A Bride Worth Billions (73 page)

Success can be defined in many different ways. It all depends on which aspect of your life you want to succeed. It is not a general term that describes your life, but a series of different achievements. In order to define success, you must first know what you want in life. The techniques below can help you defining success.

Visualize your future self
– One, two, five, or ten years from now—it doesn’t matter. Pick a future date and think about your future self. What kind of person would you like to be in the future? Do you want to be someone who knows how to play musical instruments? Someone who knows more than one language? Perhaps someone who has traveled around the world? You will find it easy to visualize a future self that is a much better person. Once you have done that, you will be ready to define your own success.

Think of your future environment
– Success goes hand in hand with change. If you are willing to change to become successful, you should open yourself to the idea of a change in your environment. Do you see yourself living the same place? Are you ready to have a different set of people around you? There is no right or wrong answer, but this step is very important once you proceed to setting your goals. Your environment influences you in the same way that you influence it. There is no way that a person would change but his environment stays the same.

Imagine your legacy
– For any living organism on Earth, the ultimate definition of success is to live as long as it can. We know that will not happen because nothing is permanent and we cannot live forever. But we, humans, also know that after we leave the Earth, we get to leave something for the next generation. What legacy would you like to leave? How would you like to be remembered?

Defining success seems simple, but it is actually the trickiest part of the process. Because we are bombarded with other people’s definition of success, we tend to just follow other people’s definition of success. For some it is wealth, for others it is fame. Some would say it’s excellence while others assert that it’s abundance. Bear in mind that your success is YOURS—not yours alone, for your environment should benefit from it, but yours to define. Do not be swayed by bad counsel or cultural norm. It is you who gets to choose your own definition.

You may have already encountered of the acronym SMART in school or at your workplace. It is a set of criteria for setting your goals. It is widely used by different organizations and proved to be very effective. Keep the following in mind when setting your goals.

Specific –
Your goal should be specific. Now that may be hard to do for long-term goals, so break it down to short-term ones. Once you have a short-term goal, break it down further to specific tasks or skills. That would make it easier to specify. For example, your goal is to become a successful chef. If so, you would have to know how to cook first. In order to master cooking, you should learn a set of skills like shopping for ingredients, slicing, chopping, knowing different cooking temperatures, etc. Those skills are now specific and you can set each one of those as your goals.

Measurable
– It would be hard to track your progress is you do not know what your baseline is. Your goals would have to be measurable so that you’ll know if you are doing better or worse. Set a baseline for yourself and then create a metric. In cooking for example, you can measure your chopping skills by how many onions you can chop in five minutes, or whether or not you produced the correct shapes.

Attainable
– Your goals should be something that you can attain. The best way to know if your goal is attainable is to find somebody who already did it. If they can, you can. Attainability also refers to how realistic your goals are.

Relevant
– Every short-term goal that you set should always lead you to achieving your long-term goal. Remember that you are tracking your progress, and if an activity is not making you move forward, then it must not be relevant.

Time-bound
– Remember when you visualized your future self? If you saw yourself five years from now, then you have five years to achieve your long-term goal. Each short-term goal that you set should be coupled with a timeline. This is for you to know how fast you are moving towards your success.

Once you have set Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound goals, it is time to create a plan. The next will help you in creating the best strategy for achieving your goals.

A good plan will determine how you will execute your goals. There are factors to consider when trying to create a strategy for achieving your goals and these factors go hand-in-hand with the SMART criteria. Follow the steps below when creating a plan for your goals.

1. Make a list
   – By this time you should already have specific short-term goals and set of skills in mind. List it down on a sheet of paper—doing so would make it official and tangible. List all of your skills or tasks that you think will help you in achieving your goals.
   
2. Review the list
   – Check each and every task on your list and check which ones are attainable and realistic. Scratch out any item that may seem irrelevant.
   
3. Prioritize
   – Organize the list carefully and figure out which goals you need to achieve first. If you are having a hard time doing this, seek help from someone who may be an expert in this field. The key is to make sure that you put first things first.
   
4. Create metrics for each goal
   – Because each goal is measurable, you have to define the metrics that you will use to track your progress. Remember to set realistic metrics for yourself. These measurements may change as you execute your plan.
   
5. Set a timeframe
   – Create a schedule and a timeframe for yourself. You will have different timeframes for each of your goal, depending on the level of difficulty. Setting a timeline for yourself will help keep you motivated.
   

Now that you have your plan on paper, it is time to execute it. Do your best to stick to your plan and follow the timeline that you set.

This is the most challenging part. Most people who have tried to be successful had very good goals and excellent plans, but they give up because they fear that they cannot execute it well. Do not get discouraged. Keep yourself motivated and put your plan into action. Below are some of the things that you can do to help you execute your plan efficiently.

Have a Buddy
– One way to keep yourself motivated is to find someone to execute your plan with. Find people who may have the same goals. It is always easier to do things if you have someone to do it with. Having a buddy will also help you in tracking your progress.

Be consistent
–
Consistency ensures that you do not lose sight of your long-term goal. There may come a time when you need to modify your plan or take risks, but the more important thing is that you do not forget your ultimate goal. If you want to succeed, you would have to be consistent in doing things that work for you.

