COULD THIS BE WHY YOU’RE NOT SUCCESSFUL YET?

I don’t know where I got the idea into my head, but at some point growing up I definitely decided that I wasn’t going to live a ‘normal’ life. Sure, I still wanted to get married, have kids, end up owning a great house, but as far as the whole struggle and scrape by and work for the man thing?

Wasn’t so appealing.

Almost by osmosis I seemed to absorb the idea that by the time I got to 30 I’d be a millionaire, famous, living in a shit-hot Vogue-esque house and basically just ruling the world. In my mind, it was a given! And why wouldn’t it be? I’d read the books, I’d studied the greats, I knew that if Tony Robbins said I could achieve anything I set out to do and create life on my terms then of course I COULD and so therefore I WOULD!

Add to that the fact that through my school years I’d been constantly assured of my intelligence and great ‘likelihood to succeed’, typically coming top of all my classes academically and to be quite honest without really having to try to do so, and it was just a done deal in my mind.

It was possible.

And so it would happen.

So I went about my way, doing my thing, not really sure what my thing was or what I wanted to do with my life (although the writing, speaking, leading idea never stopped pulling at me!) and gradually started to accumulate the usual markers of a successful adult life.

I had a great job –

I got married –

Had a fancy car and ultra-expensive surround sound system –

Lived in a hot apartment in a cool inner-city suburb

Traveled for work a bit, which felt quite glamorous in my mid-twenties even though it was mostly just between Melbourne and Sydney and staying in 4-star hotels  –

Went out to swish dinners and became used to a cafe / restaurant / make money / spend money lifestyle –

And basically just had a good enough time, most of the time, of course always sort of wondering what the missing link was that would help me feel TRULY happy but assuming that it just came down to hitting that next month commission or planning our next getaway or whatever.

I’m not quite sure when the panic set in, and it definitely wasn’t panic to begin with; probably more of a disease. But over time – I guess if I’m honest within a pretty rapid timeframe after getting married, I became most certainly NOT happy. And also … worried. I was on the wrong side of 25, and while I had all of this STUFF, the truth was that my relationship just didn’t excite me and worse still I didn’t excite me! I was bored with myself, with my work, exhausted by the long hours, not really taking care of myself, certainly not able to express what I wanted different but I just knew that this?

Wasn’t it.

And what was really fucking scary was that I was starting to wonder – just a little – if this whole millionaire and famous and free by 30 thing was actually going to happen.

And eventually it hit me:

My whole life I’d been told I was the one most likely to succeed and that whatever I set my mind to I could have and I bought so far into the POSSIBILITY of it all that I kinda forgot about the SET MY MIND TO (never mind do the work towards!) part of it.

This realisation began as a niggle and I guess it niggled away for sometime because really I had no idea what to do about it. I fell into a habit of spending quite a bit of my alone time journaling, and certainly I’d always read inspiring books about what is possible, and so that became a definite routine. I’d leave earlier than needed for work, stop at a cafe on the walk there, and I’d read and I’d journal and I’d try to make sense of the seemingly over the top ideas and ideals that came to me. And on the weekends I’d sometimes spend the entire day or close to, doing the same. But I just couldn’t make sense of it, and whilst I FULLY believed anything was possible (Tony Robbins was still telling me; I was listening to his audios pretty much every morning walking to work and gosh darn it the man is convincing!) I just couldn’t make the connection between how that could impact ME.

My husband was working practically 7 days a week, very driven by the $$ and also trapped into his job, and partly because he was never around this time I started to spend a lot of 1:1 time with his best friend, who lived in the same building as us, and also worked with me as a personal trainer. This was a guy who definitely did not fit the ‘conformity’ mold and I was fascinated by the way he seemed to question everything about the normal life or just look at it differently in the first place.

I can’t even really remember the conversations we’d have as we sat in the park on weekends, or walked around Melbourne town during the week, but he was very pivotal in inspiring me to see that the life I’d chosen by default – one that had me on a path of overwork, of treating my body like shit, of working for the man and of basically just not even really EXPLORING my dreams or all that was possible – was not the ultimate path for me.

