5 Steps to Achieving Success

You get up at 7 a.m., have a cup of coffee and bowl of oatmeal, drop the kids off at school and head to work. Tuesday evening is your bowling league night and other days you spend the evening transporting the kids back and forth to swim, dance and soccer practice. Saturday is devoted to yard work, grocery shopping and family movie night, while Sundays are somewhat of a lazy day. It's the same routine for you day after day, week after week. But are you just spinning your wheels?

First ask yourself, what is your definition of success. What does success look like to you? Each of us should have a different answer to that question. For one person success is measured by finances - in other words, financial success. Yet for others, success is determined by their relationship with their family. Still others measure their success in terms of spirituality or charity. If you don't have a vision, or clear definition of success, how can you be successful? You must know the target in order to aim for it.

Put it in writing. Begin this assignment by writing a short statement that describes your definition of success. Now divide your paper into four quarters. Give each quarter a description of success, beginning with the most important. For example, if success in family relationships is most important to you, put that in the first square/quarter of the paper. If financial success is secondary, in the second quarter and so on. At the end, you should have four key descriptions of success, put in order of importance.

Assessment. Once you've defined success, you can then determine if you are spinning your wheels. Now take a look at your weekdays. Begin by looking at the task and place it under one of the four key descriptions of success. For example, you work from 9 a.m. - 5 p.m., this can go under financial success or family success (because the money is used to care for your family), it's all in your interpretation. Remember, this is your assignment, there is no right or wrong. The idea of the project is to help you determine whether you are headed for success or just spinning your wheels. You sit on the board of ABC non-profit agency, and you meet once a month on Mondays. Where does that fit in your four squares? If you come up with something that does not fit into the four squares, write that on a separate sheet of paper.

Are you spinning your wheels? How much of your time is invested in the first square/quarter of your paper. In other words, if financial success is most important to you, how much time are you investing in achieving that? If spirituality is most important to you, how much time are you spending in study and prayer? The truth is on the paper. This should be a very eye opening assignment. The majority of your tasks should go under the first quarter, a little less in the second quarter and so on. Hopefully, there are only a couple of things on the separate sheet of paper. These are things you should consider eliminating from your schedule if at all possible because they aren't helping you to achieve success but are simply causing you to spin your wheels.

Make adjustments. Lastly, if you have been honest in your definition of success and are serious about achieving success, you'll need to make some adjustments. What do you need to spend more time doing, and what do you need to spend less time doing? Achieve success and stop spinning your wheels.