Get Motivated and Understand How You Can Become A Real Success in All Areas of Your Life
By Andrea Hall
Copyright October 2014
All rights reserved
Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chapter 1
It All Starts within You! Know Yourself then Find Success
Chapter 2
Real Knowledge Wisdom and Understanding is the Way to success
Chapter 3
What is it that you Truly Desire in your Life?
Chapter 4
Time and how we use it is Crucial to who we are to Become
Chapter 5
How to Become a Success and begin to feel Successful in all areas of your life?
Chapter 6
You can make all your Dreams begin to come true; it all starts with True Belief within
Chapter 7
Change the way you think and Start to Succeed!
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank my Heavenly Father Almighty God for giving me the wisdom, knowledge and understanding in order to discuss and consider at length this significant and meaningful concept.
I thank all members of my family including my parents, two children and loved ones for helping me to learn the lessons I needed to learn, in order to write this piece of work.
I certainly don’t believe I have found all the answers to everything and I never expect that I ever will, whilst I live in this physical world; however, I have come to know some things that I believe to be valid and worthy of some thought and consideration.
I also believe that I still have many more lessons to learn, as I continue my life journey. I believe I have come to learn what seems to have worked for me, in my experience of trying to find success in my life.
I only hope that by sharing my thoughts and views on this subject I can help inspire others to achieve real success in life. This success being knowledge, light, encouragement, inspiration and peace into the lives of others.
Introduction
It’s my view that life in this world or whatever we choose to call it, is simply time; we have this ‘life’ or this time, where we experience less than a few, a few or many days, weeks, months and years. One thing we will never know for sure is, how long that life or time will come to last.
We know for certain that we can never get the previous day back or extend the time we have been granted, no matter how much we may or may not desire it.
I personally believe we have been given this time for some reason. A collection of seconds, minutes, hours, days and years if we live long enough.
All this time we have been given to find our own individual way; it’s all rolled into one bundle; the measurement and length we have been allocated is different of course, as we are all unique. This bundle of days, this collection of time we come to label as ‘life’.
However, how do we come to know or realise how we should use that time? How do we learn how to become the person we are meant to be and do the things we feel we are supposed to do?
What is it that we truly want to do, in this experience in which we call ‘life’? What is it truly all about? What is it that we are truly searching for? Or are we simply trying to survive and receive our daily necessities?
Are we searching to find success, knowledge or happiness; or do we simply want to discover how to do the things we have always wanted to do?
How do we learn how to achieve the things we want to do and become the person we want to be or are truly meant to be? Where do we learn the knowledge that will show us the way to make the very best of our lives in the time we have been given?
How do we make the best use of our limited time whilst we journey through this temporary world? I would imagine that most of us would like to look back on our lives and feel that we have lived it to the fullest, accomplishing all the things we would have ever hoped to do.
Basically how do we discover the best way to make the best use of our time whilst we experience this physical journey? How can anyone tell us or teach us the way to fulfil our life purpose or even discover what that purpose is?
There are so many things that we may wonder about in relation to this concept. In the past I expect that I have on several occasions, even considered these questions myself.
The number of questions that we can ask ourselves in relation to who we are meant to be and what we can really achieve is somewhat limitless.
I imagine that most of us always want to do our very best in life and whatever we are doing, we believe there must be ways in which we can always do it even better. We need to feel like we have done our very best. I can’t imagine that anyone sets out to become or feel like a ‘failure’.
The difficult thing can be knowing how to go about achieving the things we would like to do and experience in our lives. We may have no clue as to what route to take; we may have no idea how to really make things work, or know how to get all that we hope to do done.
Some of us will always feel like we haven’t achieved enough no matter what we do, whilst others will feel perfectly happy with their accomplishments, even if those accomplishments have not been very many.
Some of us will push that little bit extra to achieve that little bit more, whilst others will be perfectly satisfied with their lives regardless of what they have managed to achieve and make of their life. Some of us will always be unsatisfied no matter what we manage to do, always believing we could do a lot more.
I guess it’s all to do with our individual mind-sets and what we truly believe we are capable of, what we want, or what we expect to gain out of life. We are all totally different so it’s only natural that some of us will be more ambitious than others, if even just slightly.
I also believe that some of us are just more naturally satisfied with who we are and what we have and don’t desire much more than that. Ambition is just not a feature in everyone’s character, composition and vocabulary.
I imagine that one’s mind-set will be influenced to some extent by the social environment and the expectations that are prevalent in any given society or community.
I do wonder why some may begin to feel that they have done well in their lives whilst others are yet to feel that same way about themselves, regardless of what they may have actually achieved.
Why is it that some people have the confidence, the drive and the power to achieve whatever they want to, whilst others lack any real motivation or inspiration to achieve anything at all?
Perhaps some of us have more natural vision than others and have an inbuilt forward thinking ability to know what it takes to get things done.
Perhaps some of us have more ideas floating around; others may have a more fixed or extendable imagination.
What essentially makes us all so different when it comes to being able to achieve and find out what we truly want?
It’s clear that some of us have a clear vision of our goals and aspirations for our lives from a very early age, but I would imagine that most people haven’t got a real clue about what they want to do and who they want to be until much later in life.
Yes we are all individuals and we are all distinct from each other in our own way, but what makes some people have the ability to aspire to be who they want to be and others to remain clueless in regards to what they want out of life?
Where does this vision, drive and ambition or lack of it, come from?
Maybe we all develop at our own pace, some quicker than others. Or perhaps it’s a result of our upbringing and early development in relation to our initial social environments.
Perhaps it all stems from the ‘term’ success and the connotation that we have come to associate with the word success from an early age?
I can imagine that there has also been people who had never heard of the word success, but would know how to make what they would consider to be a success of their lives regardless.
We are taught the word ‘success’ from an early age and that our time should be used to make a ‘success’ of our lives, but who decides what real ‘success’ actually means. Success and having a successful life will have a different meaning to different people.
Some may consider that having a happy fulfilling life means that one has secured a successful life. Somebody else may feel that just being financially secure, would illustrate that one is a successful person, with a successful life.
I guess it depends upon how one views the meaning of success and the purpose of their own life; or success could mean anything depending upon how you view the real meaning of life itself.
Doesn’t having a successful life all depend upon the actual real meaning and purpose of our lives beyond this temporary world? I guess that all depends upon our beliefs in regards to life after this world.
If we do believe there is life or an existence after this, then we should try to make our limited time here, have an even more significant meaning.
Perhaps we will find out exactly how successful our lives were in regards to the ‘bigger picture’ once our time is up and we finally leave this world.
If we fail to discover why we came to exist in the first place, how can our lives in the here and now, ever be considered as having been truly successful?
I’m guessing that the majority of people may think of the term success in relation to what is achieved in this world here and now; they may not necessarily think of the term success in relation to thinking about life beyond that.
If one believes that the purpose of life is to have a lot of money and assets then once one has attained this, then one may feel they have reached some level of success.
They may still want to strive to have even more, in order to feel more secure and to keep up with their peers, but they may feel they have achieved some of their initial goals.
Another person may feel that if they have a happy family life and they are generally satisfied, then they may also feel they have attained some level of success; a successful personal life.
Eventually when we become adults and enter the real world, we come to know what we believe the term ‘success’ generally means, in everyday terms.
We come to feel what it means to be in control of our lives. Depending upon our aims and aspirations, we may begin to see what works for us and what doesn’t work.
We learn what makes us feel successful and what makes us feel like a failure.
It may depend upon what society you live in, but I’m guessing that the majority of people in the modern world, would want to have what one would call a ‘successful life’.
We want to be the best that we can be and achieve all that we can, in all areas of our lives. We want to be able to provide the best for ourselves and our families or for those we care about.
Perhaps having a successful life or simply having what you want, means different things to different people.
Everything we feel and think depends upon how we view the world and ourselves within it.
How we feel, will usually determine what we believe we want in our lives and what we want our lives to be.
Each individual will value themselves and their lives as a whole, according to their perception of the meaning of life itself.
However, what does it truly mean to make a success of one’s life and how do we even know where to begin going about it? In what areas of our lives would we like to feel we have achieved success?
Who has all the answers to tell us how we can aspire to be all we want to be? Who can give us the explanations to tell us what we need to hear and what we need to do, so that we can achieve all that we want to achieve?
We are all socially conditioned from our early youth to believe that we need to achieve and become the best that we can be.
We need to be the best student, best friend, best parent, best partner, best lover, best worker and best entrepreneur. The list goes on and on.
We also desire to find satisfaction in our lives, in our jobs, in our friendships and in our relationships. We want to feel we are well grounded mentally, physically, spiritually and emotionally.
We desire good health and happiness. We also want to live comfortably and have our daily necessities fulfilled.
The question is how do we find the way to fulfilment in all these different areas in our lives? If we look around, there are so many self-help books telling us how to find love, find happiness, find yourself, find the perfect partner, have the perfect relationship, perfect family and be a good parent.
There are endless books detailing how to make money, run a successful business, and make a million bucks before you reach thirty!
I read these books myself at one point, whilst I searched for the answers to find happiness and fulfilment in my own life.
I may have wanted to do better in the world of work or do better in my personal life. I guess like a lot of people I felt a sense of urgency, like something was missing and lacking in my life.
I just didn’t really know what it was, or how to fill that feeling of emptiness. I didn’t really know what I was looking for. I just felt there had to be something more to life, something better.
I just had a desperate feeling of knowing I wanted to achieve more in my life and I wanted to feel secure and fulfilled within. I wanted to fill the inner void I felt.
I read many books some very detailed with instructions on how to achieve the best academically, how to beat the competition at work, how to make endless money online, and how to have the most perfect loving relationship.
I would search and search to find the answers to these questions; I wanted to know the answers on how to achieve and get what I wanted and be successful and happy like other people appeared to be.
At times I even found step by step instructions on how to achieve all these things by setting personal goals and following specific steps on a daily basis.
Sometimes I would come across endless jargon that I really couldn’t understand or make any sense of, but I enjoyed reading it all nevertheless, as I enjoyed considering and discussing such topics.
I thoroughly enjoyed the time I spent evaluating these concepts and theories, as I like to think and see how others have managed to find their own answers. Answers which obviously made real sense to them.
These people may have found ways of finding their own personal fulfilment and discovered methods to solutions which helped to make things work out for them.
Although I did enjoy considering many useful ideas, I do believe that feeling successful in life and finding true fulfilment goes a lot deeper than reading a few tips and following somebody else’s step by step instructions.
A life strategy that may work for one person, may not necessarily work for somebody else, so you always have to be realistic regarding the results you may achieve personally in your own life.
You have to take all points into consideration and then apply the useful aspects of it, to your own situation when trying to make the advice work for you.
I would usually find that I may read these tips, try to make sense of them and then try to apply them to my own life, but after a few days I would literally forget it all.
These theories and all the advice probably never made any real difference to my life, because it made no real difference to my way of thinking.
It’s my view, that if something doesn’t begin to change the way you think and see all things, then I don’t see how it can really begin to change your life in a significant way.
I believe that in order to make a lasting change with anything and make real sense of anything, you need to make real changes in your life and this starts by changing the way you think.
I believe that changing the way you do things and approach things may not always bring about lasting change.
The way you make real and lasting life changes is by changing your mind-set. You need to change the way you think about all things including how you think about yourself.
I believe that finding fulfilment in life starts by realising who you are and what you want from within.
You need to change how you think and feel within and then naturally the way you think and feel about the world on the outside will change also.
I personally believe that ‘success’ comes from knowing who you are, what you want to get out of your life experience and knowing what you are truly capable of.
