Consider for a moment what you really want to be at the finale of your life. Do you want to be rich? Or to be famous? How about close to the ones you love? What do you want most out of life? Take out a piece of paper and a pen or open up a word processor and begin to write out the characteristics, attributes and relationships you want to have. Basically, write out your long term goals and your core values (the things that drive you to be at your very best). When you’ve completed this exercise, plan out milestones in your life that can help you keep track of your progress toward achieving that goal (i.e. characteristics, attributes, or relationships). They will be your long-term goals or accomplishments that you want to achieve in your lifetime. Next, plan out mid-range goals that take anywhere from 1-5 years to complete. For example, if you are a college student, you may plan to graduate within 3 years in your chosen discipline. After recording your mid-range goal, make sure that they coincide with your long-term goals. Next, you’ll want to setup short-term goals. Continuing with our example of a college student graduating in 3 years; a short-term goal would be to complete your introductory courses in the first semester or term with a B+ average. You will further break down to monthly and weekly goals which would correspond to assignments, tests and projects for your courses. Our example has dealt with college goals, but the same principle can be applied to your career or any other areas of your life. On the lowest level, create daily goals and tasks. On a new piece of paper, write down, “Schedule” on the left hand side, in the middle write “To Do List”, then on the right hand side write down, “Things to Remember”. Now begin to write down your schedule for the day, such as when you have work, when you want to exercise. Next, write down the things you need to accomplish that day depending on importance and how urgent it is. Lastly, as you are going throughout the day, fill in the area under “Things to Remember” when you come across important things that you need to do; record it down for a future date. I suggest that you repeat the short-term goals and task planning on a day to day basis, and a similar planning session once a week for a weekly planning session, and a monthly planning session once a month to re-align your efforts with your goals, and an annual planning session as outlined in the first paragraph of this article to see if your annual goals match your mid-range goals and long-term goals. Doing this iterative process will help you keep a vision of what you want to accomplish on any given day of the year, during any month of the year, and for any year during your life. You will ultimately find that your finale will be a beautiful crescendo and you will become what you “want to” be!