And recent dream research has led to the possibility that dreams serve no purpose or function. Some researchers lean in the direction of these ideas:

• Dreams are not necessary for either physical or psychological health.
• There is reason to doubt that dreaming helps solve our day-to-day problems.
• Dream interpretation may be a complete waste of time. And those who claim they know what dream symbols mean, may know nothing.

For example, if you dream that a person is chasing you down a dark street, does that mean you are running away from confronting someone about an issue? If you fall off a cliff and hit the ground, does that mean you, or someone you know, is about to die? Doubtful.

These above comments may surprise or annoy you. Yet you should be aware that much is new in the world of dream research. Let’s begin with a big myth that most people seem to believe—everyone dreams.

The world of non-dreamers

Some people don’t dream at all. It’s true. And they carry on with their lives and remain mentally healthy. You may scoff and say these people do dream but simply cannot remember their dreams. Research proves you wrong.

Many people who have suffered a traumatic brain injury, perhaps from a stroke or tumour, lose their ability to dream at all. Damage to the front area of the brain often leads to a condition known as global cessation of dreaming. The person no longer dreams or has completely lost the ability for dream recall.

You may also be surprised to learn that a small percentage of healthy people who have not had an injury do not dream either. How do researchers know this? It has to do with REM sleep. REM stands for rapid eye movement. Back in 1953, REM sleep was discovered by two researchers who noticed that the eyeballs moved beneath the lids when people were dreaming.

Until recently, REM sleep was always thought to mean a person was in the dream state. However, when sleep lab researchers observe some people in REM sleep and wake them up and ask them if they were dreaming, they say no. By the way, another new finding is that people can dream in non-REM sleep also.

Children who don’t dream

Another surprising finding is that young children under the age of nine have limited capability for dreaming. Renowned dream researcher David Foulkes points out that the brain has to develop the ability to dream. So contrary to popular belief, young children don’t dream much and the dreams they do have are not well developed until about the age of 10.

As for Krishnamurti’s comments above, he said a mind that is fully alive and aware has no need for dreams. When you are awake and intently observing the world around you, without judging or comparing, simply watching, your mind becomes so alive that dreams are unnecessary. Sleep then becomes a time of complete renewal and you enter a different state of being that is beyond the mind and dreams.

Yet, dreaming is something that most people do. However, we remember less than five per cent of what we dream about. So why do some people have such vivid, elaborate dreams? There are bad reasons and good reasons.

The dark side of elaborate dreams

Some people have dreams that are so elaborate; they act them out in a negative way. These are people with a sleep disorder called REM sleep behaviour disorder, also sometimes abbreviated as RBD.

Normally, during the dream state, the body is completely paralysed. Nature has made sure we cannot move while dreaming. The muscles go completely limp. Thankfully, we sleep in beds for the most part because if you were sitting in a chair and dreaming, you might find yourself on the floor.

However, in REM sleep behaviour disorder, the muscles are not paralysed. This can be dangerous because whatever vivid dream this person is having, they begin to physically act it out.

Imagine a person with RBD who is dreaming of being attacked by giant, poisonous butterflies. This person may swat and swing at the insects. Their arms flail; they may kick. There are many instances where bed partners have been hit with fists and severely injured. Sometimes furniture gets broken as the dreamer jumps on it or throws an alarm clock across the room.

The alarming dreams of new mothers

Postpartum infant dreams are another type of dream that can be quite vivid for new mothers. The dreams revolve around danger to their new babies. A mother may feel the child is lost or suffocating in their bed.

While sleeping, the mother may call out, cry, or feel around in the bed searching for the infant. In some cases, she may act out the dream and grab her bed partner, looking for the baby. There are even instances where the dreams are so real, the mother will sleepwalk in search of the infant.

The bright side of vivid, elaborate dreams

When I was a young boy, many moons ago, I had a favourite uncle I spent a lot of time talking with. He told me fanciful stories about his dreams. As long as he could remember he was able to fly in his dreams. I found this fascinating and was captivated by the wild tales he told me of the things he did and the people he met, all while he was asleep.

Not only could he fly, he could control everything that happened in his dreams. If he wanted to talk to someone, he had no fear of doing so. If he wanted to go somewhere, he’d go. He remembered colours, details, and exaggerated themes in these dreams.

This type of dreaming is known as lucid dreaming and is perhaps the most elaborate and fun type of dreaming. In lucid dreaming, just as with my uncle, a person is able to do almost anything they want. There are no rules. There are no limitations. There are no consequences. It’s almost as though you become a director of your own movie.

Prepare yourself to dream what you want

There are two possible reasons why some people have more elaborate dreams than others. First, some people are intently interested in their dreams. They make it a point to remember their dreams and write them down. If you would like to do the same, keep a dream journal or dream diary next to your bed. As soon as you wake up, write down what you were dreaming.

Second, some people, with practice, can tell themselves to dream about a particular topic, and they do. This can produce a more detailed dreaming experience.

Whether you dream or don’t, I think it’s clear there is a bridge that connects your waking life and your sleeping life. What happens when these two worlds merge into one? Only you can discover that for yourself by driving across that bridge. The vehicle that carries you is awareness.

The post What dreams may come appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.

There is a certain aura that surrounds him. You cannot escape his piercing eyes, his glowing face, his energetic demeanour and his 1000 watt smile. His responses are spontaneous and unpretentious and yet there’s a charm about him that makes him endearing. Meet Robin Sharma, the man who lives on his own terms, and shows you how you too can do the same…

Manoj khatri: Let’s start with The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari. What inspired you to write such a book? Just like the protagonist, you too were a practising lawyer. So it seems to be an autobiographical account… are you the monk?

Robin Sharma: Yes, a lot of Julian Mantle’s story is my story. So you’re right. I was a litigation lawyer by profession. The challenge I faced was that I was living someone else’s life. I was living the life that society had sold me on the true meaning of success. I was well educated, I had a lovely office, I had two law degrees… and yet when I’d wake up in the morning, I’d feel completely empty and frustrated and disconnected with my purpose and my true values. So yes, Julian Mantle is me in many ways. Thankfully, I didn’t have a heart attack. But I went on my own odyssey and started searching—I wanted to understand what are the tools and what a life well lived is all about. And I made a profound transformation with what I learnt… about rewiring your mindset, rewiring your values and rewiring your behaviours. That’s what inspired me to write The Monk…

And it started as nothing more than a dream, I was laughed at. I think if you’re not being laughed at a lot, you’re not doing very much. I had a vision, and all I had going for me was my instinct, my gut. And I knew that people will be inspired by this book, they will connect with it and it will help transform them and help them become what they want to be. So I just went out there, step-by-step, sharing the message of the book with one person at a time. Soon the book started travelling around the world through word-of-mouth and it became what it is now.

Manoj khatri: Where did you learn the ‘rewiring’ part?

Robin Sharma: Well, you can say that I’m the product of every book I’ve ever read, every conversation I’ve ever had and every place I’ve ever been to. So everything has been my teacher. Suffering has been my teacher. Success has been my teacher. My kids have been my teacher. The taxi driver in Mumbai who told me that guests are God and that’s why he treats every single person as the most important in the world… he has been my teacher. So for The Monk… I got my inspiration from books, experiences and conversations and a lot of time just spent in solitude, in self-reflection.