I believe that wisdom, knowledge and understanding of who you are on the inside needs to occur, before you can find true happiness and success in your life experienced in this world on the outside.
The real success comes by knowing who you truly are by having been blessed with wisdom, knowledge and understanding. This will be discussed further in later chapters.
The real success is coming to realise that your life does have a purpose and meaning beyond this physical world.
When you come to recognise this, then you will come to acknowledge what real meaningful success in your life actually means.
If you have no understanding as to who you truly are on the inside, how can you make a success of your life experience in this world on the outside?
You need to find this wisdom, knowledge and understanding within, before you can make sense of your life and find real satisfaction in your life in this world.
You need to discover yourself first, so you can really live your life to the fullest and be the best individual you are meant to aspire to be.
It isn’t all just about material success, but real happiness which comes about once you have real understanding of what your life as a unique and special individual truly means. Once you begin to visualise your true purpose in life, then you will begin to feel more at ease.
Success for me is more about knowing who you are and knowing what you want. This I believe occurs once you wake up to the truth to realise who you truly are on the inside and what you are truly capable of.
I believe that success isn’t just about achieving financial aspirations but it’s about finding the strength and seeing the ability within oneself to achieve anything one truly desires, according to one’s true life purpose.
Once you realise you have all the ability within, to achieve everything you are meant to achieve, then you will find peace and satisfaction.
You will come to see the possibilities of what you can achieve in life can be endless, as you have been gifted the power from within.
I believe that each person will find success and satisfaction in life, once one comes to realise who they truly are and discover their own unique purpose and individual talent.
I believe that once you find out who you are, what you are capable of and what it takes to make you feel fulfilled, then you will come to know that real success comes about through finding satisfaction and acceptance of your particular life experience.
Acceptance of yourself for who you really are is the key to a meaningful life experience.
Once you feel satisfied with your life and who you are meant to be, you will feel as though you have found and attained your success, because you will see that your purpose and experience is unique to you, in comparison to the life and life experience of somebody else.
Once you wake up to the truth of who you are as a person on the inside, then you will see that real success is not just found in the material things in the world, but found once you know the depth of knowledge that is found when we begin to look within.
You will discover that you have all the skills within, to do all that you ever wanted to do.
I believe that we have all been given the tools to achieve what we want, but we need to come to realise that we have to find those tools within and once we find them we have to use them.
All the hard work starts with you. You need to discover you, in order to find the skills you need to truly be you. That is the way to success to first learn to appreciate who you are and the talents that you have already been given.
You need to view success in terms of what your whole life in its totality will eventually come to mean beyond this physical world, when your time here comes to an end.
In other words did one achieve one’s true purpose in life? Did one do the best that one could do to discover and fulfil that purpose and find the real meaning of their life?
I think that is the real question by which we can evaluate if our lives have been successful.
How can one’s life have been truly successful if one leaves this world having accumulated a lot financially and materially, but then fails to ever realise why one was created and given this life in the first place?!
The thing you need to remember is that you need to start by working on yourself, in order to find true success in this life.
I believe that for those of us who believe there is more life to come, we may begin to value our lives according to how we have used this life, to prepare us for the next.
You have to find your true purpose in life. Once you discover your true purpose in life and fulfil that purpose, then you will come to feel success, as you will feel that you have achieved what you were truly created to do.
I do believe we should always aspire to be the best we can be and do the best we can do, in all areas of our lives whilst we have that time.
We should make the time to research and learn that which will give us the best chance of obtaining useful knowledge.
Useful knowledge will enrich our minds further and add to our understanding of many concepts. We should use our time to continue to search for the truth within ourselves.
The more we learn of ourselves, the more we allow ourselves to make better use of our lives.
You and only you, can take the steps that are required for you to discover the success that you truly are.
Already, deep within yourself, your true self is waiting. The success that you have always desired to achieve is readily available to you.
All you need to do is wake up to who you really are and discover your true potential. When you make the true discovery of who you are within, you must embrace it! Once you embrace it you will be on your way to the true and ultimate success.
‘I can’t do it for you, only you can do it for yourself’!
Chapter 1
It all starts within you! Know Yourself then Find Success
Everything and anything you want to do and want to be, begins with you. Before you can actually succeed at anything and become who you believe you would like to be, you need to start by finding out who you really are.
Nobody other person in this world knows you, like the way you know yourself. Nobody can stop you from achieving anything that you’re meant to achieve.
You already have all the skills ready and available to achieve anything that you seriously believe you want to.
It’s all about discovering those skills and once those skills are discovered, it’s then about developing and having the confidence and belief to use them.
As well as discovering your skills it’s also about finding out what makes you ‘tick’! What do you enjoy doing? What makes you feel alive and self-motivated?
You need to discover who you are on the inside as well as who you are on the outside. You need to look into yourself and discover what is it about yourself that you really like; find out what you are good at and not so good at.
Basically you need to discover the things that are unique and special to you. You need to see what makes you slightly different in comparison to somebody else.
I believe we have all been gifted with a specific talent; some of us may have even been blessed with more than one talent.
The key is we need to discover what we are good at. If we are good at something then it’s more likely that we may become successful at it. I genuinely believe that every person has a particular skill or talent in some area.
The way to achieving our best is to find out what it is, that we are particularly good at and begin to utilise this skill.
Some people are good at speaking, writing, or focusing on completing a particular task. Others may be more artistic and may be good at art, design, photography, music, drama or sport.
There may be a number of things that we may be good at. Most people are usually talented in a number of areas, whether that be socially, physically or academically.
I believe that every individual has the potential to aspire to achieve. I believe it starts by us finding out what talents we have and then finding the time to invest in those talents and abilities.
Anybody can perform a job role to make ends meet and pay the bills. When it comes to finding long term satisfaction and success, it’s really all about finding the role or life skills that appeal to one’s personal line of interest.
It is difficult to succeed in any area of one’s life if an activity or experience does not stimulate ones heart and mind. Eventually dissatisfaction and boredom will begin to set in.
Once one begins to feel dissatisfaction, it is difficult to find any interest and re motivation. Eventually we will feel inadequate and frustrated. This frustration and resentment leads to dissatisfaction and misery.
That’s what happens in any area of our lives when we fail to see and recognise what we really want and what we already have.
Quite often we may see a potential job, potential partner, potential business venture, potential college course and we decide to go for it without much investigation.
We may look into the basic features and characteristics of a potential opportunity, but we may fail to realise and ensure that this change in our life, is particularly suited to us.
When we desire things without fully knowing whether that something is really suitable for us, we may end up disheartened and financially, mentally and emotionally lacking.
When we embrace something that is unsuited to who we are, we may find that this can lead to negativity in our lives.
This negativity can distract us mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually and makes it even harder for us to discover who we really are and what we truly want from our lives.
When we have a collection of unsuitable distractions in our lives that are clearly unfit for who we are personally, we will eventually come to realise that these useless things are not helping us to aspire to our full potential, but are in fact holding us back by consuming the majority of our daily thoughts, time and energy.
But “hey” let’s get back to the positive! I believe that as well as discovering one’s skills, success is also about having real focus.
We have so many things that distract us in our lives on a daily basis, that prevent us from focusing and taking steps towards achieving the things we really want to aspire towards in our lives.
Finding success in any area of our lives is more likely to happen once we truly come to know ourselves and respect and live by our core values.
Once we know ourselves intimately, then we can begin to see what it is that we truly desire in our lives in order to feel complete.
We can begin to see what it is, that we truly desire in our hearts and begin to find real satisfaction in our lives and true happiness.
True happiness for me comes from the satisfaction of knowing that I am doing the very best that I can, to be the best person that I can be, by making real use of the limited time that I have whilst I live in this world.
I feel satisfaction from knowing that I am using the life skills that I have been blessed with, to do what I believe to be significant and worthwhile.
Happiness for me is knowing and believing that there is better to come. I believe that happiness is found when we begin to look beyond the things of this physical world.
This belief gives me my peace of mind and the inspiration to do the best that I can during the remainder of my life experience.
It’s always good to believe and be open to the idea of finding better, regardless of your other personal beliefs. It’s always beneficial to maintain a positive outlook on life and our personal circumstances.
In regards to what makes another person happy, this may be different to what makes you happy.
It’s always good to remember that nobody in this world can tell you, what it takes to make you happy, because only you know what it is that you truly desire to accomplish.
Nobody else in this world can tell you what is right for you.
Others can only peep in and speculate and guess, but no other individual in this world, really knows how you feel in your heart and mind. What is right for you, is for you to decide.
It’s up to you, to live your life in respect for you. You need to decide to maintain honour, dignity and respect of yourself. You need to do the best for yourself by seeking to become and achieve your best.
In other words you need to begin to value and respect your life by choosing to live the best life experience that you believe you are meant to have. It’s up to you to make the most of yourself and your life experience.
You have been granted a heart and a mind of your own, so that you can think for yourself and make decisions for yourself.
You need to open your own heart and mind to discover your true inner self and talents, in order to begin to find your true path which will one day bring you to the point of peace and fulfilment that you desire in your life.
Nobody in this world is responsible for your thoughts, mind and life decisions. Nobody else can make your life choices for you, as nobody else knows the real you better than you will one day, come to know yourself.
No other person can dictate our steps. The choice is ours. It is for us to take control over our lives. We must choose to begin to live! That is the first step.
When we are young it is acceptable that our parents or guardians make those decisions for us, however once we reach maturity and are mentally capable of making our own decisions, we should be making the best decisions in order to achieve our best.
I think that if we look at those who claim to have made a ‘success’ of their lives or those who confess to be genuinely happy, we can see that these people are the ones who have always been committed and focused towards making life changing decisions.
Successful people make decisions, remain focused and motivated and do not become distracted away from their goals.
I believe that once you have begun to use your heart and mind to figure out who you truly are within and you combine your findings with the attributes of talent, focus, motivation and determination, you can go to achieve real success.
If you know who you are and what you want but lack focus, motivation and determination, then it may mean that you continue to under achieve, as you are yet to find the staying power needed to commit to completing a challenge.
You need to remain focused to begin to fulfil your life aspirations once you believe that you have discovered and realised your full potential.
I genuinely believe that everyone has a purpose in life and it’s only once you discover yourself and see the talents that you have been given, that you will begin to realise that your life purpose is to use those talents to better yourself as an individual.
You may have discovered what you enjoy and what makes you feel fulfilled; but if you settle for achieving other things opposed to what you really feel on a deeper level that you have been called to do, then you will always feel that you are in the wrong field.
You will continue to feel that the object of desire that will provide real substance and fulfilment in your life is still missing.
Having real focus and staying power, seems to be the distinguishing factor, between those who have achieved what they have set out to do and those who haven’t achieved their life aspirations.
I believe focus and determination are characteristics that differentiate people and their achievements. The more one is able to focus and remain motivated regardless of length of time and input the more one is likely to achieve.
I believe that focus is a real factor that makes some more committed to fulfilling their hopes dreams and aspirations in comparison to others. It can make all the difference between those who begin to change their lives and those who do not.
I believe that having the ability to focus on a particular task and being able to commit to it fully without losing interest and becoming distracted is so important.
Having focus and being able to see something through can make all the difference between being able to get things done and giving up at the first hurdle.
I have personally lost count of the number of times in the past, that I have started something and have then become distracted by the events and challenges going on around me in my life.
There have on several occasions been times when I have found new opportunities; whether it be a new job, college course or some new venture. I spent time and money to allow myself to engage in the process.
I have then found myself unable to complete the task at hand, because I have let my mind wander and get distracted by other things going on in my life.
