Sometimes we have certain areas of our lives that we continue to go around in circles and need guidance to embrace and experience success.

Here's a checklist for success to assist you:

Goals

We can't succeed if we don't know where we're going. Write down and read aloud every day clear, definitive goals, and make sure they are in the present tense. "I am now expanding my client base to more than 500 people that work well with me."

We need to remind ourselves every day what we are working towards and keep taking steps to make it happen.  Every step forward, no matter how small, is a victory beyond measure, to be acknowledged and celebrated a foundation for the new.

Aspire to Greatness

We can't be or do your best if we are willing to settle for less.  We've got to do what it takes to reach our goals, be willing to keep going in the face of setbacks and failures.  Never settling for mediocrity.

Education

If we have the education we need, great.  If we don't, it's something we can overcome.  Lots of people are self-educated.   We don't necessarily need a degree to succeed.

Sometimes we can you learn what we need to know by working with others, finding free teachers on YouTube, taking short courses, attending seminars and webinars. Education is not so much about the knowledge we have acquired, it’s what you do with what you know that counts.

Discipline

We've got to be disciplined to succeed; do what we need, even some small step, every day to move forward and reach our goals.  We must banish negative thoughts, focus on our inner coach, and choose to be worthy of success.  We can choose to step over the line into worthiness every day of our lives.

Health

We can't do what we need to do if we aren't healthy.  It's important to be proactive, eat whole foods when you are hungry, think positive thoughts, get regular exercise, breathe in lots of fresh air, and treat our body with love, care, and respect.  If it's difficult to stay self-motivated, we can find communities, people, and clubs to support us so we can have excellent health together.

Action

Procrastination is poison. Start now.  Don't wait to be perfect.  We can use the skills, tools, support systems, contacts, and know how that we do have to begin. We can get whatever else we need along the way. 

Persistence

We may be a good starter, but a poor finisher.   Don't give up at the first sign of defeat.  Failure dies in the face of persistence.  Never ever give up.  Call forth persistence to keep going 'after the thrill is gone'.  Choose persistence to keep going when obstacles are thrown in your way or boring tasks need to be done.

Personality

Stop being a fault finder.  It's important to listen to what we say and think.  If it's negative, stop and cultivate positivity. Be the kind of person who uplifts and encourages others, who works with others in the spirit of cooperation.  We teach what we most need to learn. Lead by example.

Decision Makers

Make decisions and stick with them.  Being indecisive leads to failure.  We must take a stand to succeed.

Marriage

If our partner doesn’t support us, it’s hard to succeed. The five or six people most important people in our lives significantly affect how we see and experience life.  We are much more likely to succeed if we have the support and encouragement of those around us.  If they are not, they do we want them in our lives?  If they are family, do you need to minimize our contact with them, especially if they are really draining our energy?

Cautious

Be discerning.  Have clear boundaries.  It's important to protect ourselves from fear-based manipulation.  Take chances; that's what successful people do. There are no guarantees in life, so embrace uncertainty.  The only thing that's certain is that everything changes.  Being overly cautious does not support our success.

Business Associates

Choose employers or partners who are inspirational, intelligent, and successful. It's important to surround ourselves with people worth emulating.

Open Mindedness

Keep an open mind.  Unafraid.  Never stop learning and growing. Be tolerant of others.  Don't judge a book by its cover; be open to who people are inside.  Be open to new ideas and new solutions.  Notice when you think you're right and someone else is wrong; it's impossible to learn, grow and be successful when we think you have all the answers.  Choose to be genuinely curious.

Vocation

It's important to love what we do. Settling for something is no guarantee that it will provide us with the safety and security we desire.

Spending

Set money aside every week, financial reserves. Avoid indiscriminate spending. This helps us to be courageous in business and life. 

Enthusiasm

We need to be authentically enthusiastic to be convincing, to get others on board with the products or services we offer. Real enthusiasm is contagious.

Cooperation

Cooperate with others. Build bridges.  Find solutions whenever and wherever possible.

Honesty

Sometimes, we must withhold information or tell a white lie to cause no harm. But most of the time, there is no substitute for honesty. As a general rule, be honest and forthright with kindness and consideration.

Egotism & Vanity

Being egoic and vain are fatal success.  Have a self-centered moment?  Notice it and move back into generosity of spirit.  It's about being and doing our best.  It's important to review our conduct daily and make new choices that support the kind of person we are choosing to be, the kind of person others are drawn to; the kind of person others want to be around; the kind of person that inspires the trust of others.

Homework

It's important to do our homework.  It doesn't pay to guess. Knowing the details and big picture of our business or project and staying away from snap judgments are keys to success.  We can be an informed decision-maker who follows their intuition and heart.