Manoj khatri: It’s evident that The Monk… came about as a result of a transformation within you. And so did all the success afterwards. What does success mean to you?

Robin Sharma: I think that as we go more out into the world, it becomes even more important to stay alone. So what I try to do is spend most of my time with my family, my close friends, my team, my books, my journal… and in nature with my thoughts. I don’t watch a lot of TV. I don’t spend a lot of my time in restaurants. This way I stay connected with my core values and my core mission so that it doesn’t get diluted by the world around me. I think once you’re successful, what you want to do is protect your vision, conserve your energy and safeguard your values.

Manoj khatri: You seem to be absolutely clear about your priorities in life. But that’s what most people struggle with. They know that it’s important for them to give time to their families, their friends, their health and yet they seem to always put these lower in the list of priorities… many fear that they may not be able to fulfil their role as a good parent/spouse and so on unless they work hard and long. What advice do you have for those who are faced with such a dilemma?

Robin Sharma: Well, I say this with great respect, but most people haven’t made the time to think about what they want. And let’s go to the neurobiology behind this. It’s because we have a neurobiological instinct to follow what everyone else is doing. So, hundreds of years ago, when there was a threat of leaving the herd and being eaten by a cheetah, that instinct served us. But now we’re in Mumbai, Calcutta, or Chennai and we haven’t taken the time to think of what’s most important to us. We don’t know our own priorities; we don’t know our own values; we don’t have a vision. A lot of people say to me, “I’m too busy to do my vision.” But actually their busyness is just an addiction to mask the fact that they are really bored. If you don’t know what’s important to you then you’re going to have to fill the hours with too much TV and too much busyness. So how do you to avoid that? Number one, you do something as simple as planning. Take the time to write a one-page plan and ask yourself [I talk about it in my books] what five things must happen between now and the end of this year for this to be the best year you’ve ever had in your life. I call it my ‘big five.’ Every morning you look at your big five priorities and then you commit to them.

Number two, you look at your goals. How many people set goals for each quarter of the year and then build a schedule around advancing these goals? It’s all about the execution. People say, “Well, these ideas in The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari and The Leader Who Had No Title don’t work. But no idea works unless you do the work. So you’ve got to execute. Each day you’ve got to advance your priorities versus living the priorities of the world. You’ve got to turn off the TV or say no to every social engagement. You have to find a vision that burns inside you so much that you are willing to say NO to the entertainment, in order to manifest your vision. Study any great master and you’ll find that they didn’t spend the best hours of their days in distraction; instead they spent all their time pursuing their craft and their dream.

Manoj khatri: What is the biggest challenge to pursue your dream?

Robin Sharma: I think it is to leave the herd—it is one of the biggest challenges we face. We spend the best hours of our best days following the herd around us. And we think that just because most people spend their best hours watching TV, or sending text messages, we think this is how you live a life. And just because most people complain and give away their power, we think this is how you live. Yet, all masters and all leaders have one thing in common: they have the guts to leave the herd and live their life on their own terms—without any regard to what anyone else was doing.

Manoj khatri: Talking about leadership… how do you define it? And how can a leader strike a balance between her commercial goals and the human development aspect?

Robin Sharma: No matter what you do—run a company, make films or clean toilets—you can still show leadership. The number one way we give away our power is that we think we don’t have any. How many people say: I’m not the Managing Director or I’m not the boss so I can’t make a difference. I met a woman in South Africa, who washed people’s toilets and she thought hers was the most important job in the world. And she worked like Picasso painted. A job is only a job if we choose to see it as a job. All work has dignity, all work is noble. Whether you cook, you clean toilets, sweep streets, see it as a craft and see it as honourable. Make it better everyday. Inspire people by your mastery. So my message is: no matter what you do in your own work, see it as your craft and pursue mastering it everyday—because all work is a chance to express your creativity. All work is a chance for you to meet your fears and transcend them. All work is a chance for you to inspire other human beings. Therefore all work is chance for you to change the world.

Coming to your question… you asked how should leaders align the competing objectives business goals and the human responsibility. Well, I actually think they are not competing. The job of a leader is to grow more leaders. If you’re not inspiring the people around you and helping them do their best work, you’re not leading. But here’s my point. If you spend your days in inspiring and developing talent, encouraging the discouraged, helping them do what they never thought was possible… they are going to wow their customers, they’re going to be more productive, they’re going to meet their vision, they’re going to give their heart and soul to your business. What’s that going to do to the profitability?

Manoj khatri: I have not a single doubt that this is absolutely correct. But any transformation takes time—there is a lag between when you begin to do this and when it begins to show results. How does one develop faith?

Robin Sharma: Yeah, you’ve got to have the guts to believe in yourself when no one else believes in you. India is the land of the great Mahatma Gandhi. When he started the salt march, he was an army of one. All he had going for him was his conviction. And where does that come from? Sometimes you just don’t know. You just have to have a dream for your job, a dream for your life. And have the guts to connect with that. How do you stay true to that? Well, you write about it in your journal, which actually deepens your commitment. You get up early and you pray, meditate, visualise. Read great business books and autobiographies and stay inspired and block out negativity. When the critic says, “This will never work,” dismiss the critic. And if you get knocked down because you fail, you just get back up. And the more you do that, the stronger you get. And if you start advancing towards your vision everyday, you start to get some traction. You get some momentum. Like Gandhi… everybody who started following Gandhi empowered him and his vision. Right now, when I look at the global movement around The Monk… and The Leader… on social media, I get inspired to keep going. I could retire right now. So what’s keeping me going is that I’m starting to get more traction. More than ever before, people are saying to me they are making the transformation. So, step-by-step, when you start to get the results—which you eventually will, because success is a numbers game—you start to believe in your vision.

Manoj khatri: What are the five most important things you do to stay inspired and focused on your vision?

Robin Sharma: The first thing is just an idea: I’m not a victim. I show leadership. I don’t play victim and I own the results of my life. I take absolute responsibility. I’m not a cat or a dog. Victims make excuses. Leaders deliver results. If you look for excuses you’ll find them.

If you say, “I read The monk… but I can’t do it because I’m too busy paying my mortgage,” you will get to live out that excuse for the rest of your life. So it’s an idea but the more you think about it, the more it becomes a belief. Do not be a victim, show leadership and get big things done.

Second thing I do: I live in a bubble. I don’t want to live in a real world and I don’t live in a real world. Who wants to live in a real world? Because there, most people are victims, most people are negative. In the real world, most people gossip, and spend their best hours SMSing… I live in a bubble, a pristine bubble of absolute focus around positivity and getting my dreams done. What does that mean in practice? It means that I don’t really watch the NEWS. If someone’s negative, I walk away politely; my friends are positive; my home is inspiring; I love great books; I don’t read cheesy magazines; I don’t pollute my mind with toxic thoughts or influences because those will affect my inspiration, my ideas, my focus and my results.

