How to Take Charge of Your Own Destiny

As adults, we have been conditioned to limit our dreams and desires. We’ve learned, over time, to settle for whatever we get. Children, on the other hand, have no trouble dreaming and are remarkably successful at manifesting what they want.

What do you want? Write down everything you can think of that you want to do, be, have, and contribute. Don’t edit. Just write it all down. Let your mind run wild. Pretend you’re a child again. There are no limits.

If you were to ask 1998 Olympic Gold Medal winner and Sportscaster, Tara Lipinski, how she was able to win the gold medal at the age of fourteen, she would tell you how she “saw” herself doing it since she was a small child. In 1997, she became youngest woman to be crowned the World’s #1 skater. A title held for seventy years by Sonja Henie.

Beyond simply writing down a bunch of goals, you’ll want to engage all your senses in creating a powerful, exciting, compelling vision for your future. One that would make you want to jump out of bed each day eager to start attracting your dreams.

Don’t get me wrong. Goal setting is a powerful exercise and something as basic as writing your goals down is better then not doing it. It’s sad how many people are short changing themselves and limiting their lives by not engaging in some form of goal setting. It’s one of those critical life skills that need to be taught in schools.

However I’m asking you to take it a step further. I’m going to ask you, before you even set goals, to think about the major areas of your life. If you were living your most amazing life in five years, what would it look like, in each of the key areas listed below?

Look at your life in each of the major areas listed below and imagine your living your ideal life in each one.

Define your five year vision for each key area below:

Spiritual-life: Spirituality, Religion, Self-development

Physical-life: Health, Fitness

Social-life: Family, Relationships

Material-life: Career, Business, Money

What does that look like? Describe what you would see if you were living your most awesome future.

Who are you spending your time with? Where are you vacationing?

What are you doing in your career or business? If you achieved your ultimate financial success, what would it be? How much are you receiving each month? How much savings do you have?

What about your health and fitness? What are you contributing to your community?

You’ll want this to be a fun, exciting exercise. One that will let you really expand your sense of what your life can become.

Allow plenty of time to play with these ideas. You may want to complete this exercise over a period of days. Invest some time thinking about what you want your life to be like in five years.

The idea is to really get your juices going, to really excite you each time you read it. For example, there is a tremendous difference in the energy produced by reading the two statements below. The first one is your typical goal statement, and while it is better than nothing, it does not create the emotion of the second. You can see this for yourself by reading the statements aloud.

Or:

Can you feel the difference? Of course you can. The key to creating a powerful vision is to engage as many of your senses as possible.

Now that you have a clear idea of where you want to be and what you want your life to become, it is time to extract one or two specific, measurable goals you will achieve in the next twelve months. We will then break these down even further and, finally, develop an action plan to keep you on track.

Next, look at your one-year goals and ask yourself what you can accomplish in the next three months. Take each goal that you set and break it down into a three-month milestone.

So far, you have created your vision, set your one-year goals and then broken those goals into smaller, three month milestones. We will now take it one-step further.

Look at your three month goals and list the specific actions you can take, in the next thirty days, to propel you toward your goals. You may want to write these on index cards and carry them with you or place them on your wall where you can look at them each day.

I know I’ve asked you to do a lot of work here and it may take you some time to fully complete these exercises, however, if you do so, you will find it time well spent. You will have gained invaluable insight into your life and taken the time to clearly define the future of your dreams.

Clearly defined goals with plans for their accomplishment are one of the “secrets” of success.

Writing your vision and goals, devoting time each day to imagining living your vision, and reading your goals will guarantee you a future beyond anything you would have achieved just living day to day, relying on circumstances.

All highly successful people, from every walk of life, engage in some form of goal setting and imagery regularly. They are successful because they are designing their lives and creating their ideal future, using the same power that lies within us all.