Vision Crashers

Vision Crasher: Anything that causes a sudden severe downturn in your vision.

It takes such a great amount of effort, not just to have vision, but to keep your vision in focus. There are many things that can interfere with your focus and I want to address the three most common.

1. Life Events

Every single one of us will experience life events that cause our vision to lose focus. Sometimes the events are truly life altering such as the death of a loved one. Or temporarily life altering… loss of a job. Sometimes they can be the little things… chores have been piling up or your family needs to spend more time with you.

All of these events can have a dramatic effect on your ability to maintain focus on your dreams. We all strive for balance in our lives and we don't want to forsake our relationships on our journey. You just need to make sure that when you stop to rest, you sit alongside the path and don't venture too far. If you stay in one place too long, you may lose sight of your destination and it can take a tremendous amount of effort to regain your focus.

The best way to overcome these life event challenges is to find someone or something that holds you accountable to your goals. This may be a best friend, family member, or mentor. If you are self-disciplined, it may be a daily Outlook reminder. Whatever you choose to hold you accountable to achieving your dreams, make sure that it is simple enough to implement immediately and that you are not responsible for it. In other words make sure that the people or systems keeping you focused are on auto pilot and if you divert from the path they will find you and put you back on track.

2. People You Are Close To

We all know someone who quit while trying to achieve their dreams. Many times this results in that person wanting to tell others about the pain endured and they feel the need to justify why others should not try. You hear phrases like: "Only 1% of people are successful at that," or "Are you sure you want to do this?" Anytime someone questions the focus of your vision, they are planting seeds of disbelief and failure. Whether or not these seeds grow into anything is ultimately up to you.

We all know people that are very comfortable with their current environment and that is fantastic. However a lot of people will justify to you why your dreams may not be worth the effort. Most of the time we hold these people in such high regard that their ability to influence our decisions is very high. Regardless of your personal goals, the unfortunate truth is that many people aren't willing to put in the amount of effort it takes to achieve their goal. The decision to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and try again is many times what separates you from your dreams. The problem comes when people try to interfere with this system by protecting you because they don't want to see you get hurt.

Every relationship of yours is unique and every relationship is going to require a different plan to achieve success. You should never try to change people to your way of thinking. You want them to respect you for your dreams and in return, you should respect them for their opinions. Just be careful whose advice you take because if you buy into their opinions, you buy into their lifestyle. The last thing you want to do is take advice from someone who is further from achieving their dreams than you are.

3. Yourself

I have seen more people be their own worst vision crasher than both of the other two combined. Experts say that it takes 21 days to create a new habit. Only 3 weeks and you will be constantly focused on your vision… if only it were that simple.

Most of us have had a vision many times in our lives. We have all had dreams that didn't come to fruition and just like touching the red hot stove, we quickly learn that failing to achieve our dreams can be painful. Quite simply it is human nature to avoid pain. Therefore, it is out of habit that we don't set our goals high enough. We second guess ourselves when things don't work out. How many times have you tried to take the next step on your journey only to go home and think to yourself "that's what I should have done / said!" We have such a lack of trust in ourselves that we are our own worst enemy when it comes to achieving our goals.

I truly believe that one of the best ways for us to learn and develop good habits is by failing. In John Maxwell's book "Failing Forward," he talks about the difference between average people and those who achieve. The theme is that those who achieve take responsibility for their actions, learn from their mistakes, understand that failure is part of the process for growth, and they persevere. Failure is nothing more than the ability to start again with more knowledge than you had the last time. Success is waiting for those willing to fail, grow in their character, and step up one more time. No one gets it right the first time, even professionals get to try again. Last time I checked, baseball players got three strikes before they were out. They also get paid millions if they hit the ball 3 out of 10 times at bat. Remember that failure is part of the game and that you need to keep focused on your vision because one of these days, you will hit the game winning home run and change your life forever.

"Success is going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm." – Winston Churchill

"Failure is the opportunity to begin again more intelligently." – Henry Ford