Number three: Ideas without execution are a delusion. I plan, I schedule every morning. I’m meticulous about where my hours go. This is not just inspiration, this is tactical. I have a one-year plan and I have a five-year plan; I look at my plan every morning and I set a weekly plan. In that way, I execute, nearly flawlessly, all my goals for every quarter. Like a great business is all about strategic plans and execution, I have dreams but dreams without plans and sequencing don’t get done. So, become a master of planning, sequencing, execution and time management. The hours that ordinary people waste, excellent performers use. People say, I’m too busy.” Well, how many hours do you spend on SMS or on your smart phone?

Number four: I learn. The world belongs to learners. You look at Picasso, Jack Welch, Richard Branson, Lady Gaga… these people are students of their crafts. So if you look at any genius, they have one thing in common: they know more about their craft more than anyone in their field in the history of the world. I spend a lot of time listening to audio books, watching videos, reading, learning.

Number five: I love to journal. Journaling is when I reconnect with my vision, my values. I record the highlights of my day, so I pour gratitude via dopamine into my brain so I feel better. How do I stay inspired? Being inspired isn’t lucky. You ‘make’ inspired. You don’t discover success, you create success. My journal allows me to record my awareness so I stay very clear on what’s important. My journal allows me to notice the miracles of my day and allows me to learn and download the benefits and miracles that each day presents.

Manoj khatri: So what’s your typical day like?

Robin Sharma: The most consistent thing that I do is that I get up at 5am and I journal. That is the most consistent thing ever. I love having a cup of coffee… you know that its nature’s number one antioxidant and it boosts brain function? And with coffee, I write. I write about my victories, my gratitude, reconnect with my goals and how I’m feeling. And I always exercise first thing in the morning to kick-start my day. And then sometimes I do some meditation, but not consistently. The only consistent thing is the journaling, the exercising, and the reading.

Manoj khatri: Finally, what is your idea about the purpose of life?

Robin Sharma: I think on the last hour of our last day, when we look back and survey our life, what would have defined our life will not be the watch on our wrist, our social standing, the title on our business card and our net worth.

I suggest only two things will matter.

Number one: Who did you become? Were you fearless? Did you achieve a level of self mastery? Did you think great thoughts? Were you positive? Did you have excellent, strong character?

Number two: How many people did you help? How many lives did you touch? What value did you create through your creativity and productivity? In other words, did you leave the world better than you found it? My dad used to recite the words of the great Indian poet, Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore. He said to me, “Son, when you were born you cried while the world rejoiced. Well Robin, live your life in such a way that when you die, the world cries while you rejoice.”

So purpose is about remembering that before you know it, it will all be dust. It’s time to step up and do great work that will change the world. It’s time to use your life not just for your own selfish needs but to inspire other people and to create value for other people and to build A FANTASTIC WORLD. And just because other people don’t think like this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t, if you want to become the Picasso of your life.

Manoj khatri: That’s a beautiful thought. Thank you so much Robin, for sharing your inspiring ideas with us.

Robin Sharma: Thanks for the opportunity, Manoj.

The post “Victims make excuses. Leaders deliver results” — Robin Sharma appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.

When I was 11 years old, I began to use a secret power, setting events in motion that have taken me to places I’ve only dreamed of and beyond. It is a phenomenon that has continued to manifest positive outcomes to this day.

It is the power of enthusiasm

It all began when my father built a “dream machine” for my younger brother and me in our backyard. If you had seen it, you would have said it was a tree-house, but for me, it was truly a dream machine. I can remember climbing up, usually at dusk, as the stars began to twinkle across the big Texas sky, and dream of all that I believed was possible, leaving behind the reality of my life.

Looking back, I realised that even my parents used this power to visualise their dream for their sons: the education they could never afford.

To save for that goal, my dad moved us into the back of his tiny barber shop which was located in a small strip centre on the Eastside of San Antonio, Texas. I shined shoes and watched as he treated every customer as if they were the first patron of the day.

He wasn’t selling haircuts. He was selling an experience, spiced with enthusiasm.

After every haircut, for which my dad charged a dollar, I would run to the corner drug store and change the bill into quarters. My dad kept several empty cigar boxes inside a cabinet in the barber shop. Each one represented a fund. One was for rent, one for groceries, one for our education and so on. I can still see him placing each coin in the box and hearing the tiny clink it made. When I think of that now, I realise what he did to provide for his family, one quarter at a time. It was a sound and a lesson I will never forget. The sound of enthusiasm.

Fasten your seatbelt. I am about to tell you how I believe enthusiasm works, why it works and, most importantly, how it can work for you.

What is enthusiasm?

The word enthusiasm comes from the Greek word, enthousiasmos. En means in and theos means God or spirit. So, to be enthusiastic literally means, “to have the spirit within”.

It was that spirit that launched my vision of the future as I sat quietly in my “dream machine”, imagining all that I believed was possible. I’d like to humbly share three personal dreams that illustrate how the use of enthusiasm not only manifests abundance, but can also accelerate the positive outcome you desire.

Dream number one: Radio

For as long as I can remember, I have been fascinated with the wonder of radio. I would listen to the “man in the speaker” and just know that someday I would be that man. When my head hit the pillow every night, under it was a transistor radio with the volume barely turned up so only I could hear the music, the banter, the magic.

I decided to create my own radio shows, using my small tape recorder and portable record player. While talking into the microphone in one hand, I played and changed the records with the other, producing my five minute “shows”. I would play these “pretend programmes” for my friends, one at a time, on the phone. That’s how badly I wanted to be the “man in the speaker”.

While attending the University of Texas at El Paso, I landed my first radio job, making a whopping $1.25 an hour. [I thought I had died and gone to heaven!] Was it possible to get paid for having this much fun?

Within six short years from the time I left home, my career had taken me to the airwaves of one of the top stations in the nation: KMPC Radio in Los Angeles. My unbridled enthusiasm and love of radio had brought me to where I knew I would someday arrive. The moment I dreamed it, I already had. While my microphone had changed from that small tape recorder in the back of my father’s barber shop to a 50,000 watt signal in one of the largest radio markets in the world, my reason for doing it had not: to share my joy.

“Everything you can imagine is real.”
—Pablo Picasso

Dream number two: Cartoons

At an early age I discovered an almost uncanny ability to mimic voices and sounds I heard. One afternoon, after school, I was watching my favourite cartoon show, Yogi Bear, and a little duck named Yakky Doodle kept following Yogi, saying, “Mr Bear, would you be my momma?”

I turned off the set and decided that I could mimic that voice and, one day, I would do voices for cartoons. Keep in mind that I’m sitting there, watching a black and white Philco TV [Google it!] with a coat hanger for an antenna, not realising that cartoon voice artists are professionals, live in Hollywood and have years of experience.

It took a few weeks, after practising day after day, to finally re-create the little duck’s voice. It was exactly as I had heard it. I was only a kid, but I had been able to do it because I didn’t know that I couldn’t.

Fast-forward to my radio show in Los Angeles. An agent calls me and says something like, “I’ve heard all your voices on radio and was wondering, have you ever thought about doing cartoons?” Was he kidding?! I’d dreamed about it! Within days, I had my first job providing voices for new episodes of The Jetsons cartoon series, working at the Hanna-Barbera Studios: the home of Yogi Bear and that little duck!

