I’m someone who sets myself a lot of goals. I find that it helps me to achieve things that I want to do, but wouldn’t otherwise put the necessary time and effort into if I didn’t have a goal motivating me. Something I’ve come to realize lately is that many people don’t set goals for themselves, and they also think that people who are successful in life have everything handed to them on a silver platter.

I actually really hate it when people have that viewpoint. Sure, some people are gifted things, but in my experience it is the exception rather than the rule. Most people who are successful and achieve great things in their lives happen to work very hard to get to where they are. To an outside observer it might look like someone has had instant success, but in reality, 9 times out of 10 a successful person is working hard towards an end goal. It isn’t always visible, and often they have a lot of failures (I call them lessons learned) along the way.

Now I’m on my own journey towards some goals, and while I don’t consider myself successful, I do know that I am on the right path. The image above illustrates how I know I am heading the right way. I used to think things would just happen as it shows on the left side of the image, but after a while I have come to the conclusion that more often than not, the right side of the image is more accurate.

So the reason this post has been brought about is because I was out with some friends earlier in the week, and one of them told me he wished he had my life. I thought it was an interesting comment and after only a couple of minutes chatting I realised that the person I was talking to had very little in the way of ambition or drive, and was always looking to others and wanting what they had.

I challenged the person and said that the only difference between me and him was that I was prepared to set goals and do what it takes to achieve them. I’ll run though a few we spoke about here.

Family

This person really wants a partner and a family, and while I know that this is a tough one that you can only have limited influence on, you still need to put yourself out there and put effort into finding the right person. You can’t sit at home watching the TV, hoping someone knocks on the front door. It’s just not going to happen.

I regaled him with the story of how I met my now wife, and the many months of persistence that it took to even get a first date. Not to mention the failed relationships before that. The journey wasn’t a short one, and the whole thing took a lot of time and effort.

Work

When it comes to work, this person still doesn’t really know what he wants to do with his life (we are a similar age) and hasn’t progressed past an entry level position. I was told that I was lucky to be where I am, and that he never has any luck.

I actually really dislike it when people tell me I am lucky. I come from the school of thought that you make your own luck, and that is exactly what I’ve done.

• I started at an entry level position.
• I did a TAFE diploma
• I did a university degree
• I did numerous industry certifications
• I made it known that I wanted to progress in a certain direction
• I took the initiative to get to know people who could assist me
• I applied to roles and practiced for interviews
• I worked hard and delivered good results consistently
• I made the most of opportunities that came my way.

In short – I did what it takes to get to where I am.

Home

I am currently building a new house, but had previously paid off our old one in around 7 years. This wasn’t luck – it came down to good money management and a desire to be debt free. I haven’t had a big overseas holiday, I didn’t always go to the pub with everyone else or see the latest movies when they came out. I decided that a few years of pain, would serve me well into the future when I had less debt.

Business

Finally, I offered to teach the person what I had learned about online business over the last 2 years, but again – it was too difficult for him and was going to take too much time and effort…