Manifest Abilities to Manage Time

We must manifest the ability to manage our time according to our goals. If we are spending hours watching television or chatting with friends online or not, we are not investing our valuable time in manifesting the abilities to reach our goals and manage our time. Rather, we are wasting what can never be returned to us. Once time is gone, there is no turning back.

Friends, family, self, school, work, activities, and entertainment, as well as other tasks, duties, chores, fun time, et cetera play a role in managing time. The trick is to find a solution to do all the things you want to do without wasting too much time doing it. I will lay out a chart in this article that may help manifest the ability to manage your time wisely while you reach your goals and enjoy life while you are doing it.

Chart

Family: How much time does your family require of you to spend time with them? Does your family understand your needs, goals, and plans? Do you regularly communicate by sitting at the dinner table and discussing with your family what you intend to achieve each day to reach a targeted goal that benefits everyone? Do you include your family in the goals you set for yourself?

Friends: Does your friends understand that you have a goal you intend to reach. Do you have friends that allow you to make your own decisions in the time you spend with them?

Work: What are your hours of work? How much of that time spent could be spent somewhere else? Does your work meet the requirements of your time management scheme financial situation to reach your targeted goal? Do you work at a job that takes more of your time than the time allowed in a single day?

Entertainment: How much time are you spending to watch television or movies? Are you so consumed in non-paying sports that you are spending more time here than other areas where you could reach for your goals? Do you frequent bars?

Self: Do you take time out of your busy schedule to take care of you?

School: Are you spending too much time on schoolwork, simply because you procrastinated?

Activities: Which activities that you attend benefit your time management plan to reach your goals?

Now we can examine each question one by one, knocking out wasted time, and increasing the ability to reach your goal. Starting with family, which is THE most important obligations in our life, we can see that we have to or are responsible to spend time with our families.

There is no escaping this responsibility. However, there is away to manifest the ability to manage your time with your family, and include your family in that time management scheme which reaches a goal that benefits everyone. Since today, families are working together in a hard-core world that makes it difficult as the time progress. If you are a family working together, you are a family on the road to success. It is important that you at least once everyday sit and have a meal together as a family. Spend an hour or so on entertainment and activities that bring forth a happy family and successful future.

Friends are individuals we all need in our lives, but if those friends are requiring more of your time than you can spare, then those are not real friends. Real friends will support you in your time managing scheme to reach your goal and will understand if you can’t spare the time they require of you. Good friends will even help you sometimes when your time management scheme is off track, by letting you know when you are on the wrong road to success. Quality time with friends should be managed wisely.

Work is essential for reaching the goals you set for your self and family. While you are at work, YOU should be working to finish your job, which is an element of time management that helps you to reach your goals sooner.

Entertainment is an option we have. Entertainment is a pleasurable action or force that we indulge, and if we are obsessively spending time on entertainment, we are not manifesting ability to managing our time.

Self is important. Take time out for your self, and spend wise time at least once a week, yet everyday include a timeframe that allows you to eat healthy, exercise and focus on your goals.

School is another essential element of time management, since if you do not have education, what kind of job will benefit you in reaching your goals. If you want to take years or more to achieve your goals, skip school.

Finally, we can look at activities. Are we spending too much time on activities that are not benefiting our road to reaching our goals, or does our activities help us in manifesting the ability to manage time and reach goals?

For more great free resources on how to manage your time visit Gabae Time Management.

Also for more informative articles on time management visit Gabae Time Management Articles.

Presence and Charisma

Why is it that some people are always noticed, and others seem to vanish away into the woodwork? Why do some individuals become “people magnets,” who can persuade others with a few choice words? The answers to these questions are of importance to anyone hoping to advance in life and to have satisfying relationships. They are Presence and Charisma.

I have met many people who have this “presence” or “aura.” In the Eastern world it is often thought of as another manifestation of “Qi.” Closely related to “presence” is charisma: a compelling attractiveness or charm that can inspire devotion in others. In the ancient world charisma was thought to be a divine power or talent, and the word comes from the Greek word kharis meaning “grace” or “favor.” There is a small scientific literature on this phenomenon of charisma, which often flows from having a strong presence. There are clearly many types of charisma: Political, sports, performance, business, spiritual, literary. scientific and so on. The only two people whom I’ve met who knew Einstein told me that people would usually all stand up when he entered the room. Charisma is more than just a personal characteristic; it can also be conceptualized as the way in which certain groups interact with each other.

