Lesson 24

Take Action

This morning before getting down to writing I decided to mow the grass. Our old motor mower has been great over the years. I just push it along and it cuts the grass very quickly. It needs petrol of course and requires several ‘pulls’ on the ‘starting rope’ before the motor growls into life. Sometimes it takes more effort than others. It is a little like a metaphor for the goal setting process, our unconscious mind is a goal getter opening our mind to new information and coming up with creative ideas but before it kicks in we need to do some hard work.

Taking action is vital; you can’t just call on the Universe and expect stuff to happen. A good place to start is by listing down an action plan that will move you towards each goal. Then plan time in your diary to complete those tasks.

90 Day Planning

I am a big fan of 90-day planning. This involves deciding and listing the most important things we can do in the next 90 days and making time in your diary to achieve them. It is a simple process and does not pressure you to do everything this month, however it does allow a reasonable time to plan the activities which move us towards goal achievement.

Taking action is essential to goal achievement. We normally start off well in January, putting events in the diary, creating space to get things done but then something crops up and we ‘get busy’ and before you know it it’s Christmas again! But what if we give ourselves a break and just plan for the next three months? Rather than doing everything straight away or setting plans for a whole year (which means we will keep putting things off) we commit to doing our action plan in 90 days. I take a page in my jotter pad, which I use for meetings. I fold the page in half, a trick I learned from Mark and write my list in the two columns. It gives me space to list 12 or so actions. I may develop a more detailed plan for each action on a separate page. I then put times and dates in my diary when I’m going to do something towards them.