Visualize Your Ideal Life to Make It Happen

The fundamentals of productivity build upon one another... You clarify what matters most, utilize those priorities to create a game plan for proactively addressing the week, utilize a daily wrap-up to stay on track and, yet, sometimes, still miss out on attaining your loftiest of goals. The missing link might have more to do with visualization of your goals than the tactics you use to get through each day.

Have you ever heard the saying that "Seeing is believing"? As the Huffington Post explains, "Before we can believe in a goal, we first must have an idea of what it looks like... This is where visualization comes in, which is simply a technique for creating a mental image of a future event." It is through visualizing our experience of desired results that we can see, feel, smell, taste and hear all that success offers, fueling even greater emotional drive to meet goals.

One of the most successful methods is outcome visualization, where you create a detailed mental image of the desired outcome using all of your senses, putting yourself in the situation of achieving your goal to envision every little detail. This could be drawings, words, diagrams or a vision board, but the key is dig into the details as you create a visual representation of that outcome.

Another of the most successful methods is process visualization, where you envision each of the actions necessary to achieve the outcome you want, focusing on exactly how to complete each steps needed to achieve your goal rather than the end result.

At the end of this year, how will you have spent your days? What will be your gross revenue? How many of what types of clients will have hired you? What new things will you have tried or what helpful habits will you have developed? What did you stop doing?

Write out your answers; then, determine exactly what needs to occur to make your vision a reality. What resources do you need to procure? What partnerships do you need to initiate? What marketing efforts do you need to schedule? What sort of training do you need to acquire? With whom do you need to interact more?

Need help? Try Jack Canfield's step-by-step to get started.

What is your vision for your ideal life? What needs to occur to make that vision a reality? Share your experience with these visualization techniques and share your successes.

Use Gratitude to Encourage Greater Productivity

As defined online, gratitude is "the quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness", stemming from the Latin word for "pleasing" or "thankful" and providing great emotional fuel.

Gratitude can be a very powerful tool in your productivity toolbox. As Lifehack explains, "Gratitude is a frame for reality, which enables us to align with the good in the world as well as the evolutionary progress of the human race." Research shows how gratitude improves productivity in many different ways: higher energy, alertness, enthusiasm, determination and attentiveness; lower stress, anxiety and depression; improved sleep and decreased illness.

According to HubSpot, there's a causal chain, where "Writing down what you're thankful for increases happiness; happiness increases productivity." Thus, documenting that for which you are grateful can be one of the easiest, least expensive and most effective ways to boost productivity. Yet, it requires a habit of documenting, not simply thinking about, that which makes you grateful.

Whether via your mobile devices Notes application, an electronic journal, a log of videos or a paper notebook, take time to jot down that for which you're grateful each day. I prefer to incorporate this in my daily wrap-up, ending each day reflecting upon the day that I just lived, but it's most important to choose whatever time of day is something you can maintain. Some days, you may be in a rush and have time to add only one item to your list; other days, you may be able to go into more depth and roll off several items for which you are grateful. Regardless of how many you list each day, the process of recognizing all your gifts will drive awareness, fuel gratitude and increase productivity.

What tool will you use to document your gratitude? Will it be electronic or paper? What can you include as today's gratitude list?

Visualize Your Ideal 2016 to Make It Happen

One of the most successful methods for achieving a big goal is outcome visualization, where you create a detailed mental image of the desired outcome using all of your senses.

Succeed With Outcome Visualization

Today, take time to visualize your ideal 2016 so you can make it happen, paying attention to the details.

At the end of this year, how will you have spent your days? What will be your gross revenue? How many of what types of clients will have hired you? What did you start doing? What did you stop doing? What did you do more often than ever before?

Write your answers down; then, determine what needs to occur to make your vision a reality. What resources would help? What marketing efforts do you need to schedule? What types of networking do you need to incorporate in your upcoming plans? With whom do you need to interact more?

If you could use a little help getting started with outcome visualization, click here for Jack Canfield's step-by-step guide.

What is included in your vision for 2016? What needs to occur to make that vision a reality?

Be Filled With Gratitude

I am blessed to live a full life, filled with many people, places, things, experiences and opportunties for which I'm very grateful, including my wonderful clients, my fabulous friends, having a roof over my head and not worrying about from where my next meal will come.

Gratitude can be very powerful! Whether via a note-taking app or paper journal, take time to jot down that for which you're grateful each day. Some days, you may be in a rush and have time to add one item to your list; other days, you may be able to go into more depth. Regardless of how many you list each day, the process of recognizing all your blessings will drive awareness, fuel gratitude and boost productivity.

Will you keep an electronic or paper list? What can you list as that for which you are grateful today?

Build a Solid Foundation for Your Greater Productivity

For many people, getting organized tops the list of new year's resolutions. All around us, there are people talking about what works for them and experts sharing tips to help. It can be very easy to say "I'll do that" or "That would be great for me" to all the ideas you hear; however, in my experience, trying too many things at once leads to failure and will discourage future efforts.

Instead, think about achieving your goals like eating an elephant. How would you eat an elephant? I have always heard the only way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time, which is the same way I look at attacking any project... Bit by bit by bit.

Attempt any productivity and organization tidbits one at a time, not all at once, and develop habits slowly so they really stick. Adopting new ways of doing things and making changes can be difficult, but it is much easier when undertaking smaller chunks instead of an overhaul all at once.

Once you've mastered one change, it is a much better time to move on to the next change than seeking to make multiple changes at the same time. Plus, each of those changes is rarely as challenging in reality as we envision it will be in our minds.

Which element of your productivity practices or workflow processes do you want to change first? Have you tried to improve previously and struggled due to attempting too many changes at once? I'd love to hear your experiences!