Of course there have also been numerous occasions when I have managed to see my personal goals through. I would say that the differentiating factor on both these occasions was my ability at the time to focus.
Did I remain focused or did I let life’s challenges and upheavals stop me from achieving the things I knew I wanted to do? It’s all about knowing how to apply yourself and keep yourself focused until you complete the task and reach your goal.
As well as major distractions in our lives, there are also the small distractions that take up our time and prevent us from achieving what we really want.
It’s not always problems that distract our attention, quite often it can be tedious things that waste our time, like endless leisurely pursuits and social distractions which consume our time and attention.
Yes we all need some time to wind down and chill out and do the things we enjoy. However, if these little distractions take up so much of our thoughts and our time, how can we ever find the time to really focus and commit to fulfilling our long term goals?
If we insist on spending all of our free time watching TV, playing video games and messaging on our phones, then how can we ever find the time to make significant changes in our lives and achieve the things we really believe we want to do?
That spare time could be better spent investigating ourselves and finding out what we are really all about and what we are actually good at. And what it is that we really hope to do.
If we never take the time out to invest time in ourselves as individuals, by giving ourselves time to ponder and think, how can we ever change ourselves or anything of significance in our lives?
For this reason we will most likely find ourselves in the same position year in year out; always struggling and trying to find a quick way out of our current situation. Always wanting better for ourselves and our families but never taking the time out to really make a difference.
As a result of this we complain and moan and believe that we are worth more than our current disposition. However, if we think about it, who can we really blame if we never take the opportunity to really discover our own minds, our true potential and what brilliant stuff we are actually made of?
Therefore recognising who we are and what skills we possess is important, but also focusing and being committed to life changing goals is important if we really want to change ourselves and change our lives for the better.
I have to stress that as well as finding your own skills, you have to find the ability to focus on your goals. To be able and willing to complete both short term and long term goals is important if we desire to see change.
If you cannot commit to completing your short term goals, how can you expect to commit to long term goals which require more time and effort? In other words, how can you expect to see any change in the long term, if you are not willing to put in the effort to achieve small changes?
More importantly, how can one expect to achieve success in any area of their life, if they cannot even commit and focus towards making minor positive changes?
I believe that once you have been focused and determined to achieve your best using the talents that you have been given, you can feel some satisfaction with your life.
Just knowing that you have tried to do something worthwhile with your time, regardless of the outcome can give one the inspiration to go on to achieve more.
If we want to achieve success we must do something instead of doing nothing. Doing nothing never will and never can, get anyone anywhere!
No matter what we achieve in life, the satisfaction comes from knowing that you tried your best to do better. You will feel better knowing that you tried to do something that you believe you always wanted to do. So it’s also important to discover our talents and it’s always good to try to use those talents to the best of our ability.
I think that when we fail to discover our skills by failing to recognise our unique talents, we often settle to do other things.
When we settle for other things that we don’t really want, we will continue to be unfocussed and unmotivated.
If this continues long enough, eventually we may begin to feel resentment within and towards our own selves. If we fail to focus and achieve our goals, we may begin to feel like a failure and resort to giving up on our hopes and dreams.
Therefore to avoid this type of false mind set and negative view of ourselves and our lives, it is important that we find ways to do what we enjoy doing; things which we are naturally good at and then our motivation and determination will come naturally.
The fact is, we can achieve anything when we come to know ourselves on a deeper spiritual level.
When we remember our Creator, the Divine Source of all our talent and inspiration, then we will be blessed with the ability to create and the staying power to see our goals through until the end.
When we recognise our personal talents and commit ourselves fully to our goals with the help of God, we will find the confidence to pursue all of our opportunities.
If we use the abilities that we have been given to do our very best in the different areas of our lives, we can feel success.
Our success and happiness in life comes from knowing that we have done our very best to do God’s Will by bettering our own lives and the lives of others, using the knowledge, wisdom, understanding, unique skills and talents that we have been given.
No matter what we achieve, I believe the satisfaction comes from knowing that we have motivated and applied ourselves fully towards completing something worthwhile.
Anyone can feel success; success in everyday terms, comes from knowing that you have worked hard to achieve whatever it is that you have set out to do. It’s about achieving what you believe in your soul that you are meant to do.
I don’t believe real success is about material acquisition, I believe success comes when you realise that you are using your talents and abilities within, to contribute positively to the world, the lives of others and also trying to do better to elevate yourself.
Every single individual is good at something. I cannot believe that there is somebody that is no good at anything. We are all able to help ourselves and others in some way, no matter how big or small that help may be.
I believe that there is no such thing as failure in terms of everyday life. The only failure we may ‘feel’ is when we fail to even attempt to try to make a real difference to improve ourselves and our lives.
I repeat there is no such thing as failure, the only failure we may ‘feel’ is when we fail to try to elevate and uplift ourselves.
Therefore we must try our best to do something good in our lives, to help others no matter how irrelevant or insignificant we believe that something to be.
I personally view life in terms of the ‘bigger picture’ so it’s my view that the only regret we may feel is if we come to the very end of our lives and realise that we have no knowledge of who we truly are, or if we have not used our time and unique talents to help elevate ourselves and other people.
There is surely a lot more to add to this list that I am yet to discover; I still believe I also have a whole lot more to learn about all things, as I continue with my own journey.
Somebody once said to me ‘If you want to achieve something, don’t ever doubt yourself; just think of what you have managed to achieve so far’.
I think this is an invaluable way of thinking. Surely all of us have managed to achieve at least one thing in our lives, no matter how unimportant or insignificant we may believe that something to be.
Some people may believe that their life has no obvious purpose. They may simply believe that one lives, then dies, end of.
Well I don’t believe in that way of thinking. I genuinely believe that every single human life in this world has a purpose, no matter who one is, or who one thinks oneself to be.
Everyone has the opportunity to find success and find meaning in their lives, according to whatever success or a meaningful life, personally means to them.
I don’t believe you need to achieve anything specific physically, to feel happy and satisfied with your life, but I believe one needs to feel that they have done their very best to fulfil the purpose they believe their life has, by finding out who they really are on a spiritual level and by becoming the best person they can possibly be.
The key is to realise that you have a real heart and mind within that needs to be opened, in order to find out who you truly are.
You need to see who you are with your heart and your mind and come to discover the skills and talents that you have been blessed with, that are unique to you.
Understanding the real you within is the first step to understanding how to make a success of your life, according to what you personally believe you are meant to do with the life that you have been given.
Once you know yourself, you will come to develop a real understanding of what makes you special, totally unique and fully capable of high achievement. You need to realise the unique talents and abilities you have been given.
You will eventually see that using those talents and becoming the person you are meant to be, is the way to the success and satisfaction in the different areas of your life that you desire.
Understanding and knowing yourself within, is the first real step to understanding and achieving anything of real significance.
The success that one may feel by the acquisition of financial or material wealth, does not compare to the feeling when one makes a discovery of the real beauty of who they truly are within.
I personally believe that we are all children of the True Living God. When we come to know and receive Jesus Christ as our Lord and Saviour and realise this, we will come to realise our full potential by the power of Jesus Christ which lives within us.
When you come to recognise the potential you have to do something worthy with your life, depending upon what ‘worthy’ means to you, you can begin to work towards doing worthwhile works during your life.
When we come to achieve the things in life, we believe to be worthwhile, then we begin to see and understand the real meaning of true success.
Chapter 2
Real Knowledge Wisdom and Understanding is the Way to Success
I have often heard the saying that knowledge is power. I personally believe that useful knowledge is even more powerful and useful to one’s wellbeing and peace of mind.
Knowledge that helps you to grow, progress and understand your life purpose is definitely useful knowledge. The key is coming to know where to begin looking for that knowledge by first knowing where to find it. Finding true and beneficial knowledge is essential.
We can spend our whole lives researching this or that; learning all types of information and indulge in all types of theoretical discussion.
However, if we lack the knowledge which enables us to understand and know our own selves, then how can we ever expect to benefit from anything else that we learn and really progress in the way we would hope to?
We can spend our whole lives doing all types of research; it could be general, scientific, philosophical, religious, physical, or academic.
Some of us simply research for entertainment purposes, to learn something new, check out the latest celebrity news and gossip or to simply pass the time.
There is so much knowledge about so many things literally available at our fingertips. We can spend our time obtaining the knowledge of TV soaps, watching DVDS, movies or playing the latest games.
There is a wealth of knowledge that we can obtain from the comfort of our own homes about any subject, via the latest technologies. All we need is a pc and modem, a laptop or smartphone to enquire about anything that we want to.
The information we find may not always be correct, as we can’t always rely on the validity of the source, but we have the option to at least take a look, if need be. As well as the latest technology we also have traditional sources of information.
I believe that a good education and knowledge in association with many areas can be useful, as it is always good to have a lot of general knowledge about many things.
There is nothing wrong with being well informed and being aware of the things which go on around us, in the world in which we live.
However, I do believe that there are some types of knowledge that are more essential to our wellbeing and understanding, in comparison to just general knowledge.
I believe the most useful type of knowledge is the spiritual sort and by spiritual I believe we should try to come to understand the spiritual aspect of our own selves within.
I personally believe myself to be a spiritual person, in that I believe and always view my existence beyond what I can physically see.
According to the Scriptures of the Holy Bible, we are told that man is made up of components including the spirit and the soul, as well as the outside fleshy part such as the physical body.
I believe that by coming to recognise ourselves within, in the spiritual sense, then we can come to know who we truly are.
I believe the way how we discover who we truly are is by coming to know the Truth who is Jesus Christ.
By opening our hearts to him and having a personal relationship with him, through prayer, we can come to know ourselves in a true sense.
I believe that once we open our hearts and minds to Jesus then his love will come to abide within us and give us the guidance that we need. Once the love of Jesus comes to abide within we will find clarity within ourselves and really begin to see who we are on the inside.
Once we have clarity in regards to who we really are within, we will have a better understanding of how to make sense of our lives on the outside, by making better use of our time.
Once we are one with Jesus and the power of Jesus comes to work through us, then we will begin to find knowledge, wisdom and understanding of our existence, journey and purpose in this world.
In the Holy Bible having wisdom, knowledge and understanding is mentioned in many verses as being of great importance. It’s my belief that this is the knowledge, wisdom and understanding of who we are, in the spiritual aspect of ourselves.
Knowing this truth is the way to true life and understanding of who we are. The more we understand who we are, the better people we can aspire to be.
As the power of Christ begins to flow through us, we begin to go deeper into the knowledge of our own selves and begin to discover the talents and skills that already exist within us; skills and talents that we may have failed to notice before.
It’s through the power of Christ that those talents come to life and begin to work for you like never before. It’s like you begin to see the talent within, that you never knew existed before. We also begin to see the significance of our experiences and our lives as we journey through this world.
If our hearts and minds are open to the truth, then we will be able to see the truth; which is the fact that we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.
No matter how big or how small the task with the power of Christ within, we can do all things that we never had a clue how to do before. We can also do all the things that we never imagined were a possibility.
It is Jesus Christ who can help us to see the truth of who we are within and see the unique qualities which we have to offer. It is through knowing Christ that we can come to recognise ourselves better from within. We can begin to see what is right for us.
Once we can recognise who we are in a spiritual sense, as in who we are in the spiritual aspect, spiritually and emotionally, then we can begin to discover who we are beyond the shell of the body.
When we come to know Christ then we come to know ourselves. We come to know the true aspect of ourselves beneath the surface. I believe that by knowing ourselves more, we may be able to have better vision of what we want to do during our lives.
