When I was an undergrad at the University of Texas at Austin, I went through a leadership program sponsored by the YWCA that gave me specific tools that I have used ever since to manage my life. The core of it seemed simple enough but the entire six week process ultimately served to unravel my way of thinking and showed me how to my live on purpose. Certain things had to be undone and broken down and cleared away before the good stuff could sink in and take root. The people closest to me could sense a profound change in me and marveled at the person that I was becoming. I couldn't see it then but in retrospect, it was like someone turned on all the lights.
Whenever I see lists like this, I recognize what that innocuous little class taught me and I feel a profound sense of gratitude. I have pretty much incorporated everything on this list into the most mundane moments of my world. A big thumbs up to #6 -- if anything has kept me outside of my comfort zone, it's growing and thriving as a working artist in New York City.
Interestingly, the first habit is the most important one. I constantly refine my goals and priorities -- two lists that live and breathe, on paper and in my mind's eye, in technicolor, all the time. S.M.A.R.T. goals are Specific Measurable Attainable Realistic and Timely. If you don't get this one right, the wheels are coming off the bus with a quickness.
What's especially vital is having your very own private working definition of success -- one that you refine and nurture when you see fit -- and a teflon coated attitude that won't let anything or anyone encroach upon it.
*sigh* If I knew then what I know now...
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