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To start off, in order to achieve a goal, you must first have a goal to achieve
(Brilliant, Watson!). There are a lot of people that go through life without
their own clear-cut agenda or goals. When you don't have your own agenda, you're
highly likely to become part of someone else's. Musicians are susceptible to
this because they have the "I just want to play music attitude" as
long as they are playing. They have a defined purpose even if the band they
are in is spinning their wheels and making peanuts.
Once you've decided what your goals are, you should put them in writing. Goals
and plans in writing become legitimate. You can review your major goals, daily,
weekly, or monthly. The more you see your goals, the easier it is to make decisions
and corrections in your life's course to stay aligned with what is most important
to you.
Some of the things that get in the way of our goals are:
Procrastination - usually stemming from the fear of failure or success. One
way around procrastination is to put it off and in the works of Larry the Cable
Guy, "Get 'er done".
Another thing is time management. In the absence of any effort to manage time,
it can become difficult to reach your goals. A familiar musician's quote, "
I didn't have time to cash the band check."
Another thing is burn out factor. Working too much without a break, life can
become a blur. You can get tired and run down physically and emotionally. You
get too worn out to think about the important goals you had set. Speaking of
burn out factor, this has an adverse affect on your health. Once your health
is in question, everything you do will be adversely affected. You need to be
healthy to have the energy to be all you can be in the guitar army!
For those of you in bands, we have the ever popular flaky or psycho band mate.
These individuals can back the collective goals and efforts of the entire band.
They need to be punished! I was once in a band where our singer used to sell
pot to the band. We came to find out that he was stealing money from the band
account to buy the pot he was selling to the band. I found out a few years later
that he had become a vacuum cleaner salesman. He got his in the end!
[Disclaimer: I no longer smoke pot, as depicted in the 1930's propaganda films.
It really does drive people crazy and turn them into ax murderers.]
There are a lot of great books, tapes, CD's, videos and computer programs available
to help you organize and develop effective strategies to reach all your goals.
Some that I recommend are:
"The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" by Stephen R. Covey
"The New Dynamics of Goal Setting" by Dennis Waitley
"The Psychology of Winning" by Dennis Waitley
"The 12 Life Secrets" by Robert Stuberg
"Personal Power" by Anthony Robbins
"Unlimited Power" by Anthony Robbins
"Lessons in Mastery" by Anthony Robbins
"Awaken the Giant Within" by Anthony Robbins
"The 1999 WOW Student Bible" which contains generation upon generation
of effective and ineffective strategies you can learn from.
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