The body is just our physical presence in this world, we also have the presence of our spirit and soul which is unseen, but which is the more significant aspect of who we really are. It’s my view that the body is the part that carries these other components around.
Who we are and what we have to offer ourselves and other people goes much deeper than just the physical body on the outside.
It’s my view that one needs to know the most significant part of one’s self in order to know who you really are, what you have to give and what you really want to achieve and gain out of your life experience.
I believe that through coming to know Jesus, we will come to discover who we really are and be able to see and use our talents and abilities like never before.
I also believe that it is Jesus who can lead one out of that hopeless feeling of self-doubt.
There may have been times when you know you want to achieve and aspire to do much better in your life and feel you have done your very best; however you lack the vision to know how to make it happen.
You may know in your heart that you have the ability to achieve more and do so much more with your life, but you are out of ideas, stuck in a rut and don’t know where to turn to make a change and really start to make things happen.
You’re literally clueless; stuck in a job you don’t want to do, or living a life that you never anticipated you’d experience.
You may hope for better and desire better for yourself, but you may have no idea of how to change your circumstances. How can you live the life and achieve the things you have always dreamt of?
I believe that once you open your heart and mind to the Light of Jesus, then you will come to discover more about yourself, as well as understand this world for what it really is.
I believe this world is just a physical experience, however I don’t believe it is our only experience.
I believe that after here we will have another experience, but in a spiritual sense opposed to the physical sense, experienced in this world.
It’s my view that it’s a physical experience that we go through to lead us towards discovering the truth, which is found when we begin to discern spiritual things.
In the Holy Bible we are also told that God is a Spirit. In the book of John Chapter 4 verse 24 it says: ‘God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth’.
So as God is a Spirit, that proves that our ability to understand the spiritual things, as in the things of God, is where the truth is to be found. And when we can find the Truth, then we can find the truth within ourselves and aspire to be the best that we can be.
This includes discovering the truth of who we really are within, children of the Living God. Eventually we can begin to see that the truth of who we are and the significance of our lives, is found when we begin to understand more of the spiritual, such as the things of God.
We begin to see that failing to recognise the spiritual aspect of ourselves, whilst choosing to spend our entire lives chasing the physical things is quite pointless. As the physical is only temporary.
I think success is found when we begin to discern the spiritual aspects of ourselves whilst maintaining a useful physical existence.
I would use the word ‘useful’ to indicate that we can say that we used our knowledge of our inner selves, to then ensure we tried to make the best use of our time in the physical world.
I believe the best use of our time isn’t spent acquiring knowledge and understanding of the physical, but using the majority of our time to begin to discern and understand the things which are true and everlasting, this being the spiritual.
It’s my view that the more we understand the spiritual, as in the things of God, the more we will come to understand the physical including how to achieve what we hope to, during our lives.
The more we can understand the purpose of our lives, the more we can make sense of the relevance of ourselves and our experiences.
I believe that the more understanding we have of ourselves and our lives in this world, the more we will begin to see a way to use that life to the fullest. It’s my view that we will begin to have more insight into what it is, that we do best.
Once we begin to recognise what we do best, we will begin to see a way forward to achieve our aspirations. I believe that by seeing who we are within, we will eventually begin to see the real purpose of our lives.
Once we begin to realise that we all have a purpose for our lives, we will find satisfaction in knowing that we are just trying to fulfil that purpose.
I believe you will have a greater insight into what it means to make a better experience of your life in this world, once you recognise and value yourself for who you really are.
Once you have more insight into who you are individually, then you can identify what skills you have to offer to make yourself attain the success and satisfaction you may desire in your life whatever that may be.
To me the feeling of success arrives when you begin to fulfil the tasks which you believe you are meant to do.
And only you will begin to see what that is, once you reach that point of self-discovery.
You will begin to see and feel what it is that you are meant to achieve and you will realise that you have already been fully equipped to fulfil that purpose.
Eventually through the Power of Christ, you will begin to visualise what it is you are to achieve in your lifetime.
Perhaps if you are yet to accept Christ into your life as your Lord and Saviour, you are unable to see it; however, all that will change once you accept the Power of Christ into your life.
When the time is right you will come to see that the possibility of achievement has been with you all along; it is through the Power of Christ that your ability and talent begins to manifest before you.
Chapter 3
What is it that you Truly Desire in your Life?
Basically you have to know what it is that you want in your life, before you can actually begin to try to achieve it.
This type of statement may seem to be totally obvious to most, but I would imagine that most people probably spend the majority of their lives going through the motions, never knowing what it is that they truly want. They only thing they may know is that a piece of the puzzle is missing.
We may desire to be happy, full of joy and successful; we may also have no real clue as to what we actually want to do in our lives, in order to begin to achieve such ends.
I believe that before you can really feel as though you have achieved real success in any area of your life, you need to look deeply within and discover what it is that you truly desire?
Do you desire a happy family life or a happy marriage? Do you desire a successful career or business venture? Do you desire a long list of accomplishments?
Do you desire something more meaningful in your life, like inner peace? The list of things we may desire to make us feel fulfilled can be a very long one!
Have you ever imagined that the way to success and happiness in our lives may not always be found by what we want, but by what we need?
Somebody once told me that there is a big difference between what one wants and what one needs. When you really start to think about it, this statement does seem to make perfect sense and I believe it’s true.
Sometimes the difference between what we really want and really need in our lives can get blurry and the two often get intertwined. The two can often overlap each other and we can even become confused.
We may even waste time aspiring for things that we think we want; once we attain these things we may begin to realise that what we thought we wanted, was not what we really desired for ourselves after all.
Eventually we can see that something that we initially thought to be right for us, was not right for us after all. This may have become evident on numerous occasions in one’s life.
It could have been a prospective job or a new partner; we may have worked so hard to get something believing it to be the right thing for our lives, only for that same thing to end up bringing us to the verge of disaster.
Why is it that we may find it so difficult to perceive and see rightly if something is good for us or totally unsuitable for us? As discussed in the previous chapter, I believe it stems from us not knowing fully who we are within.
If we don’t really know ourselves within, then how can we expect to have any idea of what is suitable for us whether that be a new partner or a new career opportunity? It’s my conclusion that the less we know ourselves within, the less we will be able to perceive what is right for us.
As well as knowing ourselves within, we need to know the difference between what we want and what we actually need in our lives.
There are times when we will have brought things into our lives, which at the time we thought we truly wanted; only to realise later that those same things we certainly didn’t need at all!
It’s just like when you find yourself out and about in one of those fancy department stores doing some shopping in the long awaited sale.
You’ve gone out to cheer yourself up and make yourself happy by getting some retail therapy.
All you want to do is make yourself feel special and on top of the world by buying that new treat; you want to make that special purchase and make yourself feel good again!
You search the different departments searching endlessly for that much desired bargain. The more you fill your basket with wonderful special offers the better.
At this point all the goods in your basket look well worth the money and you’re full of adrenaline, so you’re extremely excited.
Little do you consider the fact that you will have to dish out a lot of cash, now or later to finish paying for it all? However, at this precise moment the cost of the goods is quite far from your mind. In fact you are hardly concerned about that at all!
You are only concerned about grabbing the next bargain and putting it into your basket before the next bargain hunter beats you to it!
You have a quick peep at the goods in your basket; you have a big smile on your face and right now you are one hundred percent convinced that you really do need all of those goods.
Your mind is fully made up and you’re totally convinced that you really do need to make the purchase to make yourself happy and make you’re existence feel even more viable and complete.
You approach the cashier at the check-out desk, grinning yourself to bits, feeling totally proud of yourself at the fact that you have managed to grab so much amazing stuff.
You believe that you have found a load of bargain items and the purchase of these items, has literally made you feel over the moon.
You get your items home and it’s only after a certain period of time usually a couple of days, that you may take a look at them and realise that post spending, the novelty of the goods and the shopping spree has worn off.
You realise that you never really needed half of the things you bought.
You’ve got to pay for it all nevertheless.
Eventually guilt or resentment may set in; you realise that most of this stuff will end up in a pretty box stashed underneath your bed, alongside all the other stuff you have bought but have never used.
All the new purchases fit in neatly amongst the other boxes tucked up underneath the bed or in the closet collecting dust. All one has done, has added to the collection of one’s unnecessary purchases and numerous possessions.
This particular illustration highlights the difference between ‘want’ and ‘need’. We wanted a new designer handbag, but did we actually need one? That’s the question.
We bought that new flat widescreen TV on special offer at the store; however, did we actually really need one when the old set was still in good working order and able to do a sufficient job?
So why do we purchase stuff and seek to possess more, when we know we don’t actually need to? Is it simply because we have got so used to telling ourselves that our wants are the same as our needs?
The list of things that we think we need can be literally endless, quite similar to the length of a piece of string! It’s seriously difficult to measure the amount of things we may think we need.
We could think that we need a big house, a luxury car, a cruise around the med, the perfect job, a better salary, the ideal spouse. Where does it all end? Eventually we will come to see that we don’t always need these things but we could say that we ‘want’ these things.
If we think about it, surely there must be a reason why we have come to believe that we ‘need’ these things. We believe we need more comfort, better job security, a better home and better living standards.
We have been led to believe that we ‘need’ these things. We have been socially conditioned to believe that these are our essential needs in life.
We have been conditioned to believe that excess is ok and that living beyond our needs is perfectly acceptable, as long as our immediate desires are fulfilled.
What about our need to know who we are and why we are here? Surely this need is more significant than our need for a new convertible sports car or fancy designer watch?
We can’t take any of these material things with us when we die, so who says we really need them anyway? What do we need them for? Is it so that we can look good walking down the street? Or is it so that we can impress our peers, colleagues, friends and neighbours?
Surely we have more vital needs to discover and fulfil in our lives, as in trying to discover the whole point for our physical lives in the first place?
These material things are not things that we need, in comparison to our need to truly know ourselves. Most of the time these things are simply what we may ‘think’ we want.
I think the basic necessities that we have in life can be classified as actually being quite small. I believe that access to our basic necessities would include food, water and shelter.
It’s also my view that we have an innate inbuilt need to multiply and procreate. Of course not everyone will have that particular need.
And not everyone will be in a position to fulfil that need, even if they may have it. Just like one may not fulfil every desire in life that they may have.
I think that beyond our most basic needs, it’s usually the case that we want and desire more than what we actually need.
Although I realise that it is nice to live in comfort and enjoy a lot more than our basic necessities, we have to realise that a lot of what we want is not always what we ‘need’ to make our lives happy and fulfilling.
We have to discover the difference between what we want and need to make our lives a success, in connection with the reason for having that life.
I believe that having our needs fulfilled, rather than having our wants fulfilled, is the way to real satisfaction and success. I believe the key is to find out what one truly needs in one’s life to find peace and happiness.
One may desire to have more than their basic needs in life in order to feel real satisfaction; I believe that is fair, as long as one has already attained the basic requirement of life, which is to come to have more understanding about yourself, your unique talents and the real purpose of your life in this world.
In my sense of reasoning I think it’s difficult for one to know what they truly need in life, if they have no idea of why they have been given that life in the first place.
It’s my view that when one opens their heart to Jesus, then one will find their way and have all these questions answered.
An individual may have achieved material acquisition in their life and then be classed by some as successful.
However, it’s my view that if you have no awareness of who you are in a much deeper sense, then you may still experience an internal void within and continue to strive for more and more as you still feel that something in your life is still missing.
I believe that to know oneself and to know what one is truly capable of, is a vital requirement in life. Some may decide to ignore that type of need and just focus on the physical aspects in their life, putting aside anything spiritual or emotional.
I think success comes about when you find spiritual balance within by knowing who you are beyond the physical sense and once you begin to see the individual talents you have been given.
