Write it down!

9. October 2006

I have been reviewing my goals lately and particularly comparing how I run my personal life with how my company completes the fairing and painting of a superyacht.

I have found the fairing and painting of superyachts to be at times extremely arduous, challenging and frustrating primarily because we are contractually obliged to complete a project to an exact time, for an exact budget, and to an ever increasing level of quality but within a vague set of circumstances. Some aspects of a project are very clearly defined , time and budget, but all others are immensely varied. How the construction is managed by the shipyard, how co-operative all the differing trades people are when working together, who gets sick, how reliable material deliveries are, strikes, accidents etc. etc. However we do have a long history of getting the job done on time, on budget and to an acceptable standard largely because I have a very good team with a project manager who sets and works to defined, structured plans and goals. Planning works.

I have very much shied away from this approach to running my home and personal life because it just seemed too rigid and too “pushy” to be much fun; too much like work in fact. So I’ve tended to mooch along completing home renovation projects and personal goals etc. as and when the time feels right which was fine for awhile but lately its started feeling too wishy-washy and vague for me.

Recently, I had a little “aha” when I recognised that my primary “issue” with planning and completion dates was simply that historically they were something I had often felt were imposed upon me by others that I had little influence over. I felt disempowered, pushed and even bullied at times into agreeing to comply with anti-social schedules that had me/us working overly long hours to complete. No thank-you, not at home!

BUT in my home life and with my personal development I get to set the deadlines, its fully my choice. What if I set deadlines or milestones that really inspire and motivate me? Well then it becomes a whole different scenario. This is after all what goal setting is all about, the thought of the goal/destination continues to inspire you along the course to completion on a moment by moment basis.

Read any well regarded book on how to achieve the life of your dreams and you find that dreaming, planning and doing are essential ingredients in every recipe for success. Most of us are very good at the dreaming stage but come unstuck when it comes to formulating and committing to a plan. Perhaps its from numbing of old memories of having to do homework, be places on time, stop playing to fit timetables, be sensible, be good and the like that lead us to rebel against the very idea making plans?

Whatever, it is clear that planning and particularly writing your plans down is a key stage in manifesting swift positive results. After all you can only make a very simple object without written plans and even a basic task such as buying groceries can come badly unstuck without a written list. Writing is the first stage in grounding an idea into physical being, it holds that idea in a basic form, even if it is later developed or changed.

So write it down, make a plan, I have and its a great source of inspiration and motivation, more so than the open ended plans that I have made in the past. I began writing it on paper, then as an Excel spreadsheet but have now put it into an Omniplan project, this is a planning program that gives me a whole raft of ways to tweak and track my plans. I like a bit of technology but a simple pad of paper may be the best approach for you.

If this still all sounds like to much effort then I suggest you try writing yourself a simple To Do list at the start of the day and see what effect that has compared to a day without one.

Marc Allen is my favourite expert on “success”. He focuses on success with ease and lives an abundant easy life himself. Go Marc! The world needs more ease and joy I reckon, success the workaholic way is very well documented already (and not my idea of success anyway). I find Marc’s recipe much more flavoursome, you might want to check out Success With Ease, he’s giving away a free chapter for you to taste.

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