Everyone has his or her formula for success.  I do not believe mine is revolutionary or ground breaking.  In fact it may be too simplistic.  It has been my observation that being successful in any endeavor can be broken into three simple steps:

1 Identify what we want to ultimately accomplish.

2 Identify what we need to do in order to accomplish what we want.

3 Do what we need to do in order to accomplish what we want.

I have covered the first two steps in What Is The Best? Part 1 and What Is The Best Part? 2 .  What I want to focus on today is the third step to success, do what needs to be done.  Far too often I have witnessed people who have identified what they want and what they need to do in order to get it yet somehow they never seem to quite get around to doing what is necessary in order to attain or achieve what they want.  This is one of the most disappointing and heart-breaking things I witness on a regular basis.

Why does this happen?  Why do too few of us actually do things we are capable of which would bless our lives immensely?  What would happen if we actually just DID the things we know we should do which could help us get the things we know we want?  I believe it is one simple thing that hinders us and prevents us from living the lives we desire and we were created for.

Or I should say lack of focus.  The ability to focus is one of the most important traits necessary for success in any area of our lives.  Unfortunately we live in a society where working with daily focus has become harder and harder to do because our culture is full of instant gratification and diversion.  I do not know what time of day you are reading this, but just consider these questions for today only:

How many texts have you received or responded to?

How many times have you checked or posted to a social media platform?

How many emails have you received/sent today?

Have you watched any television shows or online videos?

Those are just a few small examples of our constant stimulation/interruption in our society today and I am positive you could think of several other distractions in your daily routine beyond those.  Now do not get me wrong.  I believe all of those above distractions I listed can be really good things.  I personally do all of them on an almost daily basis.  Just like most other good things there can be too much of a good thing.  We have to learn to limit the interruptions to our thinking and actions and control the constant stimulation our society and media throw at us so we can maximize our effectiveness in our daily lives.  There is a great book, The Organized Mind , which helped me understand how our minds work and the negative effects constant social media and stimulation have on our brains.

What are some regular interruptions you face in your daily routine?  Are there changes you could make in your daily routine to minimize and/or eliminate those distractions?  All of us have habits which are either negative or positive.  When is the last time you reviewed and analyzed your habits in order to help you begin living more effectively?  This is never an easy or fun process, but it is necessary and worth it.  I have done this several times and will continue to do so.  I even just went through this process recently to resume blogging.  I love blogging and I believe I have been blessed with some wisdom and understanding in certain areas which can help a lot of people.  I am compelled to blog and I believe it is part of my way to deliver a lot of value and positively impact others.

Even though I believe those things and know them I allowed myself to drift from it the past 10 months because Beth and I had our first son and my habits and routine went through a significant change.  I had been thinking about blogging.  I even said a few times, “I need to blog again and I am going to start soon.”  It wasn’t happening.  Then I finally decided to remove the distractions and changed my routine in order to accomplish this very important task.  I moved up my bed time and began waking up an hour earlier.  I wrote it on my daily to do list the days I committed to blogging.  I turned my phone on airplane mode the night before and refused to check social media until my posts were written.  I knew I wanted to and needed to blog.  I knew what I needed to do to begin blogging again.  It was not until I removed the distractions and changed my habits that I finally began blogging again.

Questions: What is one major thing you want to accomplish in your life?  What distractions must you remove or limit to accomplish it?  What is a daily discipline you will commit to in order to get what you said you want?  Comment below.