How and where to find opportunities.

What is the title of this article? “Opportunity is nowhere” or “Opportunity is now here?” That’s right. The second one is correct. But far more important than deciphering titles is the ability to recognize opportunities in life.

Contrary to popular belief, opportunities abound. And recognizing them is not a matter of genius or luck. It’s a matter of (1) looking intently at yourself and your immediate surroundings, and (2) doing something creative with whatever it is you see.

That’s what John Steinbeck did when he began writing about the farmers and laborers in and around his hometown of Salinas, California. His most famous novel, The Grapes of Wrath, earned him the 1940 Pulitzer Prize. Henry Ford did much the same thing.

He looked for and found an opportunity on his father’s farm in Dearborn, Michigan, where he began experimenting with power-driven machinery. He eventually helped put America on wheels by building his first automobile in nearby Detroit.

George Washington Carver, the son of a slave, also knew how to look for opportunities right where he was  and he found plenty. He won worldwide acclaim as a scientist by finding over 300 practical uses for the peanut, ranging from instant “coffee” to soap and ink.

He made 118 products from the sweet potato, including flour, shoe blacking, and candy. He then helped his fellow Alabamans develop new sources of income by growing these crops instead of cotton. But to be worth pursuing, an opportunity does not need to be earth-shaking. It merely needs to be meaningful and profitable for you.

Plenty of such opportunities exist, right where you are now. So take another look, keeping in mind that opportunityisnowhere!