Once again, what my enthusiastic boyhood imaginings had set into motion had come to be true. By the way, it was during those sessions that I met and worked with the legendary Mel Blanc. He provided the voice of “Mr Spacely” who was “George Jetson’s” boss on the popular series.

Mr Blanc was a legend and perhaps, the greatest cartoon voice artist of all-time, giving life to countless characters, including Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, Sylvester the Cat and Tweedy, Foghorn Leghorn and more, many more.

He became a mentor, teaching me many of these famous voices. In doing so he also taught me that the “ladder of life” is one hand extended to someone who pulls you up to where they are, while you extend your other hand to pull someone where you are.

Dream number three: Disney

As a child, one of my secret dreams was to be a part of the magic Walt Disney had created. I didn’t know how or when, I just knew I wanted to join in the fun. After all, I was already a card-carrying member of the Mickey Mouse Club!

That door “magically” opened in 1981, when I got wind that Disney was planning its own presence on worldwide cable and satellite TV: The Disney Channel. The idea of hosting a Disney programme was over the moon and the sun! I went to work writing a treatment for a weekly show I titled, “Saturday in the Park”. Somehow, my agent was able to get me in front of the Disney “suits”—the decision-makers. My heart was beating out of my chest as I drove onto Disney’s Buena Vista Studios in Burbank.

With great enthusiasm, I presented my idea of leading a small army of children in parks across America, explaining how our guest stars would suddenly appear in various settings and perform for our audience, both at home, and at the park. Staring back at me were three men and a lady who would occasionally turn to the others and raise her brow.

“They’re not buying it,” I thought to myself, but I refused to let my guard down. I truly believed in the concept. I believed in Disney.

As I finished, they spoke softly among themselves, then said something that I will remember for the rest of my life. “Sonny, that’s a nice idea, but it’s not what we’re looking for. However, we think you’d be perfect for another show we’re producing, called, You and Me, Kid!”

Sometimes opportunity knocks. Sometimes it taps gently on your window. And, sometimes it drives by and you must run out to the street and flag it down with great enthusiasm!

“All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.”
—Walt Disney

These three dreams and their outcome serve to illustrate the influence of enthusiasm on well-intentioned ambitions. I referred to it as a “secret power” because I am convinced that the real secret lies in the mantra: Never stop thinking like a child. You are not just the age you are; you are every age you ever were. Let the kid inside you come out and play!

The elements of successful enthusiasm

I’ve found that there are distinct elements that enhance the full force of enthusiasm. They are: Vision, Commitment, Action, Belief, Gratitude and Servitude.

Vision

Much has been written about the importance of “the feeling” one has when one is filled with enthusiasm. It is my experience that it comes from why we set out to accomplish, rather than what it is we visualise. Sir Edmund Hillary, the first man to climb Mt. Everest, said, “People do not decide to become extraordinary. They decide to accomplish extraordinary things.”

Consider the story of American swimmer, Florence May Chadwick, who, at age 31, became the first woman to swim the English Channel both ways in 1950 – 51. And, while many consider this to be her crowning glory, Ms Chadwick had another dream to accomplish: Become the first person to swim the 26 mile channel between Catalina Island and the California Coast.

On a foggy morning in 1952, she attempted to swim the distance. There was a thick fog, the waters were choppy and men on row boats, at times, fired shotguns to scare off occasional circling sharks. Florence began to doubt her own ability and told her mother she wasn’t sure she could make it, swimming for another hour before asking to be pulled out of the water. Around that time, the fog began to lift and she saw the shore only a mile away.

Two months later, with the vision of the shoreline emblazoned in her mind, under the same exact conditions, she reached her goal in less time than her previously failed attempt. Florence later told a reporter that it was the vision of her destination that kept her going.

Commitment

Legendary Hall of Fame football coach, Vince Lombardi, once said, “Most fail, not because of lack of desire, but because of lack of commitment.”

Let’s face it: everyone has dreams and desires of things they’ll accomplish one day. But it’s the commitment to making it happen that shows true character. In his book, Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience, Steve Maraboli begs us to “Set the standard! Stop expecting others to show you love, acceptance, commitment and respect when you don’t even show that to yourself.”

Action

While commitment is the contract, action is the work. It is the seeds you plant daily that bring you the fruit of your labour.

While living in Los Angeles, I was having lunch with an actor friend one afternoon. He was lamenting that after two years of giving audition after audition, he hadn’t landed a single job.

I asked, “What are you doing to grow your craft?”

He said, “What do you mean?”

“What are you doing to grow your craft?” I repeated.

“Going to auditions!” he replied.

I explained that, perhaps, the reason he wasn’t progressing in his career was because he wasn’t doing his part to prepare for success. Then, I came up with a simple formula: Every day, before you play, do three things that will bring your closer to your goal.

In his case, it could be attending an acting workshop, writing a letter to a producer, working on creating a one-man show. I asked him to imagine these actions as three seeds he was planting in his garden of realisation. If you do the math, three seeds a day, five days a week [taking weekends off] equals to 15 seeds a week and 60 seeds a month equals to 720 seeds planted in the next 12 months. [How much better would you become, applying this formula to your craft or goal?]

A year later, I ran into my friend who told me that he had been cast in a new sitcom. The seeds-of-action he had planted had taken root and when the opportunity came, he was prepared!

Belief

This is the foundation and the strongest element of success through the use of enthusiasm. When you truly believe in what you see, your vision begins to take on a life of its own. People, resources and circumstances will begin to appear.

Coincidences are just that, co-incidences or two related incidences that seem to have happened by chance. That chance is created by belief. As Einstein puts it, “Coincidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous.”

The vision of your dream, no matter your level of enthusiasm, can be a lonely experience. Even those closest to you—your mate, best friend or family—cannot see what you see. Some may discourage you by questioning your efforts. Know that, while they may mean well, it’s not their fault. After all, they want what’s best for you.

Don’t give up.

Gratitude

A college professor wanted to teach his students the concept of gratitude. During his first class of the day, at 8am, he asked everyone to draw a line down the centre of a sheet of paper. “On the left side,” he instructed, “I want you to list all the things you dislike about your life. Then, on the right side, list everything you are happy about.”

After several minutes, most of the students had a much longer list on the left side of their papers. As they slowly finished, he said, “Count the number of items on the left and remember that number.”

Next to his desk was a large box of potatoes, next to a pile of burlap sacks. He told them to come forward and place the number of potatoes in a sack that represented the number of their displeasures in life. Finally, he asked them to carry the load from class to class and when someone asked, to tell them what the potatoes represented.

By noon, there were abandoned sacks of potatoes throughout the campus.

These students were tired of lugging around their “baggage of the past”, and thus, realised a new found perspective of gratitude.

Robert A Emmons, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Davis, spent years studying gratitude and found that “people who practised gratitude daily [for example: writing in a journal] reported higher levels of alertness, enthusiasm, determination, attentiveness and energy than those who didn’t.”

Servitude

When you drive to a radio station at 4am to do a morning radio show, there aren’t a lot of choices when it comes to grabbing breakfast at a fast food drive-through along the way. The same can be said for the level of service at that time of the day.