I think people definitely come into your life for a reason, and whilst I also think I would have eventually found my way to where I now am I can certainly look back at this friendship as one of the key ones that made me question EVERYTHING.

But meanwhile time kept doing what it does, and even though I was doing my journaling and listening to my audios and reading all the personal development books I could get my hands on I STILL couldn’t seem to turn it INTO anything.

I look back now and it seems SO FUCKING OBVIOUS why I wasn’t creating the life I wanted, why I didn’t have the success I wanted, but at the time I couldn’t see the wood for the trees and all I knew was that THIS WAS NOT HOW IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE!

Have you ever felt that way?

I wonder if things would have ended any differently if I had have had someone there to tell me what I now know about success, and what it really takes to live a life on your terms, but in some ways I also think –

That was just part of my journey and for whatever reason that was how it had to be for ME, to lay the foundation of my new and I guess ‘true’ life by destroying the old one rather than by gradually evolving.

I guess when you’ve CHOSEN the wrong life it’s hard to try and MOLD it into the life you really want. In the end, it either fits or it doesn’t fit!

And for me? It definitely didn’t fit.

So in the end? I walked away from or destroyed all of it.

Over a period of about 12 months I quit my job. Destroyed that first marriage. Spent all my savings. Temporarily stopped talking to my family and friends. Went into a black cave of insomnia and bulimia and excessive drinking at night fueled by days of excessive exercise, caffeine and work. Gradually over time got to the point where I was again functioning, walking, talking pretty normally and on the surface for sure living a successful life, and with more time still beyond that started to really understand what mattered to ME.

Which was … not really that tangible and not really that relevant, certainly not to my role as personal trainer, but definitely from the HEART, and that was this:

I wanted to help people live their dream life.

And I wanted to write. I mean … I’d always wanted to write. But I REALLY wanted to write.

So, I started writing. I started a blog. And most of what I wrote about was relevant to my personal training business, but the ‘dream life’ posts would always creep in, even though it seemed like nobody really responded to them and besides how would I ever make MONEY talking about that stuff?! I was definitely MORE in tune with the life I wanted to live but at the same time I still felt SO FAR AWAY from the whole famous, free, millionaire by 30 thing!

And eventually … 30 came, and then 30 went and nope, definitely hadn’t hit those goals! But I was working fully for myself, in fact soon after 30 I was able to step down completely from personal training as I was making money online; although not really with what I WANTED to be, but I was pretty happy overall with how it was going, and meanwhile I was re-married, had a brand new daughter, life seemed to be on the track it was supposed to be finally, although the whole wealthy or even NOT BROKE thing wasn’t really happening, but hey – it was my destiny, I was going to get there right?!

And now here’s the thing. Where I interrupt myself before I end up telling my entire business / life story again, but this is the thing that really MATTERS, I would say, for you if you’re NOT yet ‘there’, if you HAVEN’T yet created the success you want even though sure, you can easily look back and see how you’ve progressed and so it kinda stands to reason that if you just keep going you probably WILL, well, keep going on that path and maybe eventually actually GET there, but also you kinda wouldn’t mind just BEING THERE, well, then, this:

Are you ready? ‘Cause this is BIG:

You will never.

Ever.

EVER.

Create success if you haven’t first FULLY defined it.

In detail.

To the letter.

And based on PRECISELY what you actually want!

Another way of saying it: if your dreams and goals are vague, then what you will GET will be vague. Word to the wise: saying you want to be rich, or famous, or even saying something a bit more specific like you want to be a writer, or millionaire by 30, IS FUCKING VAGUE.

It’s a starting point, perhaps, and better than nothing, but it’s just not enough to work with. It’s like going into a restaurant and saying you want to eat something yum. Who knows what you’ll get?! I guess in a good restaurant you assume that whatever it is it WILL be yummy, but you’re still putting your happiness in someone else’s hands.