You will then begin to see who you truly are and what you truly need in your life, to be the best that you can be. It’s could to remember that what a person may want, is usually based upon temporary desires which are subject to change.
What a person needs in life to have the best and most useful life experience, may turn out to be different compared to what we thought we initially wanted. We can’t always see and perceive clearly, what it is that we truly need.
Over time, as we learn who we are and discover our talents and reason for being, then what we truly need to have a successful and happy life will eventually become more apparent.
Once you have a real sense of happiness and peace which begins from within, then you can begin to see the things in life that you really need.
You will begin to desire long term things, opposed to short term temporary things that cannot really make you feel at peace and satisfied for the duration of your worldly life.
Eventually you may even begin to desire heavenly things, as you begin to see where true happiness is and where you truly belong.
Of course temporary things can make you feel happy and successful for some period of time, but the constant longing for more, can mean that you’re never totally fully satisfied with what you have. And if that’s the case, then you may never feel totally at peace with yourself.
Once you come to decide what are your real needs in life in a much deeper sense, you can begin to work on yourself, towards having those needs fulfilled.
Once you believe you have your basic needs fulfilled, you will develop the confidence and determination to strive for even more.
You may begin to find that your need for physical wants begins to decrease more and more as you begin to desire more out of life than just the material things.
You may begin to want to find more meaning to your life and want to do that which is suited to your particular talents; as well as accomplish that which is more meaningful.
Once you desire to attain that which is more meaningful, your life will be more peaceful.
Once you believe there is better to come after this world, you will realise that it’s ok to be you, because simply being you and achieving what you are meant to achieve, is more than enough.
It’s my belief that as you slowly begin to desire and want less, then you will start to have more acceptance of yourself and all that you already have.
You will begin to accept yourself for who you truly are and all that you have to offer.
Once you begin to accept all that you are and all the unique attributes you hold, then you will start to realise and discover all the special qualities that you have to give. Once you discover those qualities, you can then use those skills to achieve your goals.
It’s my view that it all begins from discovering who you truly are within; it’s all about realising what you need to discover about yourself, in order to be the best that you can be. It’s about realising that we all have deeper needs that go way beyond the surface.
This need to know ourselves is the starting point and is the essential ingredient for allowing us to strive to achieve the things we want to do.
We need to know who are and learn of that which we have to offer. In my opinion this is a basic need.
It then stands to reason, that as a result we will be better equipped to make a success of our lives. We will eventually begin to establish what it is that we truly want and need in our lives, to make those lives a real success.
It’s my opinion that once you believe that you are on your way to being the best person that you can be, then you will feel as though you are on your way to making a real success of your life.
You will be working towards making the best use of the time that you have been given. One must realise what one needs, in order to feel comfortable and secure in one’s own skin.
Once you are comfortable within and have your basic needs fulfilled, then you can begin to work towards fulfilling all the long term goals that you desire in your future.
Chapter 4
Time and how we use it is Crucial to who we are to Become
As mentioned briefly in the introduction, I believe our lives are simply time; we don’t know how much time we have. We all experience a different length of time, but I believe that our time in this physical world is given to us for a unique purpose.
How we decide to use that time to make the best use of our lives, is I believe to be the most important thing. Each day we live is pretty short if we really consider it; just twenty four hours then minus eight hours sleep and once that day has passed, it has gone forever.
I’ve never heard of anyone being able to rewind a day, no matter how powerful they may consider themselves to be. We cannot get the previous day back or repeat the present day; we experience each day the once and that’s it.
Each day is simply a set amount of time, an opportunity for us to experience a set of events. At the end of a particular day whatever opportunities we didn’t managed to grasp are now literally gone from our grip, until the next time and that’s only if there is to be a next time.
We move on to the next day which will never be exactly the same as the one gone before, each day being different. As we pass through each day, we will also miss or fulfil some of our opportunities.
Although we all live for different lengths of time, I believe that whatever time we come to experience, is of some significance.
The fact that we have arrived in this world is an opportunity in itself. I believe we are here to learn lessons for ourselves, or to help other people learn their lessons.
The main point is that we should value the time in which we have been given and try to the very best of our ability to make our lives as fruitful as possible, always aiming to do the best that we can do.
We should never take our time for granted, but use it to do the best for ourselves and other people.
As we know there are so many distractions in our lives that we experience on a daily basis. We are distracted by our concerns and issues. Our time is also occupied by our need to complete and fulfil daily responsibilities and duties.
We have targets to meet and things to take care of. We have a duty to take care of ourselves, our families and where necessary those around us.
We have a need to fulfil our basic duties in order to survive. There is no doubt that we usually have a lot to do and many concerns that go through our minds constantly.
We have a need to get all the everyday basics done. There is always one task or another to address and pursue.
Once we fulfil our daily work of providing for ourselves, then we have a limited amount of time to indulge in whatever we choose to do. So we go to work, sleep and the remainder of the time is for us to use in whichever way we want to.
We also have many tedious distractions which occupy our time. These things I would describe as leisurely pursuits. This includes activities we partake in, to help us escape from the variety of concerns that we may be experiencing in our own lives.
We often use the media, social networking, the world of gaming, our smart phones and whatever we can find at our disposal to just sit there and forget about the realities of our everyday lives.
The list of things we indulge in, both inside and outside of the home goes on and on. Every day there is a new movie that is brought out; a new TV show or a new TV series.
There is the constant release of new songs and new albums, constant music, social and sporting events.
There is always something new, you can never find the time to experience everything, as every day is a new day with a new release in the world of entertainment to entertain you.
Quite often we may even decide to indulge in mindless activities, to take up any time that we may have left to ourselves.
There are times when we literally take our time for granted and are happy to sit around doing trivial stuff, which in the long run prevents us from making significant changes in our lives.
The more we partake in these mindless activities the more they begin to take over our lives. They may begin to distract our thoughts, overload our minds and prevent us from progressing towards achievement
People can even begin to refuse to talk and interact with each other, this often includes friends and family members, because we are literally overwhelmed and engrossed in these time consuming activities.
The further the advances in social and interactive technology, the more choices become available to occupy our time.
It can often be quite difficult to choose to reject these activities, most of which are unprofitable in any sense of the word. If we really begin to look into it, we can see how much time we waste occupying ourselves with these things.
We always need to be mindful of the fact that our time in this world is very limited. So we should aim to use our time well, in order to make the best use of the time we have.
Our usually pattern of thinking and behaviour may mean that we literally get caught up in this web of distraction, whether that be via technology or in the field of entertainment.
We may call it entertainment and we may associate it with the term ‘escapism’. Anything that takes our mind and thoughts away from our daily lives in this world, is usually referred to as ‘escapism’.
We may use many forms of what is called ‘escapism’ to occupy our thoughts. We may often think the more we have available to ‘take our mind off things’ the better.
It’s called escapism, but what exactly are we supposed to be escaping from?
Do these distractions enable us to fully escape from our concerns, or as we like to call them our problems? Or are these things designed to make us escape from our own selves and the truth regarding the purpose of our own existence?
If we have no time to think, then that in itself could indicate that these things are in actual fact some form of mind trap.
In my view these distractions could be seen as some type of entrapment, opposed to a form of escape. I guess it all depends upon one’s own point of view.
If something constantly prevents one from finding the time to think and ponder about the truth about one’s life, I fail to see how this can be seen as a form of escape?
What are we really being encouraged to escape from? That’s the real question we need to ask ourselves. Are we being encouraged away from the Truth? Are we being encouraged away from finding the real significance of our lives?
Are we being encouraged to escape from making the best use of our physical lives, whilst we still have that time? We need to remember that one day, our time here will run out!
If we are constantly bombarded with trivial pursuits that stop us from discovering our inner selves, how can that activity be seen as liberating?
In my opinion it’s quite the opposite, it’s like we are making ourselves mentally incapacitated by wasting our time and suppressing our ability to think for ourselves.
If one cannot think for one’s self, then how can one be expected to achieve more for oneself?
How can we ever achieve our full potential and make our lives successful, if we don’t give ourselves the time to do anything of real importance with the lives that we have been given?
I personally believe that our lives should have some level of balance. Everything including how we choose to spend our time should be given the proper care and attention. We should do what we can in moderation.
If we want to achieve more in our lives, then we need to allow ourselves the proper time to ponder and think. We need to find time to think, just as we allow ourselves time to do the things we need to do and find time to do the things we like to do.
Of course there are times when we need to allow ourselves time to relax and refresh; this is especially the case if we are upset or stressed. However, I don’t believe we should allow ourselves to partake in mindless activities to the point where we become dysfunctional.
By my use of the word ‘dysfunctional’ I mean we shouldn’t allow our minds to be overloaded with useless information that can never help us to achieve anything of real worth during our lives.
We must always be aware and think about how we are using our time and remember that we have a choice to decide to use our time wisely. We also have the freedom to exercise that choice according to our own individual circumstances.
At the same time, if we want to achieve the most that we possibly can out of our lives, we need to use that time to discover our own selves and our own unique talents.
If we want to become the best that we can be and achieve what we believe we are capable of, we need to find the time to discover ourselves and then begin to work on our findings.
If we decide to leave no time to work on ourselves, then we leave no time to make a difference to our lives; we leave no time to work towards fulfilling our full potential by ensuring that we aspire to reach the highest levels of achievement.
Time is an immeasurable asset. To have time is to have something invaluable, as time is something neither gold, nor money can buy.
We can never buy ourselves more time no matter how much we may desire it. So I believe that time is the best commodity that one can ever own, no matter how long we own that time. We should try our very best never to waste the precious time that we have.
We should be able to look back on our lives including the time we have had and believe that we have done our very best to recognise why we were given that time in the first place.
It’s my view that we are given the time to discover ourselves in a spiritual sense by recognising that we also have a spirit and soul as part of our being.
I believe we are to slowly move from physical attachment to spiritual discernment, in order to understand our real value.
I believe we have been given that time so that we may find Jesus within and wake up to the true reality of the possibility of having eternal life, which goes beyond the temporary life we experience in this world.
I believe the real success in this life is experienced, when we are able to wake up to the reality of what it means to live on after this world and begin to live true life in the spirit.
When we begin to know our real selves within, it surpasses mindlessly experiencing a physical life with no meaning.
When our lives have no real meaning beyond the physical, then it is even more of a struggle trying to achieve and understand how to make good use of ourselves.
It’s my view that the more we understand ourselves, the more we can make sense of our lives and find a way to achieve the things we truly believe are meant for us.
When we realise that the most significant parts of us is our spirit and soul within, then we are using our time in this world to recognise the real purpose of our existence.
I believe by understanding our true selves and the purpose of our existence, we stand in a better position to achieve more and attain the very best from ourselves.
It’s my belief that once we begin to see the overall purpose of our lives, then we can really begin to feel more comfortable with who we are and in turn serve the purpose for which we were created.
We can begin to aspire to achieving the highest heights of our physical being, if we only take the time to really know the parts of ourselves that really matter.
We need to use our time wisely to acknowledge the spiritual things which are the things of God, whilst we are still in the physical. Then eventually we will begin to wake up to our full potential.
As we use our time to let the power of Jesus work through us, we are strengthened to go on to achieve the work and purpose that we are meant to fulfil. We are given the tools and all the power we need to achieve whatever is due to us.
It’s my belief that if we really want to achieve real success in our lives, then we should use our time to find the Truth within ourselves; that Truth is found when we open our hearts to Jesus. Jesus is the Truth and Jesus is the way to all Truth.
We just have to open our hearts to realise this. When we come to see this, we will begin to see that we have made the best start to empowering ourselves in this world.
