Life Mapping: A Vision of Succes
Success is more than economic gains, titles, and degrees. Planning for success is about mapping out all the aspects of your life. Similar to a map, you need to define the following details: origin, destination, vehicle, backpack, landmarks, and route.
Origin: Who you are
A map has a starting point. Your origin is who you are right now. Most people when asked to introduce themselves would say, “Hi, I’m Jean and I am a 17-year old, senior highschool student.” It does not tell you about who Jean is; it only tells you her present preoccupation. To gain insights about yourself, you need to look closely at your beliefs, values, and principles aside from your economic, professional, cultural, and civil status. Moreover, you can also reflect on your experiences to give you insights on your good and not-so-good traits, skills, knowledge, strengths, and weaknesses. Upon introspection, Jean realized that she was highly motivated, generous, service-oriented, but impatient. Her inclination was in the biological-medical field. Furthermore, she believed that life must serve a purpose, and that wars were destructive to human dignity.
Destination: A vision of who you want to be
“Who do want to be?” this is your vision. Now it is important that you know yourself so that you would have a clearer idea of who you want to be; and the things you want to change whether they are attitudes, habits, or points of view. If you hardly know yourself, then your vision and targets for the future would also be unclear. Your destination should cover all the aspects of your being: the physical, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual. Continuing Jean’s story, after she defined her beliefs, values, and principles in life, she decided that she wanted to have a life dedicated in serving her fellowmen.
Vehicle: Your Mission
A vehicle is the means by which you can reach your destination. It can be analogized to your mission or vocation in life. To a great extent, your mission would depend on what you know about yourself. Bases on Jean’s self-assessment, she decided that she was suited to become a doctor, and that she wanted to become one. Her chosen vocation was a medical doctor. Describing her vision-mission fully: it was to live a life dedicated to serving her fellowmen as a doctor in conflict-areas.
Travel Bag: Your knowledge, skills, and attitude
Food, drinks, medicines, and other travelling necessities are contained in a bag. Applying this concept to your life map, you also bring with you certain knowledge, skills, and attitudes. These determine your competence and help you in attaining your vision. Given such, there is a need for you to assess what knowledge, skills, and attitudes you have at present and what you need to gain along the way. This two-fold assessment will give you insights on your landmarks or measures of success. Jean realized that she needed to gain professional knowledge and skills on medicine so that she could become a doctor. She knew that she was a bit impatient with people so she realized that this was something she wanted to change.
Landmarks and Route: S.M.A.R.T. objectives
Landmarks confirm if you are on the right track while the route determines the travel time. Thus, in planning out your life, you also need to have landmarks and a route. These landmarks are your measures of success. These measures must be specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and time bound. Thus you cannot set two major landmarks such as earning a master’s degree and a doctorate degree within a period of three years, since the minimum number of years to complete a master’s degree is two years. Going back to Jean as an example, she identified the following landmarks in her life map: completing a bachelor’s degree in biology by the age of 21; completing medicine by the age of 27; earning her specialization in infectious diseases by the age of 30; getting deployed in local public hospitals of their town by the age of 32; and serving as doctor in war-torn areas by the age of 35.
Anticipate Turns, Detours, and Potholes
The purpose of your life map is to minimize hasty and spur-of-the-moment decisions that can make you lose your way. But oftentimes our plans are modified along the way due to some inconveniences, delays, and other situations beyond our control. Like in any path, there are turns, detours, and potholes thus; we must anticipate them and adjust accordingly.
This article explains how you can become the person of your dreams by simply focusing on the what you want your end result to be.
What would you like to be when you grow up?
I bet you often heard this question asked many times when you were still young from your parents and relatives.
But, have you really given that question some deep thoughts?
Different people have different dreams.
So, what's your aspiration? Do you want to become a doctor, lawyer, pilot, or entertainer?
Or...
Would you like to be a Tom Cruise or Bill Gates?
Let me tell you right now, you can become what you want to become. You can become anything you want to be as long as you put your Mind and Heart into it.
I recommend you read some biographies of the people who inspire you the most. It's a great way to give you some guidance through their experiences they share within their biographies as to how they got to where they are today.
Here are 4 more quick tips and words of encouragement to keep you all fired up towards becoming who you want to be in life.
Tip #1.
Learn as much as possible about the person you aspire to be. Let's say your dream is to become a basketball player.
Gather all facts and information about the sport. Research on the internet, read books, watch the games and analyze team strategies; in other words, strive to be an Expert.
Tip #2.
You must have the Desire and Passion to know everything you can about the subject. If you can have a real person to imitate or look up to, the better.
For example, you may see yourself as Michael Jordan (for basketball), Mariah Carey (for singing), or Heide Klum (for modeling). Feel, talk, and act as if you're that person you're emulating. You'll quickly acquire the behavior and qualities of that person. This formula works like a charm, so just give it a try.
