Something to think about podcast
Principles that will help you succeed and achieve your goals.
(upbeat music) - Welcome to The Something to Think About Podcast, where we take a closer look at what the Bible says about common questions. I am Andre Parma. - We have reached the end of our series of setting goals. I hope you are in a better place where you have set the destination that you want to achieve, you have identified the resources and you also identify the reason. You have also evaluated your mindset and attitude that will hinder you from accomplishing these goals. Last week, we look on several of them. Productive persons are happy to do the work. They think it's their duty. They gather the resources and they finish the job. Unproductive persons, their mindset, they don't want to do anything, don't want the responsibility. They do everything on their own as opposed to collaborating with other people, and they will not finish anything. Similarly with the attitude, productive persons focus on finishing non-productive persons. They really get frustrated and they're not focused at all. They do the work, productive persons do the work, unproductive persons don't do the work well, and productive persons work for the reward which is winning and accomplishing the goal, unproductive persons don't have no goal in mind. All right, so we want to wrap up this week. And of course, scripture is always, we want to stay within that context. Paul says, "I don't feel that I have already arrived, but I forget what is behind and struggle for what is I had." Philippians 3.13, reading from the CEB translation. So I just want to leave you with five things that I wanted to keep in mind as you wrap up your goal setting journey on this goal setting journey, because it's important that we keep in mind of all that we want to accomplish. One year is not enough to accomplish all the goals that we have. So sometimes you have to stretch it out a little bit and give ourselves some time to really ensure that we are working at a steady pace. Sometimes we may accomplish certain things faster than some other times it may not be so fast, but we have to be patient with ourselves when we are working with working on goals. Disappointments may come, but don't be discouraged. Like you have to take your time. You say, well, did not win his first race. First time he went to Olympics, he didn't. You came out after the first round, but he come a couple years later, he not only won an Olympic medal, he broke a record and he did so twice. So hey, it may not be you saying bold, but in your area, you can be able to break records by accomplishing your goals. And you may probably even be the first person in your family to accomplish certain things and read certain levels, but even though it's not for your family, you're doing this because you want to do it. And that's what matters. But here, some things to keep in mind. Number one, focus on what's important. So it's easy to get distracted by several things that is happening, work, school, children being sick, pressures at work, disappointments. Sometimes you have memories of things that you haven't dealt with yet and it's still coming back. And all of these things bombard your mind. Sometimes there's not enough time in the day, sometimes 24 hours is too little bit. You need, say for instance, a day should be running like 50 hours a day to ensure that you can accomplish everything and that you'll be able to survive off half an hour, tough sleep so you can do work tomorrow. Like, it's a lot. But here's the thing. It's important to focus on what matters. Paul says, everybody runs the race. To win, all the one person is going to win. But this is the attitude that you must have when you're running. You must run to win. It's an athletic analogy. But the reality is that you have to see yourself as a winner, running to win. But you have to focus on the goal. The goal is to win. So you can't really get distracted by all of that. It is important. And these are matters that may seem urgent. But when you look on your goals and look on the problems that are around you, what matters? What is important? So that's the idea that I want you to focus on, like, limit yourself to what's important. So you know, if you're a parent, taking care of your children, that's important. On the job, being productive on the job is important. Also, having peace of mind and dealing with and healing from past hurts and traumas, that's important because it helps you to become productive. It helps you to be free, creative. And also, becoming financially stable is important because no one wants to live in poverty and struggling financially. But having these goals in mind, it's important. So you have to focus on these things and working on solving these problems or accomplishing these goals. Also, passing all your courses is important. No one wants to fail anything. But setting your targets is important and being willing to put in the time to ensure that you accomplish these goals. These are things that are important. Number two, discipline yourself to accomplishing the result. You may set the goal. You may focus on what's important. But where things may fall apart is the lack of discipline. So you may think that you can do five things at the same time and, hey, I have super human strength and ability to juggle 50 things. It limits your productivity because what you want is focus. You want to limit what you're doing. Limiting doesn't put a restriction on how well you can do something. It gives you the freedom to accomplish more faster. Sometimes less is more. Sometimes when you realize you're doing several things at the same time, it's not a productive way of really running your life when you're juggling all of these things. Some things you can't run away from. Some things there's a lot happening. But sometimes doing less is actually helping you accomplishing more. So ensure that you have the right discipline in terms of to focus your attention on accomplishing your goals. Number three, make the right preparation. You cannot show up and start in line without training, without a game plan. That's why it's important to identify the resources that you need to accomplish your goals. This is a plan in part. This is a plan in part. So if you think about what we have been discussing in terms of Paul and his journey to Spain, his plan was to go to Spain, but he had to go to Jerusalem first before he went to Spain. But here is the plan for his journey to Spain. He's going to make us stop in Rome. Stopping in Rome on his way to Spain. And he also did not plan to stop long. So these are plans. And he also is making the allocations for his resources to ensure that he accomplishes his goal. So making adequate preparation is important for you to ensure that you reach your destination. Number four is that you need examples. We need examples. According to Hebrews 12 verse two, we must keep our eyes on Jesus who leads us and make our faith complete. He endured the shame of being nailed to our cross because he knew that later on he would be glad he did it. No, he is seated at the right hand of the Father, the right side of God's throne. So anything about it. He endured shame and being nailed to our cross. Who would like to be nailed to our cross? But here's the thing. He know that being nailed to the cross would help him to get to his objective. So these are the things that you need to look for examples. So Jesus is the earth and the finisher for our faith. So he's an example we can look to in terms of somebody that was super focused on achieving their objective. And they were very disciplined. And he's an example that we can follow. But if you want other examples, look for other people that are doing the same thing that you want to accomplish. And we really use that as a motivation and hope that you can actually accomplish the same thing in your own way because you may not achieve similar results in terms of our exact replica. But your testimony and your story is very different. Your journey is very different. Your destination is not the same as them. But their example can give you hope. So Jesus, if we keep our eyes on Jesus, Jesus is really the one that is going to lead us. The example is leading us to help us make our faith complete. So that is what really the component of the goal setting that you need to bear in mind, that an example would help to complete your idea that you can be hopeful and ensure that you accomplish your goal. And the last thing is that remove everything that will block your progress. So you need to remove all the distractions, anything that will prevent you from accomplishing your goals. Sometimes you have to say no to those meetings, those phone calls, all of that responsibility that really keep your time and suck your time from accomplishing certain goals. Sometimes you need to limit what you're doing. Sometimes you're too, sometimes literally another problem is that you're too busy. So if you limit all the things that you're doing and the responsibility, you can help to accomplish your goal. So as far as I keep my body under control, make it my slave. So I won't lose after telling the good news to others. So something to think about as you go through this week, make sure that you're focusing on what's important, discipline yourself to accomplishing the result, make adequate preparation. Planning is key to helping you accomplishing your goal. Look for examples and remove distractions. God bless and my love. And that's all for sure, thanks for listening. I release a new episode of this podcast every Tuesday wherever you listen to your podcast. If you find this information useful, please share this episode with a friend. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)
In this episode we explore principles that will help you succeed and acheive your goals.