How to Keep Your Eyes on the Prize
Time is too expensive to dedicate it to unfruitful endeavour. However you use it, it never stops, it is the most finite and most important yet most elusive resource. If you lose a hundred dollars, you have not just lost a hundred dollars, but the time you had dedicated to earning that money is also lost. Now the hundred can still be gotten or recovered by doing some more work, but the time lost, is gone!
It is therefore within everyone's interest to ensure whatever it is
we do, bears fruit and time is well spent. This is easier said than
done, so often, along the way we become lukewarm, neglect or even
abandon our projects. Here are some simple ways to help you keep your
eyes on the prize. That you may finish as strongly as you began.
Your Focus determines your output.
Focus is the narrowing down of your awareness so as to concentrate on
a particular thing. Focus allows you to see your goal clearer and
sharpens your efforts towards those things that count. It enhances your
thoroughness and perspective in your approach and execution of your plans.
Clarity
You are likely to perform better in a duty where the expectations and
instructions are clear. In your quest to achieve, it should be your
first task to fully comprehend what it is you intend to accomplish. Your
chances of making it are in direct proportion to how elaborate your intentions
are. Unless you have this clarity and deliberate understanding your
energy and enthusiasm may never be sufficiently aroused.
Clarity comes in two parts:
1. Clearly seeing your Destination.
You have to know where you are going for you to arrive, it's that
simple. Your clarity of what you want to achieve enables you to create
the right framework for doing so. Take for instance: John writes "I
want to be rich." and Sandy writes "I want to have an investment vehicle
of $5000 by 31 December 2016" Looking at it, they both seem to have
goals, but John's is not as clear as Sandy's. Sandy knows the goal,
its deadline and it's purpose. She already has the answer for "What? and
Why?, and When?" and having it will be a lot easier to answer the How?
and Who? If your wishes are fuzzy they may not give you sufficient
internal power, that push that propels you towards accomplishment.
Stephen Covey in his bestselling book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective
People, cites that a major point that distinguishes achievers from wishers is the ability to Begin with the end in Mind.
"The Prize has to stand out if you are to keep your eyes on it."
"The Prize has to stand out if you are to keep your eyes on it."
2. Understanding the Demands of the Goal.
Well, I think this is obvious. Before you set out to do anything
worthwhile, you have to know the demands of the task. How can you
prepare for anything if you haven't immersed yourself with the
expectations of your ideals? How shall you act and adjust yourself for
success if you are not aware of what it takes to live out your goals?
Confusion comes when you are halfway into your journey to your prize and
you figure out what you carried is irrelevant, of no value, and
ineffectual or just not enough to get you where you intend to reach. You want to start out something that you know you
understand, so as to maintain your focus and increase your chances of
success.
Concentration.
To concentrate is to centralise your efforts to a particular object
or activity. It is easy to multitask right? I mean, after all even the
gadgets we have created and gotten accustomed to can do so. We have now gotten used to working on
a number of projects simultaneously,and whilst we are gratified by the
fact that we are doing more, we are actually selling ourselves short. When you do not concentrate, you
render yourself incapable of delivering your best possible work. It is
good to keep abreast with the big picture lest you lose touch, but you
need to blind your vision to all else except a few key result areas of
your Goal at a time. That way, you are more productive, and effective.
Keeping your eyes on the prize has everything to do with attention. If
you can't attend to your attention, you will easily be whisked away
from your way. The amount of things that call for your attention at any
given point in time has become astounding. There's always a laundry list
of things to do, and all of them appear equally important. The best way
to concentrate is to keep a priority list for each project and each
day. That way, your efforts are not scattered but are confined to a
particular point at a time as determined by your priority list.
Cohesion
By cohesion, I refer to the relation between your environment and
your goal. Does your everyday environment inspire you to go for gold? If you are to keep yourself on the track of our goals, you need to ensure
that your environment pushes you towards them. Your environment is what you
see, hear and interact with each day. If this space is not optimised, it
may well serve as a negative influence and push you away from your objectives or dampen your vigor for them.
It is therefore advisable to have cues that shackle your attention to
the key task(s) of the time. Things that you see everyday,that stimulate you to action. That at every turn you have something that
relates to your objectives of the season. This is a scientifically proven
method, named, Auto-Suggestion. It is a way in which you continue to
feed your mind with the same thought until it becomes subconscious, and
you begin to act on it automatically, it's a simpler way to creating
habits.
Here's a simple list of things you could do to optimise your environment to keep your focused on what matters most and ensure that those tasks and objectives that are higher up on your priority list are accomplished.
Here's a simple list of things you could do to optimise your environment to keep your focused on what matters most and ensure that those tasks and objectives that are higher up on your priority list are accomplished.
Your Gadgets
Put your main goal as a your desktop screensaver, with beautiful background of course so that it compels your attention ever so often. This can also work for your phone too.
Your Room/Office
You could write out a list of the Week's goals in your room, Study, Office on your desk. A photo collage can also work. This has really worked for me and over time my focus has been a lot better and I don't carry over tasks.
Your Music
The Music you listen to. Okay, I know this a very touchy subject. Well, the truth is quite apparent music affects your productivity. A music track always has a mood associated with it, and that mood will create the atmosphere around you. You don't want to have music that's depressing when you expect peak performance from yourself. You need to have music that inspires you or at least that tend to make you cheerful and bright.
And of course, Your Books
I can never say this enough, books have a powerful bearing on someone's productivity. The books you read determine your perceptions and the general idea with which you process information. The kind of books you read have a strong bearing on your attitude and approach to life.
Never waste time on worthless pursuits, keep focused! Make sure, each our that goes by contributes to the achievement of your dreams.
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