Clearly some people have presence and charisma. The question is whether they can also be developed. The answer is yes, they most certainly can be. Presence is created by an overall impression constituted of posture, eye contact, stillness, silence, self-confidence, competence and serenity. People with a strong presence are often a little mysterious, in the sense that they tend not to reveal much about themselves or their accomplishments. I have also felt if very strongly in people who have worked to develop the subtle systems of their bodies. One of the most potent examples was a Korean Ki-Master who spoke not a word of English, but whose presence could be felt the moment he entered a packed room. Work on your subtle systems will likely cause you to be more still and serene and to have a better posture.

There are a number of things that you can do to improve your own charisma:

1. Create a strong first impression by developing your presence
2. Develop a good impression when you speak
3. Be a good active empathic listener who connects with other people and asks pertinent questions
4. Be supportive of other people and their aspirations
5. Be persuasive
6. Be resilient and adaptable
7. Expand your vision of what is possible
8. Practice thinking creatively

9. Use humor
10. Be committed and courageous

11. Initiate persistent action
12. Instill hope in the people around you

Dr. Richard G. Petty is an internationally renowned integrated physician, academic and researcher, and an innovator in the field of personal development. He has been Scientific Chairman and Trustee of the Prince of Wales’s Foundation for Integrated Health and he has presented his dynamic lectures, speeches, seminars and workshops to more than a quarter of a million people in 44 countries. He writes a daily column at http://richardgpettymd.blogs.com/. Dr. Petty can be reached at 770-492-3330, and through http://www.richardgpettymd.com.

Transformational Leadership

“What is leadership?” When this question is asked most of the people answer “leadership is the capacity or an ability of a person to lead”. Earlier theories of leadership viz. trait, behaviour and contingency theories explain the meaning of leadership from different angles. But all these theories spring from the point of view of leaders i.e. “How to control the followers?” Now-a-days the most recent type of leadership is Transformational Leadership theory which also theorises from the point of view of leaders but it attempts to transform the followers or subordinates into leaders.

Transformational Leaders have three basic characteristics. These characteristics help them to turn their subordinates into leaders. These are explained as below: -

1.) VISION - This is the ability of an individual to bind people with an idea e.g. Subhash Chander who initiated KBC, Super Lotto etc.

2.) FRAMING - A process by which leaders define the purpose of their movement in highly meaningful terms. (Like Laloo Prasad Yadav, who is an excellent folk orator, who sways the mass mind and that helps him to maintain his vote bank.)

3.) IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT - It is a leader’s attempt to control the impressions that others form about a leader. (Like Vijay Mallaya and his media publicity and Bollywood connections.)

Leadership is all about leaders and followers, superiors and subordinates. Transformational Leadership can be understood in a simple way by chasing
“The follower’s point of view”. Wherever there are two persons some contradiction often arise. It is said, ” Two intelligent persons often differ and in fact contradict each other.” And most of us consider ourselves to be intelligent at our own levels. So contradiction is always there. Contradiction may be of many types but broadly it is of two types. First at personal levels i.e. two or more persons generally quarrel with each other as “Ek mayan mein do talwarein nahi reh sakti”. In fact “Ek mayan mein ek talwar bhi rakkho to aawaz karti hai.” i.e. we sometimes contradict ourselves also.

Like in case of women generally they take a long time to dress up. This is because they are in a contradiction with themselves only, which is “What to wear?” So contradiction is at personal levels. Second, it may be at organizational levels also i.e. differences of any kind between different combinations of organizational hierarchy. So when we start believing that some contradiction is to be there we can arise on the meaning of Transformational Leadership from two different angles.

First——-from angle of viewpoints.

There are normally three types of viewpoints first which is ours, second, which is yours, and a third one, which is normally the right one. So contradiction arises. Now, “Who is a Transformational Leader?” and this is the basic question. Transformational Leader is a person who often reduces the contradiction between the first and the second and very smoothly takes these two viewpoints to the third one, which is as I earlier mentioned is generally the right one (third viewpoint is generally the philosophy of your workplace). This is very much similar to Henry Fayol’s principle of management—–Subordination of individual’s interest to general interest.

Second———from the angle of change.

Whenever there is a contradiction, a seed for change is sown. And whenever a change is there people start resisting it. But ultimately the subordinates have to more or less yield to the change (We can take example of natural calamities. We normally have resistance to them but we accept them after they have occurred.). S, again the same question, “Who is a Transformational Leader?” Now, Transformational Leader is a person who reduces the time lag between the resistance to change and acceptance of change as smoothly as possible.

So to sum up Transformational Leaders rely on persuasion, idealism, intellect, and motivation through values and shared vision( Like principals of colleges, CEOs etc.)

