9 times out of 10, this type of weekly review fails you. Why? Because it’s flimsy, it doesn’t hold you accountable for what you’ve done (or didn’t do). Your memory is inherently biased; you don’t think in terms of specifics, you think in terms of visuals. When you try to objectively look back at your past week, what comes out is a mess of “I did this… sort of did that… didn’t do that at all… ah, oh well, next week will be better!”

An easy way to circumvent this disastrous problem is to keep a simple track of all of your accomplishments during the course of a day - what I like to call your “daily success log”. When you meet a daily quota for a goal that you set - say, 30 minutes of exercise - write it down on a running file on your computer or a page in a notebook (divided up by days, of course). You can choose to track a certain area that needs desperate improvement (such as health and fitness) or an overall “improve my life” spectrum that covers everything.

I’ve been using a daily success log to track the various advertising and marketing aspects of my blog - blog carnival submissions, forum posts, blog comments, emailing other bloggers, the list goes on and on. I have to say, from first hand experience, keeping a log of everything I’ve done really helps me keep focus. When I’m having a lackluster day and nothing seems to be going in my favor, I just look back at the accomplishments I’ve made so far. That propels me to go even farther and try even harder to get something done; my motivation returns!

You can use a daily success log to track a variety of things in your life:

• Health and Fitness - max amount of time you want to exercise / watch TV / sleep / stay online, max amount of cups of coffee you want to drink, calories eaten, % of calories coming from fat
• Career - # of leads followed up on, hours spent researching / formatting / completing a project, # of applications sent in to various employers
• Hobby and Free Time - amount of time practicing a musical instrument, # of posts you made in your blog

If you wanted, you could break everything down into even greater detail. For example, if you were logging how much you practiced a musical instrument, you could elaborate with what time you practiced at, what pieces you practiced, musical problems you fixed, and technical difficulties you want to solve in future practice sessions.

All in all, a daily success log holds you accountable for all of your actions. You can’t elaborate or escape cold, hard facts - you either did action that moved you towards your goals, or you skipped out and didn’t do anything. Your log will say it all!

Try out the log for a couple of weeks. What aspects of your life can you begin to keep tabs on? What improvements can you make to the basic outline I presented here?

Trying to get any work accomplished on a lackluster day is like trying to actively listen to nails on a chalkboard for hours on end. Nothing worthwhile seems to get accomplished. You fiddle around with a task or two here and there, you procrastinate beyond belief, you take naps when you should be working - in a nutshell, you do everything in your power to keep you from working on any of your goals.

How do you overcome a lackluster day so you don’t continue to feel down and depressed? First you have to get to the source of your lackluster day; then you have to consciously fix the broken source to repair your enthusiasm. (It sounds simple in theory, but it’s not so simple in practice!)

Why do lackluster days happen?

Is your motivation sapped? Both internal and external motivation can wildly vary day to day, depending on your mood. Some days the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow feels like it’s enough to keep you amazingly productive for a month; other days you couldn’t care less about how those end rewards look. Low motivation = a lackluster day.

Do you have clear goals along with detailed plans to accomplish those goals? If your outside world is totally unfocused, your inner thoughts are going to reflect that to a fault. Having a plethora of goals and plans to work on can be wonderful sometimes - projects are a cure for boredom! - but unclear goals with messy planning to boot cause more damage than good. People, including myself, love to set up projects with a clear path to accomplishment. It makes for a smooth sail. But when the plans hit the fan and easily crumble under pressure, the end result is stress on yourself. Fuzzy goals with skimpy plans = a lackluster day.

Are you not getting enough sleep (causing you to feel tired), did you sleep too much, or are you getting sick? Obviously, not getting enough sleep (or even getting too much sleep) saps at your energy. You feel lethargic and like a sloth, almost incapable of getting any real work done due to tiredness. In the same vein, getting sick will plague your body with a multitude of ailments - who doesn’t know what it feels like to get the flu? No energy + sickness = a lackluster day.