But one morning everything changed as I pulled up to the speaker of a local restaurant to order a couple of breakfast tacos and a cup of coffee. [In case you’re not familiar with them, breakfast tacos are made of scrambled eggs and usually a couple of strips of bacon, served on freshly made tortillas. Delicious!]

Instead of hearing the normal monotone voice asking for my order, I heard: “Welcome to Taco Cabana. How may I serve you?” The voice was as pleasant as the words. Music to my ears at 4am.

When I pulled up to the window I found a lovely lady named Ruby who introduced herself and told me that if I would wait “just a second” she’d see that the bacon was “nice and fresh”. She said all this while putting the cream and sweetener I had asked for into the cup. After stirring the coffee, she carefully placed the plastic cover and even pulled back the little flap that always seems to break off. I watched in disbelief and could hardly wait to share the experience with my radio audience.

Every morning, afterward, I would pull up and receive the same service Ruby cheerfully provided to all her now loyal customers. Through our brief conversations, I found out that she was a single mom and was saving to send her teenage son to college. How easy it would have been for this lady to lament her circumstances and wonder what happened to her life as she tried to make ends meet, while working for minimum wage in the middle of the night.

Not Ruby.

She had plans for herself and her enthusiastic attitude was going to get her to where she was going. Then, one morning she did something that I share with audiences every time I speak.

Let me back up and say that because I enjoyed giving prizes on my radio show, it was not unusual for someone to stop me on the street and ask if I have any movie passes, CD’s, etc.

Well, that’s what I thought was happening when Ruby casually asked one morning, “Sonny, you wouldn’t by any chance have any tickets for tonight’s Spurs basketball game, would you?”

“No Ruby, I’m afraid I don’t.”

[I thought to myself that if anyone deserves to ask, it was Ruby.]

Ruby, then, reached into her pocket and said, “Well, I would like you to have mine. You see I was chosen Employee of the Month and they gave me these tickets. Since I can’t go I thought I would give them to my best customer.”

My eyes welled up because of the lesson I had just learned from this beautiful human being. I graciously accepted her kind offer and thanked her for her generosity. I gladly report that today, Ruby is office manager for a city department and no longer works graveyard hours.

Her attitude determined her altitude. Moreover, she has given many of us the true meaning of the phrase, “How may I serve you?”

Enthusiasm is infectious and serves to inspire those around you. Would you rather be around someone who is filled with optimism or someone who exudes negativity?

Three common myths about enthusiasm

Myth: Enthusiasm is a personality trait. You are either born with it or you are not.

Truth: This is like saying, you are either born knowing how to swim or you are not. Enthusiasm begins with what you want and how badly you want it. Where there is enthusiasm, there is a way!

Myth: You have to feel enthusiastic. You can’t just act that way.

Truth: Dale Carnegie used to say, “If you want to be enthusiastic, act enthusiastic!” You can put the cart before the horse. That is, you can become the enthusiastic individual you want to be by acting the part. Sooner or later, you will no longer be acting.

Myth: People who are enthusiastic are a turn-off to others.

Truth: Enthusiasm is infectious and serves to inspire those around you. Would you rather be around someone who is filled with optimism or someone who exudes negativity?

How to use enthusiasm in your everyday life

• Start your day with the idea that nothing will deter your inner spirit. For instance, if traffic is especially heavy on your way to work, use the time to focus on ideas rather than manufacture unnecessary anxiety.
• Be aware of words you use to describe yourself. Phrases like, “Well, with my luck…,” “Story of my life!” or “At this rate, I’m never going to…” become affirmations and are counter-productive.
• Imagine you are a human laser with the ability to zap anyone you see with positive energy. Silently, wish the best for them, then, blast your positive beam toward them. [This may sound silly, but what you are doing is sending a message to the universe about what you want for yourself.]
• Encourage others. One of my favourite quotes of all-time was written by a philosopher who lived in the first century named Philo of Alexandria. He said, “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a great battle.” Centuries later, these words were never truer. Your kind word, or just a smile, may be the best thing that happens to someone all day. Make it a habit to practise deliberate acts of kindness.
• Show enthusiasm by the clothes you wear, the way you walk and through your body language. Exude your joy.
• Wrap enthusiasm around the moments of your life. Eckhart Tolle, author of The Power of Now, urges us to “Realise deeply that all we ever have is the present moment.”

The gift

Enthusiasm involves suspending disbelief and “meeting your dreams halfway”.

Imagine you’re sitting in a comedy club, watching a talented comic impressionist. You don’t fold your arms and say, “That’s not who you are!” You know that they are not the person being impersonated, but your mind delights in “meeting them halfway”, resulting in the gift of laughter.

So it is with enthusiasm. You are trusting that you truly can succeed. It is that trust that results in the gift of purpose-filled accomplishment.

One final thought

Remember that the power of enthusiasm works best when you are coming from a place of what you can do for someone else. Rather than saying, “What’s in it for me?” Ask yourself, “What’s within me for others?”

Our life’s true measure lies in how we treat those who can do nothing for us. That’s when you’ll know its happening.

That’s your spirit within.

The post The unstoppable power of enthusiasm! appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.

In the summer of 2007, Mike Hyatt and several other friends joined me in Ireland for a few days of golf. Mike has been in publishing since he was in college and has done just about everything in the industry at one time or another. He’s been an author, an agent, a publisher, and even a publishing house founder. Mike is an exceptional leader. Until recently, he was the president and CEO of Thomas Nelson, Inc.

I enjoy playing golf. Though I’m not much better than average as a golfer, I love being on beautiful courses, and I like the exercise. But I also believe that golf outings are great times to build relationships and to do some business. Early one morning in Ireland as I was talking to Mike, I showed him the working outline for my book Put Your Dream to the Test. After reading through it, he immediately said, “John, you have to include a chapter on the importance of a clear vision. If you don’t have clarity, you don’t have anything.” And then he began telling me a story from his experience.

Opportunity of a lifetime

In July 2000, Mike’s boss at Thomas Nelson suddenly resigned. At that time, Mike was the associate publisher of Nelson Books, the trade book division of the company, and he was invited to take his former boss’s job as publisher. “I knew our division was in bad shape,” Mike explains. “But I didn’t know how bad things really were until I became the publisher. I took a deep breath and began to assess reality.” Here’s what Mike discovered:

• His was the least profitable of fourteen divisions in the company.
  In fact, his division had actually lost money the previous year. People in the other divisions were mumbling about how his division was negatively impacting the entire company.
• Revenue growth for the division had been flat for three years. In addition, they had just lost their single biggest author to a competing publishing company, making future revenue growth even less likely.
• His division was the least efficient user of working capital at Thomas Nelson. As a percentage of revenue, inventory and royalty advances were the highest in the company, but they provided virtually no return to shareholders.
• Everyone in the division was exhausted. The division was publishing 125 new titles a year with only ten employees. Everyone was overworked, and the quality of the work showed it.

Mike says, “Things could not have been worse. However, as the new divisional executive, I recognized that things could not have been better for me. It was a great career opportunity. If I turned the division around, I would be a hero. If I didn’t, that would be okay too. After all, the division was a mess when I inherited it. I couldn’t lose.”

