To have real fun, there are a few things you must do. Here they are;

1. Be ruthless with your time.
2. Be intolerant of your fears and weaknesses.
3. Be demanding of yourself.

Business (and maybe, life) is about the great feeling of accomplishment, not the temporary good feelings you get from self indulgence. One cannot be taken away, the other leaves as quickly as it arrived.  How much of your enjoyment is from things that can never be taken from you?

Money can be frittered away or it can be invested.  The same is true for you. A great investment grows daily.  Are you growing daily?  How are you better today than yesterday?

Sometimes I become completely fed up with myself. I discover I’ve just spent time being distracted or avoiding something I could have been doing that gets me closer to what I want to have.  Minutes, even hours, gone from life forever.  I’ve learned not to spend time dwelling on past poor decisions.  That’s wasting time over wasting time.

I’ve learned I have to invest time in staying focused. I review my goals, I plan my time.  I work on improving my moment to moment awareness – so I realize more quickly when I am off track or distracted.  I work on improving my thinking so I am not uselessly reworking the past.  I cut the anchor by taking my learnings and moving on.

It’s what you say to yourself, about yourself, when you are by yourself that hits home. Our brains are capable of great change.  We’ve all heard about people sustaining great brain damage and using a different part of their brain to relearn necessary skills – talking, for example.  You don’t need trauma to change, committment works as well.  Part of learning to be who you desire to be is telling yourself who you are in the process of becoming.

This is what I have learned to say to myself, about myself, when I am by myself. They are part of my twice daily recitation of my “I am” statements.  Yes, I have learned to be careful and deliberate about what I say to myself.  You should too.  If you can’t say them in the present tense and beleive them from yourself then use the phrasing “I am becoming…”.

• I am ruthless with my time.
• I am intolerant of my fears and weaknesses.
• I am demanding of my best effort.

I do this because there are things I want to have in my life. To have what I want to have, I must be the person I want to be and do the things I need to do.  What do you want to have?  Who do you need to be to have that?  What do you need to do to have that?

The great acheivers in our history books, our newscasts and even in our sports pages all want to have acheived something. They did what they needed to do and became who they needed to become to have those achievements and the rewards that came with them.  What acheivements do you want to have accomplished?  What rewards do you want?