"Nobody Plans to Fail – They Just Fail to Plan."

Probably one of the oldest sayings in the book, but one of the truest. At the end of the day, when things did not go well for us, it is too late to change what happened that day. There is time to get properly ready for all of the rest of the days that will follow. The question is, will we make the necessary changes to the rest of the days?

If we fail to learn from history, we are forced to repeat it, again and again. How do we avoid having to repeat history, history meaning our past mistakes? Get a plan and work that plan is a great place to start

Getting a plan is pretty simple. Go on the Internet, there are hundreds of sites out there that offer systems and programs, some good, some not so good. I have a number of Systems you should look at; I believe they fit into the good category, judge for yourself. Regardless of where you go and what you decide to do, it's paramount that you find yourself a System, program or regime that suits you and your lifestyle.

My point is this, it will not happen by chance; you will not wake up one morning and be organized, have a plan, and have the tools to implement that plan. If it was that easy, as they say, we would all be rich and retired. I've been doing this for a many years and I have seen thousands of people file past my door and the one fact that screams out is this: unless you make a concerted conscious effort to get your life in order, it is not going to happen, period.

Some quick points about what constitutes a plan, a method of getting your life on track and then staying on track.

• A regime, method, system, whatever you want to call it, the name is not important. What is important is the fact that you have adopted an organized way that you will be using to run your life.
• You make a conscious effort to find this method and you commit yourself to following their guidelines.
• This regime must be in a written form, something that you can look at, refer to, analyze and use like you would a road map.
• Regardless of how busy you think you are, you must be prepared to commit as much of your time and energy as required to making this work for you.
• No gain without pain.
• You must have faith in the System that you are following. When things get tough, that is when it is most important to follow through with the decisions you have made, stay the course.

To use our roadmap analogy, you are rushing out the door on the way to a vacation spot you have never been to before. Despite being rushed and harried, kids, spouse, everyone is pulling at you in 10 different directions, what do you make time for? You may forget the tent, the cooler, sunglasses, but you better make time to remember the roadmap. Without it, everything grinds to a halt pretty quickly.

This may not be the best example I have ever given but it's not too bad. You get the point, I hope. Regardless of how things are going for us, regardless of how busy we are, how stressed out we are, if we do not take the time to remember our roadmap, our plan, we are just going to fall farther and farther behind.

Have a plan and then following your plan gives you the best possible chance of doing the following:

• Getting some, if not all of your Priorities accomplished before the roof caves in on you.
• Helps to get your Agenda out in front of the others around you.
• Will help you weather the bad times with less damage to yourself.
• Helps you recover from bad days faster and increases the odds of more good days than bad.
• When things are going well for you, you can better capitalize on them.

Lastly, one of the hidden gems of having a plan and then following it is the reduction in stress that you will experience. Probably the biggest contributor to stress that we have, is the anxiety and stress we feel when we are not in charge of our own destiny. The surest way to reduce this source of stress is to create a game plan for yourself and work that plan on a daily basis.