At that point, most executives would have launched into a major strategy session to dig the organization out of the hole it was in. Not Mike. Through the years, he had learned that when people think about the how too soon, they hurt their potential. It actually inhibits their dreaming and blocks them from thinking as big as they can. He knows that the accomplishment of a dream depends on the clarity of the vision.

What you need is a vision that is so big that it is compelling,” explains Mike, “not only to others, but to you. If it’s not compelling, you won’t have the motivation to stay the course, and you won’t be able to recruit others to help you. Both vision and strategy are important, but there is a priority to them. Vision always comes first. Always. If you have a clear vision, you will eventually attract the right strategy. If you don’t have a clear vision, no strategy will save you. I have seen this over and over again in my professional life and personal life.

“If you have a clear vision, you will eventually attract the right strategy.
If you don’t have a clear vision, no strategy will save you.”
—Mike Hyatt

So what did Mike do to get a clear picture of what he wanted accomplish?

“The first thing I did was to go on a private retreat” Mike says, “I had one objective in mind. I wanted to get crystal clear on my vision. What did I want to see happen? What would the division look like in three years? I didn’t care about strategy; I was only concerned with vision. If I had been strategic before I was visionary, I might have said, ‘Well, I don’t see how we can accomplish much. The situation is so dire. We don’t have many resources to work with. Let’s just try to break even this next year. Maybe we can reduce our working capital by selling off a little obsolete inventory. And maybe we can sign a few new authors and get a little revenue growth.

“Do you think anyone would have gotten excited about this? Would this vision have attracted the right authors? Would it have retained the right employees? Would it have secured additional corporate resources? I don’t think so. The problem is that people get stuck on the how. They don’t see how they could accomplish more, so they throttle back their vision, convinced that they must be realistic. And what they expect becomes their new reality.”

Mike was very wise. You have to identify the target before you try to hit it. You have to know what the landscape looks like before you can paint a picture of it to others. You have to see the dream with clarity before you can try to achieve it.

If you don’t clearly see your dream—or if you get bogged down in real or imaginary restrictions—you limit yourself. If you’re going to dream, you might as well dream big. And that’s what Mike did. During his retreat, he worked on a vision statement—something he would find compelling. After all, if he couldn’t get excited about it, nobody else in his division would either. He gave himself permission to envision the perfect future. Then he wrote down a clear picture of his dream.

This is what he wrote:

Vision Statement

Nelson Books is the world’s largest, most respected provider of inspirational books.

1. We have ten franchise authors whose new books sell at least 100,000 copies in the first 12 months.
2. We have ten emerging authors whose new books sell at least 50,000 copies in the first 12 months.
3. We are publishing 60 new titles a year.
4. Authors are soliciting other authors on our behalf because they are so excited to be working with us.
5. The top agents routinely bring us their best authors and proposals because of our reputation for success.
6. We place at least four books a year on the New York Times bestsellers list.
7. We consistently have more books on the Christian bestsellers list than our competitors.
8. We consistently exceed our budget in revenue and margin contribution.
9. Our employees consistently max out their bonus plans.
10. We are the fastest-growing, most profitable division in our company.

Mike’s picture of the future was highly specific. That’s the way to bring clarity to a dream!

When Mike returned to the office, he called a meeting with his entire staff. The first thing he did was to describe the current situation; he was brutally honest and didn’t pull any punches. Then he shared his dream. And he described it in as much detail as he could.

Because his vision was clear, his people could see it. Because it was compelling, most of them found it compelling too. He could sense their excitement, and most people quickly got on board. But simply casting vision for everyone else wasn’t enough. Mike knew he needed to keep the vision clear in his mind continually, so he read his vision statement every day. He thought about it all the time. He prayed about it. And he dreamed about it.

People began asking him, “How in the world are you going to accomplish this?” At first, his answer was, “I’m not sure, but I am confident it is going to happen. Just watch.” And as he kept himself focused on the vision, a strategy began to emerge. But still his main focus wasn’t on the strategy. It was on the dream. Mike says, “I spent way more time—probably ten to one—focused on the what rather than the how.”

Mike expected the transformation of the division to take at least three years. Amazingly, he and his team achieved an almost complete turnaround in a mere eighteen months. By then, they had exceeded almost every aspect of the vision.

“This didn’t happen because we had a great business strategy,” declares Mike.” It happened because we had a clear vision of what we wanted to achieve. That’s where it started, and that’s where you have to start if you want to experience a different reality than the one you have now. You have to get clear on what you want.” Since 2002, Nelson Books has consistently been the fastest growing, most profitable division at Thomas Nelson, Inc. It’s been the home of most of the company’s most successful authors, producing one bestseller after another. That was no accident. And it was no accident that Mike was promoted from head of that division to president and later CEO of the entire organization.

Is your dream in focus?

Do you clearly see your dream? A clear and compelling dream has rescued many a struggling organization. Dreams have given meaning and significance to the lives of many an individual. Everything Mike said about clear dreams resonated deeply with me. Every time in my life that I accomplished anything significant, the dream was very clear to me beforehand. I knew what I was striving for.

If you want to accomplish a dream, you will be able to do so only when you can see it clearly. You must define it before you can pursue it. Most people don’t do that. Their dream remains a dream—something fuzzy and unspecific. As a result, they never achieve it.

1. A clear dream makes a general idea very specific

When I ask people to describe their dream, many of them stammer and stumble, trying to put into words a vague notion they’ve nurtured but never defined. A dream that isn’t clear won’t help you get anywhere. What do you want to accomplish? What do you want to experience? What do you want to contribute? Who do you want to become?

In other words, what does success look like for you? If you don’t define it, you won’t be able to achieve it. It sounds overly simple, but a primary reason that most people don’t get what they want is that they don’t know what they want. They haven’t defined their dream in clear and compelling detail. As actor and author Ben Stein asserts:

“The indispensable first step to getting the things you
want out of life is this: decide what you want.”

Deciding what you want requires you to be specific and make your goals measurable. For example, take a look at these vague notions put into more specific form:

I want to lose weight
I will weigh 185 pounds by June 1st

I need to treat employees better
I will honor someone at every Monday staff meeting

I want to get out of debt
I will payoff all credit card balances by December 31st

I’d like to learn a language
I will study Chinese one hour a day this year

I ought to get in shape
I will swim for an hour every day

I need to improve my leadership
I will read one leadership book every month.

A dream doesn’t have to be ephemeral. Even a really audacious one can be concrete. In the early 1960s, President John F. Kennedy made a big dream concrete when he said, “This nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon.” Albert Siepert, former deputy director of launch operations at the Kennedy Space Center, stated, “The reason that NASA has succeeded is because NASA had a clear-cut goal, and expressed its goal”

When you first begin to wonder about your potential and brainstorm your future, it’s good to let yourself go and think big. But when it’s time to start making your dream come true, you need to get specific.

Being specific doesn’t necessarily mean having every little detail thought out before you move forward. That would be a mistake. The big idea needs to be clear. The rest unfolds as you move forward, and you make adjustments as you go. But you should try to be as specific as you can about the overarching dream.

For years I have encouraged leaders to add value to their employees, build them up, and motivate them to help them succeed.

