Favorite Inspirational Quotes

The victory of success is half won when one gains the habit of setting goals and achieving them.  Even the most tedious chore will become endurable as you parade through each day convinced that every task, no matter how menial or boring, brings you closer to achieving your dreams.

Og Mandino

There’s a lot to journal about here.  Most inspirational quotes are a good jumping off point.  Og Mandino gives very good advice here as he usually did.  I’ll just ramble on a bit, which is what my journaling is anyway, discussing what I pick up.

First, I get that you are half way to success by developing a habit.  You probably need to develop a process first and then turn it into a habit.  In this case, the habit needs to consist of two major parts - setting goals and then achieving them.

Just the act of setting goals by itself doesn’t get you to success.  The second part of the equation is necessary, too.  I guess it really is an equation:

Setting Goals + Achieve Goals = Success

I’m thinking that Mandino says you’re only half way to success because there may be many instances of goals having to be set and achieved before ultimate success.  Some of those goals will be the chores you do, including the tedious and boring ones.  But getting them done still leads you to success.  Maybe, eventually, you can get someone else to do that boring and tedious stuff.

Getting back to the habit.  You need to create a habit of setting goals.  There are lots of books and websites that discuss this such as Zen Habits and the book by Leo Babauta,  Zen to Done.  You might want to set one or two major goals for the year and then break those down - monthly, weekly - until you get to your daily To Do list.  Each step along the way is to support and build toward achieving the major goal.

Which leads us to the second part of achieving the goal.  Personally, I think this is the harder part.  It consists of figuring out what actions need to be taken for each set goal.  Then it means getting off your butt and taking action.  You have to get your body into motion.

Taking action is hard.  Taking focused action toward a specific goal much harder.  And continuous focused action toward that goal harder still.  That’s where you need to develop another habit.  That habit is one of persistent determination or perseverance.

A lot of habit forming here.  Success isn’t for wimps.

Tags: success