Engaging With Your Checklist for Success

No one is perfect.  We all have strengths and weaknesses.  This list is an ideal tool to ponder where we are now and where we'd like to be 6 months from now.

If we take 10 minutes at end of your day and review how we've gone, the magic begins to happen. We notice where we went well and where we could have done better. We can picture the ideal of how we could handle that situation, project, or interaction differently next time, and feel the difference. 

Rapid progress is possible when we engage in honest self-reflection, with a desire to know the truth and to improve and grow.  As we self-reflect, it's important not to judge ourselves. That keeps us going around in circles and makes us wrong. This is not about right or wrong. This is about knowing that mistakes are opportunities to learn and grow; that we can turn any disaster into a blessing, and even if things went great, there is always a better way, there is always room for learning and growth.  

Reflection is not a chore, it's an opportunity, a blessing we have in our lives.  As we acknowledge what's working and what's not, we can allow change to move through us.  What we judge we become, so we're choosing to focus on the positive. When we focus on the ideal or new ways of doing things; we magnetically attract that to ourselves. 

It's also important to be grateful for the learning and growth, and to accept how we are and what we are choosing to become. Feeling grateful for our realizations and accepting who and how we are right now is vital to our ongoing growth success. 

And, we don't have to do this alone. We can work with an accountability buddy that we know and trust. We can work with a coach that can partner with us, champion us and help to ensure our initial and ongoing success.

Good luck and keep going with upcast eyes and irrepressible enthusiasm. 

Successful people are persistent.  It's a vital key to your success!  Persistence is about having the tenacity and self-determination to keep going after the initial thrill is gone.

I have a friend, an amazing artist, and he is the master of starting projects; and he has a studio filled with paintings that have been calling to him to finish for years.  Being excited and enthusiastic is only just the beginning. Most people give up at the first sign of opposition or misfortune. 

"I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games.

Twenty-six times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed."

Michael Jordan

"Success is stumbling from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm." 

Winston Churchill

Every failure is the seed of an equivalent success.  Defeat is only a temporary experience.   It's up to you to adjust your attitude and carry on, even in face of opposition or adversity.  No one is going to do it for you!

Persistence is a state of being. This is hopeful.  It means that if you aren't persistent, if you procrastinate and let things slide, you can turn things around.  Being persistent is a choice that you can make in any moment. 

If it’s easier to be persistent with the help of others.  Surround yourself with at least one person who unwaveringly supports your cause, who encourages and uplifts you.  Be passionate about your goals.  Attune your mind to what you want to create. And cultivate the eight qualities of persistence:

definiteness of purpose

desire, self-reliance

definiteness of plans

accurate knowledge

cooperation

will-power

habit

Definiteness of Purpose

Clearly define exactly what you want to accomplish, by when and what you intend to give back in return. It is by giving that we receive; be ready and willing to deliver the kind of products and services that you would be grateful to receive.

Desire

Cultivate a burning desire to achieve your purpose, a motivation to succeed that impels you ever forward to action aspiring to be and do your best.

Self-Reliance

Know that you can and will carry out your plans; be decisive. Meet and overcome or circumvent any opposition that arises. Accept responsibility for your mistakes and for the mistakes of those who work for you. If unfavorable circumstances arise, rise above them. Do what needs to be done. Avoid shortcuts that involve trying to get something for nothing.

Definiteness of Plans

Have definite, organized, written plans. Face issues squarely as they arise. Be proactive, accountable, and decisive. Assume complete responsibility for your project or goal. Move on ideas and opportunities as they present; seize the moment.

Accurate Knowledge

Don’t rely on guessing or assumptions. Research your plans and know them to be sound. Acquire specialized knowledge or surround yourself with people who have the specialized knowledge you need to succeed.

Cooperation

Together is better.   Work with people who understand and support your goals; harmony and cooperation are key.

Will Power

Be self-determining. Focus upon the object of your desire and action needed to achieve your goal.

Habit

Be persistent. Dissolve your fear of failure or fear of success by engaging in repeated acts of courage.  Dissolve your fear of criticism by closing your mind to all negative and discouraging influences, including the negative comments and suggestions of family and friends.  Unfortunately, they can be the worst offenders. 

You may have to nod your head in all the right places or stop hanging around them so much; do what you need to do to maintain a positive can-do attitude and keep moving forward.  The more persistent you are, the more you will have faith in yourself and faith in what you are choosing to accomplish.  Faith is the antidote to failure!

Good luck and keep going with upcast eyes and irrepressible enthusiasm. 

What gets in the way of reaching achieving our goals? 

