Bri­an Lewis

What's the dif­fer­ence be­tween bluff­ing and ac­tu­al­ly do­ing and lip ser­vice and gen­uine com­mit­ment?

It doesn't take much of a leap of imag­i­na­tion to re­alise the pos­si­bil­i­ties for Trinidad and To­ba­go to es­tab­lish it­self in the glob­al sport world. It's no se­cret that T&T has the tal­ent and po­ten­tial to be a gen­uine and con­sis­tent per­former on the world and Olympic stage. We have po­ten­tial for sport ex­cel­lence and elite per­for­mance.

T&T can win gold medals on a reg­u­lar and con­sis­tent ba­sis and not mere­ly by luck. We aren't best of the rest but equal to the best and can stand on the win­ner's podi­um with the best of the best.

Suc­cess means dif­fer­ent things to dif­fer­ent peo­ple. In the world of elite or high per­for­mance, sport suc­cess for many is de­fined as win­ning or put an­oth­er way the goal is gold.

What­ev­er one may de­fine it as, every hu­man be­ing wants suc­cess. Every­body wants the best this life can de­liv­er. No one likes feel­ing sec­ond class or be­ing de­scribed as mediocre.

There is a dif­fer­ence be­tween be­liev­ing you can achieve suc­cess and wish­ing for it.

Those who be­lieve they can do and those who be­lieve they can't don't.

Be­lief trig­gers the pow­er to do.

Most self-im­prove­ment pun­dits claim that if you be­lieve you can suc­ceed and you will.

Think doubt and fail. Think vic­to­ry and suc­ceed. But is it that sim­ple?

Pos­i­tive think­ing ex­perts say that we are all prod­ucts of our own thoughts.

So thought man­age­ment is im­por­tant.

Un­suc­cess­ful peo­ple suf­fer from a dis­ease called ex­cusi­tis.

The more suc­cess­ful the in­di­vid­ual the less they re­ly on ex­cus­es.

Over­com­ing the bar­ri­ers to suc­cess is achieved by mak­ing no ex­cus­es.

The goal is gold.

How do we over­come the hur­dles and ob­sta­cles?

If for ex­am­ple we look back at the Lon­don 2012 Olympic Games, it's safe to say that Lon­don 2012 will al­ways be spe­cial. But don't be fooled, there is a lot of un­fin­ished busi­ness to take care of.

Any­time you rep­re­sent your coun­try, it is im­por­tant. There is no room for com­pla­cen­cy.

If the goal is gold, the bridge that leads to achieve­ment is dis­ci­pline, be­lief, pas­sion and per­se­ver­ance.

Suc­cess in the past does not guar­an­tee suc­cess in the present or fu­ture, it sim­ply fu­els ex­pec­ta­tions.

Progress isn't suc­cess. At the elite lev­el of sport it's a nev­er end­ing process–the bar is al­ways go­ing up. You reach one lev­el and the bar is al­ways raised high­er. Com­pla­cen­cy will sti­fle con­sis­tent achieve­ment.

Once you fall back in­to busi­ness as usu­al or rest on your lau­rels, the chas­ing pack will hunt and run you down be­cause every­one is fight­ing to achieve the ul­ti­mate goal which is the gold. Re­con­di­tion­ing for suc­cess starts with rais­ing the bar and go­ing af­ter more ma­jor ac­com­plish­ments.

Ten or more Olympic Gold medals by the year 2024 or put an­oth­er way ten or more Olympic cham­pi­ons by the year 2024 will be achieved if we be­lieve that it can be ac­com­plished.

Our sports­men and women have what it takes, they are equal to the best and are world class per­form­ers.

It's not about luck but plan­ning and prepa­ra­tion.

We have to cre­ate the strat­e­gy and the struc­ture that will al­low our sports­men and women to de­liv­er on their po­ten­tial and to mo­ti­vate them to have the sin­gu­lar fo­cus and hunger that will in­spire in them the will to push them­selves to the lim­its of their abil­i­ty.

The Olympic Games are the ul­ti­mate in most sports. The ul­ti­mate quest is gold.

Bri­an Lewis is the Pres­i­dent of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Olympic Com­mit­tee. The views ex­pressed are not nec­es­sar­i­ly those of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Olympic Com­mit­tee http://www.ttoc.org.

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