His future is a manifestation of the present deeds. You can know your future by your present actions. You can transform your future by changing your present life.
However, change is one of the most difficult things to experience. Many people cannot tolerate drastic changes in their lives. Because of the uncertainties that come with change, people are reluctant about it. If you want to change your tomorrow, you need to commence the changes today. Here are the seven vital steps to help you bring a more fruitful tomorrow.
#1: You Are the Sum of the 5 People You Spend Most Of Your Time With
If you want to know your future, look at the lives of the people you are presently with. The people around you have a direct influence on your life. You acquire some of their attitudes, principles, and practices. You are like a small child that imbibes the practices of the adults around. When you go with dishonest people, eventually, you alter your own values and acquire their dishonesty. However, if you go for honest people, their honesty reinforces your own personal values.
The kinds of people you share your life with are very powerful personalities that affect your present actions and later own your future life. Because of their great impact on your life, it is very crucial that you know them very well. Once you know their influence on you, you will know how to take it to your own advantage.
The idea of being the sum of the people around you is often one of the most neglected parts of human psychology. Although this is not a novel thinking, people keep on ignoring the bearing of others in their lives. As a result, they just end up being like their detested character. This is all because they spent too much time with the person.
The person you are with can elevate you as much as they can pull you down. The first step to change your future today is by knowing the five people from your core circle. In order for you to see their impact in your life, here are the steps that you can do.
Identify the five people you spend most of your time with
Because you are the sum of the people around you, you need to be careful with the people you spend most of your time with. Although some of them are indispensable in your life, like your parents or siblings, try to spend as little time as possible to inevitable people with a negative impact on your future life. Other people that you may frequently spend your time with are your friends, office mates or schoolmates, and your special someone. Each person may have a different answer to the five people they spend most of their time with. But it will mostly revolve around these groups.
Identify the Qualities of these Five People
Once you have identified the five people in your life, try to assess each one’s personality. Look at them in every aspect of their life. Look at their family relationship, their dedication to work or school, their attitude towards problems, and their outlook in life. Getting to know these people will help you know yourself better.
Identify the attitudes you share with these five people in your life
After knowing your core circle and their special attributes, try to assess your own life. What positive and negative characteristics do you possess? To whom can you relate your characteristics? When you are able to identify the major influence in that character trait, then you can do something about it. If you want to enhance a positive attribute coming from one of your core groups, then try to get closer to the person. The more time you spend with him/her, the better you can imitate that attitude. However, if you see mostly negative attributes to your core group, better reconsider your relationship with the person.
Everyone needs a tribe. However, your tribe must exert a good influence in your life to benefit from it. If you are in a bad company, your future is at risk. Your choices today, including your choice of the company, have a direct effect on your life. If you want to know your future, look at the lives of the people you spend most of your life with.
#2: Find a Mentor
Everyone looks up to someone; it may be an old teacher, your parent or elder sister or brother, or your very own best friend. The person you admire may serve as your mentor. Because you adore him/her, most likely, you listen to his/her suggestions and teachings. A good mentor provides new knowledge and directs you to the right path.
If you wish to change your life tomorrow, look for a good mentor who will bring you to the kind of life you wish to have. To whether your mentor is good for keeping, here are the ideal characteristics of a mentor.
Acts as a Role Model
You have to practice what you teach. To be an effective mentor, you need to do what you say. The best way to direct a person on the right path is by modeling a good example. As the cliché goes, actions speak louder than words. If your mentor is worthy of emulation, look at his/her life. Otherwise, you must find other mentors to relate your life with.
Willingness to Share
A good mentor is someone who is willing to share the secrets of a good life. If your mentor is open to share his/her expertise and teaches you the skills to succeed in life, you can trust the person with your life.
Motivates Others
A good mentor can bring out the intrinsic motivation in a person. For your mentor to be a good leader, he/she must bring out the best in you. Some students or followers go back to their old ways when the mentor disappears. If you are one of these people, your mentor is not effective. An effective mentor naturally brings out the inner motivation in his followers. Even in his absence, the followers stay within his teachings without the need for constant supervision.
