By Monica Sampson

Picture by Shon Carrera at Wikimedia Commons

It’s a new year. 2017 successes await you if you start taking actions that align you with success. Start now. The first step to 2017 successes is to commit to taking action.

This means that you cannot stop at positive thinking, repeating positive affirmations or fantasizing about what it will feel like to reach your goals. Dr. Steve Maraboli said, “Don’t just sit and wait for magic to happen. The magic that turns dreams into reality is YOU. When you are inspired by a dream, create a good plan. Creating that plan turns your dream into a goal. Then, take action!”

Passion, plan and action create 2017 successes

Action is a must in this world. You can’t just think-think-think about what you want. Even a great magician has to actually reach inside a hat and pull the rabbit out. A rabbit doesn’t come out of a hat simply because a magician thinks about a rabbit coming out a hat.

It could be why Dr. Steve Maraboli goes on to say that, “Live your life in a way that will bring that dream, that goal, to life. The magic is you.”

To map out 2017 successes, review your 2016 accomplishments. Major corporations don’t do this during employee performance reviews for nothing.

You need to see where you are. You need to see what you have accomplished, what you tried to accomplish and where gaps between the two are.

Now let the past go and look ahead

After you review your 2016 successes and identify areas for improvement, focus on the 2017 successes you want to experience. Get out a sheet of paper or computer.

List the top three successes that you want to experience this year. You really need to be passionate about achieving these goals. It could take weeks or months of consistent action and thought to manifest a goal. Inner passion will fuel you forward.

Stick to three successes as doing so helps you to focus. For example, you might write that you want to visit your adult children three times this year, gaining their genuine invite. Other goals might be to lower your blood pressure 20 points and to increase your business profits by 12 percent.

Build on your 2017 successes

Beneath each goal, write out at least 10 specific actions that you will take to manifest these 2017 successes. For instance, to lower your blood pressure by 20 points, you might:

1. Stop sprinkling salt on food
2. Eat clean salads (not add salad dressing to vegetables)
3. Walk 1 hour a day
4. Drink 4 to 8 glasses of water a day
5. Meditate for 15 to 20 minutes a day
6. Write in a journal at least four days a week
7. Sleep 7 to 8 hours a night
8. Use a fitness watch and track your exercise and deep sleep
9. Take your blood pressure once a month to see if the actions you’re taking are working
10. Reduce or eliminate fried foods from your diet
11. Read at least one new article a month on blood pressure to discover new ways to lower your blood pressure
12. Spend time with family and friends each week (good social connections improve our overall health)
13. Every half hour, for 30 to 60 seconds, visualize my blood pressure readings being 20 points where they are now

Stay open to the Creator’s word

Stay open to hearing and obeying our Creator. Insight on what you need to do to achieve 2017 successes could surface to your conscious mind seemingly out-of-nowhere. Speak positive affirmations to yourself if you start to feel as if your efforts will never pay off. If you keep going, something will happen.

Actively visualize yourself doing what you want to do. But, also take actions — lots of it! If your desired 2017 successes align with your authentic passions, you’ll want to do the work. In fact, it may not feel like work. It may feel like what you love to do, what you were born to do!

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