We will begin to overcome our self-doubts and begin to overcome the things of the world too.
As things begin to gel then your life will begin to make a lot more sense. Once your life begins to make sense, then you will find that your ideas and direction in life will start to flow more easily.
You will naturally begin to visualise a road ahead and a direction for your life. You will have a much clearer insight into what it is you really want to achieve. And you will visualise a way in which you can do it.
It’s my view that if we use our time to try and recognise our real life purpose by understanding who we are within, then we will naturally begin to achieve as we head towards that which is naturally suited to us.
If we don’t use our time to find out who we truly are within, then it will be more difficult to find and make the most suitable life choices.
It’s incredibly important to use our time to search our inner selves first, if we really want to discover what is right for us during our life journey.
We often hear the saying ‘time is money’ but I disagree with this statement and believe our time is worth a whole lot more than money could ever be. What use is money when you don’t have any time?
If you don’t have any time left, how will you spend your money? And that’s the whole point, you won’t be able to spend that money somebody else will end up spending it for you.
So what’s the point in wasting all the time you have been given, in order to strive for riches, when you don’t know when your time will end?
Get to know what is really important and use your time wisely to make the best use of your life.
Once again, the importance of our time can never be compared to riches. When we are on the verge of leaving this world, we may then begin to see that we desire more time.
It doesn’t matter how much money we have or have had, when we know we are running out of time!
That money then becomes a useless commodity. Once we leave this world the amount of money we had whilst we were here, will be neither here nor there. That money we had, will be left for others to inherit and will be of no use to us personally ever again.
We need to remember that our time and how we use it is always more important in comparison to temporary worldly assets. The real success is when we realise that our lives are worth a lot more than the riches of this world.
Instead of the accumulation of more money which eventually becomes useless to us when we depart from this world, shouldn’t we aim to accumulate more wisdom and understanding instead?
The fact is, we can never really know when our time will run out. We can run out of time when we least expect it!
We don’t know if our lives will suddenly end without warning. That is one thing we can be certain of, we never know when our time here in this world will come to an end.
I believe that more wisdom and understanding about ourselves, will bring about more faith. And eventually our faith can lead us towards inheriting everlasting life to come by knowing our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We are saved by Grace, through our Faith in Jesus.
If we use our time to learn about Jesus and make Jesus a real part of our lives whilst we remain in this world, then we can go on to achieve anything we want to.
It is the power of Jesus that gives us the strength to accomplish and succeed in whatever we put our minds to. We begin to achieve whatever we were made to do.
As mentioned earlier, I believe our lives need to have some form of balance. We need to persevere with our lives in the physical, but always remember to nurture the importance part of ourselves within.
We should aim to achieve and do our best in the here and now, with the time that we have been granted. If we want to look at our lives as having been a real success, we need to always view our success in regards to the ‘bigger picture’.
We need to realise that alongside our desires to achieve our goals in this world, these goals are pointless if we fail to use our time to find the real purpose and meaning of our lives beyond this temporary physical experience.
It’s good to achieve in life and do the very best you can, but more importantly it’s essential to achieve the real success of knowing why you have been granted the precious gift of life in the first place.
Using your time wisely so that you may know the Truth in regards to the meaning of your life in the world, is of more importance than trying to attain success associated with accumulating the temporary things of the world!
Once you come to know the Truth, that Truth being Jesus, you will be empowered to go on to accomplish what you are meant to achieve in your life.
Chapter 5
How to Become a Success and begin to feel Successful in all areas of your life?
It’s my view that in order to give yourself the best chance to succeed in specific areas within one’s life, you need to have some key ingredients embellished within your mind-set.
You have to establish a mind-set based upon focus, drive and determination. Alongside that you have to know who you truly are, by first coming to know Christ within.
Once you are in Christ and Christ is in you, then you will have the power through Christ to achieve all that you are meant to. You have to remain focused and maintain self-discipline in order to complete the task at hand, whatever that may be.
You need to believe that you are able to achieve anything you put your mind to, as long as you choose to remain committed to the task.
Being able to focus and remain committed to a task is not always easy. Many distractions will come along the way to stop you from being able to stay focused on what you wish to achieve.
There will always be something to distract your mind away from that in which you truly desire to do and from what you believe God may want you to do.
Many issues big and small, may arrive along the way too, which will continuously take your mind away from focusing on your long term goals and aspirations.
The thing is more hurdles and short term distractions may always be around the corner. Our concerns and distractions will always come and go and some of them may even remain, but it’s our choice whether we decide to let those things get in the way of what we believe we are destined to do.
We need to try and overcome those things which distract us. We reach the Lord through prayer and we just need to put our full trust in Jesus to make a way for us in regards to all of our affairs.
We need to turn to God for help and this will enable us to deal with any issues that may come about. We have to remain in Jesus to find our way and find the right direction.
At the same time, we need to always press ahead towards achieving our long-term goals whilst praying that we always do God’s will in our lives.
The point is, whatever comes our way, we always need to press ahead with whatever we believe we are meant to do.
We shouldn’t let our concerns and distractions, stop us from achieving our long term goals, or allow ourselves to be distracted to the point that we are prevented from doing the things we truly believe we are meant to do.
We can decide to let our concerns and issues take up all of our time by constant worrying; we can also spend all of our days trying to change the things we may never change. It’s up to us as individuals to choose to remain focused.
If we choose to let our short term or ongoing issues distract and overburden our minds, then we may never find the time to achieve the things we really want for ourselves.
I guess it’s only natural that we would want to achieve success in all areas of our lives. If we really think about it, we all have a lot of areas to juggle.
We want to be part of a happy family, have happy relationships and friendships and have a successful professional life. We want to feel secure and comfortable in every area of our lives.
It’s difficult to maintain any level of perfection in any area of our lives, if at all. Sometimes we may be happy in our relationships and then be unhappy in our careers.
Another time it could be the other way around. We could really struggle in our private lives and then be doing extremely well in our professional ventures.
It’s very difficult to maintain that balance of everything being good, all of the time. Life just doesn’t always seem to work out like that.
And how can it be perfect all the time? We are all unique and very different. Things happen in life and we just have to adjust, dust ourselves off and work through it all, no matter what comes our way.
It’s my view that no matter what crops up we have to remain fully committed in our minds to whatever we want to achieve. We have to make a start and once we make a start we have to be committed to seeing it through.
If we begin to think about achieving success in specific areas of our lives, then we have to be prepared to apply ourselves and put the work in. We also need to do our research when applicable.
I think that when trying to achieve academic success, one needs to do a lot of research to begin with.
One should research the course of study that they are considering and think about if that particular path of study would lead them towards a profession that they would actually like to do.
I believe one should choose to study areas that they really enjoy. I believe that the better you enjoy something and the more it appeals to your personality, the more you will be able to apply yourself and remain committed to it.
Once you are convinced that you will enjoy the topic and you are certain that it will lead towards a profession that you want to do, then you need to apply your mind to it.
If you choose something that you like, but you lack determination and self-motivation then completing a course, will still prove to be very difficult.
Whatever one may choose to study will prove to be a challenge, but if you have the drive and determination to see it through, then most certainly you will be able to see it through until the very end.
We also usually desire to make a success of ourselves professionally in the world of work or whilst conducting financial business. Once again I believe it comes down to knowing what type of venture appeals to us personally.
If we decide to take on a job role which fails to appeal to us in any way, then we are very likely to get very bored and demotivated with the role very quickly.
We may become disinterested and will find that it is very difficult to remain focused on the task, because we are simply there for financial reasons and nothing else.
If we are unenthusiastic about a role, then it’s quite likely that we will have very little to contribute towards it.
Once we are contributing very little and failing to fully apply ourselves, then it will be very difficult to make a real success of it.
We usually spend a great deal of our time at work, whether that’s work from home or outside of the home.
Work is normally such a big part of our lives; if we are unhappy with the work that we are doing, that unhappiness can normally start to affect us in our private lives.
We may begin to bring our misery from work home with us, just as we can bring our personal problems at home with us to work.
Creating misery and disharmony in the home is the last thing we want to do, so we really have to work hard to find the right job that will fulfil us and give us the peace of mind we need, so we can also create a peaceful home life.
This proves once again that thorough research is vital. We need to research a potential role to find out exactly what type of work we will be doing.
We need to ensure that we are aware of what duties are involved, so that we will be fully fit and able to commit to the job.
We need to ensure that the potential role will suit us in the long term, if a long term opportunity is what we require.
It’s no good choosing something that you know you really won’t enjoy. Once the novelty of starting a new job wears off, then you will be left with boredom and disappointment.
Eventually you may begin to feel like a failure, doing a role that you know fails to fulfil you. Feeling somewhat disheartened, you may then feel the need to begin looking for something alternative.
So it’s really important to find a job that appeals to your character and personality in the first place.
It’s really important to ask yourself questions. You need to know if you’re a people person. Are you sociable or somebody who prefers to keep quiet?
Do you enjoy talking to people and helping people? Or would you prefer a job where you simply work as a lone agent, getting on with a job without much interaction and mixing?
You need to think about your level of tolerance and patience. Some jobs may require you to have more patience than others; this is especially true when having to deal with the public.
You have to have patience to provide a good standard of customer care, because you have to be willing to listen and respond to the needs and requirements of others.
You have to be able to keep calm under pressure and deal with a variety of issues. You have to have the right demeanour to be able to cope with all the different personalities that you will have to encounter on a daily basis.
Every job role is entirely different, depending upon which sector and particular role you choose.
It’s my belief that it’s essential to choose to enter into opportunities that appeal to one’s own interests; it must provide one with real satisfaction, if one truly hopes to make a success of it.
In regards to personal and family relationships, I think the key thing is to start by knowing yourself, then you will be better equipped to choose to be amongst those people who are most suitable for you.
The key is always to try and attract and maintain positive people in your life. Negativity and negative feelings will also eventually begin to have a negative influence in your life.
It’s my view that negative energy or a non-positive influence can drain your positive energy and pull you down, so it’s always best to try and keep it out of your life as much as you can.
It’s good to be around others who have a good and positive spirit.
I think that when it comes to family relationships, we should always try to be a source of strength for our family members and be a positive role model to one another.
We should always try to get the best out of each other and provide continuous encouragement to one another.
We should always be there to support one another in times of need. I think the most important thing when trying to maintain good family ties, is to always remember the importance of showing respect.
Having respect for someone else’s characteristics, feelings and personality is always important. We have to respect one another’s differences, as well as our similarities.
Of course there will always be times of disagreements and conflicts, that’s to be expected occasionally.
However, if we want to have a peaceful and successful relationship with our family members and partners, we should always try our very best to maintain an environment of peace, tolerance and understanding.
We should apologise when we know we are wrong and just try not to cause conflict between ourselves unnecessarily. Sometimes we may have to appear to agree when we really disagree, if it helps to keep the peace. It often helps to simply remain silent!
I believe that a happier family who are generally supportive of one another, are a much stronger dedicated family unit.
In regards to our personal relationships, we all want fulfilling companionship and happiness in our lives.
We know that we want somebody to share our lives with, but it’s no good choosing a random partner based purely upon attraction and outward appearances.
If you really want the connection to work, it’s better to choose someone according to who you believe they are on the inside, opposed to just who they appear to be on the outside.
As what you find within, is where you will find the real truth of who that person really is.
Appearances can be deceiving, so it’s best to try to establish who the real person is deep down, to begin to see who they really are beyond the surface.
The real person is who they are in their soul and spirit; their spiritual essence, is of so much more importance, than who they portray themselves to be on the outside.
