Have you ever wondered how an artist is able to chip away piece by tiny piece of excess wood or rock to finally end up with a perfect sculpture like Michelangelo’s David?

The story has it that when Michelangelo was commissioned to do the sculpture of King David he looked at hundreds of blocks of marble before he decided on the “right” one. To most of us all those blocks shown to him would have looked more or less the same but for Michelangelo it needed to be a certain piece of marble – nothing else would do. Why was that?

It was because he knew exactly what he wanted his David to look like. He could see the end result in front of his eyes. When asked how he was going to create such a fine figure as King David out of such an enormous chunk of marble his answer was: “That’s easy. All I have to do is chip away everything that isn’t David.” Isn’t that incredible? And so easy…

But why am I telling you this story?

Because I want you to look at what your “David” looks like.

Do you know what your major life target is?
Do you have a clear vision of what you want from life?
Do you know where you are going with the actions you take every day?

Do you know that about 90 % of us do not have a clear goal;
do not have a clear vision of what we want?
But if we don’t have a very clear and precise picture of what we aim at how can we reach it?

• How can we chip away at the rock that is our life to create David (our destiny) if we don’t know what our ultimate goal looks like?

Does that make sense?

Let me give you another example. Imagine you are on a nice sailing yacht and you want to go from Marbella to Mallorca (Spain) or from Miami to Cuba. The distance is only a few hundred miles but if you would go off course by only 1° you would miss the island altogether and might end up somewhere completely different. And exactly the same happens when you go even slightly off course on the path to your life’s destiny!

To summon it up: Before we can attempt to reach our destiny; before we can start walking towards what we most want in our life, we MUST KNOW exactly what it is we want! Only then can we sail towards it. This is absolutely fundamental.

Action Steps

Go somewhere where you have peace and quiet with 3 crisp pieces of paper and a pen

1. Imagine you had all the money you might ever need and could do anything you wanted to do knowing that you could not fail, what would you want to do? Describe it in great detail, get emotional and let yourself get carried away. Nothing is impossible!
2. Take a fresh piece of paper and write what you want to tell your great grandchildren about your life.
3. Now write your own eulogy. What do you want people to say about you when you are gone.
4. Now compare what you have written and merge the 3 pictures.

Can you see your “David” emerge from the crude block? Does what you have written sound like something to aspire to?

If you are not yet 100 % sure what it is you want from your life the above will help you find it. These might not be the easiest of exercise but they are extremely efficient and helpful. If you want more tips on these topics sign up for my “Success Nuggets”, short messages for a great(er) YOU.