If you were starting a new job would you prepare yourself for your first day? What about a dream vacation? Wouldn’t you read up on the places you want to see and the things you want to do? When we set out to attempt something that is life changing we prepare and plan for it. It doesn’t matter if it’s a date, moving to a new city or getting a new job, we want to be as ready as we can for life and its many curveballs. Yet when it comes to our dreams, our goals and our resolutions, we run off willy-nilly without a second thought. It’s time to take a moment and prepare. It’s time to plan out how you are going to succeed.
If you planned to accomplish your New Years Resolutions, or just resolved to finally chase after your dreams then you have only just started out on a long journey. Journeys take time, and they often take us to unexpected places. This is why it is so important to have a plan and to have some sort of measuring stick to gauge how you are doing. If you don’t know where you are going, or how to get there, how can you tell when you are lost?
I used to camp out a lot when I was young. Every time I went out there was extensive preparation beforehand. Do the tents leak? Are there batteries in the flashlight? What will we eat? What will the weather be like? Where did I put my compass this time? One time I hurriedly ran off to go camping and in my haste I didn’t bother to check these things. Unprepared and with only a vague sense of where I was going I found myself wet, hungry, and lost in the dark on a mountain top in the middle of Kentucky. It was a minor miracle that I was located the next morning, uninjured and without having a bobcat or a bear eat me. I made it back home with a minor case of hypothermia and missing my favorite blanket but it could have been much worse.
The path to our dreams and goals is not always one that is clearly marked. Sometimes we will be tried and tested, other times everything will click and just work. To be able to handle the easy and the hard times we must know who we are and what we want to achieve. We have to be prepared for whatever comes our way. Though it may seem like your goals are a long way off, preparation at the beginning of your journey lays a foundation that you can succeed with. So ask yourself simple questions, about yourself and your dream. What skills do I posses that will help me achieve this? What skills do I not have? Where do I want to be at the end of the year? Can that be done and still keep my sanity? What else do I need to accomplish this and where do I attain it? You don’t need a complicated chart of every single detail, because life rarely follows charts, but it is important to take stock of who you are now and where you want to be in six months or a year.
Now just because you started working towards your goals without a plan does not mean you will end up on a mountain top in the middle of Kentucky. Nor should drop everything you are doing and immediately and formulate a five year plan. Instead I suggest you be diligent. Keep your eyes focused on what you want to do in the short term and figure things out as you go along. When I first started writing I had no idea what I was doing or how I was going to get to where I wanted to be. Heck I didn’t even believe in myself enough to actually let others read what I wrote! It wasn’t until much later that I decided to get serious about what I wanted to do. The important thing is that I never gave up; I never stopped. Now I do have a plan, now I do know where my limitations lay. All it took was a little bit of planning. Now I know that my once far off dream can be achieved.