How you relate to the person spiritually and how you connect to each other from within is the real significance and a good indicator whether or not that person is good for you.
So to summarise this chapter, it’s my view that having real success in our lives is all about knowing our true selves within and coming to know what is suitable for us in relation to the things around us.
It’s also about knowing where we want to go in life. The most important thing to find success within one’s life experience, begins when we come to know Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Saviour.
It’s my belief that once we become one in the Love of Christ, then his insight will lead us in the right direction during our lives.
We will become more capable of seeing what is meant for us. We will be able to see the way to go in relation to all areas of our lives. And it will be easier to decipher when something isn’t right for us.
By praying and trusting in the Lord we will be able to visualise the right way. And by relying on the power of Christ within, we will be able to make better choices for our lives.
If we simply trust in our own ability to make all the decisions in our lives, we may find that we often make the wrong decisions.
Something that we may perceive to be the right thing, can quite likely turn out to be the total opposite.
How we make a success of our lives in all areas is quite often influenced by our perception. If our perception of the situation is incorrect, then our decision in relation to the concept is likely to be incorrect too.
It’s my view that our perception is the main feature which enables us to see more clearly. When we are in Jesus Christ, then we have a much better perception of that which is true.
Jesus Christ is the Truth, so when we are one with Christ we have better insight, compared to when we rely purely on our judgements and trust in our own perception of things.
If we lead ourselves and are not led by the Spirit of Christ then we are without the spiritual insight and ability to see what is the right thing for us. This can mean that we waste a lot of time bringing the wrong things into our lives.
We need the guidance of Jesus Christ, to lead us to the right path in all areas of our lives. And we need the power of Jesus Christ to strengthen us and give us the motivation and power to see all of our hopes and aspirations through to the very end.
To have Jesus in one’s life, is to find the way to real success in all areas of one’s life. It’s through this new found insight that we will come to know our real selves and begin to identify our strengths and individual talents.
By having Jesus in our lives, we will be given the strength and ability to discover and develop our talents and skills. This will help us on our way towards achievement.
As a result of this clarity, we will eventually be led towards becoming the best individuals that we can be. We will be guided towards becoming the person that we are meant to be.
Chapter 6
You can make all your Dreams begin to come true; it all starts with True Belief within
If we want to achieve anything in our lives, I believe that one needs to know who one is and what it is that one truly wants.
We also need to see that once we have and know Jesus Christ within and have a personal relationship with Jesus during our lives, then we can do all things through the power of Jesus Christ within who strengthens us.
Once you know who you are and what you want, you need to begin to see that you have been given all the individual talent and skill in order to aspire and achieve anything one truly wants in life.
You have to begin to adopt a new mind-set; a mind-set which is set in the belief and understanding that you can achieve anything that you truly set your mind to, once you begin to know who you are and what you are capable of.
All you have to do is believe that you have the power within to achieve it once you set your mind to it. You need to trust in the Lord and believe that he wants to give you goodness in your life.
It may not happen overnight and it may take time. You will eventually come to realise it’s all in the mind; we just have to change the way we think about ourselves and change the way we apply ourselves mentally to the task at hand.
We need to believe and literally begin to see that whatever we want to achieve is definitely achievable and within reach.
If we tell ourselves that we can’t do it, then it’s very likely that we won’t ever do it! Whatever we choose to believe about our ability to do something, will most likely determine whether or not we ever finally manage to do it.
You may need to fine tune your thoughts and fine tune your talents, to become the person you hope to be.
You have to recognise your natural abilities and skills. You need to begin to develop yourself from the inside alongside developing your skills on the outside.
When we begin to change our thoughts, then these changes will begin to manifest on the outside. We may change the way we do things and approach things as a result of changing the way we think about things.
You need to change how you think on the inside and then begin to change your behaviours on the outside. To change the way we think, without taking action to make changes in our lives may delay our progress.
To see real progression and change in our lives, we have to try and act according to our new way of thinking.
We need to begin to reflect the changes within ourselves to that which is displayed on the outside of ourselves.
We can begin to completely change our persona and characteristics on the outside, once our perception of who we truly are on the inside begins to manifest itself.
Once this persona of who we truly are begins to manifest itself, we will begin to feel like we are making a success of our lives and we will begin to feel as though we are finally becoming the person who we believe we are truly meant to be.
The view you have about yourself and the way other people will begin to view you can change dramatically, once you begin to behave according to who you truly believe yourself to be.
If we act according to who we believe ourselves to be, then others will also treat us according to the characteristics we put on display.
If we believe in ourselves and act with confidence in association with that belief, then others will naturally begin to have confidence in us too.
The way we think about ourselves, can influence the way other people then begin to think about us. If we appear to be lacklustre and deflated, then we will not inspire others to feel confidence towards us or have any confidence in our abilities.
How can we inspire anyone to trust in our abilities if we fail to trust in our own abilities ourselves?
The key is to develop yourself from within, then you will gain the confidence to go on to fulfil your dreams.
You will begin to realise that you have the full potential to achieve what it is that you truly want to. It’s up to you to choose to begin to believe in the possibility of real achievement in your life.
The journey may not always be easy, but you will know that you are not alone. You will know that Jesus is with you every step of the way in your walk to make the best use of your life and the time that you have been given.
You won’t be alone in any area of your life; you will have the power of Christ to help to guide you towards whatever is right for you and that which is meant for you.
You will begin to progress towards a positive and fulfilling future. You will naturally begin to feel more vibrant and hopeful as you begin to feel the possibility of real inspiration and success in all areas of your life.
You will have God’s guidance in your life. And that guidance will help you to realise all that you have been given, which you can use to help you in your walk during your life.
Once you open your heart to Jesus, then you will slowly begin to see who it is that you really are. You will begin to discover things about yourself that you never really knew.
You may begin to see why things may have happened in your life the way that they did. It’s all been a way to lead you to the path and take the steps that you were supposed to take to get you to a certain point of discovery.
You will begin to see things more clearly and begin to discover the ability that you never knew you truly had. And through the power of Jesus Christ those skills will come to life.
It’s like the power of God within you, will just activate those skills that may have been sitting dormant within you and you will have the ability to do the work and fulfil the purpose that God created you to do.
Once you begin to achieve the things that you were created to do, you will begin to feel as though you are fulfilling your life purpose. Once you begin to fulfil that purpose, your life will feel as though it has more meaning.
Once your life begins to feel as though it has more meaning then you will begin to feel like you are on your way to making a real success of your life.
The feeling of success is the feeling you get when you believe that you have woken up and begun to do the things that you have always wanted to do.
As a result of my beliefs I genuinely believe that everyone has a unique talent or skill that simply needs to be discovered and once discovered it may require due care and attention, before that skill can really begin to work for you.
Once that skill begins to work for you, you must continue to develop and nurture it.
Once you discover the love of Jesus within then you will come to life within; once you come to life within, I believe ones talents and life skills will come to life also, so that they can be used for the purpose in which they were given.
I also believe as well as discovering yourself and beginning to work on yourself, you also need to discover what it is that you truly desire in your life, to bring you the peace and happiness that any life experience deserves.
You have to think about what you would like to do with your life. Discover yourself and then discover your dreams.
What would it take to make you feel happy with yourself and happy with what you have achieved with the time you have been given during your lifetime?
Everything worth achieving takes hard work, real focus and commitment. It requires time and effort. Big achievements don’t usually happen overnight but take time to accomplish.
You may not always see the results you would like immediately, but you have to know that in order to succeed we have to be prepared to persevere with the task. We have to try and try again to do even better.
We have to believe in ourselves to know that eventually we will achieve the results we want to. We can’t decide to give up at the first attempt if we really want to achieve, we have to stick at whatever we are doing.
There is always room for improvement, so there is always opportunity to try again; there is always an opportunity to make changes and try alternative methods.
We just have to believe that anything can happen as long as we focus our minds towards it and pray that it is God’s Will for our lives.
No matter what we are trying to achieve, we always have to be prepared for the occasional delay or set back. However, no matter what we must always be persistent and consistent!
We cannot afford to lose hope and lose confidence in ourselves. We have to be prepared to strive and work hard to keep working towards our goals.
You have to keep your eyes on the road ahead and be prepared to cross all the bridges that it will take to get you to where you want to go. You have to keep marching ahead towards the target of your goals, no matter what comes along the way.
You always have to keep in mind that if you stop or turn back you may never achieve your goals, as you have ceased to even give yourself the opportunity. How can you ever get to where you want to go, if you don’t even try?
You have to make a consistent effort to try and try again, no matter how long it takes. You have to believe that it’s worth the effort. Just remember what you have managed to achieve in the past, once you actually made an attempt to try.
You have to work hard to discover your own abilities and see the truth of what you have to offer and give within. You have to discover yourself, in order to discover what you would like your life to become.
Once you discover your dreams for your life and discover yourself, then you will begin to find a way to make your dreams come true and achieve the things you have always wanted to achieve.
Once you truly realise what you want to achieve in your life, you always have to remain undistracted and keep focused and determined.
You need to be self-motivated and realise that achievement takes real hard work and determination. You will find it hard to achieve long term goals, if you quit easily when trying to achieve the short term goals.
Everything we want to achieve takes very small steps. It takes real belief and passion, to achieve whatever one wants to achieve.
It takes commitment to accomplish anything, even the small things. And those small things are equally as important as the large things.
As you begin to achieve and attain the small tasks, then you will find your way towards accomplishing the big tasks. Everything achieved whether important or non-essential, builds a sense of confidence.
As ones confidence begins to grow, so will the amount that one begins to achieve. As you begin to complete your big goals, then you will slowly begin to pave the way towards achieving your long term goals.
You have to be passionate about everything you set out to achieve in life, regardless of how insignificant you believe that quest might be. It’s the very little things that we gain, which will give us the confidence and belief to go on to accomplish even more.
As those accomplishments begin to grow, we will grow in self-confidence and experience and become familiar with the feeling of success.
We will feel good in that we managed to stick to an idea; feel pleased that we managed to focus on a task and feel successful due to the fact that we did not allow distractions to stop us from arriving at the finish line.
The experience of getting the job done, whatever that job may be, will help to show us we can get things done, when we really need to.
Once something becomes a positive habit then we will become more comfortable with it. We will come to recognise the fact, that if we put our minds to it then we can do it! We just have to maintain that belief.
It’s my view that in order to achieve our own self-worth and achieve as much as we are capable of, we have to believe that whatever we do in life, is actually worthwhile. It has to be of some worth or some use, to ourselves or somebody else.
Once we begin to achieve what we view to be worthwhile and good in any area of our lives, then we will begin to feel more positive about our lives and ourselves.
If we also begin to feel like our lives are having a positive influence and good effect on the lives of others, then we will begin to feel like our lives are more meaningful.
When we eventually begin to feel the purpose and significance of our lives, then we may begin to feel like we are making a real success of the lives in which we have been given.
Chapter 7
Change the way you think and Start to Succeed
I decided to write this piece of work as it’s always been my desire to teach and encourage others to reach their full potential.
Although I always knew that I hoped to achieve and do my best in every area of my life, I never received adequate knowledge and information during my early years.
In order to make the best possible life choices, it’s essential to get good advice very early on.
Every choice we make on a daily basis whether big or small, may have some impact on our daily lives or how we come to view our lives long term.
Major decisions can affect us for our entire lives, so it’s important that we understand this during our youth.
We may not realise how significant some of our choices are at the point we are making them.
Quite often we may come to realise a choice we made in an instant without much consideration, may be the one to shape the general course of our lives.