Superiors should try to groom their subordinates in such a way that they grasp the their qualities. A leader attempts to transform the subordinates of today into the leaders of tomorrow.

This is what Transformational Leadership is all about.

Bharat Gaurav Kapur
(Lecturer in Commerce)
Sri Aurobindo College of
Commerce and Management,
Ludhiana.
bgkapur_bg@yahoo.co.in
9855451309, 01862290309

From Mistake To Breakthrough

When you learned to walk (a very important life skill that you probably now take for granted), you fell down over and over again. Your ability to walk was developed through determination and consistent trial and error. You kept making mistakes until you had a breakthrough and could walk.

Since then, somewhere along the way, most of us learned to label our mistakes as “failures.” But a mistake isn’t a failure unless you quit. The only way a normal child would fail to learn to walk is if they “give up” instead of “get up.”

Here’s a grown up example. If you have a desire to listen to a specific radio station and, in the process, you turn your dial too far, you might end up with static. Does that cause you to give up? Of course not.

If you’re turning the dial, you will have to pass numerous unwanted stations (mistakes) in order to reach your desired target. Each time you pass a station that’s not the one you want, you get clear and valuable feedback that lets you know you have not reached your goal yet.

Learning to walk and radio station hunting are just two example of how you don’t need to look at mistakes as failures. “Not” achieving your goal yet is just part of the process of getting there. It serves the purpose of giving you feedback as you go from mistake to mistake to mistake to mistake to mistake to breakthrough.

Katie Byrd will take you by the hand and teach you the skills she’s used to journey from a financially strapped, bad credit nightmare to debt free abundant living. To find out more visit: http://abundanceandwealth.bellaonline.com

When You’re Negotiating, Money isn’t as Important as You Think

Let me tell you about my pet subject: When you’re selling your product or service, money is way down the list of things that are important to the other side.

First, we’ll talk about something that you may find hard to believe but it’s something of which I’ve become convinced-that people want to spend more, not less, and that the price concerns salespeople more than the people to whom they sell.

Then I’ll teach you all the things that are more important to people than money.

Finally, I’ll teach you some techniques to find out how much they’ll pay.

People Want To Pay More, Not Less

After almost two decades of training salespeople, I have become convinced that price concerns salespeople more than it does the people to whom they sell. I’ll go even further than that-I think that customers who may be asking you to cut your price are secretly wishing that they could pay more for your product. Hear me out before you dismiss this as being imbecilic.
I was the merchandise manager at the Montgomery Ward store in Bakersfield, California back in 1971. Although Bakersfield was not a large town, the store ranked 13th in volume in a chain of more than 600 stores. Why did it do so well? In my opinion, it was because head office left us alone and allowed us to sell to the needs of the local population. For example, we did a huge business in home air conditioners because of the outrageously hot summers. In Bakersfield, it’s common for it to be 100 degrees at midnight. In those days an average blue-collar home in that city cost around $30,000. The air conditioners that we would install in these homes might cost $10,000 to 12,000. It was very hard for me to get new salespeople started selling in that department because they had a real resistance to selling something that cost more money than they had ever made in a year. They simply didn’t believe that anybody would spend $12,000 to put an air conditioner in a $30,000 home. The customers were willing to pay it, as was illustrated by our huge sales volume, but the salespeople weren’t willing to support these decisions because they thought it was outrageously expensive.

However, if I could get salespeople started to where they began to make big money and they installed air conditioner son their own homes, suddenly they didn’t think it was so outrageous any more, and they would dismiss the price objection as if it didn’t exist.

Beginning stockbrokers have the same problem. It’s very hard for them to ask a client to invest $100,000 when they don’t know where lunch money is coming from. Once they become affluent, their sales snowball.

So I believe that price concerns salespeople more than it concerns any customer. This is demonstrated by the experience of one of my clients who is a designer and supplier of point-of-purchase sales aids and displays. He tells me that if three products are on a shelf in a store-let’s say three toasters-and the features of each are described on the carton, the customers will most frequently select the highest price item-unless a salesperson comes along to assist them with the selection. When that happens, the salesperson, who is probably working for minimum wage, is unable to justify spending money on the best and manages to talk the customer down to the low-end or middle-of-the-line toaster.

The important element here is the description on the carton. You must give customers a reason for spending more money, but if you can do that, they want to spend more money, not less. I think that spending money is what Americans do best. We love to spend money. We spend six trillion dollars a year in this country, and if we could walk into a store and find a salesclerk who knew anything about the merchandise, we’d spend seven trillion dollars a year. And that’s when we’re spending our own hard-earned after-tax dollars. What if you’re asking someone who works at a corporation to spend the company’s money? There’s only one thing better than spending your own money, and that’s spending someone else’s money. If that weren’t enough, remember that corporate expenditures are tax deductible, so Uncle Sam is going to pick up 40 percent of the bill.