Adding value to people is a natural gift for me. But it’s not for many people, and I could see that some struggled with it. Because I longed to help others in this area, I realized I needed to be specific on the subject and write about it. The result was a book I wrote with Les Parrott titled 25 Ways to Win with People: How to Make Others Feel Like a Million Bucks. It explains practices to help people add value to others. Now I’m not just encouraging people to add value; I’m helping them actually do it.

2. A clear dream doesn’t become clear without effort

It doesn’t take much effort to let your mind drift and dream. However, it takes great effort to set your mind to the task of developing a clear and compelling dream. Mike Hyatt says that when he took his retreat to get a clear vision for his division, he went to a solitary place with just a pen and journal. He began the process by describing in writing the current reality he was facing. He was brutally honest, writing down everything he didn’t like. Only then did he write out in detail what he wanted to see happen in the future—not just as a vague dream of success or improvement. He even wrote it in the present tense to make the dream more concrete and credible. Take the effort to bring clarity to your dream using your own tools and method. If you’re like Mike, you can go away to a cabin with nothing but pen and paper. I, on the other hand, need starters to get me thinking in the right direction. Maybe they can help you as well. Here are some essentials I bring to the task of clarifying my dream …

» Questions. For me the whole process begins with questions I must ask myself. The dream is always rooted in the dreamer, in his or her experiences, circumstances, talents, and opportunities. I ask:

• What am I feeling? —What are my emotions telling me?
• What am I sensing? —What is my intuition telling me?
• What am I seeing? —What is happening around me?
• What am I hearing? —What are others saying?
• What am I thinking? —What do my intellect and common sense say?

If I can get a good sense of where I am, what I know, and what I want, I’m on my way to clarifying my dream.

» Resources. I rarely try to think, create, or dream in a vacuum. I’m a firm believer in tools that can help me. Sometimes that means reading a book, listening to a message on CD, watching a movie, or reading quotations. Other times it means having a photograph or an object in front of me to help me dream. More than once I’ve kept a photograph on the desk in my office for a year or longer to help me see a dream more clearly.

» Experiences. Years ago when my dream was to build an influential church in America, I reinforced and clarified that vision by visiting congregations around the country that were already influential. I have also traveled to historic areas and visited the home of one of my heroes to inspire me. Such experiences help me dream bigger and with greater clarity.

» People. When I dream, I think about people who have already been where I want to go. For three years I made appointments with leaders who were already doing what I dreamed of so that I could gain insight from them. Those interactions gave me confidence, inspired me to dream bigger, and sharpened the picture of my dream. Listening to people share the details of their journey can sometimes help you discover the details of yours. If you have already discovered a process for bringing clarity to your dream, then use that. If you haven’t, try mine. Or do as Mike Hyatt did. But however you approach the task, remember this: it’s usually a process. A clear picture of a dream may come to you all at once, in lightning bolt fashion, but for most people it doesn’t work that way. Most people need to keep working at it, clarifying it, redrawing it. If the process is difficult, that’s no reason to give up. In fact, if it’s too easy, maybe you’re not dreaming big enough. Just keep working at it because a clear dream is worth fighting for.

3. A clear dream affirms your purpose

Bringing your dream into focus should confirm the sense that you are going in the right direction, and it should strengthen your sense of purpose. I’ve found this to be true in my life. In my effort to clarify my dream, I discovered that the more clearly I saw my dream, the more clearly I was able to see my purpose. That is true, I believe, because a person’s dream and purpose are intertwined. God designs us to want to do what we are most capable of doing. Because of this, when I visited churches that were making an impact, something resonated within me. I felt that I belonged in such places. And when I interviewed the successful leaders in these churches, I sensed that I could become one too. In a way, it was an odd situation. I was fanning the flames of my imagination, making me dream even bigger, and at the same time it confirmed the reality that I was on the right track. I could see a picture of my dream, and I could see myself in the picture!

In my effort to clarify my dream, I discovered that the more clearly I saw my dream, the more clearly I was able to see my purpose

When your dream and your purpose are aligned, you know it. That was true for filmmaker Steven Spielberg. When he was in high school, he dreamed of directing movies. “I want to be a director,” he told his father, Arnold.

“Well,” his father told him, “if you want to be a director, you’ve got to start at the bottom; you’ve got to be a gofer and work your way up.” “No, Dad,” the younger Spielberg replied “The first picture I do, I’m going to be a director,” And he was.

“That blew my mind,” his father says. “That takes guts.” Arnold Spielberg was so impressed with his son’s ambition and confidence, he bankrolled Steven’s first feature film, Firelight, a science fiction thriller that premiered at a little movie house in Phoenix, Arizona. During the making of the film, the young Spielberg told his collaborators, “I want to be the Cecil B. DeMille of science fiction.” That’s not a bad description of what he has become, having produced or directed Jurassic Park, Men in Black, Transformers, ET, Minority Report, Back to the Future, Gremlins, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and other science fiction films. Spielberg’s dream was clear, and the power of that clarity helped him achieve it.

As you put your dream to the test and seek to bring clarity to it, having your dream and purpose aligned will change your life. Why? Because it will make clear why you’re here on this earth. If you don’t sense that alignment and strengthening of purpose, you might need to make sure your dream is really your dream.

4. A clear dream determines your priorities

The Bridge on the River Kwai, which won the Academy Award for best picture in 1957, is considered by many to be one of the finest films ever made. The lead character, Colonel Nicholson, portrayed by Alec Guinness is a study in misplaced priorities. Nicholson is an admirable man and tough leader who is taken prisoner by the Japanese during World War II and finds himself the highest ranking officer in a Burmese prison camp. His Japanese captors try to coerce him into leading his fellow prisoners in the building of a railway bridge. In the beginning, Nicholson resists heroically, but in time he relents and begins the building project. Eventually he takes so much pride in the work his men are doing in the construction of the bridge that he loses sight of his real goal—defeating the Japanese and winning the war.

At the end of the movie, there is a moment when Nicholson actually starts to guard the bridge from attack by an Allied officer who has set charges to blow it up. But in a flash of insight during his dying breath, he says, “What have I done?” His last act is to detonate the explosives and blow up the bridge. It’s easy to get so caught up in the day-to-day process of life that you lose sight of the big picture. However, when your dream is clearly in sight, it helps you get your priorities straight.

Even though I’ve taught this truth for years, there are times when I need to be reminded of it. That was the case in December 2007 when I went to the hospital because I was experiencing some dizziness. After two days of tests, I learned that I had an irregular heartbeat. Dr. Crandall, my new cardiologist, visited me in my hospital room to talk to me about my health. I knew what he was going to say. I hadn’t been watching my diet for quite some time. So in an effort to show him that I knew what was coming, I said, “Dr. Crandall, I know I need to do some weight management.”

“No, you don’t need to do weight management,” he replied, much to my surprise. For a moment I had hope. “You need to do weight loss. John, you’re fat! After you lose a bunch of weight, then you can manage it!” During our fifteen-minute conversation, if he told me once, he told me a dozen times that I was fat. He was making sure he brought great clarity to the picture for me. With my problem in focus and the dream of wanting to remain healthy so that I can continue to spend time with family, my priorities became clear. I would do what it took to reach a healthy weight. That meant changing my priorities and developing a new pattern for living, which would dictate what I did in the future. Until further notice, I would consume no more than sixteen hundred calories a day. And I would exercise for no less than one hour every day. If I wanted to achieve my dream of a long and healthy life, I would have to realign my living according to these priorities.