Do you just not care about your projects? Honestly! If you feel overworked, overstressed, and just plain awful, why would you even care about your goals and plans? High motivation, detailed planning, and adequate sleep provide the energy, but you have to care about what you’re doing. Working too much overtime and feeling inundated with stress are the two main things that will chip away at how much you care about your projects. Huge workload + too much stress + less than rosy outlook = a total lackluster day.

What do you do on a lackluster day?

Relax! Take a deep breath, push your nonessential tasks to the side, and take a break from your life.

When you encounter a lackluster day, a day where nothing seems to be going right and you feel at your wit’s end, take it as a sign. Your body and mind is sending you a clear message - “Hold on, buddy! Something’s not right here! Slow down, take it easy for a little while.”

Figure out why you’re having a lackluster day. Lay in bed for 20 minutes and just think about the reason you feel unmotivated and so down. Or better yet, journal about your thoughts and feelings. Take a walk outdoors, if that’s something you enjoy. Take an honest look at yourself; get to the root of the problem. Are you having a lackluster day because you aren’t treating your body as well as you should? Or is the day caused by feeling overloaded with goals and plans, and you feel ambivalence about what you should be doing? Do you need to readjust your focus to find better motivation - would that cure your lackluster day? Or is the answer “none of the above”, and the source of your lackluster day doesn’t even come close to what’s listed above? (There’s a good chance of that!)

Feeling lousy is often your brain telling you “Hey, something isn’t right here. Take a breather! Listen to what we’re trying to tell you - we seriously know what we’re saying!” Take listen when those feelings happen. Work through them, and before you know it, your lackluster day will pass to a new, fresh day of hope and encouragement.

Does a list of 100 work? Absolutely! And incredibly well, at that. I have a few tips that I use to make the list of 100 even more effective as a brainstorming tool - by applying these to your list of 100, you may become even more creative and think up of better solutions. (Before reading these tips, it’ll help if you read the original article here first!)

• Throw in a few restrictions. Suppose you have a blog you want to publicize, but whenever you write your list of 100 publicity methods, you start thinking too broadly and the list becomes a mess. Instead of a vague list of 100 (e.g., “100 Ways to Advertise My Blog”), think in smaller, more restricted terms. Perhaps you can write a list of 100 ways to advertise your blog only through other blogs, or 100 ways to advertise your blog using solely social media websites. By restricting your list of 100, you narrow down your ideas; your thinking becomes more clear and focused.
• Make your topic novel and interesting. If you’re trying to create a list of 100 on an incredibly boring or trite topic, switch it up a bit. Your brain loves to think in patterns and ruts as it cuts down on thinking time. If you’re trying to brainstorm on a topic that’s been done to death (e.g., “100 Ways to Sleep Better”) your brain will automatically start throwing out solutions that you’ve heard before - because you’ve heard them *all* before! Rephrase the topic to make it more interesting (e.g., “100 Ways to NOT Sleep Better”), and you’ll have an easier time coming up with new solutions.
• Having trouble thinking of solutions? Rephrase the list topic. If you’re having difficulty trying to make the list work for you, completely rewrite the topic. Keep the topic along the same lines, but reword it so you look at the problem from a different angle. For example, instead of “100 Ways I Can Eat Healthier”, why not write “100 Tips I Would Give to Others to Eat Healthier”? One perspective is focused on you, the other perspective is focused on others - depending on which list you choose to brainstorm with, you might get two totally different answers.

Try a list of 100 today! What obstacles are you currently facing that could be solved by brainstorming up 100 creative solutions?

Change can either be gradual or sudden. Gradual change would be along the lines of starting an exercise program and carrying it out for six months. You would see a few immediate results from your workouts, but the fruit of your labor would come later on down the line. Other examples of gradual change would be learning an unfamiliar musical instrument, writing a romance novel, or reading five books on your favorite subject.

People are usually accepting of gradual change. Why? Because it’s controllable! Using our above example, you can totally decide if you want to hit the gym or not. (And, well, for most people, the decision is obvious!) When you have a degree of control over something - anything - if change happens, it’s suddenly not so bad. You can always revert back to how you were at the drop of a hat, and nothing would be too different than how you started.

