a different perspective.

They hold onto their gratitude for the road behind them, which allows them to imagine a road ahead.

… and that’s how it works.

Amateurs paralyzed by despair fail to access the mental resources required to see the road ahead. Their negative emotional state blinds them to the opportunities and solutions available.

Successful entrepreneurs remain thankful of the adversities they’ve overcome. They remember that while those old problems seemed horrific at the time, hindsight transforms them into educational, capability-building experience.

As the entrepreneur gives thanks for their past they intuitively know that, in time, they’ll look back on the current obstacle in the same way. They realize that the current (new) problem is actually a good thing – an opportunity to stretch!

The successful entrepreneur believes that life is perfect.

On Thanksgiving day (more or less – I was in Sydney, figuring out the timezones), I took time out to remember everything I have to be grateful for. As a child born into a social demographic that 95% of the world’s population envy, I consider myself pretty fortunate.

I’m grateful to my professor parents for their academic careers that sowed the seeds for my rejection of the academic status quo. Simultaneously, I’m grateful for their stubbornness in ignoring my views. There’s a direct correlation between every essay my mum ever forced me to write… and the effectiveness of this blog.

I’m grateful to all my friends for being who they are (priceless!). I thank my business network for putting increasingly more-awesome roofs over my head. I’m grateful for every reader of this blog – even though I might only know some of you as a statistic, you’ve changed my life.

I think life is perfect and I’m looking forward to changing it for the better. That’s right! Perfect though it may be, there’s huge things afoot and a lot to look forward to.

If you want to stack the odds for business success in your favor, I suggest you adopt the perspective that life is perfect too.

My good friend, author Michael Ellsberg, released a free manifesto on Thanksgiving. It may change your life. What does it mean that your life is Perfect? is one of the most significant pieces of writing that I’ve digested all year.

It’s short and high impact – I read it cover to cover, twice, in one sitting. It challenges the reader to adopt a level of highly mentally evolved thinking that is guaranteed to create more happiness, more success and more fulfillment.

Michael has a landing page set up with an email opt-in form. His list serves just one purpose – alerting Michael’s tribe to new manifestos as he publishes them. I’ve heard a little about what’s coming next from Michael and I recommend you sign up. The next manifesto is one you’ll want to grab the day it ships.

Michael’s Perfection Manifesto eloquently and passionately argues for the adoption of a philosophy that my experience confirms as the single greatest factor in determining the success and fulfillment of human beings.

Read it. Today.

With gratitude and thanks,