What are you hopes, goals and dreams for your life? How many of your goals or dreams for your life are tied to money or dependent upon money to achieve them? Many of our personal goals are tied to money. Not money itself, but the lifestyle or financial freedom that is a result of our financial achievements. Therefore, it is essential that we work on improving our knowledge of money, personal finances i.e. our financial literacy
We must be willing to accept full responsibility for the outcome of our lives. This is why our vision and goals for our life are so important. They can inspire and empower us.
People become empowered to take action to transform their lives when they learn that they have the ability to impact their lives, to achieve their goals and make their dreams become a reality. This realization or breakthrough creates hope for the future. It is this hope for the future that will compel people to take action, to stay the course, to overcome setbacks and to make conscious choices on a daily basis to move closer to their goals.
History is full of compelling stories of individuals who overcame adversity, lack of education, physical limitations, lack of financial resources, etc. to accomplish great things in their lifetimes. They were able to accomplish these great feats because they had a crystal clear vision of what they wanted to accomplish in their lives. They were unwilling to accept failure or be deterred from achieving their vision for their life.
Therefore, it is essential that we work on developing a crystal clear vision for our lives. This is the first step in our pursuing Financial Literacy for our lives. Financial Literacy is not just about the money. It is all about understanding the power of money, the impact of our financial choices, and how we can use our financial resources to accomplish our goals for our lives.
Everyone wants to achieve financial independence but few people actually achieve it. Why? Most people end up consuming their future by the financial choices they make every day. They never stop to consider the how their financial decisions today will impact their future. Unfortunately, many people never received any formal education in school regarding financial principles on money, budgeting, investing, etc. Therefore, they were at a disadvantage from an early age. For many people their only source of input on money came from their parents. Well intentioned parents may have never received any formal education on money during their lifetimes as well. Therefore, they may not have been the best source of information or set the best example with their personal finances for their families.
However, there is a group of people who achieve financial independence. There was a great book written that examined the lives, lifestyles and financial habits of self-made millionaires. There are no get rich quick stories. It is about average people who achieved above average results in their lives. The common denominator is revealed as you see the similarities in their lives. The book will provide you encouragement and insights into achieving the same goals for your life.
The book is “The Millionaire Next Door” by Thomas J. Stanley Ph.D. and William D. Danko Ph.D. Here is a link to Google Books for a preview and review of the book. http://bit.ly/asJ15s
It is interesting to note that approximately 80% of the people who achieved financial independence did so on their own, they did not inherit their money. They worked hard, lived conservatively, learned sound financial principles and became financially independent. These statistics should provide hope and encouragement for any person who wants to take control of their finances and move closer to financial independence. It all starts with a vision of what can be possible for our lives when we see that it became a reality in other people’s lives.
Therefore, It is critical that you stop and take some time to reflect on what you want, why you want it, what will it give you. This will help you create a vision for your life. Here are some questions to help you start working on creating a clear and concise vision for your life. A vision that you are passionate about achieving in your life. The list is not all-inclusive, but is only meant to serve as a reference to help get you started. It is your life and your future. Think Big and don’t limit yourself!
Questions to help you create a compelling vision and goals for your life
What are your hopes and dreams for someday?
What’s missing in my life?
What are you passionate about?
What things do you value most in life?
What gives you meaning and purpose in your life?
What is your idea of the perfect life?
What would it look it?
Where would you live?
How would you spend your time?
How would you touch and impact others lives?
What your natural gifts and talents? Are you using them to your benefit?
Are you living a balanced life?
What things do you value most in life?
What are you committed to personally that would be bring balance to your life?
How much money do you want to make?
What would you do with the money?
Why is being successful important to you?
How would you use your success to help others?
Vision Planning – This is the first step to creating a compelling vision for your life. You need to take your answers and insights from your planning questions and clearly articulate the vision for your life. This needs to be written as if it has already occurred in your life. I suggest writing from the perspective of a journal entry reflecting back on your awesome life at a given point in time in the future that you select. For example, a key birthday, a specific date like 12/31/2020. This vision for your life must be written be so clear that you can see it, feel it, touch it and experience it as if it has already occurred in your life.
Convert your vision into specific goals and commitments. Once you have clarified your vision for your life and committed your vision to writing, it will be much easier to establish meaningful goals. You want goals that will inspire you to take action. Goals that keep you committed to achieving your goals and ultimately the vision for your life. Why? Because your vision for the future will compel you take action today.
What actions MUST you take to achieve your goals? Break them down yearly, monthly, weekly daily. Nothing meaningful ever happens with our hopes, dreams or goals for our lives until we commit to a “specific date” that we will achieve our goals. Therefore, once you have committed to these dates, you are on a path to achieve your goals. Next you can start creating an action plan to achieve the goals you set for yourself. Therefore, you must take your goals and break them down into measurable tasks, activities and results that you can measure. This provides you a basis for tracking your progress and celebrating the achievement of your short-term goals and successes on the way to celebrating the achievement of your ultimate vision for your life.
What are your personal commitments to achieving your goals? You can create an awesome vision for your life, set specific goals and create action plans to help you achieve your vision for your life. However, without an unwavering personal commitment to changing your habits, actions and thoughts you will never achieve them. You need to realize that there will be setbacks, road blocks, break downs along the way to achieving the ultimate vision for your personal life and finances.
However, just like with every other person who has achieved something meaningful in their lives, they remained committed to their goals, hopes and dreams for their lives. They were unwilling to accept failure or be deterred from achieving their vision for their lives. Therefore, I suggest you read and reaffirm your vision for your life on a daily basis. Think about it, dwell on it and act on it every day until it becomes a reality in your life. You can achieve your dreams…..
I hope this blog post has added value to your life. I hope it has inspired you to take action. If so, I hope you will forward this post to someone else who might benefit and become inspired in their lives. You can follow my posts on Twitter as well.
The focus of this blog will be Financial Literacy. The goal of Financial Literacy is to help educate and empower people transform their lives in a way that not only touches and impacts their lives but also gives them the resources to touch and impact others lives. That is why I have created Fiscal Literacy.
I wanted to leave you with a compilation of famous quotes on the subject of vision, goals, etc. I hope they inspire you to take action in your life today, not someday….
Inspirational Quotes
“People never plan to be failures; they simply fail to plan to be successful” William Ward
“Vision is the art of seeing the invisible” Jonathon Swift
“Goals are not only absolutely necessary to motivate us. They are essential to really keep us alive” Robert Schuller
“Goals determine your thoughts – thoughts determine your life” Anonymous
“The greatest thing limiting ourselves, is our conversation with ourselves” Scott Cummings
“Your life is an expression of all of your thoughts” Marcus Aurelius
“What the human mind can conceive and believe, it can accomplish” David Sarnoff
“Some men succeed because they are destined to, but most men because they are determined to succeed” Anonymous
“Success if it is to be, it is up to me” Anonymous
“Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly” Robert F. Kennedy
“If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with success unexpected in common hours.” Henry David Thoreau
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