Sudden change, however, is what drives people mad. Sudden change is - you guessed it! - sudden changes in your life that normally involves circumstances out of your control. If the sudden change is in your control, it usually involves an incredible lifestyle switch. Examples of sudden change would be divorce, a death of a close friend or family member, or relocating to a new city. Sudden change is heavily characterized by sweeping emotions, new role learning, and total life adjustment to new circumstances.

Sudden change is scary! No wonder most people don’t like change! If you had to deal with the aforementioned changes every single day, life would become unbearable. It’s for this reason that people outright reject all change to their lives, instead wishing “everything would always stay the same”. To them, change is the epitome of death to themselves. If their world changed, they themselves would change, and to change themselves would mean to change their life. That’s something these people don’t want to do, at all costs.

But is rejecting gradual and sudden changes really a way to live? To me, that’s the #1 way to completely stall out your life. Myself, I believe change = growth. A life changing experience - which can be anything from the birth of a son or daughter to becoming more healthy to learning a foreign language - is something that can promotes growth as an individual. It makes life richer, more rewarding. Constantly tackling changes in your life head on can make life an incredibly fascinating experience.

Without change, there can’t be any growth. If everything constantly stayed the same, your life would literally stagnate. Your earthly existence wouldn’t get any worse, of course, but it wouldn’t get any better either. And that’s okay! Some people choose to keep the same job for 40 years. It’s their choice. Some people don’t move out of the area where they grew up; some people keep the same friends they’ve had since high school or college; some people hold on to their childhood values for dear life as they grow older. That’s fine - you are completely entitled to do that.

But can you really grow if you stay in the same area, hold onto the same values, and keep the same job you have? You can, to an extent. There’s some wiggle room in there for improvement, and you can definitely learn a new thing or two. But you can never experience real growth if you don’t bash through your comfort zone and change your life completely every once in a while.

Shake things up! Read a new book on an obscure subject. Travel to a place you’ve always wanted to explore. Write that country song you’re itching to get out of your brain. Start up a blog on your favorite subject. Join a brand new religion for the thrill of learning how it functions. Do something that changes your life.

It’s up to you to embrace a life of constant change, excitement, and thrills. What’s your decision?

There are five easy, simple ways to fake your personality:

1. Dress comfortably for you.
2. Be prepped and prepared for what you’re going into.
3. Smile!
4. Pretend you are interested and observant to everybody.
5. Look fully relaxed and at ease with yourself.

And now, getting into greater detail:

1. Dress comfortably for you.

Forget about “dressing for success”! Most people feel uncomfortable when they step up their wardrobe, because dressing to the nines feels unnatural to them. And if dressing up feels unnatural to you, you’re not going to be comfortable and at ease with yourself - no matter how hard you try. The best advice is to dress slightly above what you consider “normal”, but not so decked out that you feel out of your league. You should look fabulous, of course, but not like you are about to walk down the red carpet. Dressing up comfortably can naturally make you feel a step above the rest - and if you feel great about yourself, your personality will shine!

2. Be prepped and prepared for what you are going into.

You may be all smiles and have this totally fake, charismatic air going on, but that house of cards is going to collapse if you don’t have a clue how to talk the talk. If you’re going to a party, research a bit on the guests and what their interests are, for the purpose of small talk. If you’re going to join a club, find out all you can about the organization’s topic. If you’re giving a presentation, learn all you can about the subject and go all out! Present yourself as an expert, and people will think you are amazingly witty and knowledgeable!

3. Smile!

This one should be obvious, but a lot of people don’t smile. How many times have you ever walked in any store - say, the supermarket - and said to yourself “Wow, everybody looks so… sad today…”? When you smile yourself, you automatically boost up your mood (try it right now!) And smiles are contagious, as well - we all know when one person starts smiling, we all start smiling, even if we have no idea what that one person is smiling about. We automatically think of smiling, carefree people as having bubbly, effervescent personalities; on the opposite hand, we also automatically think of frowning, sad people as having sullen, upset personalities. Turn that frown upside down, and fake that smile!

