Success is a Choice, Not A Destiny, Make it yours!

By: Paulet Biedermann

You may not realize it, but you possess all that you need to become successfull. There are several steps that you must take on your journey to success. First and foremost, you must ensure that you are in control of your life and your life isn’t in control of you. With proper self management, one can create infinite and limitless opportunities. Taking ownership of your life and plan for success is something that only you can do for yourself. This is the single most important job you will undertake in your lifetime. In fact, if you are not competent at self management, both public and private, you will not be able to manage other areas outside of your life successfully. You must be hungry enough to be able to identify your vision and develop your goals and achieve them one by one. You must be results oriented, not activity focus.

There are countless strategies and resources that you can utilize as tools to help you get where you want to go in life. Some important contributing factors and or stepping stones to success are outlined below. One of the first and most important steps is to objectively evaluate and analyze where things are in your live today versus where you would like to be in the future. Some of the important influences that shaped our lives such as media, family of origin, religion, personality, poverty, neglect and abuse must be looked at, explore and place in the ‘used to be or once upon a time box’. You need to know that everything is possible, but you must be honest with yourself and relate to yourself with integrity and moral courage. You must believe in yourself. You must know yourself and believe in what you can accomplish, know that you can do whatever it is that you want to achieve in your life. There are several proven techniques and strategies that can be utilized to set realistic and attainable goals to get you on your way.

Now that you have chosen success, what is the next step? You must carve out the pathway that will take you from an ordinary person to an extra-ordinary one:

1. Embrace Integrity, moral courage and authenticity: You must be able to behave with integrity toward yourself before you can practice with someone else. It is not always easy as we live in a world that promotes BS and condone immorality. But you don’t have to be one of the masses, you are on a path to becoming extraordinary. Therefore, it’s in your best interest to be true to yourself . Compromising your integrity is not an option!. You may be tempted to rationalize your behavior by pointing out that others are doing it. But this is not about others, and this is not the mindset of extraordinary people. You must retain and guard your integrity at any cost; remember, this is all about you and your path to success.

2. Assess your goals: Know your purpose, without a purpose, you are like a ship adrift. You go where ever the current takes you. This is not the life of a winner. You need to have goals that you are serious about attaining. You need to remind yourself of your goals everyday. You should never go a whole day without looking at your goals. You must never let your goals slip into second place on your list of priorities. Write down all your goals and read them twice daily. You must write the goal on one side of a card or paper and customize the other. Write something that will motivate you, a prayer, repetition of goals or anything that will remind you of why you set the goals in the first place and the great person you are meant to become. And remember, you must challenge yourself.

3. Mindset validation: Have a mindset development strategy. Your mind is a machine, you can program it for success or failure. Every one of us is capable of programming our minds, the trick is whether you program to succeed or to fail. In order to succeed, you must monitor what goes in your mind, you ultimately become what you are exposed to. Think and behave positive and surround yourself with positive and successful people. You deserve the best life has to offer.

4. Daily efforts of the winner: We are creatures of habit, and we are programmed to repeat our behaviors almost automatically. You get up, brush your teeth, take a shower, get dressed, eat your breakfast and off you go to work. You don’t have to think, you are programmed. This is true of people we are close to. You would be amazed at how many people and in particular women, who do not live purposefully. They pay a hefty price. You need to be purposeful in everything you do. This is especially important in your day to day activities. If you want to sing, take voice lesions, if you want to sew, get a mentor who is a seamstress, and if you want to go to graduate school, you start hanging around graduate students. Set small daily goals and be mindful of becoming the auto-pilot.

5. Attract positive influences in your life : You know how it is; you become what you associate yourself with on a daily basis. Author and motivational speaker Devon Harris said that “‘you are as poor or as rich as the people you hang around with, and Show me your friends and I will tell you who you are” or who you will become eventually. In the end, you will become what you surround yourself with. Be forewarned, a lot of these influences are insidious, and not easily detectable. Be deliberate in who you befriend. Surround yourself with winners, and you are on your way to becoming winner you are meant to be!

6. Treat yourself like you treat your best friend! Take a hard look at yourself. Is there something that holding you down? Have you dealt with all the potential goal stoppers and dream killers? Get rid of all the issues and baggage’s that may drag you down, It is imperative to ensure that you are balanced in every aspect of your life, you need to have equilibrium in your life. You also want to feel entitled, by this I mean you must remind yourself that you are worthy of whatever it is that you want out of life and this is the first step towards becoming a winner.

7. Fail Your Way to the top: Failure is not a bad thing, the winner sees it as experience on which to build the steps to success, while the others see it as failure. The winners try and try and try again and again. As they realize that “tough times wont last, but tough people will.” The winner looks around to see if what they need to keep on going is there and if its not, they create it. It’s a constant fight, fail, get up, try again, fail, get up and try again. The moment you give up trying, you create space for the things you don’t want in your life.

The idea that success is a choice and not a destiny was true one hundred years ago and is true today. Some people regard success as fleeting, unattainable and unsustainable, and that it can only be achieved by the elite few. This is a dangerous and self defeating myth that can rob you of the opportunity to become successful. Success, greatness, winner, whatever you want to call it, is a choice that every one of us makes; it’s not a destiny. You are the only person in the world who can make you successful, this is one of the few things in life that no one can do for you. That said, you must realize that in order to attain any degree of success, you must persevere, stay focus and behave with integrity and authenticity. Additionally, use failure as a stepping stone, keep on getting up every time you get knocked down.

Take care of you, be true to you, and nurture your self esteem, and strengthen your confidence. Stay away from the moaners and groaners and negative people; they are viral! Surround yourself with positive people, environment and thoughts. You become what you associate with, and what you think. Stay away from joining the NEGATIVITY club or you will soon find out that winners are allergic to this club. But,guess what? You are reading this article and that is a good sign that you are well on the way to success. Hence, SUCCESS IS A CHOICE, Not A Destiny! And remember, you are your best friend; as the old African proverb goes, “If there is no enemy within, the enemy outside cant do you any harm.” Additional info can be found at:www.yourbestyou.ca.sign up for a free newsletter.