CHAPTER 1
EVERYTHING IN LIFE HAS POTENTIAL
All men are sent to the world with limitless credit, but few draw to their full extent.
Your potential was not given for you to deposit in the grave. You must understand the tremendous potential you possess and commit yourself to maximizing it in your short lifetime.
Potential is unexposed ability and latent power. What you have done is no longer your potential.
Unless you do something beyond what you have done, you will never grow or experience your full potential.
One of the great enemies of your potential is success. You must never be satisfied with your last accomplishment.
Nothing in life is instant. People think miracles are instant, but they really are not. They are just a process that has been sped up.
God knew that in Adam and Eve there were enough people to fill the earth. That’s the way God works. He knows the potential principle because He introduced it. It is Him.
One of the greatest enemies of your potential is success. God wants you to maximize the potential He has given to you. You are not yet what you are supposed to be—though you may be pleased with what you now are.
Don’t be satisfied with your last accomplishment, because there are many accomplishments yet to be perfected.
Never accept success as a lifestyle—it is but a phase. Never accept an accomplishment as the end—it is but a mark in the process.
There are many selves within you that lie dormant, untapped and unused.
The minute we begin to settle down and be satisfied with what we have, we lose the possibility of revealing what is really inside us.
People die without getting out their full potential. They fail to use all that was stored in them for the benefit of the world.
What would the world have lost if you had not been born? What will the world lack because you fail to live out your potential? Will you carry songs, books, inventions, cures, or discoveries to your grave?
As the time for His crucifixion drew near, Jesus spoke of the potential principle in terms of His life. He compared Himself to a kernel of
wheat that falls into the ground and dies (John 12:23-24).
People who die without achieving their full potential rob their generation of their latent ability. Many have robbed me—they’ve also
robbed you. To die with ability is irresponsible.
We will never know the wealth God planted in you until you bring it up. There’s always something in you that we haven’t yet seen because
that’s the way God thinks. Release your ability before you die. Use the power and strength within you for the good of yourself and others.
If you want to succeed, strike out on new paths. Don’t travel the worn paths of accepted success.
No man can climb beyond the limitations of his own belief.
Every day sends to the grave obscure men and women whom fear prevented from realizing their true and full potential.
Failure is not the absence of success. Failure is the neglect of trying.
PRINCIPLES
- God created everything with potential.
- Nothing in life is instant.
- Everything in life has the potential to fulfill its purpose.
- Don’t be satisfied with what you now are.
- Don’t die without using your full potential.
- The greatest threat to progress is your last successful accomplishment.
Source: Understanding Your Potential (Chapter 1)
Copyright © 1991, Revised Edition 2002 by Dr. Myles Munroe
Understanding Your Potential | Chapter 2
