When you make the choice for success, you have taken the first step in choosing your own future. Making the choice is critical to being successful since our life is governed by our choices. But many times we do not make a choice and the result is a life that is full of good things like family, friends, hobbies, work and career. But for some of us our life still has unfulfilled dreams, frustration, and stress. Its even worse when we are chronically short of money, when we have unhappiness, anger and we have problems with our weight.
The strange thing is that it hasn’t always been like this.
Do you remember the time when you were younger and you made choices in life, and you were excited about those choices?
Remember choosing which University or College you were going to attend? Do you remember selecting the courses? Do you remember dreaming about the future after completing your degree?
Do you remember graduating and the excitement of the first job?
I remember when I received my first set of business cards. I was so excited! I gave the business card to the first person who came into the office. It was the FedEx delivery guy. He thought I was nuts – but I was excited about what I had accomplished and what my future looked like.
When I graduated in 1982, there was a recession on, but it was as if it didn’t exist for me. I had applied for 15 or so jobs, and received 8 job offers. I wasn’t anything special, everybody in my class had the same situation. I had made the choice in selecting The University Of Western Ontario. I had made a choice in selecting to study Computer Science. I had made a choice to study rather than to party and have a good time. I had made a choice to focus on Computer Graphics. And I had made the choice in the first company I would work for.
Can you imagine having that excitement again?
The excitement was all about choosing to be successful and having that success.
But now 25 years later, many of my class mates are had problems with careers and relationships. Myself included. I closed down a company and fired 27 employees. One of those employees got engaged the day I had to let him go. I have gone through a divorce. My story is not unusual and mine isn’t nearly as difficult and as bad as many many others.
So what happened?
Why didn’t the success continue?
I can look back at those same choices now with 25 years of experience and say that there were other choices in front me that I didn’t make. While I can’t predict what might have happened, I think there are some choices that may have been better.
My choices were based on advice I was given about what the future would be and where the job opportunities were. The choices were made using the knowledge I had at the time.
Hindsight is 20:20 and looking back, the advice I was given and that I followed was good, solid, and accurate. They said the job market and computer science skills were the way of the future and it was. Each and every choice I made was a good one, but things didn’t work out correctly. I am sure you can relate to this.
Why did good advice and good decisions not work out the way we expected it to?
What is the difference between making a good choice and a choice that 25 years later can still be seen as a good choice?
I am not talking about the kinds of choices we know are bad. I am talking about the choices that have merit and are seen by our peers and all around us as good choices, but are not good choices for us personally. Deciding to go to law school can be seen as a good choice. But many graduates of law school are terribly unhappy or give up their career to do something different. Going to law school is a good choice for most people, but for the person who eventually gives it up, it was a poor choice. My choice of Computer Science was wrong for me.
So what did we do wrong and what should we do now?
We could say we have made our choices and we should suck it up and live with it.
This is a totally wrong attitude and I think I can help you understand a different approach to being successful.
A small change in attitude and a few new skills will bring you success again and you will return to that place of success.
For many reasons as we get older, many of us stop choosing success. Sometimes, we have had bad results from some of our choices and now are hesitant to make choices. Sometimes the demands of children, work, spouses, or ex-spouses keep us so busy that we believe we can’t make the choices that will change our lives. We feel it doesn’t matter that even if we make choices, nothing will change.
Can you imaging waking up each and every day excited about all the things you are going to accomplish today?
I am excited again about life and about the future. I feel and act like I am 27 years old when everything was new and fresh and wonderful. Its a totally amazing feeling. I have to have a notebook by the side of my bed to capture all my thoughts as I wake up. I love to get up in the morning and start the day.
I write, I teach, I run marathons, I do business, I have a great relationship with my children, I make wine, I am so busy doing wonderful things. My biggest wish is that I could clone myself, so that I would be able to do everything I enjoy at once. (That won’t work – since each clone will have the fun!)
Why do I feel this way?
Because I am now making choices again in my life. I control my life. I make the choices in my life.
I am making choices now because I choose to set goals and to follow these goals.
This one single change in my life that has driven all the other changes.
This change can make a difference in your life as well.
I apply goal setting to everything I do. And everything comes out well. Sometimes its not exactly the way I expect it to happen, and sometimes its not exactly the way I would want it, but its so close that the differences are usually better than I imagined.
Click here to learn how to set Goals And How to Achieve them.
I believe in living a life of Balance. I believe in being successful. My approach to life is called Success Through Balance. Choosing Success is just one skill in the components of a successful life. You can find my description of Success Through Balance by clicking here.
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This is impressive…thanks for it!