How Do I Know Which Thing, is the Right Thing, to do First?
This is the million-dollar question…literally.
I think this one question costs us more time and money than any other. Especially as entrepreneurs and business owners.
Last week I wrote about the millions of bricks that represent all the small pieces that our dreams are made up of and the difficult decision of choosing the one from the millions.
When there are millions of things to choose from it can be overwhelming.
As a recovering perfectionist I struggle with indecision. This indecision comes from a long list – lack of clarity, it won’t be good enough, fear of failure, fear of success, and a multitude of other insecurities.
This indecision is the one thing that costs me more than anything else.
It’s frustrating having dreams and them not becoming reality.
Dreams are the subliminal ideas, thoughts and images occurring in our minds. I believe this is how God shares His ideas of our purpose and a direction for building our lives.
This means that when we’re not taking actions to move us toward those dreams, we’re ignoring God.
Dreams are critical to living the life God intends for us.
In the Certain Decision, from the Andy Andrews book, The Traveler’s Gift, he says, “A person without a dream never had a dream come true.” This is what happens after we’ve had dreams that haven’t come to fruition. We give up on those dreams and just drift through life without a plan. We get stuck between dreaming and results and just stop dreaming.
I gave up on my dreams until God got my attention with a smack in the head with a board. Don’t ignore your dreams. They’re there for a reason.
I would have all those big dreams, but for some reason I couldn’t get from dreams to results. I could figure out a plan and get the dreams turned into goals but would struggle to get to the results that were needed to turn those dreams into reality.
How do I get my DREAMS to become RESULTS?
The missing part was the ACTION. This needs to be actions specific to achieving the goals. Not just actions that make us feel good about being busy. They need to be specific to accomplishing the goals that lead to the “one thing”.
Previously I wrote about building our dream lives one brick at a time and the importance of doing something rather than nothing.
My life plan includes a process for getting dreams to results.
DREAMS → VISIONS → GOALS → ACTIONS → RESULTS
Having a life plan helps me do the things that get the results that will build my dream life.
It starts with a plan for building my best life as per God’s plan –
- Building my relationship with God (spiritual)
- Building a family legacy (family)
- Helping people build their dreams (vocational)
- Build wealth (financial)
- Build the best me (personal well-being)
- Help others build a better them (ministry)
- Help build a better world (social & community)
It also includes a list of big, someday dreams –
- Home addition/remodel to level of new
- Keep my truck repaired and maintained in like new condition
- Build, repair and/or maintain out buildings, fences, yard, etc.
- Traveling / cruises
- Have a four-wheel drive project/play truck
- Own properties; houses, commercial buildings, land
- Have trucks, trailers, tractors, loaders etc.
- Vacation home in the mountains
- Own a NASCAR team (possibly sponsor instead?)
- Have a plane with optional container spaces – office, seating, living, storage and ability to haul my truck (Could be used for disaster response and various services)
But how do I know which thing, is the right thing, to do first?
Next week we’ll go deeper yet.