Top 7 SECRETS to a Great Life

A great life doesn't happen by accident. A great life is the result of allocating your time, energy, thoughts, and hard work towards what you want your life to be. Stop setting yourself up for stress and failure, and start setting up your life to support success and ease. These 7 SECRETS can help you get started:

1.S - Simplify: A great life is the result of simplifying your life. People often misinterpret what simplify means. It's not a way to remove work from your life. When you focus on simplifying your life, you free up energy and time for the work that you enjoy and the purpose for which you are here. In order to create a great life, you will have to create room in yours.

2.E - Effort: A great life is the result of your best effort. Creating a great life requires that you make some adjustments. It may mean reorganizing how you spend your time, or choosing to spend your money in a different way. It may mean looking for new ways to spend your energy that coincide with your definition of a great life. Life will reward your best effort.

3.C - Create priorities: A great life is the result of creating priorities. It's easy to spend your days just responding to the next thing that gets your attention, instead of intentionally using the time, energy, and money you have in a way that's important to you. Focus on removing the obstacles that get in the way of you making sure you are honoring your priorities.

4.R - Reserves: A great life is the result of having reserves - reserves of things, time, space, energy, money. With reserves, you acquire far more than you need - not 6 months living expenses, but 5 years worth; not 15 minutes of free time, 1 day. Reserves are important because they reduce the fear of consequences, and that fear causes delay. With reserves you can be much more generous with yourself and with others.

5.E - Eliminate distractions: A great life is the result of eliminating distractions. Up to 75% of your mental energy can be tied up in things that are draining and distracting you. Eliminating distractions can be a difficult concenpt to many people, since they haven't really considered that there is another way to live. Look around for someone's whose life you admire. What do they do that you would like to incorporate into your own life? Ask them how they did it.

6.T - Thoughts: A great life is the result of your belief in the outcome. Believing there is a solution to the problems you encounter year after year is vitally important to creating the life you love. Whatever you think and believe, you create. Listen to what you're telling yourself, and adjust that voice if you need to.

7.S - Start!: A great life is the result of starting. There's the old saying that everyone's familiar with, "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step." In order to even move from the couch to the refrigerator, you have to start. Choose to start today. Don't wait for a raise, or until the kids get older, or until the weather is better. Today, right now, is the time to take a step in the direction of your dreams. It's what you do TODAY that will make a difference in your life tomorrow.