Here’s a big one that used to trip me up in my youth, being anti-something. I can remember wearing a t-shirt that said, “A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle.”  I had some pretty angry, blaming moments during my teens.

What I learned is when you focus on what you don’t want, you get more of what we don’t want.

Remember the anti-war movement in the 1960’s?  Same thing.  Being against the Vietnam War was actually putting energy into keeping it going. The protestors could have had a bigger impact sooner by being pro-peace.

What can we do? It’s simple.  Focus on and align to what you want to create. So instead of being anti-fracking, be pro-environment.  Instead of being anti-plastic, be pro-hemp.

And aligning to what you want to create, your vision and goals, is bigger than just focusing on it. Aligning to means that everything you think, feel, say and do, supports your focus and you see it as if it’s already a reality now.  That’s a big one. Everything.

How do we do that?  You probably know about writing down your vision and goals and reading them every day.  That’s a good one. Just make sure you write everything in first person, present tense.  “I am now creating a client base of 100 people who align with my vision and ideals and love working with me.”  “I am now creating a customer base of 5000 people who are buying and loving my new book, a base that is growing by 400 people each month.”

It can be really simple.

When I was a young attorney, a successful solo practitioner told me that every year he wrote down how much money he was going to make and put that figure in the top drawer of his desk so he would see it every day, and it worked.  He didn’t say so, but I saw him giving his best to his clients, being focused and fully present, setting his alignment and then putting all of himself, his heart and soul, into his work.

Here’s another idea that’s worked for me: television commercials; you visualize and feel your own.  Spend 5 or 10 minutes a day visualizing your personal, professional, and spiritual goals.   What do they look like, feel like and sound like? How do you feel?

If you can daydream and get lost in your thoughts, you have the creative juices to make your own commercials.  Be proactive about what you want.  Focus on and align to what you are choosing to create.  Keep it simple.

Peer reviews often don't work.  People feel too confronted or defensive to individually or as a team get the results intended.

Here's the problem with peer reviews:  You don't know what to say because a colleague is doing a good job; or, you don't work closely enough with them on a daily basis to have an opinion. And personally, if you are honest with yourself, what you really want to know is what your colleagues thing about you.

Maybe you have some anxieties and don't know if they are well-founded or just in your head and it's affecting your sleep, mood, attitude and quality of life.  You may wonder how valued you are as a team player, if you are goin a good job with your staff and critiquing their work or if you are seen as being too social or anti-social.

Here's what some companies and organizations are doing: They are setting aside structure time to let select groups of people get their anxieties out in the open and calling them Anxiety Parties.

I don't like the name; it's focusing on the reverse of an idea, what we don't want to create and perpetuate at work.  Can you help me to come up with something more forward sounding?  Maybe a Partnering for Success Party.

The point is, if moderated and structured properly, if participants know that they are safe and in judgment free space, Anxiety Parties can help foster a happy, enthusiastic, and productive corporate culture leading to more job satisfaction, productivity, and a better quality of life.

So, here's how to structure your Anxiety Party or Partnering for Success Party:

Gather a small group of colleagues or team members together for an hour in a quiet meeting room.

For the first 10 minutes, each person writes down their biggest anxieties on a private sheet of paper.

For the next 2 minutes, everyone ranks their anxieties, ones that worry them the most to the least.

For the next 30 minutes or so, each person shares their top anxieties to the group. 

After each sharing, everyone takes a few seconds to rank how much it troubles them: from Zero (“It never even occurred to me that this was an issue”) to Five (“I strongly believe you need to improve in this area.”)

Then everyone shares their numbers and there is a discussion on how to help that colleague resolve 5's 4's and 3's.

You may discover that most of your anxieties are baseless. Maybe you are afraid that your colleagues view you as a lone wolf instead of team player, but they really enjoy working with you and don’t mind if you are off on a project on your own for a few weeks.

Some of your anxieties may be well-founded. Maybe you are worried that you are placing too much emphasis on conferences and networking events over other priorities, and that does annoy your colleagues. Then great! The issue is on the table and you can talk about the pros and cons and come up with a new plan together.

Notice how this is not a meeting about anyone telling you what to do. It's supportive brainstorming to help you be better at what you do.  It can feel like the weight of the world has been taken off your shoulders to talk openly and honestly with your peers and work things out together.

Are these 'parties' the perfect solution for all small groups or teams? No. There must be a high level of trust and support to be open, honest and vulnerable. If your group or team feels this level of psychological safety, then it's a great stress deactivator, confidence booster and group harmonizer.  It's a great way to bond and feel part of something bigger than yourself, as together you see a clearer way forward.

And, even with the best of teams, it can be good idea to have a professional coach or trusted moderator on board to ensure that your 'party' is a team building experience.