permanent.
Time management is your key to personal effectiveness, self-esteem, self-
respect and greater personal productivity and happiness. With time
management, you can overcome any obstacle, and achieve any goal. With
excellent time management skills, you can take complete control over your
life and your future. Time management is your key to unlimited success.
“You are searching for the magic key that will unlock the door to the source
of power; and yet you have the key in your own hands, and you may make
use of it the moment you learn to control your thoughts.” (Napoleon Hill)
Action Exercises:
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1.
Select one area where better time management skills can help you to
be more effective and get more done. Resolve to go to work on
yourself in that area immediately.
2.
Think back on a time when you were performing at your best. Recall
and replay the picture of this experience on the screen of your mind
whenever you approach a new task.
3.
Talk to yourself positively all the time. Repeat affirmations like, “I
use my time efficiently and well!”
4.
Imagine that everyone around you is looking up to you as the role
model of personal efficiency, and that they were going to organize
their days the way you organize yours. Act accordingly.
5.
Think about teaching a course in time management to your friends
and colleagues. What would be the most important things you would
want to teach them?
6.
Determine the areas of your work that give you the most satisfaction
and make plans to become even more productive in those areas.
7.
Resolve today that you are going to work and practice until you
become one of the most efficient, effective and productive people in
your field. Take action immediately on your resolution.
Chapter Two
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Setting Goals and Objectives
“You too can determine what you want. You can decide on your major
objectives, targets, aims and destination.” (W. Clement Stone)
The most important word in personal effectiveness is the word “Clarity.”
The starting point of Time Power is for you to develop absolute clarity about
your goals and objectives. The most common time waster and biggest
obstacle to success in life is losing sight of what you are trying to
accomplish, or forgetting what you set out to do. In The Devil’s Dictionary,
author Ambrose Bierce wrote, “Fanaticism is redoubling your efforts after
your aim has been forgotten.” Many people are working hard every day but
they have no clear idea of their real goals and objectives.
Time management, more than anything else, requires the planning and
organizing of your time in such a way that you accomplish your most
important goals as quickly as possible. Organizing your goals and objectives
clearly, and by priority, and then working with single-minded focus on the
most important things you can possibly do to achieve them, is the key to
using your time effectively and well.
Join the Top 3%
As it happens, fewer than 3% of people have clear, written goals, and they
are usually the most successful in every field. Less than 1% of people
rewrite and review their goals on a regular basis. In an article I once wrote
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for a national publication, they highlighted the words, “If you do not have
goals for yourself, you are doomed forever to work for someone else.”
That is just as true today as it was then.
In your career, you can work to achieve your own goals or you can work to
achieve the goals of another person or company. The very best situation
occurs when you are achieving the goals of your company or organization
while you are achieving your own personal goals. But in every case, you are
always working to achieve goals of one kind or another.
The Master Skill of Success
Goal setting is the master skill of success. Your ability to clearly and
systematically create goals, and plans for their accomplishment, will help
you more to achieve success and happiness than any other skill you could
develop.
Goal setting is not complicated. It begins with a pad of paper, a pen and you.
The very act of writing your goals down changes your life, sometimes in
dramatic and unexpected ways. As motivational speaker Zig Ziglar says,
“Written goals transform you from a wandering generality into a meaningful
specific.”
The very act of writing down your goals programs them into your
subconscious mind. Your subconscious mind, in combination with your
superconscious mind, then goes to work on your goals 24 hours a day, even
while you are sleeping. You begin to attract people and circumstances in
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harmony with your goals into your life. You get ideas and insights that can
help you. You come across articles and books with solutions to your
problems. You begin to experience a flow of energy and excitement that
drives you forward.
Until you have practiced goal setting on a regular basis, you may be
skeptical about its power to change your life. But after you have tried it,
along the lines that we will discuss here, you will be convinced. Your whole
life will change.
Increase Your Success Rate By 1000%
In February 2003, USA Today ran an article discussing New Year’s
Resolutions. One year before, they had interviewed people about their New
Year’s Resolutions for 2002. They divided the respondents into two
categories, those who had written down their resolutions, and those who had
just thought about them.
One year later, only 4% of the people who had made resolutions, but not
written them down, had made any changes. But a whopping 46% of those
who had written down their resolutions had followed through on them. This
is a difference of more than 1100% in the rate of success and achievement
explainable by the simple act of writing the resolution down on paper.
Essential Goal Setting Principles
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There are several essential principles of goal setting that dramatically affect
the speed at which you achieve your goals. These are principles that you can
return to and practice repeatedly for the rest of your career.
Number One: Dream big dreams! Only big dreams have the power to
motivate and inspire you toward the fulfillment of your full potential. Only
big dreams liberate your imagination and energy, and give you the drive to
overcome the obstacles and difficulties that you will experience on the path
to your goal. Only big dreams can keep you excited and working
enthusiastically every day toward their accomplishment.
When you set goals, practice the principle of “Idealization.” Imagine that
you have no limitations on what you can do, have or be. Imagine your goal
as if it were perfect in every respect when you set it in the first place. Don’t
allow yourself to think of all the reasons why it may not be possible for you
at this time. Put those mental roadblocks and excuses aside. Set your goal as
though you could achieve anything you wanted, as long as you are perfectly
clear about what it was.