#3: Start or Join a Team of Like-Minded Individuals
A group’s effort is stronger than an individual’s effort. When you want to transform your life today, join groups or teams with the same interest as yours. Unlike when you are working alone to change some aspects of your life, a group effort is stronger and harder to disrupt. When you belong to a team, your conviction to better life is tougher and thus harder to break. When you reach a saturation point, your team can assist and support you along the journey. Contrary to working alone, the team with like-minded individuals can back you up when you lose your perseverance. Below are the advantages of working as a team.
Provides a Sense of Security
Working as a team gives you a feeling of security. When you have a group who shares the same interest as yours, you are sure of their support with any problem that may come. You know that there are people who stay with you and will guide you as you go along.
Increased Learning
As you work with people, you increase your knowledge of their experiences. Because you share common interests, you can draw wisdom from them. You do not have to experience personal things just to learn. By listening to their sentiments, you can learn a lot from the events in their lives.
Compensate to an individual’s weakness
Each person has his own weakness. When you work alone to change your future, even a small weakness can be deleterious to your goal. However, if you have a team, other members can compensate for your own weakness. They can assist you in dealing with a weakness and teach you how to overcome it. You can draw strength from the team, especially in your lowest situation.
Develop a Personal Relationship
Joining a team also provides you with relationships that are more personal. As you spend more time with your team, you can find friendship with them and influence each other. Again, in this case, we go back to the five people you spend most of your time with. Make sure that the team you will join will have a positive impact on your future life.
Increased understanding of other people’s perspective
Because you are working with other people, you will have a better understanding of the way people think and act. You can use your learning to assess your own character and later on improve your self.
#4: Get Into Business
Most people who want to transform their lives start with a business. If you notice, the richest people are not employees, but they are entrepreneurs who took the risk to do things on their own. If you want to achieve a better financial status in the future, you can begin establishing your own business today. Here are the perceived benefits of having your own business.
Be your Own Boss
If you are an employee, you need to get along with your boss and your coworkers. There are too many people to work with. You need to adapt to their personality and whims. When you have your own business, you become your own boss. You do not have to adapt to anyone’s caprice. All you need to do is work hard and work with your future clients.
Flexible Time
Working in an office means spending 8 hours in the area. You cannot leave the workplace since sanctions are ready for implementation. When you have your own business, you can own your time. You have the final say about your day off, working hours, and your break time.
Generate Unlimited Income
Because you work at your own pace, you can generate more income as you wish. Unlike when you are an ordinary employee, you only receive your paychecks twice and at a predicted amount. In business, you can generate millions within days or years, depending on your own capacity.
#5: Start a Bank Account for Investing Purpose
Starting a bank account helps you save your resources and invest for your purpose. Instead of keeping your money in your hands, having a bank account gives you countless benefits. Here are the few advantages of maintaining a bank account.
Safer When you have your bank account, you do not personally keep your money. The bank holds responsibility for your money. Therefore you safeguard it from thieves and possible disasters like natural and man-made calamities. Even during a bankruptcy, your money has insurance to keep the depositor’s worry-free.
Easier to Save Banks helps you save money. Most people who overspend keep more cash with them. When you keep your money in the banks, you avoid too much spending. You also avoid withdrawing large amounts of money in banks because of their existing withdrawal limits.
You Earn Interest With bank accounts; your money works for you. If you keep your money in your own safekeeping, the value is the same from day one up to the day you will need it. If you keep it in banks, it becomes your personal investment because you earn interest every month.
#6: Time Management: How To Get More Time In A Day To Build Your Financial Freedom
Sometimes you can hear people say that 24 hours in a day is not enough to finish all their work and meet all the deadlines. If you are one of these people, you will hear answers like “if you cannot find time, make time.” With the busy society that you are in, it feels that you need to compress everything in 24 hours. The secret to meeting your set goals is simply by ceasing to complain and sit down and start doing the work. Most people who keep on saying time is not enough are the people who love to complain. Instead of using the time working, they spend two or three hours complaining and discerning how to start the work. If others can compress all their obligations in the time given to them, why cannot you do it?