4. Pretend you are interested and observant to everybody.

Not interested in what somebody is telling you? Fake it all the way. Nod your head when they say something that sounds profound, open up your eyes as if you’re thinking “Wow, that’s so fascinating!”, and use hand motions when it’s your turn to talk. People with personality are naturally interested in what everybody else is doing, thinking, and saying. If you want to fake having the personality of a social butterfly, you have to be able to give the impression that you actually care what’s going on around you. Other people love to blather on about their lives, hobbies, whatever, even if it’s the most boring topic on Earth. Look interested in what everybody else is saying, and you’ll appear to have a wonderful personality!

5. Look fully relaxed and at ease with yourself.

People who are the most affable are people who constantly look fully relaxed and at ease with themselves. No matter how many people they talk to in a given day, socializing appears to be a natural part of them. If you want to fake having a great personality, you must make your movements, your voice, and your movements seem very natural and fluid, not choppy, and mechanical. Nothing says “fake personality!” more than having the social grace of a robot. This tip might take some practice, but it’ll pay off in the long run.

So what are you waiting for? Start faking your golden personality today!

Timeboxing is a pretty simple technique once you understand the basics:

1. Choose a project to work on. Simple enough.
2. Set aside a block of time to work on the project. 30 minutes should be your bare minimum, though you can choose anywhere from 1 minute to any amount of time you’d like.
3. Try to finish that project in the allocated amount of time. Aim for completion of your project in the amount of time you gave yourself. Try not to go over your scheduled time, no matter what. It’s fine if you finish up sooner than you expected.
4. For the entire amount of time, stick to the task. Try not to take breaks unless you are giving yourself over an hour to work. It’s best if you can get into the stage of “flow” so your work becomes easier and more enjoyable.

Need an example? Let’s say you’re itching to write a new blog post, but you have horrible perfectionistic tendencies. Blog posts that should take you 45 minutes to write end up taking 4 hours. Because of that problem, it’s hard for you to commit to blogging. What should you do? Use timeboxing to write that new post! Set aside a block of time to compose, edit, and post the post, doing as best of a job as you can during that time frame. In this case, you could set aside an hour and a half, perhaps from 9:00AM to 10:30AM, and tackle the task to completion.

Having used this technique for so long now, I found there are two extremely useful tips I like to use that I’d love to share with you!

Tip #1 - Use it to knock off small, numerous, mundane tasks.

Batch together multiple, annoying tasks that need to get done, and timebox an amount of time to get through them all. Do you have several desk drawers that need to be cleared out and purged? Instead of doing one drawer at a time, timeboxing 30 minutes per drawer and spreading the task over three days, timebox one hour to purge all of the drawers. You’ll work faster, get the task completed sooner, and feel more accomplished.

Think of it this way. Before you go to the grocery store, you generally make a comprehensive list of everything you need so multiple trips aren’t necessary. Why take five separate trips for breads, fruits, vegetables, meats, and desserts when you can take one trip and buy everything you need in one swoop? Timebox multiple, similiar tasks for the same reasons.

Tip #2 - Timebox a small amount of time just for perfectionism.

Okay, so I admit it! I’m a total perfectionist when it comes to writing my blog posts. I can’t help but sit around and edit my posts after they’ve been up for days, trying to find the “right” phrases to make my posts stand out and shine.

However, I can’t let perfectionism run my blog. (Otherwise I wouldn’t get around to posting or doing advertising work!) Instead of gleefully editing all posts at all hours of the night for kicks and giggles, I instead timebox a small amount of time right after I post my post to let my perfectionism run free. I allow myself to do all of the editing I can in that small amount of time, and then once the minutes are up, I’m completely done and will never touch that post again. Does it work? Fantastically well!

