It’s Thursday and we have just a few days left to our year, just a few posts left before 2011 is in the books. I reached one of my personal goals earlier this week. I still hope to reach one more but that one is up to you, my readers. I set a goal for how many posts I wanted to write this year. I reached it and will pass it by a few. The other goal I am still working to reach is about how many people read my blog (that is the one that is up to you). I could have written even more this year, but I got a late start because I was away from home for over two months helping my mom.
Today I was thinking about a few phrases that I have heard over the years about planning. They focus on how those who do not plan end up falling short in many areas of life.
Poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part.
The one thing in life that brings about more trouble for people is when they do not plan for things in life. I know we all have unexpected things that will happen, but how many of us like to have a boss come in and tell us to do something because they forgot to? We hate having to do work that others failed to do for themselves. But, if we planned more, set more goals for ourselves and sooner we would reach those goals and exceed them faster. If I had gotten started on my goals for the year earlier I would not be playing catch-up in the last month; instead, I would have been able to take the last month off and relax while planning the next year.
Failure to plan, is a plan to fail.
I have heard this line so many times, it used to make me mad. But it had such truth in my life that I felt like sharing it today. When I was younger I was able to talk with someone who gave me a simple way to get a picture of what I wanted to do. He said, “Whatever you want to do, take a look at someone who has been doing it for 20 years or more and see if they live the life you want to.”
Because of those words of advice, I took that to heart by trying jobs or career paths on for size before going further. I enjoyed working in the auto industry for years and before I set out for a long path in any job, I would work with someone who was doing it to see what it was like. If I wanted to learn something new, I went and found the best person at the job that I could find to train me. Then I worked to be successful at it.
If either one of these quotes above ring true for you take these last few days of 2011 and think of how many times in the past you have forgotten to plan, failed to plan, or did not set yourself up for the unexpected. If you could have taken a few precautions would you have set yourself up for success? Well we cannot go back in the past and change it. But we can learn from those areas and set up a life where we are prepared for some of those unexpected things in the future.
When planning out where we are going in the next year, or the next five years we cannot take out the risk factor. In life we are going to have to take a few chances, but those who will be successful will take calculated risks.
Life will have some gambles to it, just in living. But to keep your risks back to a minimum, set yourself up to take them. Before taking the big risk make, sure you have enough to live on, until it pays off. If you are behind in life, be willing to work extra to get ahead. When you get ahead, stay there. There were times in my life that I got behind and, if I had to, I would work two jobs to get myself back on track.
This next year will have some failures; even if you stay in a safe zone, you will still fail sometimes. So it’s time to stick your neck out, but prepare for it so you will not end up asking others to help you out of it. After all, 2012 is your time to rock.
I’m Tim Gillette, the Rocker Life Coach. It’s time to live your dream, to love what you do and those you share life with. Learn from past failures, plan your future and become the RockStar in your world.
