Investment

Why invest in your success? Do you invest more time and money in continuing to be average, or are you working towards becoming the best possible person you can be? If you are not happy with the direction your life is going in, and you are willing to change your life, I would recommend watching how you invest your time and money. Two of the most meaningful resources we have in life are time and money. If you want to improve your life, you are going to have to change your actions, and invest time and money in the direction in which you want to go.

Results Are Feedback

Results are the feedback we get from whether we are living the life we want, or whether life is living us. Have you made promises that you can’t or aren’t keeping? Are you over-promising and under-delivering?  Are your goals realistic? Are you putting enough effort into achieving your goals or does more effort go into making excuses of why you aren’t where you want to be? If you are not happy with the results you are getting, it is time to start making some changes. The first task is to see where you are now. The second step is to begin defining a new direction for your life. The third is to take action in that direction.

Track Your Money

If you want to see if you are leading your priorities or if your priorities are leading you, track where you invest your money. Are you investing too much in weekends with friends and not enough in your career? A few years ago, I was guilty of neglecting my career and wishing I was doing something else with my life. I was always able to justify the beer I was drinking and the cigarettes I was smoking back then, but when it came time to advance a little money towards improving my life, there was none left. I started tracking my money to discover what my true financial priorities were and still track my money to this day.

Track Your Time

The best lesson I ever learned about time is that time is more important than money. You can always make the money back if you lose it, but you can never make more time. Once it is lost, it is gone forever. Several years ago, I started tracking my time to see what I was doing with my day. I was working hard, but I was working hard to make someone else’s dreams come true instead of my own. I found myself watching more TV than reading books and developing new skills. After I realized how much time I was wasting, I immediately changed my habits and changed my course in life.

 Invest Your Time in Developing New Skills

There are vital skills that you need to succeed in business. One of those skills is to communicate effectively. There are many ways to develop better communication skills, like learning to write and speak better. If we speak more influentially, then we can start influencing people in a positive way. If we start influencing people in a more positive way, we can sell people on ideas that are mutually beneficial. These ideas could be a raise if you work for someone else, or closing a sale and earning a commission on that sale.

Invest Money in New Education

These were once big excuses for me. I knew I could do better. My friends were all puzzled about why I didn’t get a “good job” (whatever that means).

• “I can’t go back to college.”
• “I don’t have a college degree.”
• “I can’t get a good job.”

Maybe you have some real limits placed on you by your environment. Maybe you do not have thousands of dollars to invest in your traditional education. That actually gives you an advantage. A traditional education prepares you to work for someone else. One day, I thought of a book I wanted that could change my life after I read it. I had heard of this site called Amazon.com and that they sold books, but I never tried purchasing books from them. I found that book and discovered that I could invest less than $20 and have it delivered to my door. I bought that book and read it. Which lead to another book. And then another. Now I have three bookshelves in my personal library and my life has improved markedly.

A Different Result

When you begin this process of change, it will seem awkward at first. If you keep tracking your time and your money, you can then decide where your current priorities are and if you want to change them. Then you will create a life by your own design and not that circumstances created for you.