What the Mind Can Conceive, Can Be Achieved

What causes people to give up smoking? Why can some people lose weight and keep it off, whilst others can’t? What makes the difference between success and failure? Before you do anything, you are going to decide what you want to achieve. Try and phrase it in a positive way and stick to the acronym of SMART rules for goal setting.

As such do not just say, “I want to give up smoking.” Instead, you need to set a time frame and say, “I want to give up smoking over the next 2 months. However, when it comes to weight, it’s the same concept, you need to say, “I want to lose 12 lbs over the next 12 weeks by eating healthily, eating less and working out.”

Firstly, you must have your foundation and desire if you’re going to change something, then you’ve got to be upset with how things are now. This is the number one reason why people do not achieve things. For example, when it comes to budgeting, I am sure that most of you all find it very challenging to budget. If you want to keep your spending under control, it's essential that you make a budget. A budget allows you to get a handle on the flow of your money, how much is coming in and where it goes out. With that information in hand, you can make intelligent choices about how to spend. Here are some tips when it comes to budgeting:

v Don't rush budgeting. You need a month to figure out exactly where your money is being spent the most.

v If you find your expenses are extremely high, compared to your income, you have to cut back on some unnecessary spending.

v Very few people ever bother to budget, which is why so many people are in debt. Few really realize just how much they spend on worthless expenses.

v Once you have got the budgeting process in place, take an in-depth look at your largest spending categories, brainstorm about ways to reduce spending in specific categories and set realistic goals.

v Think of your budget as a tool to help you get out of debt and save money

v Update your budget and expenses monthly.

With stating those effective tips, are you determined enough to make this change?

Secondly, you have your target. So you know you want to change something, but you have got to know where you want to end up. This comes into the S part of SMART. You need to know where you’re aiming for to expect great results, or you’re never going to manage it, and you’ll just float around for a bit, then fail and blame yourself. With this in mind, I bring up another issue.

In today’s society, there is high unemployment rate. The question I ask you all “ when it comes to lifelong learning, how are we doing today?” The answer unfortunately is mixed. By international standards, we’re actually doing quite well with our formal education system. Us teenagers, for instance, score among the top industrialized nations in the core areas of reading, mathematics, language arts, science and so forth. But yet, there are worrisome signs. Our high school dropout rate may be at a record low, but it’s still twice as high as some other countries. At the end of the day, there is no end to education.

So if our record is mixed in terms of formal education, what about those long years of life that come after school? Once people hit the workforce, does the training and learning continue? Here are four tips that should be taken into consideration:

v Firstly, we need to develop a comprehensive approach that engages all players including government, educational institutions, individuals and, most important, you in the private sector.

v Secondly, government, employers and workers could share in the cost of paid training leave, as well as mechanisms to pool training resources and expertise for the benefit of small and medium-sized enterprises.

v Thirdly, in order to demonstrate value for money and effort, we need to put in place systems to assure the quality of training programs, and to measure their results.

v Finally, we need better certification processes to recognize and validate the achievements of individuals who take part in training.

I bring about the next step to achievement. Planning is very important in this era. This involves breaking down where you want to get and how to get there. Everything needs to be broken down into small measurable attainable parts. However, you need to be patient and learn to