So, I believe that we’ve had it all wrong for all these years. When we’re trying to sell something to somebody, she doesn’t want to spend less money; she wants to spend more. However, you do have to do two things:

1. You must give her a reason for spending more.

2. You must convince her that she could not have gotten a better deal than the one you’re offering her.

That second point is where Power Negotiating comes in because everything I teach is designed to convince the other people that they won the negotiation and that they couldn’t have done better. Let’s face it, does what you pay for something really matter? If you’re going to buy a new automobile, does it matter if you spend $20,000 or $21,000? Not really, because you’ll soon forget what you paid for it, and the slight increase in payments is not going to affect your lifestyle. What really matters is the feeling that you got the best possible deal. You don’t want to go to work the next morning and have everybody crowded around to admire your new car when somebody says, “How much did you get it for?”

You say, “I worked out a terrific deal. I got them down to $21,000.”
“You paid what?” he replies. “My friend bought one of those, and he paid only $20,000. You should have gone to Main Street Auto Mall.” That’s what hurts-the feeling that you didn’t get the best deal.

The objection that every salesperson hears most is the price objection. “We’d love to do business with you, but your price is too high.” Let me tell you something about that. It has nothing to do with your price. You could cut your prices 20 percent across the board and you’d still hear that objection. I trained the salespeople at the largest lawn mower factory in the world. You probably own one of their products because they manufacture most of the low-end private label lawn mowers that discount and chain stores sell. Nobody can undercut their production cost on lawn mowers. They have it down to such a science that if you bought one of their mowers at Home Depot and you tipped the kid who carries it to your car a dollar; the kid made more on the lawn mower than the factory did. That’s how slim their profit margins are. However, when I asked them to tell me the number one complaint they hear from the buyers at stores, guess what they told me? You got it. “Your prices are too high.”

You hear that complaint all the time because the people you’re selling to study negotiating skills too. They meet in groups at their conventions and sit around in the bars saying things like, “Do you want to have fun with salespeople? Just let them go through their entire presentation. Let them take all the time they want. Then when they finally tell you how much it costs, lean back in your chair, put your feet up on the desk and say, ‘I’d love to do business with you, but your prices are too high.’ Then try not to laugh as they stammer and stutter and don’t know what to say next.”
Instead of letting this kind of thing work you up into a sweat, adopt the attitude that negotiating is a game. You learn the rules of the game, you practice, practice, practice until you get good at it, and then you go out there and play the game with all the gusto you can muster. Negotiating is a game that is fun to play when you know what you’re doing and have the confidence to play it with vigor.

The next time you’re trying to get somebody to spend money remember that they really want to spend more money with you, not less. All you have to do is give them a reason and convince them that there’s no way they could get a better deal.

Things That Are More Important Than Money

A reporter at a press conference once asked Astronaut Neil Armstrong to relate his thoughts as Apollo 11 approached the moon. He said, “All I could think of was that I was up there in a spaceship built by the lowest bidder.” A cute line, but he was falling prey to a popular misconception that the government must do business with anybody who bids the lowest price. Of course, that’s not true, but it’s amazing how many people believe it. I hear it all the time at my Secrets of Power Negotiating seminars: “What can we do when we have to deal with the government? They have to accept the lowest bid.”

I once found myself sitting next to a Pentagon procurement officer on a flight to the East Coast, and I raised this point with him. “All the time I hear that the government has to buy from the lowest bidder. Is that really true?”

“Heavens no,” he told me. “We’d really be in trouble if that were true. Cost is far from the top of the list of what’s important to us. We’re far more concerned with a company’s experience, the experience of the workers and the management team assigned to the product, and their ability to get the job done on time. The rules say that we should buy from the lowest bidder who we feel is capable of meeting our specifications. If we know that a particular supplier is the best one for us, we simply write the specifications to favor that supplier.”

Of course, that is the key to selling to government agencies, whether it is the city, county, state, or federal government. If you want to do business with any level of government, you should become known as the most knowledgeable person in your industry, so that when the agency starts to prepare bid specifications, they welcome your advice on what they should specify. Fortunately, the trend is away from this type of direct bidding and toward the government agency hiring a private sector project manager to supervise the work. By inserting this middle person, they avoid the obligation to let bids and instead let the middle person negotiate the best deal.

