From goal setting to the psychology of achievement, New York Times bestselling author and motivational speaker Brian Tracy knows what he is talking about. This powerful session on staying positively focused is filled with ideas for higher achievement. You’ll learn exactly what to do in order to the break negative patterns that are stopping you from reaching your next level. Goal setting is one of the core skills for creating your ideal life. You’ll discover the critical steps necessary to stay focused on your goals and make the goal setting process fun, instead of a chore. You’ll also get the motivational boost you may need, to follow through on your goals and keep yourself in balance. Loaded with great ideas and philosophies for the achievement of big dreams, this power-packed training video is one of Brian Tracy’s best ever.

Brian Tracy is one of the most in-demand speakers in the world on the subjects of goal setting, success and personal performance. He’s a dynamic and entertaining presenter, teaching critical laws and important ideas on how to reach higher levels of achievement. Brian Tracy is the author of numerous bestselling books and audio programs on achievement, and has appeared on countless television and radio shows. In addition, he is featured regularly in major publications across the country, and overseas. Brian Tracy has also conducted high-level consulting assignments with several billion-dollar-plus corporations in strategic planning and organization development.

Perhaps the greatest single problem that people have today is “time poverty.” Working people have too much to do and too little time. Most people feel overwhelmed with responsibilities and activities, and the harder they work, the further behind they fall. This sense of
being on a never-ending treadmill can cause you to fall into the “reactive/responsive” mode of living. That is, instead of clearly deciding what you want to do, you continually react to what is happening around you. Pretty soon, you lose all sense of control. You feel that your life is running you, rather than that you are running your life.

On a regular basis, take stock of yourself and what you are doing. You have to stop the clock and do some serious thinking about who you are and where you are going. You have to evaluate your activities in the light of what is really important to you. You must master your time instead of becoming a slave to the constant flow of events and demands on your time. And you must organize your life to achieve balance, harmony, and inner peace.

Sociologist Dr. Edward Banfield of Harvard University wrote a book titled The Unheavenly City, in which he described one of the most profound studies on success and priority setting ever conducted.

Banfield’s goal was to find out how and why some people became financially independent during the course of their working lifetime and others did not. He started off convinced that the answer to the question would be influential contacts or some other concrete factor. What he finally discovered was that the major reason for success in life was a particular attitude of mind.

Banfield called this attitude “long time perspective.” He said that men and women who were the most successful in life and the most likely to move up economically were those who took the future into consideration with every decision they made in the present. He found that the longer the period of time a person took into consideration while planning and acting, the more likely it was that he or she would achieve greatness during his or her career.

The key to success in setting priorities is having a long time perspective. You can tell how important something is today by measuring its potential future impact on your life.

Economists say the inability to delay gratification – that is, the natural tendency of individuals to spend everything they earn plus a little bit more, and the mindset of doing what is fun, easy, or enjoyable right now – is the primary cause of economic and personal failure in life. On the other hand, disciplining yourself to do what you know is right and important, although difficult, is the high road to pride, self-esteem, and personal satisfaction.

So setting priorities begins with deciding what you want most in life and then organizing your time and activities so everything you do is the most valuable use of your time in achieving those objectives.

With your larger long-term priorities in order, you can much more easily decide upon your short-term priorities

The process of setting short-term priorities begins with a pad of paper and a pen. Whenever you feel overwhelmed by too many things to do and too little time in which to do them, sit down, take a deep breath, and list all those tasks you need to accomplish. Although there is never enough time to do everything, there is always enough time to do the most important things, and to stay with them until they are done right.

Peter Drucker once said, “Efficiency is doing things right, but effectiveness is doing the right things.” And this requires thought.

Once you have listed your tasks, ask yourself this question: “If I were to be called out of town for a month, and I could finish only one thing on this list, which one thing would it be?” Think it through and circle that one item on your list. Then ask yourself: “If I could do only one more thing before I was called out of town for a month, what would it be?” This is the second thing you circle on your list.

Perform this exercise five or six times until you have sorted out the highest priorities on your list. Then number each priority according to its importance. With these priorities, you are now ready to begin working toward the achievement of your major goals.

Once you can clearly see the one or two things that you should be doing, above all others, just say no to all diversions and distractions and focus single-mindedly on accomplishing those priorities.

Much stress that people experience in their work lives comes from working on low-priority tasks. The amazing thing is that as soon as you start working on your highest-level activity, all your stress disappears. You begin to feel a continuous stream of energy and enthusiasm. As you work toward the completion of something that is really important, you feel an increased sense of personal value and inner satisfaction. You experience a sensation of self-mastery and self-control. You feel calm, confident, and capable.

