Writers 
This is true of our lives. At any point in our lives, we are the sum total of all the decisions we have made, the people we have met, the exposure we have had, and the facts we have learned. In essence, every human is a walking history book. Nevertheless, we must keep in mind that our personal history is being made and recorded everyday, and our past experience was once our future. Therefore, we must be careful not to allow our past to determine the quality of our future.
Instead, we must use our experience to help us make better decisions, always guarding against the possibility that it may limit our decisions. Remember, your ability is never limited to your experience.
This world is filled with millions of individuals who are capable of traveling at a maximum capacity of 180 mph, but they have settled for 55 mph. Because they have overtaken some folks or may have exceeded the expectations of a few others, they have compared their lives to these persons and have accepted mediocrity as excellence.
Determine not to let your past experience limit your capacity. Be grateful for the lessons of the past, then accelerate with confidence, on to the autobahn of life, being careful to obey only those signs that have been established by your Creator, who admonishes you,
All things are possible if you only believe (Mark 9:23)
One of life’s great tragedies is that the majority of the world’s population is composed of individuals who have negotiated an agreement with mediocrity, signed a contract with the average, and pledged allegiance to the ordinary. They have resolved never to be more than society has made them or do more than is expected.
What a tragedy of destiny. God expects more.
Inside of every human being is a deep call of destiny to do something worthwhile with our lives. The urge to accomplish great things and engage in significant endeavors is the germ of purpose planted by God in the heart of man. Why then do we settle for so little? Why do we abandon our dreams and deny our purpose? Why do we live below our privilege, buried in the cemetery of wishful thinking and empty regrets?
As we have seen, one reason we fail to progress in fulfilling our purpose is satisfaction with our present measure of success. The belief that we have arrived is the deterrent that keeps us from getting to our destination. A second part of the answer lies in the fact
that we have accepted the present state of our lives as the best we can do under the circumstances.
This concept, under the circumstances, serves to imprison us and to immobilize our God given ambition because too many of us have surrendered to the status quo and have become prisoners of the war for our minds. We forget that circumstances are simply temporary arrangements of life to which we are all exposed. We overlook or disregard the fact that these circumstances are designed to identify, expose, develop, refine, and maximize our true potential. It’s not what happens to us that matters, but what we do with what happens.
Much of the time we are not responsible for our circumstances, but we are always responsible for our response to those circumstances.
One key to maximizing your potential is to become dissatisfied with the circumstances that restrict, limit, and stifle your potential.
Maximizing Your Potential Many people know that they possess great potential, that they have a significant purpose in life, but they still fail to move beyond good intentions to experience the fullness of their lives. Their comfort is greater than their passion. They are more concerned with fitting in than with standing out.
Remember, you will never change anything that you are willing to tolerate. Your Creator wants you to consciously choose to fulfill your purpose and maximize your potential because in so doing you will bring glory to His name. Unfortunately, history gives evidence of only a few rare individuals who, driven by a passion to achieve a cherished vision in their hearts, initiated their own deliverance, rose above the tide of the norm, and impacted their generation and ours.
A second significant key to maximizing potential is the unassuming benefits of “crisis.” Crises, as defined by author Dick Leider, are life’s “wake up” call. These alarms are often the catalysts that impel us to become fully conscious of our mediocre lives.