Nobody can have it all. We like to think we can, but we can’t. If you see your dream clearly—and keep it in front of you continually—it will help you to understand what you must sacrifice and what you must dedicate yourself to in order to keep moving forward.

Only a clear picture of who you are and where you want to go can help you prioritize what you need to do. We all make choices.

The question is, Are you going to make choices that bring you closer to your dream or take you farther away from it? If you don’t know exactly what your dream is, then you won’t be capable of making the right choices.

Clarity of vision creates clarity of priorities

5. A clear dream gives direction and motivation to the team

Your big dream will undoubtedly require the participation of other people. If you are part of an organization that has goals or vision, then you must work with other people in order to accomplish them. No matter what, you must be capable of working with a team. That can be done effectively only when you possess a clear picture of what you want to achieve.

Jim Tunney, author and former NFL referee, says that many business organizations fail to accomplish what they set out to do because they don’t clearly define their target. “If employees don’t understand their company’s goals and its game plan,” he notes, “these goals won’t be achieved.” He goes on to point out that the game of football never has unclear objectives. “Its goals are always clearly defined,” asserts Tunney. “At the end of the field is a goal line. Why do we call it a goal line? Because eleven people on the offensive team huddle for a single purpose—to move the ball across it. Everyone has a specific task to do—the quarterback, the wide receiver, each lineman, every player knows exactly what his assignment is. Even the defensive team has its goal—to prevent the offensive team from achieving its goal.”

Pastor, writer, and editor Ed Rowell says, “A dream is a better future in need of an architect who will show others how to make it a reality.” If you are a leader, you must be that architect. You must identify the dream and be able to draw it, not only for your benefit but also for the benefit
of others.

One night I had dinner in Dallas with an architect named John Fleming. He told me, “If you’re an architect, you can’t start building a project until you’ve finished it.” By that, he meant that if you’re the visionary—the leader—you need to know the end before you start leading the team. You have to see it. If you don’t, your team will never be able to fulfill your vision.

As a leader and leadership mentor, I am continually thinking about how to communicate vision to others. If leaders create a fuzzy picture, then people follow in an equally fuzzy way. Lack of clarity hinders initiative, inhibits persistence, and undermines follow-through.

Followers don’t give their best to some thing they don’t understand. People don’t stay on course for something they cannot see. Nobody becomes motivated by something he kinda, sorta believes in

I love the story of how a certain track coach communicated the goal to his runners before a race. Just before the gun sounded, he used to say, “Stay to your left and get back here as soon as you can.” It doesn’t get any clearer than that!

Anytime a team, department, or organization doesn’t see the same clear picture of what it’s trying to accomplish, it is destined to get off course. I faced this reality in 1981 when I became the senior pastor of Skyline Wesleyan Church. Although the congregation had experienced growth in the past, it had been stagnant for years. I quickly sensed that the leadership had lost its way. Following my instincts, I asked each member of the board to write the purpose of the church on a three-by-five card. My suspicions were confirmed when I read the cards and found that the seventeen members had written fifteen different answers.

The energy of the church was unfocused, and the direction was unclear. Why? Because the leaders of the organization didn’t share a common dream. No wonder they weren’t able to move forward. Over the next six months we hammered out our core values and our common vision. As the dream for our church became clearer, the energy of the leadership increased. And the newly focused and energized leaders carried those qualities to the rest of the congregation. The result was that the congregation tripled in size during the next ten years and made a positive impact on the community, which was our dream.

You must see it to seize it

Most people wander through life. They have no clear dream, no clear picture of where they want to go. And even when a great opportunity presents itself to them, they don’t have the ability to see it and build a dream upon it.

In 1866 an amateur geologist noticed some South African children playing with a glistening rock. Intrigued, he asked the children’s mother if he could purchase it. She said it wasn’t worth anything and simply gave it to him. Later when he examined it more closely, his hunch was confirmed: it was a diamond. He calculated its weight at 21 carats.

When others heard of this and other discoveries, a Scottish mineralogist named James Gregory was sent to investigate. He reported that South Africa wasn’t suitable for the occurrence of diamonds. He speculated that the previous discoveries had resulted from ostriches, of all things, eating the gems in distant lands and depositing them in South Africa via their dung. A few days after Gregory’s report was made public, an 83 carat diamond was found in the area that he had visited. It is now known as the Star of South Africa, and it launched the region’s first mining operation in what is today the world’s largest producer of diamonds. And what about Gregory? His name lives on, but not as he might wish. In the diamond industry, when someone exhibits bad judgment, it’s called “pulling a Gregory.”

Among the people who flocked to South Africa during the diamond rush was Cecil Rhodes, a young man from Britain who dreamed of success. He and his brother saw the potential of diamond mining in the area and bought as many claims as they could.

They also purchased an ice-making machine in England, which they brought to Africa so they could sell ice to mine workers suffering in the heat. They used their profits to purchase more mining claims. In the 1880s, Rhodes went on to found De Beers, the largest producer of diamonds in the world.

How would you describe your vision when it comes to your dream? Do you blindly accept the status quo? Or do you look at things with your eyes wide open, seeking greater possibilities? And when you see them, are you serious enough about achieving a dream to actually put it to the test by defining it clearly? Are you willing to describe it in detail, put it on paper, and tell others about it?

If you’re not, then you’re placing yourself at a disadvantage. Only those who see their dream are able to seize their dream. If you can answer the Clarity Question with a yes because you clearly see your dream, then you are greatly increasing the odds that one day you will do more than just see your dream—you will live it!

Only those who see their dream are able to seize their dream

Answer the clarity question: Do I clearly see my dream?

It’s time to bring clarity to your dream, to give it detail. If you have a general idea of your dream, your temptation may be to start creating your strategy. Don’t do it yet. As Mike Hyatt asserted, vision must come first.

1. Begin by writing a detailed description of your dream. Let your imagination go wild. Write as many elements or pieces of it as you can. Don’t stop until you have more than you think you need.
2. Now quantify anything you can. Make it measurable. Don’t worry about how you’ll get there yet. Be bold. Be audacious. Dream big!
3. The next step is to state your dream succinctly in writing. Mike broke down his dream into ten clear, measurable elements. Do something similar with your dream. The number doesn’t matter—it simply needs to match the dream—but try to keep it fairly short.
4. Don’t expect to be able to do the whole process in one sitting.

For most people that’s not possible. Instead, give it time.

You may want to get away for a retreat to start the process. If you can separate yourself from your usual surroundings or routine for a couple of days, you may be able to get most of the work done. Otherwise, take a day to dream, and then come back to the process for a few hours at a time in subsequent weeks. Don’t forget your goal: make your dream as clear and specific as possible. Then keep it in front of you so that you can see it every day.

P.S. To maintain sanctity of the source, this article follows American English.

This article is an edited excerpt from Put Your Dream To The Test by John Maxwell, Published by Jaico Books ; reproduced with permission.

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