Ask Questions
– Do not hesitate to use any available medium to find useful information about what you are trying to achieve. Do some research, utilize social media, perhaps even get help from a professional.

Record
– Track everything. Record your actions every step of the way. Not only is it good for checking your progress, it is also a good way to analyze delays, setbacks, and even good techniques.

Delegate
– If your hands are full, get help. You can break down smaller tasks and delegate these to people who are willing to help. This will ensure that you get results faster.

No one ever executed a plan to the letter, no matter how good the plan is. You are bound to face challenges. There will be highs and lows, bumpy roads and detours. As long as you take a step back and see the bigger picture, it is easy to know whether you are still on track. Do not be afraid to think out of the box to come up with solutions, things seem totally different when seen in a new light. Be creative and be resourceful. Just remember that any deviation from your plan should be temporary. Your goal remains your goal. You may need to change your mode of transport, but as long as you get there within the timeframe you set, then you’ll be fine.

Have you ever heard of anyone who was born successful? Probably not, because that’s impossible. How about anyone who succeeded on their first try and stayed on top? That’s possible, but highly unlikely in our lifetime. Let me reiterate: Success is not an end, it is a process. And just like any other natural process, you are bound to fail 50% of the time.

Those people who we consider as ‘successful’ today got there because they failed first. How do I know? It is because no one learns from always winning. If you would listen to any successful entrepreneur or public figure when they talk about success, you would often hear them say that it was a trial-and-error affair. The way to make it in life is to know that you will learn something from failure, and that you have the power to choose whatever you want to do with your newly-found knowledge.

Here are some final notes on success that I learned on my way to achieving it:

Failure is not permanent; neither is success
– Yes, you definitely read it right. There is no way to stay on top because the wheel of life always turns. You may be successful in one aspect of your life in a particular period of time, but you will find that you will fail at other times. Such is the nature of life. So why do we still strive for success? Because it is inevitable. Just as you are bound to fail, you are also bound to succeed, but not without you trying. If you make an effort, you will either fail or succeed, so just keep the big wheel turning. It’s a different matter altogether if you didn’t even lift a hand to spin the wheel.

The loser is not the one who failed, but the one who stayed the same
– Remember the previous about defining success? I asked you to visualize your future self. While most people will visualize a better version of themselves, only a handful actually made a move to achieve it. Why, you might ask, does the person who stayed the same lose? Isn’t it safer to just stay where you are? The answer is no. Life is for living. You either make your life better, or you make it worse. If you do not make any changes, you are not living your life.

Success is not at the end of a single road; it is in different corners of many different roads
– The thing about people is that we do not recognize our little achievements every day. We tend to think of success as something that is extremely life-altering and only happens if we strive so hard. That is not true at all. Every little task that we do everyday contribute to the big change that we are aiming for, so it is only right to give ourselves credit for doing a good job, however mundane it may seem. You aim for a healthier self, and you managed to say no to dessert today? High-five yourself! You want to be frugal, and you saved money by walking home? Pat yourself on the back! Acknowledge the fact that you are making the right decisions and achieving little successes every day.

I can confidently say that I made it, and I am successful, but I also know that my journey continues. With the habits that I developed, the goals that I’ve set, the plans that I made and the lessons that I learned, I am willing to give the wheel another shoulder-breaking spin. I hope that you also do the same and try the things that I’ve tried. Let us all move towards our goals and have a rewarding, fun-filled, successful life!

Thank you again for downloading this book! 

I hope this book was able to help you to define your own success and motivate you to create a plan and execute it, just as I did. 

The next step is to try out the steps I have provided and see for yourself if it works. I bid you good luck in your journey to success!

Finally, if you enjoyed this book, then I’d like to ask you for a favor, would you be kind enough to leave a review for this book on Amazon? It’d be greatly appreciated!

Click here to leave a review for this book on Amazon!

Thank you and good luck!

Ultimate Guide to Financial Freedom

How to be Financially Independent, and Achieve your Financial Freedom with Step by Step Instruction

I want to thank you and congratulate you for downloading the book,
“Ultimate Guide to Financial Success”
.

This book contains proven steps and strategies on how to attain financial freedom and be financially independent.

Many people believed that receiving high salaries or earning big profits from their business venture is equivalent to wealth. Well, it is a fact that you can accumulate more assets if you have the money. In reality, income is not actually equal to wealth. You can have millions in your account now but it will not ensure financial freedom in the end if you do not know how to manage your money. That is why there are highly paid athletes earning $15-20 million dollars a year who go penniless after just a few years. On the other hand, a mere government worker can retire a millionaire, comfortably living off on the interest income of his passive income.

The secret to gaining financial success is to spend less than you earn. Coupled with other good habits and sound financial decisions/actions, you will achieve financial independence and freedom, in no time.

Financial independence in this context means that you can just lounge in the pool all day without having to worry about where you should obtain the money to pay for your bills. It means that you have the power to control your time since you do not have to work 15 hours a day just to make both ends meet. You can now enjoy the fruits of your labor, with worrying about bills to pay, debts to settle or funds for your chosen lifestyle. If you worked long hours, get paid with an exceptionally high salary but still worry where to get the money for your bills, then you are not yet financially independent.

Learn the basics of managing your finances and start your journey towards financial freedom.

Thanks again for downloading this book, I hope you enjoy it!