Secret #1: Know Your Very Next Step

Knowing specifically what your next steps are will keep you constantly moving forward. A huge stopping point for many students is having no clear idea what to do next. Here’s something to think about: when we don’t know what to do next, we do nothing.

Let me know if this scenario sounds familiar. John is your classic C person. He has a paper to write. John sets a vague goal of “getting my paper done.” However, it is unclear what his very next actionable step will be. So John will sit down, stare at his computer screen, move papers around on his desk, and right before he starts, he will check his Facebook account, see a newsfeed of someone’s new photo album, and check it out.

Then all of a sudden, five hours of his life have disappeared and he has accomplished nothing with his paper. Sound familiar?

Let’s change his goal from vague to specific: “I will complete my paper by Friday of this week so that I can enjoy my weekend stress-free.” An actionable step to help him get started is “I will go to the library after my English class and ask the librarian to help me find three books and then use Google to find two Internet sources.”

With this action step, he knows exactly what he has to do, where to go, and whom to ask for help.

What this also means is there will be planning involved. Most people don’t like planning, but as Brian Tracy states in his book Time Power,

“Every minute in planning
saves you ten minutes in execution.”

So six minutes of planning will save you one hour of time. Not bad, huh?

Arel Moodie is widely known as America's Top Young Speaker. He has spoken to over 65,000 students in 39 states and 2 countries on the topics of student success, student leadership and student entrepreneurship. He is a leading authority on helping students of this generation succeed in school and in life. He is also the best selling author of the book Your Starting Point For Student Success. To find out more about Arel's book, go to www.startingpointbook.com. To find out more about Arel's speaking please go to www.arelmoodie.com.