WHAT DO YOU WANT IN LIFE? (Part 5A)

STAY FOCUSED ON YOUR CORE GENIUS

You have inside you a core genius — some one thing that you love to do and do so well that you hardly feel like charging people for it. It's effortless for you and a whole lot of fun. And if you could make money doing it, you'd make it your lifetime's work.

Successful people are able to do this by focusing on their core genius. They then delegate everything else to the people around them.

Compare that to most other people in the world who go through life doing everything, even those tasks they're bad at or that could be done more cheaply, better, and faster by someone else. They can't find the time to focus on their core genius because they fail to delegate even the most menial of tasks.

Many salespeople, for example, spend more time on account administration than they do on the phone making sales, when they could hire a part-time administrator (or share the cost with another salesperson) to do this time-consuming detail work.

Most female executives spend too much time running their household, when they could easily and inexpensively delegate this task to a cleaning service or part-time mother's helper, freeing themselves to focus on their career or spend more time with their family.

Even most entrepreneurs spend less than 30 percent of their time focusing on their core genius and unique abilities. In fact, by the time they've launched a business, it often seems

entrepreneurs are doing everything but the one thing they went into business for in the first place.

Don't let this be your fate. Identify your core genius, then delegate completely to free up more time to focus on what you love to do.

When you delegate the grunt work — the things you hate doing or those tasks that are so painful, you end up putting them off — you get to concentrate on what you love to do. You free up your time so that you can be more productive. And you get to enjoy life more.

So why is delegating routine tasks and unwanted projects so difficult for most people?

Surprisingly, most people are afraid of looking wasteful or being judged as being above everyone else. They are afraid to give up control or reluctant to spend the money to pay for help. Deep down, most people simply don't want to let go.

Others — potentially you — have simply fallen into the habit of doing everything themselves. "It's too time consuming to explain it to someone," you say. "I can do it more quickly and better myself anyway." But can you?

(these contents are extracted from article written by Jack Canfield posted in Nightingle Newsletter)

WHAT DO YOU WANT IN LIFE? (Part 4)

THE VISION EXERCISE

The following exercise is designed to help you clarify your vision and what you want to accomplish. Although you could do this as a strictly mental exercise by just thinking about the answers and then writing them down, I want to encourage you to go deeper than that. If you do, you'll get deeper answers that serve you better.

Start by putting on some relaxing music and sitting quietly in a comfortable environment where you won't be disturbed. Then, close your eyes and ask your subconscious mind to give you images of what your ideal life would look like if you could have it exactly the way you want it, in each of the following categories:

First, focus on the financial area of your dream life. What is your annual income? What does your cash flow look like? How much money do you have in savings and investments? What is your total net worth? Next ... what does your home look like? Where is it located? Does it have a view? What kind of yard and landscaping does it have? Is there a pool or a stable for horses? What color are the walls? What does the furniture look like? Are there paintings hanging in the rooms? What do they look like? Walk through your perfect house, filling in all of the details. At this point, don't worry about how you'll get that house. Don't sabotage yourself by saying, "I can't live in Malibu because I don't make enough money." Once you give your mind's eye the picture, your mind will solve the "not enough money" challenge. Next, visualize what kind of car you are driving and any other important possessions your finances have provided.

Next, visualize your ideal job or career. Where are you working? What are you doing? With whom are you working? What kind of clients or customers do you have? What is your compensation like? Is it your own business?

Then, focus on your free time, your recreation time. What are you doing with your family and friends in the free time you've created for yourself? What hobbies are you pursuing? What kinds of vacations do you take? What do you do for fun?

Next, what is your ideal vision of your body and your physical health? Are you free of all disease? How long do you live to? Are you open, relaxed, in an ecstatic state of bliss all day long? Are you full of vitality? Are you flexible as well as strong? Do you exercise, eat good food, and drink lots of water?

Then move on to your ideal vision of your relationships with your family and friends. What is your relationship with your family like? Who are your friends? What is the quality of your relationships with your friends? What do those friendships feel like? Are they loving, supportive, empowering? What kinds of things do you do together?

What about the personal arena of your life? Do you see yourself going back to school, getting training, attending workshops, seeking therapy for a past hurt, or growing spiritually? Do you meditate or go on spiritual retreats with your church? Do you want to learn to play an instrument or write your autobiography? Do you want to run a marathon or take an art class? Do you want to travel to other countries?

Finally, focus on the community you live in, the community you've chosen. What does it look like when it is operating perfectly? What kinds of community activities take place there? What about your charitable work? What do you do to help others and make a difference? How often do you participate in these activities? Who are you helping?

You can write down your answers as you go, or you can do the whole exercise first and then open your eyes and write them down. In either case, make sure you capture everything in writing as soon as you complete the exercise.

Keep your vision someplace where you can see and refer to it often, such as on your computer or bathroom mirror. Every day, review the vision you have written down. This will keep your conscious and subconscious minds focused on your vision.

Once you have your vision for what you want to accomplish in your life, the next step is figuring out how to get there. Fortunately there are as many ways to achieve the personal and financial goals identified in your vision as there are people; the difficulty is selecting the right path for you ... the one that leverages your "core genius."

(these contents are extracted from article written by Jack Canfield posted in Nightingle Newsletter)

WHAT DO YOU WANT IN LIFE? (Part 3)

HIGH ACHIEVERS HAVE BIGGER VISIONS

I want to encourage you not to limit your vision in any way. Let it be as big as it is. When I interviewed Dave Liniger, the CEO of RE/MAX, the country's largest real estate company, he told me, "Always dream big dreams. Big dreams attract big people." General Wesley Clark recently told me, "It doesn't take any more energy to create a big dream than it does to create a little one." My experience is that one of the few differences between the superachievers and the rest of the world is that the superachievers simply dream bigger. John F. Kennedy dreamed of putting a man on the moon. Martin Luther King Jr. dreamed of a country free of prejudice and injustice. Bill Gates dreams of a world in which every home has a computer that is connected to the Internet. Buckminster Fuller dreamed of a world where everybody had access to electrical power.

These high achievers see the world from a whole different perspective — as a place where amazing things can happen, where billions of lives can be improved, where new technology can change the way we live, and where the world's resources can be leveraged for the greatest possible mutual gain. They believe anything is possible, and they believe they have an integral part in creating it.

When Mark Victor Hansen and I first published Chicken Soup for the Soul®, what we called our "20/20 vision" was also a big one — to sell 1 billion Chicken Soup books and to raise $500 million for charity through tithing a portion of all of our profits by the year 2020. We were and are very clear about what we want to accomplish.

(these contents are extracted from article written by Jack Canfield posted in Nightingle Newsletter)