The first month of the New Year is well on its way to being over. How are you doing with keeping your commitments, to carry out the daily activities you need to do, to achieve your goals? Have you started this New Year the same way you have always done in the past, with a commitment to reinvent yourself and to finally live your greater life purpose? Yet by the middle of January, things feel like they are falling apart and you are once again so wrapped up in doing to survive, that getting to actually carrying out the tasks you need to do to achieve your goals, is a distant memory.
The challenge you face and the reason you seem to lose momentum every year is that you have not really discovered your true life or higher purpose. In other words you do not have a clear vision of what is important to you and more importantly why achieving this really matters. Until you know why making time for and ensuring that you keep all the goal activity commitments you make, is important to you. Other things will always be seen as a higher priority to you and you will gradually neglect your goals.
Your purpose, vision or reason why you want to achieve something must become really compelling and be construed as more important or as important as all the other activities you carry out each day. Or the things that you see as more important will, over time, flow into your day, almost unnoticed to replace your goal achieving activities. You will always find time to carry out what you see as your most important activities, at the expense of anything that you subconsciously view as less important.
We all have a higher purpose and deep down we all know what it is. The challenge is to uncover yours and to then articulate it into a clear vision or purpose statement, which will inspire you. Discovering your life purpose and formulating a vision statement that clearly defines why achieving anything is really important to you, is not an event, it is a process. I want you to start this process by exploring your life where you begin to understand and read the clues that are visible in your life, clues that will gradually unlock and reveal your higher purpose or reason for being.
Action Idea: Scan your life and explore all the actions you are taking or have taken that have really inspired you. Try to uncover the common thread in all of them, this will begin to point you in a meaningful direction and help you to begin the process of discovering your higher purpose: Explore all the activities that have been or are the most meaningful, inspiring and make you feel the most alive and synthesize these.
•What were you doing when you felt the most inspired or driven?
•Where are your skills most profound?
•What inspired you most when you were taking these actions?
All the actions you take, which make you feel good and you feel passionate about doing; are directing toward discovering and formalising your vision. When you experience feelings of gratitude or any strong positive emotion, you are on track and moving toward discovering your higher purpose. Pay close attention to those moments they are incredible clues. Living a life of meaning and purpose is all about doing what you love and loving what you do.
Action Idea:
•Look back over your life and see who your heroes have been. What they do or did is an incredible clue to help you discover your life purpose.
•What have you studied most or what do you enjoy studying most?
•What do you think about most?
•What in your environment inspires you the most?
Integrate all of these and search for a common thread. Each of the answers you come up with, should give you a massive clue and will help you to uncover your higher purpose.
Until you have a clear vision and know why achieving your goals and dreams is important to you. You will not place a high enough importance on carrying out the daily activities you need to do, to achieve your goals. Everything else will be seen as more important and you will relegate your goal achieving activities to the bottom of your daily to-do list. Uncovering and discovering your higher purpose, formulating a vision and understanding why your goals are really important to you, is one of the most crucial things you must do. Invest the time today to start this process, the results you will enjoy will be well worth the effort.
Andrew is an expert and master teacher that speaks and teaches self-leadership, expanded awareness, effectiveness, efficiency and productivity. He guides individuals and business professionals, to identify, prioritise and carry out the right activities, consistently, so that they can maximise their personal effectiveness and deliver their best; on time, every time. All the tools and techniques Andrew teaches; have been tested in the laboratory of his own life and the many successful businesses he has owned and led, over the past 20 years. These strategies have seen Andrew achieve financial independence and reach a point of harmonious balance in all areas of his life. His purpose is to help as many people as possible, achieve similar or better results and to show them how they can realise their full potential, both personal and professionally and to help them live a meaningful life, where they are fulfilled in all areas. http://www.andrewhorton.co.za