So even with the federal government, price is far from the most important thing. When you’re dealing with a company that doesn’t have legal requirements to put out a request for bids, it’s far from the top of the list. Just for the fun of it, review the following list of things that are probably more important than price to buyers.

Balancing Act

The art of balancing work and play is difficult in today’s society. If you are like me - a woman who has dreams, passions and a creative side stifled during the day to earn a paycheck, you have to be extremely organized and use time management, priorization, and lists and planning to balance work, home and time for yourself.

Time Management and Multitasking

Three nights a week, there are TV shows that I can’t miss. I use this time to iron, fold laundry, check my emails. If I really need to get to use my creativity, I use the time to make beaded jewelry, paint or make greeting cards.

Writing Lists and Making Priorities

As an avid notetaker from my past school days and as a writer, I already carry at least one “brillant idea notebook” in my purse and in my car. This enables me to write down (Web) article ideas, words or license plates that make me laugh. One example is a hearst bearing the license plate “RUNext”.

Seriously, lists serve as a reminder to achieve tasks that need to be done on a daily (short-term) and when I get to it (long-term) basis. At times my lists are too optimistic with several items. I ease up by crossing off what I’ve done and starting two new lists: one for short-term (today) and long-term (this week) projects on separate pieces of paper.

Prioritization involves decision making - “do we have clean underwear for tomorrow?” and must-do items that pop up including “the cat threw up again”. These may not be on the list, and that’s OK. The list is a guideline, not set in stone.

The key question I ask myself is, “how important is it”? I use short- and long-term lists to achieve my daily and weekly goals. I’ve found that writing down “relax”, “play” and “exercise” remind me to take the time that I need for myself.

Work and Commuting

The average person may spend at least 60 hours per week working outside the home and commuting. I’ve begun listening to audiobooks during my commute and doing errands during my lunch hour. This increases the time I have during the week to do household chores or freelance work for clients or updating Web sites.

Focus

If you are not doing a project that involves multitasking, focus on the task at hand and see it through to completion. For example, while I read incoming newsletters/ ezines, it’s very easy for me click on Web links that take me off into the adventures of Web Design and copywriting and other interests.

Don’t do this => I have learned that if I get on the computer after 9 PM, I won’t get off until after midnight, and this woman needs her beauty sleep! I try to cut myself some slack on the weekends.

Or this => I can also get sidetracked while cleaning by going through the magazine rack where I find pages from the newspaper that I’m saving to write about.

On this topic I’ll conclude with “do as I say, not as I do” since I’m still working on mastering it.

Weekends

On weekends I am often up until 2 AM writing, reading or blogging. I usually nap on the weekends, giving myself permission to rejuvenate my body, mind and spirit. Frequently, in private or group meditations, I sing or chant, fulfilling my need to be connected to the Universe and unplugged from normal weekday activities.

One goal that I have is to take spiritual time, even if it’s 15 minutes to start, during the week also.

Spiritual Time

This can be praying or meditating individually or in a group, observing nature and the Universe around me. For me, it’s important to belong to a community of like-minded people, so I attend weekly religious services and spiritual meetings.

Nutrition and Exercise

Yoga and Pilates reduce my stress level and doing it with a friend results in laughter at attempting poses that experts
have been doing for years.

Recently, instead of eating ice cream or popcorn for lunch or dinner, I’ve been eating salads, vegetables and trying to eat more meat than dairy.

So, you might be thinking, “what’s the plan for this weekend”?

• Working on our income tax returns and
• Playing with the cats and spending time with my husband are the priorities.
• At least one nap
• I might even do some laundry and cleaning in between.

It all depends on what my spirit guides me to do.

Linda Blatchford is an experienced editor/proofreader an writer and Web designerchic at LinorStore.com. She has a Basic Web Design Certificate and is hungry for new Web knowledge. She is currently working on three Websites; proofing her recently completed book, “Cats Are People Too”; learning to make beaded jewelry and other craft projects and increasing her knowledge of spirituality.

Linda loves chocolate, cats, ice cream, laughing, crafting and shopping.

Linda is a member of the Society for Technical Communication, the National Association of Women Writers and listserves for Chicago Women in Technology, copywriters and writers and spiritual ideas.

Linda Blatchford
Etailer, Web Designerchic, Writer
LinorStore.com

Exploring Beneath The Surface

Unwanted feelings and thoughts are rich territory to dive beneath the surface for fresh insights that open the heart. Imagine for a moment that you are floating along on the ocean of feelings unwilling to accept that the choppy waves to your left signify anger. If you put on snorkeling gear and dive under them, you will see a whole new world.

