Most of the successful people I have met over the years describe their pursuit of their goals as an obsession. They state clearly that they began to make things happen in their lives when they focused solely on the achievement of their goals, often to the detriment of everything else in their lives.
I am not advocating that you take an unhealthy approach toward goal achievement. I’m not telling you to avoid your family and friends and only concentrate on the goals you have outlined for yourself. What I am saying is that in order to really make things happen in your life – to achieve your goals and make your dreams come true – you need to spend as much time as possible working toward those goals.
The question then becomes: How can I align my daily actives with the goals I have set for myself? This question is particularly perplexing when we are faced with goals that may be set for a significant time period in the future. Time and distance can often distort our perception of reality. In other words, because a goal is set so far out into the future we may have a difficult time believing that it is relevant to what we are doing today.
I often compare this perception of goals to the feeling of traveling in an airplane. When we are at 20,000 feet and we look out of the window of an airplane we see the buildings of a city. Those buildings appear very small and almost look like tiny little toys. Our brains have a difficult time comprehending the fact that those buildings are actually several hundred feet tall and may contain thousands of people. As the plane descends and we get closer and closer to the ground, we begin to grasp the size of those buildings. We also begin to realize the magnitude of what has just happened. We have, in fact, just traveled at significant distance in a short time at an altitude that would make a bird nervous. Our minds have a difficult time comprehending things that are not local and in perspective.
Think about some steps you can take today to bring you closer to your long term goals. The journey of a million miles begins with one small step.
This is not the easiest thing to accept for people that talk about work life balance and such, but successful people like to succeed and they do not want needs done to make that happen.
This post made me think abot Keith Ferrazzi. He has a good book, Never Eat Alone, but the first thing I read about him was a magazine article. http://www.inc.com/magazine/20030101/25049.html
Thought you might find it interesting.
Posted by: Buzzoodle Ron | September 29, 2005 at 08:43 PM