Ralph Marston Jr., an inspirational author once said; “Your goals, minus your doubts, equals your reality.”
If you want, you could take this concept, reduce it even further, and transform it into some simple arithmetic.
G – D = R
With some effort, a personal commitment and a positive attitude, you can solve for “R”. And being that you are the one to control the factors, you are also the one that can make the difference.
A dream is a blueprint.
A fully illustrated and dimensionalized rendering of your goals. Creating an image that is so vivid, that you can actually live in it, each step along the way.
Until you make it your reality.
That image of what you want to do, where you want to go, and what you want to be, becomes the focal point of everything you do along the way to get there. Then all you need to do is make what is going on out here match with what you see in your head and what you feel in your heart.
It requires an extraordinary level of vision to be able to “see” that goal.
Because you can never afford to lose sight of the present; the moment you are in right now. This is where all the prep work takes place. Discipline learned. Commitments made. Attitudes formed. Character revealed.
Yet you also need to develop the skills to check the horizon, to establish your coordinates and to adjust your long term plans if need be.
If it appears that your destination – the goal – is getting closer, then perhaps your work in the present is paying off. You are making progress, you are affecting your reality.
And once you get to that point, when you get there, it will be like deja vu all over again. You will have already spent months or years in that moment, in that very place Only this time, you get to actually do it.
However, if you look up and find the horizon seems farther away than when you last looked, or is missing altogether, perhaps it is time to regroup.
It can be at this juncture where doubt can make its presence known. Excuses, rationalization and self pity will begin to take their toll. A negative attitude can add to the inertia, increasing drag, acting as an anchor.
Self doubt can begin to slowly destroy your spirit, overshadow your confidence, bury your talent, and push you to simply quit. The voice within you that always said. “I know I can” grows silent.
Self doubt is a choice, and if you allow it to take root it can diminish the value of your goal substantially. Allow it to grow and get out of control, self doubt will ultimately erase your goal in its entirety, leaving in its wake, a reality marked by unrealized potential, disappointment and pain.
Your choices wield the power to ignore self doubt’s distractions and eliminate them altogether.
You can choose to refuse doubt.
With vision, a positive attitude, and the ‘want to’ to eliminate self doubt, the equation for success is simpler yet: goals equal reality.
Or:
G=R
...my temporary assignment. 