This process will change your life.
This is pretty simple but it takes hard work. It only requires discipline and knowledge. I will give you the knowledge. Are you ready to supply the discipline?
The first step to pulling yourself up by your bootstraps is to build a foundation to grow from
Step 1: Eliminate the debt.
There are 4 main reasons to eliminate debt from your life
- Gain mental and emotional freedom
- Focus your energy on reaching your goals( not giving your money to everyone else)
- Having debt is like living in a hole, you have to fill in that hole before you can climb higher
- You get to keep what is yours.
The plan my family is following to get out of debt is by Dave Ramsey. There is a ton of free info on his site and if you are willing to spend a little money I recommend you buy his book: The Total Money Makeover (if you buy it online you will save money)
Step 2: Find more time
Your priorities can be managed very much like your money. First, I believe in order to accomplish anything meaningful you need to set your priorities: do not let others set them for you. You need to plan to accomplish your highest priorities and stop doing the things that do not help you reach your goals. Once you have decided your priorities you need to focus your attention and energy (multitasking sucks)on completing those priorities.
There are 3 tools that I use to help me keep from wasting my time
- The time budget, it is like a money budget but you use it to decide where your time will go instead of your money
- Time Study, this is used to identify why you do not have enough time. You take it with you and write down what you are doing every 15 minutes. At the end of the day review the worksheet you filled out. What were you spending your time on that did not help you reach your goals?
- I learned this trick from Darren Hardy of Success Magazine (check out the blog on this technique here). You carry a stopwatch with you and whenever you are doing something that is helping you reach your goals then you keep it running, when you are not doing things that help you reach your goals then you stop it. At the end of the day look at the stopwatch, this is how much time you spent reaching your goals. Was this less time than you thought? Then you need to start spending more time trying to reach your goals or you will never reach them.
Step 3: Focusing your attention to accomplish your priorities
Getting Things Done (GTD) by David Allen is the system I use to keep track of everything I want to do and then get it done with out being distracted. This system is great because it can be used anywhere. It also helps you free your mind of the busy mundane stuff and allows it to be used on more productive work like solving problems and creative/meaningful thoughts.
Another concept to keep you from procrastination is to ask “What is the next action?” This allows you to focus on the little steps of a project and not get overwhelmed by the whole bunch of things you need to do.
Step 4: Find work you would love to do
First, let me say that I am going to tell you to start a business because of the freedom it allows you. Even though I recommend this I know owning a business is not for everybody but finding a type of work you love (yes it is possible) can be done even working for someone else. The system I use is taught by Dan Miller and the book I recommend is 48 Days To The Work You Love. This book changed my life and actually was the catalyst to get me moving on developing something I am passionate about (helping others bootstrap their lives) .
Here are some questions you should ask yourself to help figure out some type of work that you would live to do:
- What would you do with your time if money did not matter?
- How do you want to help someone else?
- What dreams did you have as a child?
- What hobbies do you have?
- What activities do you do that time seems to pass quickly?
The next step you need to do is write down 30 things that you would like to do for work. You need to be creative here.
Finally, no matter if you want to start a business or would prefer helping working with a company to help them reach their goals you need to differentiate yourself and be audacious. Being average is only going to help you to make average pay at an average job and have an average life.
Step 5: You need to set some goals.
You need to set some goals in your life. If you do not have goals it is driving to your vacation spot without a destination in mind. How are you every going to get there if you do not know where you are going? Your goals should be based on your priorities and your goals should be balanced. You are not a one dimensional person so you should not have one dimensional goals.
Use this worksheet to begin setting your goals: Here is the link. This is the exact one I use and I review it every week, I revise it once every year.
Once you decide on your goals then you need to choose one of the goals. List all of the things you need to reach that goal. Then order each item in the list by how then need to be accomplished (remember “What is my next action?”). Start prioritizing these steps in your time budget.
Step 6: Build your mastermind group
The mastermind group was a term made popular by Napoleon Hill in his book Think and Grow Rich (I highly recommend that you read this book). We are surrounded by people that want success but they do not want to do anything about it (I guess they really do not want success then) and they do not want you to succeed. They do everything to bring you down, they talk behind your back, they criticize you, they call you a suck up, they tell you that you are doing at all wrong, they tell you that no one could do what you are trying to do. You need to get these people out of your life. They are toxic. You need to do the opposite; you need to surround yourself with encouraging people that want to succeed in life. You need to start meeting with people regularly where you can talk about your wins and challenges and where you can trade ideas to help each other reach your goals.
First you need to list some people that are achievers. Then you teach them about this concept and see if they would be interested. Then yo ask them if they know anyone else that might be a good addition to the group. Finally, you meet regularly to reach your goals.
Just 6 steps to change your life. What you will find is that the end point is not not the best part. It is what you become trying to reach the goal.
Let me know how I can help you.