Just remember - perfectionism can absolutely destroy a meaningful, valuable work; but on the other hand, if perfectionism is used constructively, it can completely enhance and boost up a project you are editing to an entirely new level. Timebox a specific time for perfectionism, and try this trick out for yourself.

What other timeboxing uses can you think up?

Your homework for tonight? Apply timeboxing to your life and see what a difference it makes! And after trying timeboxing out for a while, see what improvements you can make on this simple technique. You’d be surprised how much more productive you’ll become after just a few days of timeboxing tasks.

I’ve been waking up at 5:00am for the longest time now, so I have a bit of background in this area. There are three main tips that I’ve found useful for getting myself up so early on a consistent basis:

1. Use multiple alarm clocks;
2. Have some compelling reasons to get up so early;
3. No strange foods or practices before bedtime.

1. Use multiple alarm clocks.

Most people set only one alarm clock; they keep it across the room, and when it buzzes in the morning they shuffle over, turn it off (or smash it on the ground…) and slink back into bed. Obviously that’s probably not the reaction they’re going for! But what if those people were to use three different alarm clocks, all spaced out around their room? As soon as they turn off one, they realize there’s two more to shut off. So they turn off the second and third clock, and what do you know? Those people feel wide awake and are ready for their morning cup of coffee!

I’ve used this method with a pretty good success rate. For me, getting up and moving around is a pivotal component of being able to successfully get out of bed at an early hour. If I trudge around to shut off one alarm clock, that’s not a lot of movement. But if I have to stomp around my room in a foggy daze to shut off three different alarm clocks, that gets me moving and my blood flowing. Try it out!

2. Have some compelling reasons to get up so early!

Let’s be honest here. If you have no real reasons to be getting up so early in the morning, then you’re better of sleeping in bed until 10:30am like the rest of the population.

Most early risers - including myself - generally get up so early because we’re more productive in the morning. By 11:00AM, I can knock out a good portion of my projects and get more accomplished than most people do in three days. I’m focused, I have goals, and those goals motivate me to get up. If you can’t give yourself two good reasons for waking up so early, why bother? You’d just be hitting your head against the wall over and over again when what little motivation you have runs dry.

3. No strange foods or practices before bedtime!

Some people can drink massive amounts of coffee before bed and be absolutely fine when trying to get to sleep. For other people, drinking one weak cup of coffee six hours before bedtime is enough to keep them up half of the night. Some people can exercise vigorously before hitting the sack; for others, that’s enough for them to be tossing and turning the entire night.

Your body is unique; your physiology is completely your own. What works for you might not work for anybody else, and what works for 99% of the population might have no effect on you.

The best thing you can do is cut out all strange foods and substances (alcohol, caffeine, spicy foods, gorging on ice cream) about two hours before you go to bed. Yeah, yeah, that’s a long time! But your body will totally thank you for it. Along those same lines, skip out on doing your Richard Simmons “Sweatin’ to the Oldies” exercise routine if you plan on going to bed immediately afterwords; that might cause nightmares when you finally do get to sleep. ;]

Test, get feedback, then test some more.

What works for you? In all honesty, no amount of blog articles, posts, tips, tricks, or advice can tell you the exact strategy that works best for you. Your best bet is to read all you can on getting up early, test out some of the tips you come across, and if what you tried doesn’t work, ditch it and try another tip. The worst thing that can happen? You have a night where you don’t get a wink of sleep.

But the best thing that can happen? You finally are able to get up constantly at 5:00AM, awake, alert, and ready to tackle all of your projects and goals for the day. Who’d want to pass up that kind of opportunity? Just imagine how productive your mornings will become.

Situations like these are what I like to call “sticky goals“. You literally become stuck somewhere on your path towards goal completion - it’s almost like your goal needs an energy drink! In a situation where you have a sticky goal that is in desperate need of some CPR, I use a technique that’s fairly simple: I brainstorm ideas that I know could completely exceed my goal.

