Achieving Personal and Business Success - Vision, Focus and Discipline

Have you ever met someone who is amazingly talented and highly credentialed in a wide variety of areas? A person who is phenomenal in both the diversity and quality of their work, yet has just never truly achieved success? Someone who may be a gifted artist, an investment pro, graduated from law school, and has people skills galore - yet, they just haven't made it. Have you ever wondered why? Perhaps this is you. Why, with all the resources and skills at your disposal have you not found success?

Success is a result of knowing where you want to go, creating a specific roadmap to get you there and having the discipline to stay on track.

Individuals and organizations fail to achieve success because they have never done the work of defining who they are or what they do and then sticking with it. People fail to succeed for the same reason businesses do; they are not focused in the way they invest scarce resources. Each person or business has only a limited amount of time, energy and capital to use pursuing their goals and dreams.

Most fabulously talented people fail because they don't set limits. Have you met someone who has three or four different business cards? They are so busy doing a little of everything they never shine at any one thing. In order to succeed, you must select some one thing to be the vehicle of your success. You can't be committed to two visions any more than you can drive two cars at one time.

Crafting an effective mission statement provides the framework for using resources in ways that will best support all your efforts to achieve the goals you set. Individuals, families, churches, charities and businesses all benefit from well thought-out summaries of who they are, what they do and why they do it.

Establish your vision. If you don't know where you want to go, just how do you propose to get there? Do you really want to entrust your future to nothing more than luck? If so, quit reading and go buy a lottery ticket.

Once you have a vision, specifically outline the process of attaining it. Set a series of goals, beginning with step one and continuing all the way to where your vision becomes your reality. Vision and goals are useless without discipline. Stay focused. Invest your resources only in ways that achieve set goals; using each dollar, hour or calorie wisely to get you closer to your vision and not wasted on impulsive activity.

Another aspect to achieving success is being realistic. What are you really willing to change? What are you truly able to change? What are you willing to do? What are you willing to risk?

Set yourself up to succeed. Identify smaller goals and gradually build a foundation of success. As that foundation gets stronger you can increase your expectations, expand your vision and build as high as you can imagine. Even though each step won is a small one, they eventually combine, serving as your road to the top.

Success isn't really all that complicated if you remember that Vision gives you direction, Focus determines the method, and Discipline makes it happen.

Lynn Baber is a Christian writer, recovering business consultant and retired equine professional. She shares lessons learned in thirty-five years at the business table and round pen with her clients and readers. Highly credentialed in issues of leadership, customer relations and most things equine, Lynn has a unique perspective not found elsewhere. Whether the topic is customer service or training stallions, Lynn brings years of experience to presentations and articles. Lynn is the author of two books, the latest scheduled for release next spring.