Dear Destiny Friends,

Much as succeeding entails a lot of work, it is important to note that one must desire success before success comes to him. Success doesn’t just come to you; you attract success by the work you do. Success does not attract excellence; it is excellence that attracts success, which in turn attracts prosperity. When you are good with your what you do, people will gradually flock to you because you practically have the solution to their challenges.

Success is not accidental, it is an intentionally effort, and one must crave for it; you must desire it like a man desires and chases after a lady. Even when he gets hold of the lady, he must strategically do all that is necessary to make the lady love and stick to him, otherwise, the lady might be tempted to leave. That’s how success truly operates.

When you attain success, you must ensure that you maintain it by crossing the Ts and dotting the Is. It’s important to note that you can earn wealth, you can come first in class, you can distinguish yourself in any sporting activity, but what’s important is maintaining the top spot.

Sometimes, we mix-up goals and desires forgetting that there’s a thin line of difference between both of them. Did you know that you can desire something without necessarily putting in the work to attain it? In the same way, if you have a goal without a plan to actualize the goal, it becomes a mere wish. According to Greg Reid, “A dream written down with a date becomes a goal. A goal broken down into steps becomes a plan. A plan backed by action makes your dreams come true.”

It’s instructive to note that goals are different from desires. While one is a mere wish, one is backed by action. It is the desires, passions, and sacrifice that you have for any idea that will determine how successful you will be in life. You can hardly succeed in a craft or business you are not passionate about. To truly succeed, in any endeavor, you must love what you are doing. Happiness and joy are critical to success. It is difficult to “succeed” in any craft you don’t like.

In connecting your desires, ambition, goals and interest, there’s a spiritual connection attached to your instinct, passion and happiness when you are working on purpose. It is this feeling that makes you spend countless hours and energy on the cause. While working on the project, you might feel hunger, experience disappointment, betrayal, or even failure, but what keeps you going is the internal feeling of fulfillment/joy you get while working on the project. This is the feeling of success. This feeling stimulates your goals and desires.

Do you know that success is relative? If you ask a thousand and one person what success means to them you are likely to get a thousand and one responses.

As an individual, if you are asked, what success means to you, what’s likely going to be your response? While some people will say building a house, getting married, having kids, and affording the good things of life without stress, some others person might say having XYZ amount of money in my bank account. Another set of persons might say training my children to be good children, having a good name or even achieving my personal and professional targets. Yet another set is wont to say living in superb health as it is universally believed that ‘wealth is health’.

It is therefore, obvious that, depending on who you speak to, every person’s case is literally different? This goes to say with equivocation that just as we have different taste buds, our individual tastes and preference to life is quite different.

It is imperative to note that planning and execution are two different ball games. While it may be easy to plan, it may not all be easy to implement/execute. We are in the third week of January, and some of us are already sliding back from the wishes, desires, and goals we set for ourselves early in the year, while some others are already hitting the ground running, with hundreds of thousands and millions of naira, dollar and pounds, depending on the currency of the host country, lining their bank accounts.

In conclusion, take time and examine the goals you set for yourself in 2022? What are the personal and professional training you plan to attend in 2022? Do you plan to read a book every week? Do you plan to publish a book? Do you plan to start your online business? Do you plan to go to the gym on a regular basis? The list is literally endless. The ultimate aim here is to reposition and change your mindset on the difference between desires and goals as they relate to attaining joy and fulfillment.

Henry Ukazu writes from New York. He’s a Human Capacity & mindset coach. He’s also a public speaker. He works with the New York City Department of Correction as the Legal Coordinator. He’s the author of the acclaimed book Design Your Destiny – Actualizing Your Birthright To Success and President of gloemi.com. He can be reached via info@gloemi.com