Getting Things Done

Here are six ideas that you can use, every day, to help you set priorities and keep you working at your best:

1. Take the time to be clear about your goals or objectives so that the priorities you set are moving you in the direction of something of value to you. Remember that many people scramble frantically to climb the ladder of success, only to find that it is leaning against the wrong building.
2. Develop a long time perspective and work on those things in the present that can have the greatest positive impact on your future. Maintain your balance in life by setting priorities in the areas of your health, your personal relationships, and your financial goals.
3. Make the commitment to improve those aspects of your life that are most important to you. If you’re in sales, learn how to be an excellent salesperson. If you’re a parent, learn how to be an outstanding mother or father. The power is always on the side of the person with the best practical knowledge.
4. Be sure to take the time to do your work right the first time. The fewer mistakes you make, the less time you will waste going back and doing it over.
5. Remember, what counts is not the amount of time that you put in overall; rather it’s the amount of time that you spend working on high-priority tasks. You will always be paid for the results that you obtain, not merely the hours that you spend on the job.
6. Understand that the most important factor in setting priorities is your ability to make wise choices. You are always free to choose to engage in one activity or another, but once you have chosen, you must accept the consequences of your choice.

Resolve today to set clear priorities in every area of your life, and always choose the activities that will assure you the greatest health, happiness, and prosperity in the long term. The long term comes soon enough, and every sacrifice that you make today will be rewarded with compound interest in the great future that lies ahead for you.

In order to get your personal time under control, you must decide very clearly on your priorities, but at the same time you must also establish “posteriorities” as well. Just as priorities are things that you do more of sooner, “posteriorities” are the things that you do less of. It is just as important to know what to focus on as it is to know what not to focus on.

Some think that time management is only a business tool, like a calculator or cellular phone. It is something that you use so that you can get more done in a shorter period of time. In reality, it is not a peripheral activity or skill. It is a core skill upon which everything else in life depends.

The fact is, your calendar is full. You have no spare time. Every moment is extremely valuable. Therefore, to do anything new, you will have to stop doing something old. In order to get into something, you will have to get out of something else. In order to pick up something, you will have to put something down. Before you make any new commitment of your time, you must firmly decide what activities you are going to discontinue.

Time is your most precious resource. It is the most valuable thing you have. It is perishable, it is irreplaceable, and it cannot be saved. It can only be reallocated from activities of lower value to activities of higher value. The very act of taking a moment to think about your time before you spend it will begin to improve your personal time management immediately.

Personal time management and proper prioritization enables you to choose what to do first, what to do second, and what not to do at all. It enables you to organize every aspect of your life so that you can get the greatest joy, happiness, and satisfaction out of everything that you do.

Six Steps to Efficient Prioritizing

1. Be clear about your goals and objectives.
2. Develop a long-term perspective.
3. Make the commitment to improve.
4. Take the time to do it right the first time.
5. Always work on your highest-priority activities first.
6. Make wise choices of which activities are higher priority.

Follow these steps and you’ll consistently make the best use of your time, all the time.

The New Psychology of Achievement
This is The Psychology of Achievement as you’ve never heard it before. Brian Tracy has preserved the great and timeless ideas from his original bestselling program, and added newer research and innovative concepts relevant to the “wired” world and global marketplace in which you live and work…. Read more>

© 2011 Nightingale-Conant Corporation

Effective time management is one of the most important skills for boosting productivity. In this powerful time management session by Brian Tracy, you’ll learn how to organize every area of your life. You’ll discover several time management tips, including the best ways to eliminate time wasters, time management techniques for maximizing productivity, how to increase your personal power, how to make yourself more valuable, and keys for staying motivated. No matter what you do for a living, this session promises to bring your time management skills and organizational skills to a new level.

Brian Tracy is one of the most in-demand speakers in the world on the subjects of effective time management, business productivity and personal performance. He’s a dynamic and entertaining presenter, teaching important strategies on how to reach higher levels of achievement, income and happiness. As the author of dozens of books covering the entire spectrum of human and corporate performance, Brian Tracy has appeared on countless television and radio shows. He is also featured regularly in major publications across the country, and overseas. Brian Tracy has also conducted high-level consulting assignments with several billion-dollar-plus corporations in strategic planning and organization development.

Courage Is Needed to Make a Better World (22/37) © by Tony the Misfit

There are several different aspects of courage. Perhaps the most important is the courage to endure, to persist, to “hang in there” in the face of doubt, uncertainty and criticism from others.

Practice Patience in Adversity:
This is called “courageous patience,” the willingness and the ability to “stay the course” in the face of uncertainty, doubt and often criticism from many quarters.

Stay the Course:
In my experience, there is a critical time period between the launching of a new venture and the results that come from that venture. During this hiatus, this waiting period, many people lose their nerve. They cannot stand the suspense of not knowing, of possible failure. They break and run in battle, they quake and quit in business.