Brainstorm more ideas for above and beyond goal completion

Notice my choice of words - “completely exceed my goal”, “above and beyond goal completion”. The solutions you come up to complete your goals are directly proportional to the questions you ask yourself on how to complete said goals. For example, suppose you ask yourself “How can I squeeze two extra minutes in my day?” You’d tell yourself how easy of a question it is - you could leave two minutes later to work, wake up two minutes earlier, take two minutes off of your daily shower, and so on. Now suppose you ask yourself “How can I add fifteen minutes in my day?” It’s a tricker question, but I’m sure you could think of some great solutions. Finally, imagine asking yourself “How could I add an hour in my day?” Whoops! Now you’re pushing your mental capacity. An hour is a lot of time - it just doesn’t come from nowhere. You’ll have to do some out-of-the-box thinking. What activities could you cut corners and free up some extra time with? What can you completely cut out of your daily schedule?

Goal brainstorming falls into the same category. Too often a person will have a goal where they need to do out-of-the-box thinking, but they ask themselves simple questions. They want to add an hour to their day, but they instead ask themselves “How can I squeeze two extra minutes in my mornings?” These people will get solutions, of course, but the answers won’t lead to the desired outcome they were hoping for. You see small thinking all of the time with bloggers. They want to know “How can I get 1,000 visitors to my website?” but they’ll ask themselves “How can I get 10 new visitors to see my product?” Ask small questions, get small answers. Ask big questions, get big answers.

You can use this type of thinking in a variety of settings:

• You want to increase something by X amount (subscribers, sales)
• You want to make a product go above and beyond expectations (designing a website)
• You want to present something that people will be floored with (a presentation)

Don’t ask yourself how to merely complete the goal - ask yourself what you could do to make the goal an absolute, outright success if you had to complete your goal at all costs. Sometimes the best answers are created by flamboyant thinking. Part of the reason your goal is stalling out might very well be because you aren’t thinking big enough!

Afternoons are a bit different than mornings for several reasons. First, the boost of energy you feel in the mornings is generally gone by 2pm, and you’re left will willpower, motivation, and self-discipline to get you through the rest of the day. Second, you’re likely to be burnt out from a mass of projects that you’ve been chipping at since 9AM. Lastly, you’re frazzled from having to deal with distractions all day.

I know where you’re coming from. I feel your pain - afternoon blues plague me too. Fortunately, I have some tips you can use to re-energize your afternoons, so you can accomplish everything you want to on a given day.

1. Make a plan of what you want to accomplish. With a crystal clear plan of what you want to get done, you automatically become more motivated. Working without a plan in the afternoon is like trying to drive through fog - you can only see so far in front of you. Fuzzy, unclear goals are no good; they’re entirely de-motivating. Decide exactly what you want to do, write it down, and get to work.
2. Deliberately schedule some downtime. One of the major problems people have with afternoon scheduling is that they try to cram in every little task they can think of because they want to stay “productive”. Unfortunately, productivity suffers when you start running out of steam. Take breaks liberally if you can. The more energized you are, the more creative and focused your thinking and actions will become.
3. Don’t skip out on the caffeine. It’s odd to say this, but if you’re one of those people who is a major coffee drinker, and you bypass your afternoon cup of coffee, your late afternoon and evening will be a nightmare. Drink the cup(s) of coffee to bypass caffeine headaches and to give you a quick burst of energy.
4. Do some light exercising. No, no, you don’t have to go running for 30 minutes around your neighborhood. Just do some light exercises that are energizing. Take a quick 5~10 minute walk around your block, or lift a couple of 1lb weights for several reps. Even dancing in your chair for a few minutes will boost your heart rate and make you feel a bit more alert and energetic!
5. Listen to uplifting, upbeat music. This is the perfect reason to put in your Madonna CD! When you hear music with a good beat that makes you happy, those feelings immediately rub off on you. How many times have you been in the car when your favorite song comes on, and you can’t help but smile and belt it out for the world to hear? That is what your afternoon music should do to you! Put in some tunes that make you feel great, and watch your enthusiasm level soar.
6. Review your goals and aspirations. Knowing why you’re working on (what you think are) asinine, boring projects is a class of motivation in itself. Taking a look at your current goals and lifelong aspirations can make you realize why you want to have a productive afternoon - which in turn will make you feel more motivated and inspired to take action on even the dullest of projects.
7. Talk to the people you care about most. Call up a friend or significant other when your afternoons start to go to waste. You’re a person - and people are extremely social creatures who want to talk to other like-minded persons like themselves. Just hearing another person’s encouraging words can be enough motivation for you to finish that project you’ve been procrastinating for months on.
8. … don’t do anything productive at all! Yeah, I know… Bad advice, right? I don’t think so! Everybody has those days where nothing goes right. You spill hot coffee on yourself, you accidentally throw away an important paper, you snap at your boss, something sad happens in your life, and you got the wrong order at McDonalds when you went to get lunch. If this sounds like the story of your afternoon, just think about taking the rest of the day off, if possible, and relax as much as you can. You can always start your projects where you left off tomorrow morning.

