MAKE A POWERFUL ENTRY IN 2013

A fascinating year is about to end. It is only about a week before 2013 starts.

There are two things that you can do:

1. Make a powerful entry into 2013; or,

2. Float into 2013 and happen to show up in the New Year.

I am certain you would like to make a powerful entry into the New Year and make 2013 the best year you’ve had till now. If that’s what you are interested in, read on.

So that you can make an authoritative and a commanding entry in the New Year, it is important to do a review of the last year (2012) and take stock. I am going to recommend a set of questions that you ask yourself. I have broken these questions into 2 parts – one that reviews and completes 2012 and another set that helps you declare your goals for the next year.

It is important to know ‘What is so’ about your life at the end of 2012; and then ‘where do you want to be this time next year’ so that you can make an unassailable entry into 2013 and achieve the goals for the New Year. These questions will help you get a deeper understanding of where you are today and where you want to be this time next year.

I am suggesting this to you after having completed this exercise and I can state out of experience, once you have done so, you will be making a very powerful entry in to the New Year.

1. What have I achieved in 2012?

While answering this question, what I did was to break up my life into important areas and identified what is it that I achieved in each of these important areas of my life, such as: my personal life; my work; my health & well-being; and, Gift Your Organ Foundation (NGO);

Just writing down my achievements in each of these areas gave me a great sense of achievement and a lot of power to look at audacious and bold goals for the New Year!

I suggest you identify the important areas of your life and list out your achievements in each of these areas.

2. What did I learn new in this year?

I have a keen interest in reading and continuously developing myself and one of the ways I evaluate my growth is based on the new things that I learn. I can easily state that 2012 has been a year of a lot of lessons for me, a year of a lot of new knowledge that I gained and the most important recognition of how much I don’t know yet and still need to gain. The more I learn, the more I feel I don’t know enough and hence the more I want to learn.

3. What is it that I want to acknowledge myself for in this New Year

We perpetually see the good in others and compare ourselves to others. No wonder then that most times we fall short. This is the time of the year to step back for a few moments and pat yourself on the back for all the good that you are and all the good that you have done. I made a detailed list of points that I wanted to acknowledge myself for. I acknowledged myself for the various achievements of the year in different areas of my life, to something as simple as acknowledging my new found patience in certain trying situations. I discovered a new me in this process of acknowledging myself. Try it, it is a lot of fun, I promise!

4. What is it that I missed out on this year?

I missed out on a few of targets and certain self development goals. By simply distinguishing what I missed out in the last year, it has helped me re-evaluate these targets and goals and the ones that continue to hold its importance in my life have found a place in what I want to achieve in the New Year.

5. What do I want to achieve in 2013?

There are two ways to approach any goal in your life – one is to first identify ‘what’ is your goal and then figure out the ‘how’. The other is to first look at the resources that you have, the effort that it will take, and then determine your goal. A lot of people first look at the ‘how’ and based on the `how’, they decide the ‘what’, i.e., their goal.

I am firm believer that you need to figure out the ‘what’ first and the ‘how’ will take care of itself. Think of all your dreams, make them specific, make them measurable, put a deadline on these dreams and go after them! If there is sincerity in your effort, the universe will conspire to achieve these goals.

Break down the important areas of your life and identify ‘where would you like to be this time next year’ in each of these areas. Like I did while reviewing 2012, I have identified where I want to be this time next year in my personal life, my work, health and the gift Your Organ Foundation. I also included places I want to travel in 2013 and other fun things that I would like to do and people that I would like to meet.

6. What new do I want to learn in the New Year?

I have also indentified what new I want to learn in the New Year. There are some specific goals that I have for myself in this area and I am committed to achieving these goals of gaining new knowledge. There are some courses that I have identified and will commence in the New Year.

Feel free to add more questions if you would like. The more you question yourself, the more you will seek answers from yourself.

Once you have done this, one last but an extremely important thing that will be required is that you will need a structure of people around you with whom you will need to share these goals; people who will not allow you to be lackadaisical and will continuously remind you of each of your goals; people who will hold you accountable to take actions to achieve these goals.

I have created a solid structure of people around me and those of you who would like to participate in this structure are welcome to email me (sameer@sameerdua.com ).

