Be your own life coach

I was reading this nice article in RD March edition by Keith Ferrazzi, CEO of Ferrazzi Greenlight and author of Never Eat Alone. He emphasizes on the following four aspects that sound quite logical.

Focus: Identify your needs first. Form a focus. Many times it is not easy for us to answer this simple question 'What do I want to do?'. But its not that difficult too. Its a matter of focus. Dont let others define your success. Once you know what you want, just follow the next three steps.

Diagnose: You need to identify what is the behaviour that stops you from moving forward in achieving these goals. Identifying weakness is as important as knowing strengths. The good behaviour and the bad one work in opposite directions to prevent moving forward. For example, I was raised in an environment where I was told to respect elders, do not question them and give them what they want. Unfortunately I observed that I carry the same with me in my professional life where I seldom question my manager in the fear of sounding too argumentative and also in fear of making my boss feel uncomfortable with me. But when I found such a problem with me, I consulted my friends and got an advice that I need to handle the conversation in a professional way. Put all the information in black and white and let him know what I want, instead of work towards what he wants me to be.

Share: Help others to let them help you. Let others know what you have in mind. Be open to receive feedback. If somebody is giving you a 'gift' saying your behaviour is not good or certain aspect of you is not good and few more people share same feeling, certainly there is some change needed in you. A good behaviour is always respected and makes you feel good. Someone would not bother to give their opinion on your behaviour if you are going to contradict everytime you receive some feedback. Perhaps the best people who would know your weakness are your friends, colleagues, or your spouse. If you receive some negative feedback, seek clarifications if you dont understand. Ask more like 'Could that person give more examples', or 'What exactly do you mean by that?', 'What came to your mind when I was doing this?'. You could work it out by forming a group of trusted advisors to you and let them know that you give importance to their advice. 

Milestones: You cant manage what you cant measure. Once you got the focus, you need to see if you are going in the right direction. Periodic checks always help. It is possible that the contents of checkpoint change. For example if your focus is weight management, check everyweek changes in the weight. Once you got the weight into control, perhaps next checkpoint would be to see if the waist is reducing.