Time Management
The key to keeping up with your deadlines is through efficient time management. With the right allocation of your time and task, you can meet your target and still find time to relax. Although time management is a skill, you can learn it as you practice it. Here are some of the proven beneficial time management tips.
Prioritize things
You can start your day by listing the things you need to accomplish prioritizing those that are urgent. When you have a to-do-list, you can keep your mind focused on your list and prevent straying away from this. You can create the list by writing down those that need your immediate attention. Once you finish the most urgent one, you can start doing the next in line and so on. By prioritizing things, you prevent sacrificing a task over another.
Know your most productive hours
Different people have different levels of productivity during the day. Although most people are more productive in the morning, there are also people who find the restful afternoons to work at their best. If you are a morning person, try to delegate complicated tasks in the morning. When you know your most productive hours, you can allow this time to accomplish difficult work and set aside the easier ones during your idle moments.
Start and finish your task.
The problem with people who complains of insufficient time is leaving a task unfinished and starting a new work. If you want to adopt a good time management skill, finish all tasks that you have started. Otherwise, your day will be over, with several tasks open and hanging. In the end, you do not accomplish even a small work, and you will totally screw up everything.
Analyze your situation
If you feel running after the clock each day, it is time to sit down and analyze the whole situation. There might be problems with the way you handle your time. Find out activities where you spend too much of your time. Once you discover these, then you can be more watchful when doing them. If you waste three to five hours surfing social network sites, you can reduce this to one hour to make the remaining hours more productive.
Create a goal
A goal is your motivation for time management. When you set your goals, be realistic. Remember that you only have 24 hours in a day. Never set goals that are not feasible. Otherwise, you will end up frustrated every day.
Delegate and outsource
There is nothing wrong with volunteering your services to people. However, be realistic. You cannot be a hero every day. Learn to delegate other tasks to trusted people and let them take responsibility for it. Much as you would want to do everything, multitasking is often difficult. If you are not good at it, you will end up sacrificing some things over another.
Use your waiting time productively.
Waiting is one of the most time-wasting activities. You wait for your turn in the cashier’s line, wait for the foodservice, and wait for a long line in the department stores. You can spend these hours of waiting productively. Instead of watching the next leaf to fall or the next person who will enter the door, you can bring a good book to read or check papers or bring any handy task with you. As you learn to do this, the number of tasks you finish during your waiting times can save you from any obligations.
Time management is learning to use your time wisely and to your own advantage. It is a skill that no one teaches you, but you need to learn to survive the challenges in life. For as long as you are keeping your things well organized, you are in control of your time and your life.
#7: Focus On One Project At A Time!
Our brains are like computers. When you put several tasks all at the same time, the computer hangs and breaks down. Like computers, our brains can only fully accommodate one project at a time. Although some people believe in multitasking, the quality of the product produced from multitasking is not as efficient as the project produced with full focus. This is because your brain can only focus on a single thought at a time. When you follow the concept of one project at a time, your output is superior and is more likely to be completed.
Staying focus on one project, and closing your thoughts from other tasks is quite difficult. The presence of constant distractions in the environment and in your mind can easily divert your attention to other things. No matter how difficult the skill is, you need to master it to create changes in your life that will be beneficial for your future. To help you learn the skill, here are the tips that you must follow.
Break things into bite-sized chunks
Do not overwhelm yourself with a huge task if you can break it into smaller tasks, much better. Split difficult tasks in several smaller and attainable projects. Instead of getting an overpowering project, try to divide it into divisions.
Remove possible distractions
You work best in a quiet environment; find a quiet room where you can focus on your project. Avoid distractions like noise, interruptions, and other forms of disturbances.
Keep your goals clear.
One of the best ways to stay focused on a project is by making your goals clear. When you have clear goals, all will direct all your effort to attain the goal you set. It is easier to keep you motivated when you have realistic and attainable goals.
Conclusion
Changes do not occur in an instant. To create a long-lasting change for your future, you need to equip yourself with the necessary skills to ensure a successful future.
Much as you would want to achieve your goals alone, this is quite difficult. The most successful people did not attain success on their own. There are people around that helped them be the person they wanted to be. IF you want to change your tomorrow, start acting today and look for people who will share the same sentiments that you have.
