Stop! It could be the best move you have ever made in your quest to create financial security.Until recently I had been working non stop for 18 months. That isn’t some kind of macho boast, it’s an admission of temporary failure because no one should be at the helm for that long without a formal break. When I eventually decided that enough was enough, I booked a plane ticket and headed for Madrid; best thing I ever did. For the first two or three days I did nothing other than flick through the pages of a book; it was the first time I had ‘read’ something for months that wasn’t a newspaper, journal or online blog!The book was about goal setting. We all know the patter, write your goals down and you will be more successful. Right? But how many of us do it? I mean REALLY do it and stick to the plan? Sometimes we need reminding about those things that are gathering dust in the annals of our mind. I read the book in question and began to think new thoughts. Funny how making time for yourself also creates time for innovative thinking!When I got back from Madrid I went into the local supermarket and bought two ring bound A4 books, one for personal goals and one for business goals, and I set about putting that book I had read, into practice. It made me think about my 30 and 90 day goals. From those emerged my one, three and five years objectives. I can already hear the cynics huffing and puffing……..’it won’t work, I’ve heard it all before’ etc. But, as Henry Ford once commented ‘Whether you think you can or you can’t you’re right’.I wrote my ‘quick win’ goals down, simple ones like join a gym, buy a bike, introduce a fitness regime, however, unless you break those broad goals down still further, action by action, then they will remain too ‘big’ and might, possibly, not happen. You have to micro manage your objectives so that they become manageable. Join a gym is the easy part but, unless you commit to go to the gym at least three times a week (designate the days and times), and couple your commitment to an appropriate diet (review your dietary regime and make it better)…………..then your chances of success diminish. And, you need to build ‘review’ time into your goals……one hour every Friday at 9am……………and make that time sacred. You’re working then? OK, make time when you are not working! The process will create focus
This blog post is about me saying ‘take time out to think about you’. If you are overly focused on work to the exclusion of everything else, then you will not have time to think about what you really want from life. If you don’t ever think about what you want how can you goal set and achieve something better? It might be money, it might be weight loss but, without pause for thought, you have already lost the race. Don’t wait 18 months, act now! Think about your goals and write then down!