As a result of my own experiences I decided to speak out to help others to equip them to make better life choices, which I hope will eventually lead one to having more light and direction in their life.
It’s my understanding that one should never under estimate the power of prayer and the benefit of thinking things through, before we do anything major in our lives. I believe this is so important, so I wanted to encourage others to do this.
It’s also my goal to speak to people from all walks of life, about the importance of coming to realise the individual skills and talents which perhaps they are yet to discover.
I believe that we all have something that we can discover about ourselves. Sometimes all we need is the time to apply ourselves to see what we have to offer.
Once we begin to recognise what we have to offer then we can really begin to achieve. It’s not impossible, if we choose to believe in the possibility of making things happen.
We are all good at something and we can all be of some good use to ourselves and to other people if we choose to. It’s always good if we can start to encourage our young people to discover their individual talents early on in life.
Being able to recognise our strengths and weak areas is always useful. We can then develop our strengths and work harder to support and work towards improving any areas of difficulty.
Being able to see how we are developing in all areas, is especially important in regards to the area of education.
I will begin here, as I believe that’s where we normally begin to make important decisions which go on to shape the direction of our lives.
The choices we make at this point in our lives will normally come to affect our ability to do what we would like to in the future.
So it’s imperative that we do all that we can, to follow the best course of action in regards to making informed decisions about the future.
How we do academically can usually determine or influence what we go on to do later in our lives post education, so it’s good to make the best choices, to put us in the best position possible for future success.
Therefore it’s never too early for one to begin to start thinking about what they would like to do and what they hope to achieve academically.
It can make all the difference to your life choices, if you develop an early realisation of what it is you would really like to do.
The difficulty is the fact that when we are young we usually haven’t got a clue what we really want to do; even if that is the case, there is no harm taking some time out to start thinking about it.
Although we may be unsure of what career path we would like to pursue in adulthood, it helps to begin by choosing academic options based upon areas which we are naturally comfortable with.
If we are naturally very good at something especially from a young age, then it’s likely that as we develop ourselves, then our skills in that particular area will increase. We just need to focus on continually improving our skills all the time.
The more time that you give yourself to consider your future, the better choices you can make when the time finally arrives.
It’s no good to rush these decisions it’s essential to start considering a career path as early as possible.
It’s important to develop some idea of what you hope to achieve post study, that way one can begin working towards it, by choosing the most relevant course of study and work experience.
You always need to consider the end goal; one needs to consider what career they would like to work towards. Once you have a career in mind, then you can focus your attention on choosing the most relevant subjects.
It’s good to have an understanding of what type of qualifications you will require in order to pursue the career one intends to do.
We have to always consider the fact of whether or not a particular line of study is going to be suitable for us and bring out the best in us.
It’s always useful to choose to study subjects that you know you will naturally appreciate and enjoy. You will have to apply yourself to the course at hand for a long period, so it makes sense to pursue and make career choices based upon what you believe you would like.
You want to give yourself the best chance of seeing it through to the end and the best chance of success. It’s my view that the more you like something, the more likely you are to do well at it.
It makes no sense to study something that you cannot tolerate. It also makes no sense to study something which will lead towards a career you don’t wish to pursue.
We have to always remember to choose appropriately keeping our future long term goals and aspirations in mind.
On the other hand it could be a mistake to study something which you enjoy, if it means it will lead you away from the work that you eventually hope to do.
There needs to be a balance between choosing to study what you enjoy and eventually obtaining the qualifications that you will need.
You always need to focus on choosing your studies wisely, in order to make the work you wish to pursue easily accessible.
In regards to making a success in any area of our lives, I believe it’s of vital importance to try to make the best choices throughout one’s life and to do as much research into the specific areas where we may be considering changing direction in some way.
We shouldn’t rush into making important decisions; whether it’s choosing a course of study, starting a new business venture, a new job, moving home, buying a home, beginning a new relationship or ending a relationship.
We should always give ourselves quality time to really think things through and give ourselves the knowledge to know what it is, that we are really getting ourselves into.
We should never let ourselves feel pressured or oppressed into making important decisions.
If we are considering an academic course we should know all that will be involved when considering the suitability of that course.
If it’s a new job we should be aware of all the work involved and all that will be expected of us. If it’s a new business venture we should be aware of the possible losses as well as the possibility for gain and profits.
If it’s a new relationship or encounter we should give ourselves the time to see what we are bringing into our lives.
Just as there are possible risks in business, there is also the possibility of risk, in a new relationship.
I think that we should always do our very best to ensure a life choice, will be the right one.
I can’t stress enough, the importance of always doing research into the specific change that we are considering, before we go ahead.
And we should always pray about it, as much as we can.
We may hear about something and believe that it will be beneficial and right for our lives and we may discover that it failed to become what we thought it would turn out to be.
Just because something may be right for someone else, we should never assume that it will be equally the right choice for us.
We are all different and unique and should view our life choices as such.
We should never just simply follow the crowd, or choose to make a choice, because the initial idea of it ‘sounds good’.
We should always be prepared to research, consider and evaluate things for ourselves. And choose to do only what we believe to be the best for us personally.
One should never jump into something without really considering whether or not something will be beneficial.
We need to consider, will this ‘thing’ bring added value and happiness to our lives? What provides peace and happiness to one person, may not provide that same feeling to another.
It doesn’t matter how many other people believe something to be right for them, you have to be careful when making life choices that will impact on your life and future.
We may learn from every decision we make as a result of the consequences; however it still saves a lot of time and heartache in the long run, if we try to ensure that something is right for our lives before choosing to make it a part of our lives.
Sometimes we may think that something is the right thing for us and it turns out that in actual fact it wasn’t.
It’s much better to look into things as much as we can and pray about the issue as much as possible, in order to feel comfortable that we are making the best choices during our lives.
I think that in most areas of our lives we should always consider some level of risk assessment, before we bring new things into our lives.
As well as some mental consideration, prayer is vital because we cannot always perceive things accurately.
What we see, may often be a false perception of the truth and may not be the reality. Therefore we need God’s guidance in our lives to show us what is right for us.
In regards to achievement I believe as well as making God a major part of our lives, we also always need to remain focused and committed towards always doing our best.
If we want to make all areas of our lives a success, we need to listen to the Guidance of God, within ourselves by coming to know ourselves.
We also need to discover our individual skills and talents and then commit ourselves towards achievement by using the talents which we have been given.
It’s my belief that every skill we have, has been given to us for a reason; it’s up to us to wake up and discover who we are, discover what we have to give and make the decision to use those skills.
Eventually we will begin to discover our life purpose, which may be directly aligned with the natural talents we have.
We have to make a decision to commit to seeing through our goals once we start them, regardless of those goals being short or long term. It makes no sense to invest time, effort and money if that’s applicable into something and then not bother to see it through.
Things may come up along the way to throw us off track, but we should always try to maintain our intention and desire to complete a task, especially if we believe we are fulfilling our life purpose by doing God’s work.
No matter what we are doing, if we believe it’s something worthwhile and good, it’s always useful to try and complete it, once we start it.
If we seriously have no desire to do something, then perhaps it’s not meant for us to begin with and perhaps we should think again and pray before venturing towards it.
It’s my view that each time we begin something and fail to complete it, it may subconsciously begin to dent our self-confidence. It can set us up with the false notion that we are unable to get things done.
The more we begin to fail to complete our goals, the more we may begin to lack belief in ourselves.
We may begin to struggle even further to get things done. Therefore being able to consistently maintain our self-belief is extremely important.
We need to believe that what we are doing is necessary and we need to have trust in our ability to get things done.
We need to have self-belief in our own ability to make the right decisions for our lives. We have to have some trust in our own ability to make sound judgements.
We have to believe in our ability to achieve, in order to have the possibility of achieving our aspirations.
If we simply fail to believe in our own ability to make the right choices for ourselves and to see those choices through, then it will be difficult for us to feel as though we are taking steps towards making progress in the various areas of our lives.
If we lack any real sense of self belief, then it may become virtually impossible to attain any real level of success during our lifetimes.
We need to establish a basic level of self-belief, otherwise we may feel that we cannot achieve, no matter how much others may try to convince us otherwise.
It doesn’t matter how much advice one receives and how much step by step instruction one gets, we have to believe that we have the ability to make our lives go forward in the way that we would like them to go.
We have to believe in our ability to make things better for ourselves. We have to maintain a positive attitude in the direction of progress.
We need that self-belief as a starting point; self-awareness, knowing one self and self-belief leads to self-determination. When we are self-determined and determined to get things done, we will develop the self-motivation to do it.
Once we are able to remain self-motivated then we are more likely to reach our goals. Once we achieve our goals, we are more likely to feel self-fulfilment.
Once we arrive at self-fulfilment then we may develop the desire to achieve even more and the positive self-fulfilling cycle continues.
We have to feel that we have done our best to make good of the opportunities in life which we have had.
I believe we need to feel that we have done our best to overcome our personal challenges, as well as done our best to achieve in situations of ease and opportunity.
If you want to make things better in your life, then try your best to change things for the better. If you doubt in your own ability to make things better, then simply persist in your mental quest to make changes.
Once you begin your mental quest to make changes, then pray about it. You have the ability to change your life for the better, if you begin to believe in the possibility for change.
Even if changes don’t happen overnight, the fact that you are evaluating a situation, instead of remaining ignorant to it, will mean that a change can come about.
The fact that you are changing the way that you perceive and think about a situation shows that you care about it.
Once you take the time to care about that area of your life, then eventually you will decide to take action, to change that area of your life.
No matter the uphill struggle, you have to commit to making a change, no matter how small that change may be. If you sit back and do nothing, it will be virtually impossible to change any area of your life.
You always need to take action to change the course of your life. If you really want to change an area of your life and make it successful, then you have to work towards making it a success according to what ‘success’ means to you.
Personal success for me means that one knows one self and knows the purpose and meaning of one’s own life.
That success comes about when one knows their creator and understands the true meaning of life.
The meaning of life for me, is for one to come to know Jesus as their Lord and Saviour.
Once you know Jesus as your Lord and Saviour then you will see that we all have a talent and we just have to open our hearts to Jesus, for the power of Jesus to begin to work through us bringing those natural talents to life.
We can then use those talents to make all areas of our lives more fulfilling.
When we begin to feel real fulfilment in all areas of our lives, then we will feel that we have obtained the ultimate success.
The best feeling whilst in this world, is the feeling you get when you finally wake up to the Truth within yourself and your life.
That success goes beyond this world and it’s the peace of knowing that we have the true success of knowing the True Living God.
Through accepting Jesus as our Lord and Saviour, we have the gift of eternal life.
That is the ultimate success! And once you come to realise this truth, the peace of knowing this Truth, will begin to enrich all areas of your life.
This is the ultimate success, knowing the Truth and knowing True life.
This success is everlasting and Jesus has already paid the price for you.
And once you come to realise this truth, you will recognise you have already achieved the best thing you could ever achieve, whilst on this journey.
The only success and achievement worth striving for, is to come to know the Truth. Open your heart to Jesus and you will come to know how it really feels to know that your life is already a success. It’s a success because you have opened your heart to the Truth.
Real success isn’t measured by what we have of physical things, I believe it is measured by what we come to know and feel in our hearts, when we open our hearts to the Light of Truth.
Come to know yourself within, open your heart to the Light of Jesus.
Jesus is the Way the Truth and the Life.
Jesus is the only way to True Everlasting Success in this world and in the Everlasting life to come.
This is the way to true success.
Receive the Truth and receive Everlasting success.
I can’t do it for you, only you can do it for yourself!
Receive the Truth
May God bless you!
Know The Truth Forever and Live 