Determination

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Some people believe that talent and a winning attitude are all you need in order to succeed in your endeavors, but a winning attitude means having determination, which many people lack. As seen on wisdomforthesoul.org, “Real leaders are ordinary people with extraordinary determination.” Determination is an important factor in the overall success or failure of a person’s efforts. Unfortunately, determination is not something that comes easy to the majority of people. To be truly determined, a person must first be passionate about what they’re doing. Passion, however, is only the first step towards resolution and determination. One must have a clear goal in mind, and be willing to do anything to achieve said goal. Once they have set their mind on the task at hand, and they will not allow obstacles to impede their path, then they have reached the state of true determinedness. This is how a normal person can move mountains, how an earthbound society can fly to the moon, and how we can, as a society, do things we would never have thought possible.

The word determination originates from the Latin, “determinare,” meaning to set limits to. Looking even further into the word, the prefix de-, (meaning to remove), and the root terminus, which means limits, form the word determination, as found on etymonline.com. So now, how does this play into the sense of determination that we have now? Personally, I work hard to set my limits high, or even remove them completely, in my endeavors. The downside to this is that I’m always looking to the future, and never at the present, which is not exactly ideal, when you consider the fact that short-term goals build up to long-term destinations. So obviously, determination has its positives, a...

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