The True Leader:
But the true leader is the person who can stand firm, who refuses to consider the possibility of failure. The turning points of many key moments in human history have been the resolution, or lack thereof, of one person. Courageous patience is the acid test of leadership.

To encourage others, to instill confidence in them, to help them to perform at their best requires first of all that you lead by example.

Allow Honest Mistakes:
The second thing you can do to help alleviate the fears of failure and rejection in others is to encourage them to take calculated risks and allow honest mistakes.

Build People Up:
Give the people who look up to you regular praise and approval. Celebrate good tries as well as success, large and small. Create a psychological climate where people feel safe from censure, blame or criticism of any kind. Then do things that make people feel terrific about themselves.

Become Unstoppable:
Courage comes from acting courageously on a day-to-day basis. Your personal development goal should be to practice the behaviors of a totally fearless person until you become, in your own mind, unstoppable.

Action Exercises:
Here are two ways for you to develop courageous patience.

First, prepare yourself in advance for the inevitable disappointments and setbacks you will experience on the way to your goal. Don’t be surprised when they occur.

Second, resolve in advance that you will bounce rather than break and continually encourage others to think and act the same way.

Too Much to Do, Too Little Time
The most common form of stress that managers experience is the feeling of being overwhelmed with far too much to do and having too little time to do it in. In fact, “time poverty” is the biggest single problem facing most managers in America today. We simply do not have enough time to fulfill all our responsibilities. Because of budget limitations, staff cutbacks, downsizing, and competitive pressures, individual managers are forced to take on more and more work, all of which appears to be indispensable to the smooth functioning of our company or department.

Become An Expert
The solution to this problem of work overload is for you to become an expert on time management. There is probably no other skill that you can learn that will give you a “bigger bang for the buck” than to become extremely knowledgeable and experienced in using time management practices.

Be Open to New Ideas
The most foolish manager of all is either the manager who feels that he has no time to learn about time management or, even worse, the manager who, while being overwhelmed with work, feels that he already knows all that he needs to know about the subject.

Never Stop Learning
The fact is that you can study time management and take time management courses for your entire business life and you will still never learn everything you need to know to get the most out of yourself while doing your job in the most efficient way.

The Keys to Time Management
The two indispensable keys to time management are: 1) the ability to set priorities; and 2) the ability to concentrate single-mindedly on one thing at a time.

Since there is never enough time to do everything that needs to be done, you must be continually setting priorities on your activities. Perhaps the very best question that you can memorize and repeat, over and over, is, “what is the most valuable use of my time right now?”

The Best Question of All
This question, “what is the most valuable use of my time right now?” will do more to keep you on track, hour by hour, than any other single question in the list of time management strategies.

Start With Your Top Tasks
The natural tendency for all of us is to major in minors and to give in to the temptation to clear up small things first. After all, small things are easier and they are often more fun than the big, important things that represent the most valuable use of your time.

However, the self-discipline of organizing your work and focusing on your highest value tasks is the starting point of getting your time under control and lowering your stress levels.

Action Exercises
Here are two things you can do immediately to get your time under control.

First, make a decision today to become an expert on time management. Read the books, listen to the audio programs, and take a time management course. Then, practice, practice, practice every day until you master time management skills.

Second, set clear priorities on your work each day, before you begin. Then, discipline yourself to start on your most important task and stay at that until it is complete. This will relieve much of your stress immediately.

When you learn the characteristics and techniques of top ranked managers, you’ll be the one who leads your company to success! Discover the best ways to cut costs, increase sales and dramatically improve profits. You’ll also learn how to hire, keep, manage and motivate the best people and guarantee that you’ll get outstanding results from everyone on your team. This 14 DVD set will turn you into a champion manager that will lead your company to success and skyrocket your income.

These self-limiting beliefs act like brakes on your potential. They hold you back. They generate the two greatest enemies of personal success – doubt and fear. They paralyze you and cause you to hesitate to take the intelligent risks that are necessary for you to fulfill your true potential.

For you to progress, to move onward and upward in your life and your business, you must continually challenge your self-limiting beliefs. You must reject any thought or suggestion that you are limited in any way. You must accept as a basic principle that you are a ‘no-limit’ person, and that what others have done, you can do as well.

When I was a young man, coming from a difficult upbringing, I fell into the mental trap of concluding that because other people were doing better than I was, they must be better or smarter than I was. I accidentally concluded that they were worth more than I was. I must therefore be worth less. This false belief held me back for years.

The fact is that no one is better than you are and no one is smarter than you are. If they are doing better, it is largely because they have developed their natural talents and abilities more than you have. They have learned the laws of cause and effect that apply to their lives and work before you have. And anything anyone else has done, within reason, you can probably do as well. You just need to learn how.