I can guarantee you, once you have done this, you will not only make a powerful entry in 2013, you will conquer the year!

Make 2013 count in your life!

Good luck and have a blast!

‘I FELT MY FATHER’S DEATH HAD A PURPOSE’

In the last two years, one of the starting points of conversations has been the Gift Your Organ Foundation. Interestingly, I get introduced by my friends to people as one of the founders of the Gift Your Organ Foundation and from there on the conversations most times begin with Organ Donation, the organ transplantation scene in India, the work done by the Gift Your Organ Foundation and so on.

Last week, I had a close friend who had come over and was staying with me. He had visitors visiting him and I had the pleasure of being introduced to them. One of them was Amisha (name changed), a friend from Bombay. In this case, my friend had already spoken to Amisha about the Gift Your Organ Foundation and that I was involved with it even before we got introduced.

Not too far in the conversation, Amisha mentioned to me that her father’s eyes were donated and she had confirmation that two people got their eyesight because of her father’s donation. With moist eyes, she stated, ‘I felt my father’s death had a purpose’. I could listen to the pride in her voice and that pride to some extent had overcome the grief of her father’s demise.

That her father had to die was not in her control, but to give her father’s demise a purpose was in her control and she did exactly that.

In the last two years, I have seen so many such instances and each one of them is similar in this one sense. The family has such deep love for the deceased member and that love drives them to donate organs / tissues of the person.

Donating organs provides a new perspective to death. It provides a perspective of life after death, a perspective not of pain, but one which gives a lot of satisfaction and pride.

For information on Organ Donation and to pledge your organs, please visit the Gift Your Organ Foundation website. For any questions or clarifications, please email celebrate@giftyourorgan.org

GET ON THE COURT!

The India – England One Day Cricket series is coming up after the Test series. Imagine the first One – Day match between India and England is in progress. Sachin Tendulkar is batting and India need 300 runs to win. In the stands, there are 40,000 people watching the match and each one of these 40,000 in the crowd has an advice for how Sachin Tendulkar should be playing to ensure India’s success in the match. Some want Sachin Tendulkar to get acclimatized to the conditions, the pitch and the bowlers before he gets aggressive; some others believe that India need a huge total to win and there is no time for acclimatization, if Tendulkar goes slow in the beginning, then the pressure will be upon the middle order to score at a higher run rate in the later part of the innings.

How do all these views matter to Sachin Tendulkar? Zero! Nothing at all! Waste of time!

Tendulkar, on the pitch there (read on the court), will do exactly as he thinks he should be doing. All these views of the entire 40,000 odd crowd mean nothing to him. And thank God for that! If Sachin Tendulkar took all these views every time he went to bat, one thing was for sure – he would have not lasted for 20 years in this very pressurizing and ever demanding game of cricket; more so in this country of cricket freaks!

Let’s now cut back to your life. Are you on the court as far as your own life is concerned? Are you taking actions to deliver results towards achieving your goals? I want to you to really think hard about this question. Most people I interact with regularly keep saying things like, I have wanted to go to the gymnasium for so many months now but just cannot get myself to; or, I have been planning to start my business but am waiting for the right opportunity; and so one and so forth.

Being on the court means being in action and not wondering what people around you are saying. Listening to too many will shake your conviction and take you off your course.

Then there these others who do get on to the court, but seek approval, assurance and views from the ‘people on the stands’. Sure seek others views; and that actually is a great idea. However, the views that are important are that of your coach, team mates, captain (read Manager), etc. Certainly not of the ‘people on the stands’. (And if you do not have a coach yet, seriously consider getting one.)

Being on the court means being the cause in the matter. Remember, it’s actions that you take that lead to your performance. History is evidence of the fact that no one has ever won the game by being on the stands.

Get on the court and feel the heat! Feel the heat of the perspiration, feel the heat of responsibility. Remember when you last went to the gym and after a hard hour’s workout, you so enjoyed the sweat rolling down your cheek. That stinking sweat was very important to stretch yourself, and make you a healthier person. Similarly, being on the court and taking actions is extremely important in stretching yourself and making you a successful person.

The problem for a lot of people is not that they don’t know what to do; the problem is that they don’t simply do it.