*** Make Your 2008 Resolutions Now!

By Keith A. Shaw, President, Mind Body Spirit Central.com and SelfGrowth.com Official Guide To Motivation

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As this year comes to a close, the next few weeks should be a time of honest evaluation and self reflection for you. Did you achieve what you set out to do in 2007? Did you even have a plan? Or did you just wish and hope something would fall into your lap.

The reason I ask, is that people typically fall into those three categories…

There are those who have no idea of what they want at all. In fact, in a study done by the Ford Foundation, 23% of the population has no idea of what they want from life, and as a result, they do not have much.

Even more startling is that 67% of the population has no plans for getting what they want! These are people who will just “wish and hope” that something good happens to them. Yes, some people do just that, wish and hope. Then, when they do not get what they wish for, they point fingers and blame others for their current situation, circumstances and the reason for all their misfortune.

In both of these illustrations, five or ten years from now, these types of people will wistfully wonder where the time went, will have accomplished nothing and will be no further along than they are right now!

Finally, there are people who make well thought out, written plans. Not only for what they want to achieve in 2008, but also for their life. These people use the past year as a time to “review” their progress and use this as a guide to motivate themselves and for self improvement as they look ahead. They know that not every undertaking will result in guaranteed success, but they are willing to take the risk and put in the effort and persistence that is required. These are the types of people who do not let their circumstances, negative thoughts (their own and others) and environment stand in their way. They know that in order to achieve, they must have a plan.

Here is a real-life example that shows you that thought, planning and action, not environment or circumstances, decides who achieves and succeeds in life.

There was a young man whose family did not have much in the way of finances. In fact, for a time as a small boy his family lived in a trailer home that was so poorly insulated that his sister nearly died from pneumonia.

As he grew and entered his teen years, he did not have the material things that teens do today; a car, a personal telephone and television, a closet full of clothes. He shared an unfinished-basement sleeping room with two other brothers. The walls in the basement were constructed from discarded cardboard boxes. Meals were “rationed out” daily between the three boys and also two girls.

One cold winter, his coat was a thin, unlined windbreaker and if he needed to be outside for any length of time he shared a real, lined winter coat with his brothers. Another snowy winter, holes in his only pair of shoes were repaired with a piece of copper wire, glue and duct tape as his parents did not have the money to buy him another pair, even used! The family station wagon had holes in the floorboards through which you could see the road. Even though his parents both worked and did the very best they could, the family was basically at the poverty level. As a result, the youth and his siblings were in the free-lunch program at school for students whose parents could not afford to pay. Of course, this was unacceptable for him. In order to make money for clothes and food, he worked after school and on weekends as a hospital janitor while still attending high school.

Due to his parents’ financial and personal situations, there was no chance that they could help him with college. But he dreamed of better things. He thought of what education and self improvement would bring him. He conceived of, and mentally built up, an ideal condition of what he wanted his life to become. At the same time a vision of freedom and possibility took hold of him. Because he was dissatisfied with his environment, he took positive, productive action and found the means to attend college. He utilized all his spare time and resources, small though they were at the time, for his self development. He worked eight hours a day, while attending college full time at night. While his classmates spent their free time playing cards or hanging out watching television in the dorms, he spent his evenings until midnight in the library. Because his thoughts and his mind became energized with the power he harnessed, he soon became the first in his family to attend college and graduated at the top of his class.

With the growth of opportunities before him, which fit the scope of his expanding powers and vision, he continued on to graduate school. Years later we see this youth as a full-grown man. In his hands he holds the cords of responsibility by heading up his own company. He has realized the vision of his youth. He has become one with his ideal. The youth in this story is me.

Now, as you get ready for the New Year throw away all your outmoded ideas about how your circumstances, environment, and how the negative words of others are holding you back from achieving success and making your life the MASTERPIECE you always wanted.

Develop your life plan - write down your goals, your dreams, your THOUGHTS. Imagine how motivated you will be if you start every day of the New Year with clearly-defined goals and the emotion and desire for achievement in all areas of your life.

My Motivation And Success System, The Power Of Thought is an excellent resource to help you get what you want, when you want it. See my website http://www.MindBodySpiritCentral.com for details.

Copyright 2007 by Keith A. Shaw and Mind Body Spirit Central.com, LLC. All rights reserved. No portion of this article may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means – electronic, mechanical, photocopying, audio or video recording or otherwise – without the written permission of the author and publisher.