Beneath the anger you will most likely find a hurt or a fear. Complete the following sentences with yourself:

• Each time I think of __________I get angry.

• If I feel this anger, I’m afraid that ___________.

• When I feel this anger, I am hurt about __________.

Remember, avoid assigning personal meaning to these feelings. (I’m such a terrible person for feeling and thinking this way.) Just swim around with your snorkel securely in place, investigation the fear and hurt that lies beneath the anger.

Surface briefly and reflect about the role your anger plays. Here are a few possibilities:

• Anger is a shield that protects a part of me that feels afraid or hurt.

• Anger is a red flag alerting me to the presence of fear of hurt.

• Anger is a messenger. A part inside must feel afraid or hurt.

Now take a deep breath and dive again, looking next to the fear or hurt for a judgement it may have spawned, such as the following:

• If people knew I was afraid they would reject me.

• I’m pathetic for being afraid of this.

• Feeling hurt is weak and foolish.

• Because I feel hurt I am unworthy of love.

Chronic reactive angry responses can disrupt relationships, derail important business deals, and cause high blood pressure. Unexpected fear can freeze us in mid-sentence, hold us back from speaking our truth.

The heart - the energetic center of acceptance and loving - shuts down when you adopt black and white thinking. Desperately needing to stay in control of life and make sense of the world, you resort to rejecting what you see as wrong (bad, inappropriate, immoral) and cling to what you see as right (good, appropriate, moral).

When the heart opens, making sense of the world is not as important as being happy, finding lasting peace, feeling healthy and stress free, and getting a good night’s sleep. Restraining from taking a position about the world, other’s behavior, your performance at work allows the heart to thaw out revealing depths of information that quiets fear and loosens the grip of control. You then can live authentically rather than self-righteously.

Questions for Letting Go of Black/White Thinking:

1. If I am judging my husband/wife/boss/ friend do I also judge myself in the same way?

2. Am I condemning my mistakes or lack of perfection because I am afraid of failing or being seen as a failure?

3. Do I judge anger (fear, sadness, caring, loving) as wrong in others because I see it as wrong in myself?

4. Do certain people get on my nerves because I’m afraid their behavior resembles my own?

5. If I want to be happy rather than right in this situation, what do I need to accept and forgive in myself?

Snorkeling can open the mind to what is really going on in your ocean of feelings. But only self-acceptance can uncover these truths and open the heart.

© 2003, Rebecca Skeele, Author, Coach, Counselor

You may publish this article on your website or for personal use as long as the article remains unchanged and the signature file is included. Notification of use is appreciated.

About The Author

New Strategies for Living Well
Rebecca Skeele, MA, MSS
Author, Coach, Speaker
“expand your vision - change your life”
BK: You Can Make It Heaven
(505) 984-1739
http://www.makeitheaven.com
rebecca@makeitheaven.com

Goal Setting; Part III

If you’re like me or probably most men for that matter; when you buy a new piece of equipment you start putting it together instead of reading the instruction to learn how to properly do it. It is only after we make a mess of it that we consult the instruction to get a better understanding of what we’re doing. In this series I’ve opted to go through the instructions first, so you can truly understand what you’re doing. So far we’ve discussed the incredible benefits of having this piece of equipment(YOUR GOALS)and we have explored some of the reasons why most people resist setting goals. In today’s lesson, we will look at some of the nuts and bolts-some important ideas you should consider when setting goals.

1. They are written

This extremely important. When you write your goals down, you make them concrete. Having them only in your mind is wishful thinking. Having them written down is commitment. Choosing to write down powerful goals means that you are at the same time choosing to live a compelling future. Remember that all the studies show that people who write their goals down are ten times more likely to achieve them compared to those who simply have their goals in their heads.

2. Goals should be specific

You need to be clear about what it is that you are working to achieve. Clarity attracts and will help you to better measure and evaluate your progress.

Goals like I want to have lots of money, or I want to lose weight are simply too hazy… too ambiguous. They cannot be measured. Saying that I want to have a net worth of 1 million dollars or I want to lose 15 pounds is far more specific.

3.Goals should be challenging but realistic.

Many would say that having a goal to be a Jamaican bobsledder was unrealistic. I think we proved that it wasn’t. Undoubtedly it was very challenging but all together realistic. Back in 1988, having a goal to win an Olympic Medal, for us, would not only have been challenging but totally unrealistic. Your goals must be big enough so that they push you out of your comfort zone and cause you to stretch beyond your limitation. The key is to strike a balance. You should have a 50-50 chance of success. In other words, thy should be set at such a level that through effort, the chances of you NOT achieving them is the same as the chances of you succeeding.

