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1. Holding that visualization in your mind, read through the following list of values below. They may be important to you; they may not be. Circle any of the values you'd cross the bridge for. Add any others important to you but not listed at the bottom.

Peace Integrity Power

Wealth Joy Influence

Happiness Love Justice

Success Recognition Spirituality

Friendship Family Career

Fame Truth Status

Authenticity Wisdom Acceptance

Health ____________ ____________

2. Next, go back through the items you've circled and narrow the list down to only six. Which items are more important to you than the others? Place a star next to your top six values.

3. Now picture this: you've got those six items lined up with you on the side of the chasm. I have the ability to make you choose between them. You've got to throw three away. Which ones would go? If all you had left in your life were three values, what would they be? Cross out three of the six so that your top three values remain.

4. Last, rank your top three values. Which one would go first? Label it #3. Which one would go second? Label it #2. Label the remaining item #1.

You have just listed the top three most important values in your life. There are, of course, no "correct" answers, just the correct answers for you. Everyone's values are different. My values are spirituality, family, and health, in that order. Yours are probably different, but even if they are exactly the same, in the same order, we probably place different meaning on each of the words.

Defining your core values

Rewrite your top three values in order on the blanks below. Then for each value, write a definition, a statement of what it means to you to be successful in that area. At the end of your life, looking back, how will you know if you've been successful in that area? If "Family" is one of your values, how will you know if you've been successful as a family man or woman? If you put "Happiness," what does that look like to you?

1. Value:

"Success to me means . . ."

2. Value:

"Success to me means . . ."

3. Value:

"Success to me means . . ."

Sit in front of a computer or with pen and paper and merge the three paragraphs together into one statement. It could be several sentences or several paragraphs. You've just created a personal mission statement for your life.

Your mission statement will reflect who you are and what's important to you. Think of your personal mission statement as your constitution. It will become your benchmark. Your standard of excellence. It will get your behavior in line with your values. You measure yourself against it and continuously ask yourself if an activity is moving toward your mission in life. For example, if taking care of my health is important to me, and I eat eight slices of pizza and watch five straight hours of television, my actions are not supporting my mission.

When you're making changes in your life and setting goals, refer to your statement of purpose. I promise this activity will have an impact on your productivity. It's been said that "true character is the ability to carry out a goal long after the mood in which it was created has passed." That's when the real challenge begins.

Preparation quiz item #2:

2. I track my long-term goals and aspirations.

The Dream Machine

Do you remember the first thing you ever wanted to be when you grew up? I wanted to be a singer. When I was five years old, I used to tape record myself singing "You Are My Sunshine," "The Rainbow Connection," and "Wendy." My mother would play the tapes in the car as she drove. My first public debut was playing Ngana in South Pacific at the age of eight at the Air Force Academy. I sang, danced, and acted my way through school. But then my ballet teacher told me my legs weren't long enough to ever make it into a company. My voice coach told me I had a nice voice, but nothing I'd ever make any money with. My acting coach told me I wasn't cut out for the big screen. Then I saw Zig Ziglar present at a motivational rally when I was fourteen years old, and I was hooked. I wanted to be Zig Ziglar. I said to myself, "Hey, a little song and dance, a lot of acting, and I get to be in front of an audience. Perfect!"

No matter what my ballet teacher or acting coach told me, I was blessed to have parents who told me I could do anything I dreamed of if I worked hard at it. It's not enough to set your mind to something; you must also plan your time around those goals. So I set my sights on being a professional speaker. When I set that goal, it acted like a magnet, pulling me toward it. I interviewed professional speakers and discovered most of them owned their own businesses. Perfect! I'd owned lawn mowing and babysitting businesses in junior high school. So I based my high school and college curriculum around fully understanding how to run a business. I took speech, drama, marketing, instructional design, communication, and organizational management classes — all skills I knew I would require as a speaker. I skipped my last year of high school and received both undergraduate and master's degrees in business by the time I was twenty-one. Then I looked for my first job as a corporate trainer to start gaining "real" experience. The realization of my dream required some goals and action.

You need goals to:

• clarify your objectives in life,

• help guide you in the right direction,

• enable you to decide what's most important in your life,

• help you monitor yourself as you advance toward a desired outcome, and

• use your abilities more effectively.

Copyright © 2004 by Laura Stack, MBA, CSP. Excerpted by permission of Broadway, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

About the Author

Laura Stack is an internationally recognized productivity expert and bestselling author of Leave the Office Earlier. As president of The Productivity Pro®, Inc., she gives over 100 seminars and keynote speeches a year on managing time, reducing stress, and getting organized.