It's who you know....

As Jim Rohn put it so succinctly….”we become the combined average of the five people we hang around most", optimally we need to surround ourselves with high concentration of these high influencial people.

Influences can come in various ways – people, places and environments. They provide positive influence that allows us to move forward to our goals, rise above the influence of the everyday, and change our lives.  We should consider all avenues to how we can be inspired, challenged, encourage and motivated in our own lives and how we can return the favor. When we think of how these influences affect us, we need to consider the following:

• Inspire – Seek out and immerse ourselves with those who have already been where we want to go in life.

• Challenge – Strive to participate in activities that allow you to stretch ever so slightly beyond your comfort zone, this will allow for personal growth to occur. As we stretch ourselves, we grow and move forward towards our goals.  

• Encourage – Allow for external motivations – verbal and otherwise, that give you the attitude of positive reinforcement such as “You can do this!" so that it becomes the mantra - “I can do this!"

• Motivate – Seek out and discover a sense of purpose.  Walk the talk and ensure your actions and deeds are a lifestyle example that you wish others to immolate - there's always someone else looking to us and we can be the change we want to see in ourselves and influence others.

Never Give Up…Never Surrender

Persistence. It is one of the important traits we have in our tool box that allows us to achieve our goals in life. As we determine our life goals we wish to accomplished, it this trait that gives us the momentum to take the massive action required on a consistent, persistent basis in order to succeed.  Persistence is like a muscle; it must be exercised and built. Each time we use it, we grow this trait and it get stronger, the more we use it; we may find ourselves closer to goal with each and every day.  

One of the things you’ll notice on your journey, are roadblocks.  You may encounter obstacles that seem to come out the blue that will stop you in your tracks.  If we didn’t have these adversities in life, our goals would come to easy.  It’s in the adversity that persistence lives.  We are challenged in these moments and when you do reach your goal, the moment is greater than we could have possibility imagine. We can revel in our achievement thanks to the persistence we have used to arrive at our destination.  

Every successful person has had more failures than success.  Successful individuals possess the trait of persistence and know instantly how to stumble and fall in their process.  Those who never learn or acquire this trait, miss out on their own success and fail to take the lesson that are learn in failure to heart.   A great example of persistent success is Walt Disney. Walt was turned down 302 times before he got financing for his dream of creating the “Happiest Place on Earth”, Disneyland.  With Persistence, all is possible. Never Give Up…Never Surrender.