While it is true that you can achieve anything you set your mind to, if you are only earning $50K, don’t shoot for earning 500K next year. That’s a little bit of a stretch. Instead find a point between where your income is and where you would like it to be. Maybe you chose to double your income to 100K next year. Such a goal would definitely cause you to stretch but would be more believable and therefore more achievable. Once you’ve achieved that goal of 100K in income it now become your new platform from which to launch to higher income levels. Of course this principle works for any other goal you may set.

4. Goals should have a deadline.

Without a deadline our goals are just idle wishes. As human beings we suffer from a disease call procrastination and it causes us to put off for no apparent good reason actions that will move us close to our goals. Having a deadline puts positive pressure on us and gives us a sense of urgency. Make sure though that your deadlines are realistic. As they say…there are no unrealistic goals only unrealistic time frames in which to achieve them.

5. Goals should be well planned

To increase your chances of success you should have a detailed plan of how you are going to achieve your goals. Write down all the activities that you would need to complete in order to achieve your goals. Prioritize them and review and rewrite the plan to make it as perfect as possible.

Keep On Pushing!

Copyright (C) 2005 Devon Harris
All rights reserved worldwide
www.devonharrislive.com

The contents of this E-zine may be copied, reproduced, or freely distributed for all nonprofit purposes without the consent of the author as long as the author’s name, copyright notice, and contact information are included.

Good Intentions!

Resolutions and goals intimidate many people.

What immediately comes to mind are memories of past failures, the hard work involved, and the fact that there is no guarantee of success.

What if instead of goals and resolutions you were to create intentions, results, accomplishments or outcomes?

Do you feel an increased or decreased charge in your body when you change the language you use?

Many labels could support filling your thoughts with the target that is your priority of choice. There is no right or wrong way to phrase/language the journey toward accomplishing a result. There is only empowering and disempowering language - the words that have impact are different for everyone.

It’s all about putting something on priority status for yourself and maintaining focus with consistent, regular, forward steps that will accomplish your desired results.

There are actions which produce little or no result, critical actions, possible actions, massive actions, and more. The ones you choose to run with are determined by your level of courage, by how urgent the goal is for you and by your resolve to achieve the intended outcome.

The main thing is clearly knowing what you want and having huge reasons for wanting this, so that you are pulled forward to take disciplined, consistent, daily, effective, forward moving actions.

Concentrate on your intended outcomes and don’t waste your time on “busy work”. This includes worrying - unless of course you can tell me of a time that worry produced a positive result for you.

“Retreat, hell! We’re just advancing in another direction.” ~ Oliver Prince Smith ~

©Thea Westra is an international life coach who resides in Perth, Western Australia. She is editor and publisher of a free, monthly newsletter at http://www.forwardsteps.com.au Thea also publishes a few blogs, visit here http://inspiration-daily.blogspot.com/ for directional links to each.

Inner Trust, Goals and Vision

On our journey into more expanded levels of consciousness, we will encounter a passage. To enter this passage we will need an essential companion: inner trust. The passage is the journey of creation. Inner trust is your ally.

Creation is ushering something from non-existence into existence. It is creating a goal from something that does not exist and building its reality in time and space. To accomplish this, we must have inner trust. To develop inner trust we must manage and keep our agreements.

An agreement is a structure for fulfillment. This structure, or agreement, is the avenue for an idea, which is unseen, to be made seen in physical reality.

Inner trust is essential because the world of physical reality that we move in each day is a world of agreement. It is the outer world of evidence. It is what has already been created, what has already been agreed upon. Most of humanity believes the physical world to be our only reality and all we have to draw on. Inner trust allows us to venture beyond the physical world to the inner world of creation.

Everything you see around you was once in the unseen world of ideas. Each thing exists because someone had vision. They decided to keep their word long enough, and without any evidence or agreement from anywhere else, until the agreement was a strong enough force to be an avenue of expression for the unseen idea to become a reality in the physical realm.

An example is the room you are standing in. If the contractor changed his mind (and therefore changed his agreement) every day regarding the size of the potential room, it would never have been built. It would have stayed in the unseen world of ideas. Making and keeping the agreement regarding the size of the room became the structure for fulfillment.

Many people make agreements. Few keep them long enough for something to actually get created. We lack inner trust for our own word, and therefore vision. We sell out because we cannot see beyond the conversation of our ego minds about how hard it will be to accomplish the task, etc.

