Brian Tracy said: “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail”. And I totally agree with him. That follows my prior posts talking about having to know what you want before you can start walking (and working) towards it. I hope it is obvious by now that becoming crystal clear is the first key to a successful, happy life.

Then you need a plan… but before you begin your planning, you need a clear idea of your destination, right? Ask yourself where you want to end up? Ask yourself what you want to experience when you get there?

From my personal experience I know that I have reached many a goal – small or big – without even realising that I had.  And that is bad because if you don’t recognize your achievements who will?

If you don’t celebrate, if you don’t reward yourself when you have reached one of your goals,  you will not enforce your potential and might even think you are a failure because you don’t recognize in how many areas of your life you are already successful.

Let me give you an example. When I was in the middle of writing my book I got stuck. I had the feeling I would never finish and at one stage I actually stopped – I procrastinated on finishing it for over 2 years. I got distracted by someone else’s dream and joined forces with that person for a while. It was hard work to get back on track with the book because now it felt like work and not like fun anymore.  I re-started writing only because too many people asked me how the book was doing and it wasn’t doing anything so I felt like a failure. Not the best of motivation, is it?

Fortunately that feeling was short lived and once I got going I actually loved the process again but can you follow my train of thought? I had not appreciated the conclusion of each chapter. I had not really appreciated the writing process and the parts that I was accomplishing really well. Because of that lack of appreciation for my creativity and for the results I was producing, I got frustrated and later distracted until I actually  stopped writing altogether.  This is a trap I see many of my clients fall into and the grass always seems greener on the other side, doesn’t it?

I discuss this topic in depth in the Cycle of Success and also in the TO BE book because most people don’t realize what keeps them motivated and appreciating your own achievements – no matter how small – is one of the big factors in that.

The cycle of success is like this:

Belief > Potential > Action > Results > stronger belief > higher potential > more focused action > even better results > even stronger belief (this is where total assurance starts)…

And that brings us to the next part which is believing that you can achieve what you set out to do. We will talk about that in my next post.

Have an amazing day

Barbara

www.yoursuccesscycle.com