I had the genuine pleasure of attending a webinar by Michael Hyatt on goal setting on January 8th 2015 and it was mind 
blowing. I am still processing a lot of it but I want to share my greatest ‘aha’ moment of the day.
Michael Hyatt said…Get Past The Past…yes…Get Past the Past. In the beginning I wanted to laugh at the statement but later in the day I had time to really think and it made sense. Let me help. In life, things don’t always go the way we want them to and life is often harder than we anticipate. At one point or other, we experience the big emotions of fear, uncertainty and doubt because of these things that happen. Yet, it’s not what we experience that matters rather how we deal with these experiences. Often we feel these big emotions because of unresolved experiences in the past. Don’t quit on me yet as I explain.
When we fail at something or don’t do it as well as we would like, our internal response is often to remember the event one way or another. This often becomes the starting point for the list of things we cannot do well. This list often creates a list of fears and discomfort. We have to deal with these feeling or we will lose out on great things in life. To deal with these emotions, we all need to externalise the failures, assess and work through them in totality. After all, ‘The future doesn’t equal the past.’ Did you know that, ‘failure always makes something good possible?’ Michael Hyatt. These possibilities are what we must focus on.
This caught and held my attention. As I looked back at 2014 with this renewed mindset, I actually began to see possibilities that were created by the challenges I went through. This thought process consolidated something I had only begun to understand in the last three weeks. The hard times almost took everything out of me but with this new hindsight I realised that these times gave me an opportunity to really understand me and grow in areas I will need to prosper in 2015 and beyond.
As I thought, I realised that I need to get past personal fear and doubt about my abilities. I need to reconnect to my personal purpose and my pattern. I need to understand how I am created to function and where I thrive. Once that is done, I need to live in that pattern for the rest of my life. I now understand deeper that the circumstances of my life will change but I have to be able to rise above each circumstance and find solid ground to walk on back out of the hard place.
So I want to go back to the statement ‘The future doesn’t equal the past.’ This statement really blew my mind on one hand and totally encouraged me on the other. It means that I can move from lack to abundance, loss to fail, failure to success, as easily as I can change my mind. Do you think it’s too simple to be true? Well, in reality, the starting point to changing the course of my life is to change my mind. Note I said the starting point. There will be things I need to do after that but I must start with the way I think about and relate to life based on my thoughts.
Remember Proverbs 23:7? ‘For as a man thinks in his heart, so is he…’ This makes it simple to understand that the success of my life depends on my focus and consistent keen renewal of my mind. I can reach further and go higher if I constantly work on my mind and keep at it since my future doesn’t equal my past.
The depth of hope that has sprung in my heart, mind and life following this realisation is inexplicable. I hope it does the same for you. As you plan out your year; connect deeply with your purpose, find the will of God and set audaciously big goals that will bring Him the greatest glory ever. Remember, you are blessed in every way and every age group.
Shalom.