Number Two: Your goals must be in writing, in the present tense, as
though they already existed. Your subconscious mind only accepts
commands that are worded in the present tense, such as, “I weigh 150
pounds.” Or “I earn $100,000 per year.” Or “I live in a beautiful, 3500
square foot custom designed home.” Each of these goals begins with the
word “I” and is followed by an action verb. This is the fastest and most
direct way to activate your subconscious mind and harness your
superconscious powers.
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Positive, present tense goals program your subconscious mind and build
faith and conviction within you that your goal is realizable. The more often
you read and repeat your goal, the deeper you program it into your mind,
and the sooner you begin to become absolutely convinced that you will
attain this goal, exactly when the timing is right for you.
Rewrite Your Goals Daily
My favorite technique for programming my goals deep into my
subconscious mind is to rewrite my goals in the present tense each day in a
spiral notebook. I learned this technique many years ago. I was absolutely
astonished at the speed at which my life began to improve when I began to
rewrite my goals each day.
The best time to rewrite your goals is first thing in the morning, before you
start your day. This exercise only takes about five minutes, but writing out
your goals activates all your mental powers so that throughout the day, you
will be more sensitive and aware to possibilities and opportunities to achieve
those goals.
Affirm Your Goals Regularly
There is a wonderful technique for goal attainment called “Standard
Affirmation Technique.” To use this method, you get a stack of 3 x 5 index
cards and write out your goals in the present tense, one per card, in large
letters.
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Each day, and throughout the day, take out your stack of goal cards and
review them, one at a time. As you read each goal, concentrate on the words
on the card, as though you were trying to photograph them with the lenses of
your eyes. Think about one or more things you could do to achieve that goal.
Then go on to the next card.
When you combine the two methods, writing and rewriting your goals daily
in a spiral notebook, and regularly reviewing them on 3 x 5 index cards, you
begin to believe that these goals are achievable. You eventually convince
yourself at a deep subconscious level that the attainment of these goals is
inevitable. As you become more and more confident that your goals will
soon become realities, you begin to move faster toward them, and they start
to move faster toward you. You activate more of your mental powers. When
you practice either one or both of these methods for 30 days, you will be
astonished at the changes that will take place in your life.
Number Three: Your goals must be in balance, and cover the three most
important areas of your life. They must be in harmony with each other, not
contradictory. Just as a wheel must be perfectly balanced to rotate smoothly,
your life must be in balance as well for you to feel happy and effective.
What Do You Really Want?
The first types of goals you need are business, career and financial goals.
These are the tangible, measurable things that you want to achieve as the
result of your efforts at work. These are the “what” that you want to
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accomplish in life. With these tangible goals, you must be absolutely clear
about how much you want to earn, and in what time period you want to earn
it. You must be clear about how much you want to save, invest and
accumulate, and in what period you want to acquire these amounts.
Remember, you can’t hit a target that you can’t see.
Why Do You Want Them?
The second types of goals you need are your personal, family and health
goals. In reality, these are the most important goals of all in determining
your happiness and well-being. These are called the “why” goals. These are
the reasons why you want to achieve your business, career and financial
goals. They are your true aims and purposes in life.
Many people become so involved with their work and careers, and their
financial goals, that they lose sight of the reasons why they wanted financial
success in the first place. They get their priorities mixed up. As a result, their
lives get out of balance. They start to feel stressed and driven. Sometimes
they become angry and frustrated. No matter how hard they work to achieve
business and financial goals, they don’t seem to enjoy any more peace,
happiness and satisfaction in life. They need to get their goals back in the
right order of priority and realize that achieving work and financial goals are
the means to the end of enjoying your family and relationship goals. They
are not the ends in themselves.
How Do You Achieve Them?
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The third types of goals you require are your personal and professional
growth and development goals. These are the “how” goals. Learning and
practicing new skills and behaviors are how you achieve the “what” in order
to enjoy the “why.” By working on yourself, you become the kind of person
who is capable of achieving your business, career and financial goals. As a
result, you can achieve and enjoy your personal, family and health goals
faster and easier. By working on all three types of goals simultaneously, you
keep your life in balance, and continue moving onward and upward.
Number Four: You must decide upon your “Major Definite Purpose.”
This is the one goal in your life that is more important than any other. This is
the one goal, the accomplishment of which will enable you to accomplish
more of your other goals than any other single goal.
The selection of a major definite purpose for your life is the starting point of
great success. This decision enables you to focus and concentrate your
mental and physical energies on a single point, the one point that can have
the greatest positive impact upon your life at this time. Deciding upon your
major definite purpose, at each stage of your life, is one of the major
responsibilities of adulthood.
How to Decide What You Really Want
There are several questions that you can ask yourself to help you determine
your major definite purpose. These questions force you to think through who
you are and what you really want to do with your life.
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Question One: What would you do differently, how would you change
your life, if you won one million dollars cash in the lottery tomorrow? If
you became an instant millionaire, tax free, what would you do differently in
your life from what you are doing today? What would you start doing that
you are not doing right now? What would you stop doing? What would you
do more of or less of? Where would you go? Who would you see? What is
the first change that you would make if you had a million dollars cash in
