Successful and Set for Life

Always Think Big! You Create Your Own Destiny

“Precious is the moment when the dream and the dreamer become one!” Unknown

You must strengthen your ability to take positive action in your life. This simple statement begins the power of making decisions. The first decision is to raise your level of thinking. One of the most profound elements of life that I have realized is that life gives you whatever you ask for.

Imagine getting all the way to the end of your life, dying and going to Heaven. When you arrive you tell your creator what you became here on Earth and what happened to you. You are then informed that you, like everyone else on Earth, got what you believed you would get. The money, the jobs, the type of education, the spouse were all manifested to you. The creator simply gave you the platform and let you believe and achieve on your own. Most people would be shocked to find this out. If they had known this information before they died, they would have asked for more.

The problem is that most people do not ask for very much out of life and they often get slightly less than what they ask for. Imagine if I told you when you were born that you would get whatever you asked for from life. That could be a beautiful supportive mate, a rewarding career, a published book, or a multimillion dollar portfolio, if you just asked for these things, and worked with the belief that you would eventually acquire them, barring any unfortunate tragedies of life. This is your life. The problem is that many people who make this request do not actually believe that this is how life works. If you do not believe it, you cannot accomplish it.

When you were young, you believed you could be anything that you wanted to be. When young people are tested for creativity they are found to be very high in the capacity for creativity. Yet as they become teenagers and young adults we can give them the same test again and find that their score dropped considerably. If people get smarter and increase in knowledge as they age, why do we find that their creativity decreases? The answer goes back to the belief system. If there are several people you know telling you this, not only do you start to believe it, but you start to act on it. You start to limit yourself to your original aspirations, and this is sad. You have been taught that you can only jump but so high. You have been trained like a flea. If you put a bunch of fleas in a jar and watch them jump and jump and jump, trying to get out of the jar, after a while they will learn that they cannot jump out of the jar. They have been taught that they can only jump but so high. What have you taught yourself? How high have you allowed yourself to jump?

To be truly successful in any endeavor you must strengthen your ability to take positive action in your life. This simple statement begins the power of making decisions. Decisions are largely responsible for separating the happy and elated from the frustrated. Instead of simply closing your eyes and dreaming, open your eyes, believe in your heart that your dreams can and will come true, and take positive action. The act of being decisive separates the dreamers from the capitalists in America. Proceed in life as though you could not fail. Accomplishing 90 percent of a worthwhile goal is better than 0 percent of a dream.

Wealth Tip

Do not let your life be based on your existing problems; instead, base your life on your future potential. This decision is yours to make and can be as simple as changing the way you think. Many people do not achieve their goals in life because of what they choose to think. Many people focus on what they lack instead of what they want.

Take sound and meaningful actions toward your goals. This idea sounds obvious. The best ideas, practices, and methodologies are usually the simplest. You must decide that you have endured the pains of financial imprisonment long enough. You must decide to become free. Define your freedom in writing. Define your freedom as ending the bondage of your debts. Define your freedom in terms of time for unrestricted travel or family time with your loved ones. Contrary to what you see on television, freedom is not a Porsche or a BMW convertible but rather the time to enjoy a vehicle without the restrictions imposed by work or bill payments.

Great things in life may appear serendipitously, but more often they come because we have made a decision to seek great things. Higher goals are defined by the individual and often include spiritual, religious, and personal goals. Freedom from debt obligations and entrapping employment starts with a decision. Decide today that you are no longer going to live in debt. Use the philosophy of Debtors Anonymous, which teaches that freedom from debt begins by not creating any new debt today.

Life is not a long and gloomy look at the past or a fearful look into the future. A successful life begins with controlling the present and the moments over which you have the most control. The past is gone; the future is an illusion for which to plan and hope. The only chance you have to create lasting meaning in your life is the present moment. A successful life will become a stream of successful moments organized into daily goals, weekly goals, and higher goals reached through consistent effort. Decide that you are not going to create any new debt today. Decide that you are going to become wealthy in America.

Decide to keep a log of your goals, and track how many days you need to take steps toward your endeavors. Set a goal to create no new debts, one day at a time. Each day as you awake, decide to create no new debt and to enjoy the day. Decide to become wealthy and financially independent at some point in your life. Brian Tracy, in his influential work, Getting Rich in America, states that most people living in America do not become rich because they have never decided to become rich.

Create the belief and the plan and the actions will soon follow. Decide upon your goal and then learn how to take the necessary steps to meet your goal. Changing any process or action will involve reading and learning. You must understand that everything you have learned to get to the present stage in your life will not necessarily get you to the next stage; but you must believe that the next stage is coming.

"Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase." Martin Luther King

Everything you learned in grade school up to the third grade helped you but did not guarantee that you would complete the fourth grade. Life is the same. Many people will work on a job for twenty years, literally repeating the same work with the same level of effort over and over again. Decide to be different. Write down what you have done that has been successful and what has been less than successful. Strive not to repeat the problems you had the year before. If you have ever bounced a check, try to never bounce a check again. If you have ever spent your last dollar, commit yourself to always having a ten or a hundred-dollar bill in a separate place in your wallet, so that you will never again spend your last dollar. Realize that your old financial self will not carry you forward into the future. Decide to start over today and move with confidence in a positive direction.