Tip #3.
Take Motivated Action and start pursuing your dreams!
Don't wait for everything to be perfect. That will never happen. There will always be bumps and obstacles ahead. The important thing is to start Right NOW and adjust along the way.
You'll be glad did.
Tip #4.
Persist until the VERY end.
Never let failures distract you. Just keep pushing yourself to the limit.
If you think that a task seems impossible to accomplish, banish that thought... Immediately!
Your mind has the capacity to bring into reality anything you desire.
As long as you stay Focused and Patient on your objective despite any setbacks or discouragements, you will become successful much sooner than you may think.
Life Without Limits, Clarify What You Want Redefine Your Dreams Become the Person You Want to Be - 2001 publication
Are you a mother who is also a career-oriented woman? If you are, you may have number of different issues tugging at your heart. In today’s society, many mothers are fearful of putting their family first, especially in certain circumstances, in fear of losing their jobs. With that in mind, there are many mothers who are fearful that their children will grow up resenting them due to the amount of time they spent focused on work. While being a mother and a career-oriented woman, all at the same time, may seem like an impossible task, it is a task that you can more than perform. What you need to remember, although difficult as it may be, is that you should be a mom first. However, that doesn’t mean that you should just toss your workload to the side and not care. There are a number of different ways that you can go about being a good parent, while still brining home an income. One of those ways involves spending quality time with your child or children when you are not working. One of the best ways for you to go about spending quality time with your child or children is by creating a schedule for yourself. This schedule can be used to outline any important events that you and your child or children have planned. Although your schedule does not need to be followed right down to the letter, it is important to have one. Mothers who create schedules for themselves are more likely to follow through with their plans.Speaking of your plans, you may be wondering what you should do to spend quality time with your child or children. Of course, it is important to keep your child’s age in mind. A child who is three years old will prefer different activities than one who is nine or ten years old. With that in mind, there are a number of different activities that many children, including those of all ages, love. A few of those activities are outlined below for your convenience.One activity that you may want to think about doing with your child or children is taking them to the zoo. Regardless of where you live, you should have a zoo within a reasonable driving distance to your home. Zoo trips are fun and exciting, as they often last all day. What is nice about zoo trips is that they are fun and educational all at the same time. This means that your quality time can benefit your child or children in more ways than one.Another activity that you may want to think about doing is taking your child or children to the movies. Whether your child is three years old or fifteen years old, there should be a movie playing that would likely interest them. Going to the movies is nice, as many children view it as a treat. For more affordable movie tickets, you may want to think about going to see a movie with your family during the daytime.Additional activities that many children enjoy are those of park visits, museum visits, and sporting events. In all honestly, it really doesn’t matter what you do. To your child or children, how matter what their age, they will likely just appreciate the fact that you took some time away from work to have fun with them, no matter what the activity.
If You Can't Make Time, Don't Make Children: How To Spend More Time With Your Kids
Spending Time With Your Kids & Growing Rich : How To Run Your Own Home Based Business
Facts About the 2009 Swine Flu
Your head aches, and so does every muscle in your body. You're cold one minute and hot the next. Your throat is scratchy and you're starting to cough. You might be coming down with the flu!
If you get the flu, you'll have lots of company. Each year from November to April, all across the United States, as many as 60 million people come down with the flu. Although kids get the flu most often, people in every age group — including teens — can catch it.
Search Amazon.com for Flu Facts
Posted on: 5 November 2010 | 7:45 pm
Where There's a Will There's An A Set (How To Get Better Grades In High School)
Parent-Teacher Conferences: Five Important QuestionsPrepare yourself for parent-teacher conferences by thinking about what information parents really should have.
Here are some examples
What skills and knowledge will your students be expected to master this year? What will your students learn this year in key subjects like math, science, history, and English?
Are there challenging academic standards in place at your school, and how do they compare with those at other school districts? Show these standards to parents.
How will you inform students about the academic standards they're expected to meet? What kinds of projects and assignments have you planned that will help your students meet higher academic standards?
How will your students be evaluated? What kind of information do you use to evaluate students? How do you know if they're academically ready to move on to the next grade?
How are grades determined in your classroom?
What can parents do to stay more involved in their child's academic progress? What can they do at home to complement what is happening in the classroom?
How can they know on a daily basis what homework has been assigned?
How can they support your efforts in implementing higher academic standards?
How do you accommodate differences in learning? What if their child is a slow learner and falls behind, or is a fast learner and is bored?
Are summer school, tutoring, or other programs available for students who need more help?
How are older students prepared for further learning after high school? Are children encouraged to think about a wide variety of career interests?
Are all students encouraged to take algebra by the end of eighth grade?
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