Henry W. Longfellow once wrote: “Great is the art of beginning, but greater is the art of ending.” How nice it would be if we all had a genie who could help us finish what we begin. Unfortunately, we don’t. But what we do have is a dynamic called discipline—which extracts a high price. Accomplishment is often deceptive because we don’t see the pain and perseverance that produced it. So we may credit the achiever with brains, brawn of lucky break, and let ourselves off the hook because we fall short in all three. Not that we could all be concert pianists just by exercising enough discipline. Rather, each of us has the makings of success in some endeavor, but we will achieve this only if we apply our wills and work at it.
19世纪美国著名诗人亨利·瓦兹沃思·朗费罗曾写道：“善始固然伟大，善终更为伟大。”如果能有一位神灵 帮助我们去完成业已开始的事情，那该多好呀！只可惜，我们没有。但是，我们却拥有一种叫做自律的动 力——它要求我们付出很高的代价。成就常常有误导作用，因为它会使我们看不到成功背后的艰难困苦和 坚韧不拔的精神。于是我们常会把别人的成就归功于人家脑子灵，身体壮或者运气好，而以我们不具备这 三个条件为自己开脱。不是说我们只要严格要求自己就都能成为独奏钢琴家；而是说我们每个人都具备在 某一方面取得成功的基本条件，不过只有下决心，坚持不懈才能达到目标。