Action, action, action! Personal development skills all revolve around that one word - action. Whether it be installing a new habit, starting up a new lifestyle, or even taking the guts to quit your unsatisfactory job, if you don’t take action towards your goals, those goals are worthless. Hopes and dreams take you only so far; you have to add in the last few steps to make them a reality.

Speaking your mind and actions are something that go hand and hand with one another. Often times, people are able to dish out their opinions and advice on a multitude of subjects… sometimes when the person doesn’t even know anything about the subject. Of course, this leads to major incongruence. Apparently we speak our mind, but rarely take our own advice.

In late December / early January, lots of person development bloggers wrote on the subject of “New Years resolutions”. Everything from why your resolutions will not fail to keeping up with your resolutions was covered. Consequently, I wonder how many people’s resolutions failed because they didn’t take action on what they truly desire; I also wonder how many of those same personal development blogger’s New Years resolutions failed themselves because they didn’t take their own advice.

Advice is great. This website has a multitude of advice for you, from motivational pieces to pieces that I hope can change your life in some great way. But this website - and all other websites similiar to it - can only do so much. It can’t push you to take action on your plans. This website can motivate, can inform, can change, and can mold you into a brand new personal, capable of amazing things. But motivation, being informed, and changing and molding yourself is only part of the equation. Action is the missing piece.

You can have the most perfect, detailed plans on how to get exactly what you want, but without action, those plans are better used as birdcage lining. You can be the most motivational speaker out there, but if you refuse to take action to share your talent with the world, what good is your gift? Action is the key to unlocking your destiny.

And it doesn’t even have to be the right action to begin with! Lots of people start out on one path, turn around, then start on a brand new path when it didn’t work out the way they expected. That’s fine! Too often we get in this phase of action paralysis, when we decide we can’t move on because we have to “explore all of our options and decide what to do”. That’s not proactive. That’s not living. That’s excusing yourself from making real progress towards your dreams. I’ll be the first one to say planning is essential in any endeavor. You need to know exactly what you want and a fuzzy idea of how to get there. But to use planning as an excuse to stay stagnant is for losers. (You’re not a loser, are you? I hope not!) Just pick a path and go down it. It doesn’t matter if it’s exactly what you want or not. Your life is going to go by anyway - you better make the most out of every day. Find out later that’s the wrong path for you? Ditch it and start a new one. You have nothing to lose!

Nothing to lose at all. What’s the absolute worst that can happen? You go down the wrong path and end up back where you started? You go down another wrong path and end up worse off than you started? So what! Just pick a different route and go down that! The worst thing of all is no action, because if you don’t take action, you’re no better off than where you are now.

I know a lot of you who read this article are personal development fans too. But be honest with yourself. A year from now - when you’ve all but forgotten your New Years resolutions for 2008 - are you going to be staring at a bunch of empty goals and plans from the past year, neatly typed up and printed out? I hope not.

Take some action today. Decide on a goal, get a basic plan written up on how to achieve it, and move towards it! And whatever you do, don’t give up. Don’t ever stop taking that action to get what you want.