The BEST YEAR of YOUR LIFE
by Debbie Ford
Review by Marie-Claire Wilson
Debbie Ford is the national bestselling author of The Dark Side of
the Light Chasers, The Secret of the Shadow, Spiritual Divorce, and
the Right Questions. She is the founder of the Ford Institute for
Integrative Coaching and conducts workshops and lectures across the
country.
This remarkable book, about a subject that should interest everyone,
has some deep truth to it that you will not want to miss. Debbie
Ford, a very talented author, puts her observation powers and her
life experience to work, and crafted some wise advice about how to
take your life back into your own hands. What does she mean
by this? Essentially, never put off until tomorrow what you
can do right now... do not wait for what you need or want, act on
it now.
For most of us, the moments of our lives slip by unnoticed. We
are so engrossed in the worries of survival and overwhelmed by the
inevitable crises that life brings we are locked in emotions about
the past and fixated on fears about the future. Even
if we are trying to plan for a better future, we have so many conditions
on our plans, using a lot of “ifs” and “buts” until
we are remaking the whole world. This results in a lot of waiting,
waiting for life to happen!
Waiting for life to happen results in a life of chaos, with us never
seeing the potential of the moments that one by one, stream by us
like water through a sieve. We keep putting off until tomorrow
what we want to achieve now. There are so many reasons and
excuses why we do this. Too old, too young, too fat, too skinny,
too broke, too late, the time is not right (or, “I don’t
feel like it”), things will be better next year... We wait
because something more urgent comes up, we wait because we have to
do six other things before we can do what we want to, we wait and
we wait, and then one day, we wake up to find that we have missed
out on our own lives. And the excuses that we make to ourselves
are really a type of emotional and spiritual laziness or a situation
of blocked energy.
We all know that time is precious
in this incarnation and we must act now because all we have is
the present time. We know
it intellectually, but we do not know how to translate that into
real actions. Instead, we say, “I would like to but
I can’t... I don’t have the time... the money...
the opportunity... I’d like to meet people... I’d
like to meet my soul mate... ” then we don’t
get anywhere, we WAIT. And death sneaks up on us without
announcing itself, and our life has not been lived for all of
the excuses we have made.
Would you like to act today and quit putting off until tomorrow
everything that you need to do now? The author gives us a
plan of ACTION so that right now, we can start with moment by moment
how to make this year the best year of our lives.
Here is some of the practical advice that Debbie Ford gives us
about achieving our goals:
Define your goals and state exactly what it is that you want to
achieve in a way that is clear, concise, and easily understandable.
Make your goals measurable. If you can objectively quantify
your goals, it will be unmistakable when you achieve them.
Goals work best within a set time line. Set a specifictime
to start and a date by which you will achieve the goals.
Make your goals realistic. Is there a high probability that
you can actually achieve it? If you have the ability to achieve
the goal, it probably will not require any particular good luck,
divine intervention, or depend upon another person for it to be
fulfilled.
Make a plan for your goals with a clear structure that includes
the specific step by step actions, resources, skills, and supports
necessary for achievement.
As the author points out, we must remember that we are projecting
our own reality with every minute and every thought. Therefore,
she says, the key to success is a positive and constructive attitude. Every
year, people make New Year’s resolutions that they never
fulfill. Often they make grand plans to change their lives,
and it is often unrealistic. Much of it gets forgotten or pushed
off to the next year’s list. Time passes and the years go
by. Then we look in the mirror and we do not like what we
see. We may feel as if we have not accomplished anything compared
to our goals. We become insecure and even envious of others
who seem better accomplished.
But the human is an unlimited creature, thus, we make our own limits. We
can change careers, study and learn new things, take better care
of our health and our bodies, and take better care of our emotional
and spiritual health. Success is within the reach of all
of us if we think that we deserve it.