And when it comes to business – and life – if you’re not stating precisely what you want then basically you’ll get whatever you’re given. Which may very well be someone else out there’s idea of awesome, but so what? And here’s what else:

Not only will you NOT get what you don’t specifically ask for and act towards but you definitely WILL get the outcome of whatever your default actions and beliefs are instead of actively defined ones.

So if you’re not ‘there’ yet?

It’s almost a sure thing that you haven’t a) fully defined what ‘there’ IS, and b) actively then DONE THE WORK to get you there each day.

So let’s play a little game. A game of CHOOSING YOUR FUTURE! So maybe not so little after all

What DO you want?

Just grab a pen and paper, right now, and write it out. It will likely start off vague, but I want you to get really specific with it. If it’s money, exactly how much per month and WHY? If it’s fame exactly how do you want it and would getting to that and then living with it FEEL good? If it’s to write, what do you want to write about? To whom? Published where, and how?

You HAVE to be specific. But you also have to really QUESTION and consider when setting goals and dreams. Really ask yourself if doing the work and then the MAINTENANCE of that dream or goal would feel amazing for you. I believe there also has to be a deeper reason than simply ‘because it’s possible’, or ‘because it’d be awesome’. It has to be about how you see yourself on a soul level, how you want to define yourself and ultimately what you feel your life is supposed to BE about.

And this is why when people say they want to make money online – or even a set amount of money – or that they want to be ‘famous’ or known for something, they just don’t get there. Because they haven’t attached deep meaning to it, they’re not brave enough or aware enough to precisely define how it would look, or even what it really IS, and because ultimately if you’re ‘dream life shopping list’ looks the same as everyone else’s then it’s going to be pretty damn hard for you to create in such a way where you can truly say it’s ON YOUR TERMS!

So in the end, what it comes down to is really fucking simple (as it always is!):

You can keep doing things the way you’re doing them now, where you’re sort of progressing and evolving and eventually you probably will get SOMEWHERE, but it probably won’t be exactly where you WANT to be because you never fully defined where you want to be! So you’ll just … keep on looking. And maybe accidentally end up somewhere awesome. Hint: this approach? Not so smart, and pretty damn tiring as well!

Or:

You can realise now that if you want something different it’s not enough to NOT want what you have now or even to want MORE than what you have now.

If you want something different it makes sense to take the time now and then REPEATEDLY to define what that something different IS.

And yes of course your desires will change, and of course you can’t always even define what you do want right now, but you can state SOMETHING.

You can INTEND something.

You can MAKE UP YOUR MIND that you will then make that something – even one thing – happen. Just one thing beautiful.

Choose one thing, for today, that you decide IS going to happen.

Tomorrow, another.

The next day, one more.

All the while, to the best of your NOW ability, doing the work to make these things happen but honestly the GREATEST key to success is deciding that what you want WILL happen. Just make sure you don’t leave out the description around the what you want bit!!

I know for me, when I ‘wanted something different’, I got something different but it was NOT necessarily awesome. When I wanted to ‘be a writer’, I became a writer but it wasn’t really what I wanted to write about and it didn’t quite feel right. When I wanted to ‘make money online’ I eventually DID make money online but it was forced and pushed and I still never had anything to show for it.

I always got what I wanted, what I asked for, and what I then decided WOULD happen.

For a long time this is why I got vague and all over the place and NOT dependable results.

But it’s also why now, now that I GET it?

I live location free.
I make over a million dollars.
I write about EXACTLY what to write about.
I run my programs in exactly the way that suits me.
I work with ONLY the sort of kickass women I really want to work with.
My entire business is built on me doing what I love, in the way I want to do it, and for who I want to do it for.

Not because I learned more about online marketing or about business but because I finally GOT DELIBERATE and SPECIFIC with what I wanted, gave myself permisson to CREATE those outcomes, and then committed daily to making ’em happen.

It’s actually not that hard to succeed at anything in life.

Decide what you want.
Decide you’re allowed it.
Decide you WILL get it.

And then go get it.

Just be sure that when you ask for what you want? You have the balls and the smarts to actually ask for what you want.

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