If we have not demonstrated and developed our ability to manage and keep agreements, our inner trust is not developed or enhanced. I know of many wonderful ideas, plans, and goals that go unfulfilled primarily because the person gave up on their agreement. They had no vision.

Their inner trust was swayed by the reasonableness of the ego mind. They trusted reasons over their own word. They stopped telling the truth, going for results, and maintaining their freedom of choice over the ego’s excuses, and therefore sold out on being their word. And by doing so, they collapsed the structure for its fulfillment.

All we have is our word. If we do not trust our own word then a new idea that lives outside of the present realm of agreement has no chance of being born through us.

Inner trust allows us to risk and commit to goals that are outside of the safe world of what is seen—in other words, what is already agreed upon as attainable. Inner trust enhances vision and allows us to stay committed to something that is not yet seen physically. It is the precursor to Faith.

We risk each time we make a goal that places us in an arena where there is no agreement. We then accomplish the goal by creating agreement for it. Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and women suffragettes created agreement for something where there was once none. They took their goal from non-existence and sourced it into being. They had vision.

The basic disciplines of Telling the Truth, Going for Results, Maintaining Freedom of Choice Responsibly, and Managing our Agreements with ourselves and others are essential to discovering, developing, and maintaining inner trust and vision. Once these disciplines are established, we release ourselves from the clutches of the ego mind and allow ourselves to have vision beyond its limiting sight. The next steps of Making Goals and Risking then become effortless. That is why the people at LifeForce are steadfast in teaching and assisting our clients in developing these skills.

Vision allows us to go beyond the ego’s limited thought systems. Vision is a function of inner trust. Inner trust and responsibility go hand in hand. Without this inner trust we will not experience the expanded consciousness of true responsibility, which is the very core of atonement.

Atonement is the opposite of the ego. It is our “at-one-ment” with, and our functional relationship to, the Universe, God, Self, Buddha Nature, Higher Self, or whatever term you may use. This melding with the Universe, the field of all possibility, pure potential, allows vision far beyond what seems possible when we rely only on the ego’s view of our past thoughts, belief systems and accomplishments. With vision, we can attain breakthrough goals that are life-changing.

Until true responsibility, inner trust, and vision are accomplished, we are tossed in the sea of emotion and outer conditions, purposeless, and directionless. Our goals are stunted and repetitious. The ego is in control and we only create goals that are not challenging. We become bored with life.

Inner trust bonds us with the higher realms of responsibility. It fosters vision where we are able to see beyond our own mind and thereby allow higher frequencies of thought to empower us. We begin to think of solutions instead of focusing on the problems. We can easily shift from breakdown to breakthrough. We no longer let the ego have the last word. Our freedom to risk beckons us onward and we begin to imagine results that, here-to-for were not only resisted, they were non-existent.

Without the inner trust and vision of true responsibility each new goal is a futile attempt toward a new life while clutching to and relying on old, outdated fears. With inner trust, each new goal is a delightful game to be played where obstacles become amusing challenges.

Inner trust and vision emerge by being responsible for our integrity. This means that we do not have to be chased or hounded or otherwise talked into cleaning up our messes. This is not a morality issue. We clean up our out agreements because we want to be counted on in the world and we want to trust ourselves to do what we say we are going to do. In doing so we cultivate the level of humility that allows us to risk. This humility is a basic principle that must be developed or we will stay stuck in looking good because we are too afraid of making another mistake.

We grow by risking and by being responsible enough to clean up anything that gets damaged along the way. Each time we humbly clean up a broken agreement we enhance our inner trust and increase our willingness to risk. We have demonstrated that we can be trusted even if we make a mistake.

Begin to develop inner trust and vision. By demonstrating these principles first to ourselves and then to others we can become beacons of hope for those who are still bound to the ego. And we can challenge ourselves to endeavor to reach greater and greater accomplishments for ourselves, for our families, and for this beloved planet.

Life is too big to be playing small. This is your life. Don’t miss it.

Matt Garrigan is a motivational speaker, the founder of LifeForce Educational Corporation and the creator of The Liberty Experience Training, The Mastery Course and the Awakened Potential Course. Matt has been a pioneer in the human potential movement since 1980. His exceptional goal oriented coaching techniques, expanded consciousness training, awareness counseling, integrity coaching and spiritual guidance have assisted thousands of individuals in transforming the quality of their lives. As a motivational speaker Matt’s ability to uniquely integrate many different philosophies and practices, combined with his steadfast commitment to empower people, makes his work a potent, life enhancing experience that sheds light on new possibilities in communication, relationship, prosperity and enlightenment.


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© Matt Garrigan – http://www.mattgarrigan.com