In the world there are two distinct groups of people.

Those that fight their way through life, and those that sail through life, riding over the rough seas – with help from their friends.

When you see someone truly successful in life or in business they will undoubtedly have a very strong network or fan club around them.

I noticed this early on in my business career when I worked with a young man, who despite his years had an amazing network of people supporting him. He seemed to know everyone that was possible. If you need a mechanic, he knew one, if you needed a builder he knew a reputable one and on and on it went. Not only was he referring a lot of business to this group but he was constantly getting the heads up from them on any business within his industry too. He has learnt the value of having a strong group of people around him that were looking out for him – ensuring his journey was going a lot more smoothly than mine!

Sometimes in our lives we have to make sacrifices now to accomplish the greater goal later. Delayed gratification it is called. Unfortunately others around us may not be so committed to the long term goal and believe they need our time or resources right now.

This can create what I call ‘an emotional blackmail’ situation. Where quite frankly you are left feeling dammed if you do and dammed if you don’t

I remember in my early years of selling real estate when my children were very little. I was in a constant dilemma when I had to go out in the evening to secure a listing or negotiate a deal. This was often right at their dinner or bedtime and their demand for me to read a good night story or be there with them in the evening was strong and well vocalised.

Often I would leave the house with such a feeling of guilt, that it affected my whole performance in the field. Instead of walking out the door charged to go and do the business, or to be in the groove to negotiate a deal, I was stressed and guilt laden to the point that I knew the clients could probably sense it too.

Then one day it dawned on me, what I need was fan club one that would cheer me out the door, one that would be as excited as me when I had completed a deal, and a fan club that was coming with me on the journey.

So, simple as it sounds, I sat down with my two young boys and my wife and set about explaining to them what I was trying to achieve and what it meant when I had to go out at night.

I went to great lengths to explain, what I did and how it all worked.

But most of all, I sold them on what it would do for them. I set a goal for all of us, that if I could sell one extra house each month for the next 4 months we would all go to a tropical island for a holiday.

They were impressed. I put up a poster of the island in each of the boys rooms and got some brochures showing them all the fun things they could do on the holiday!

Now I had a fan club!

Each night if I had to go out, I now had two young boys cheering me out the door, ‘go Dad’ they would yell, ‘get out there and sell a house’! Waving as I drove out the drive, what a difference this made, when I drove off I was invincible, the greatest sales man in the world!

And of course first thing in the morning they would run into our bedroom to ask if I had done the deal! Were we all, that bit closer to the holiday?

Now here is the secret! This worked in two ways!

Firstly I was released to do the job without having to carry the emotional burden out the door with me – weighing heavy on my back.

I now had a ‘fan club’.

But just as importantly I now had a whole extra layer of motivation, how could I let this new ‘fan club’ down and not perform to deliver the team the goal of the holiday on the tropical island.

This is a technique I still use today, if you can have others buy into your dream, with their support anything is possible!

One of the major obstacles we have to overcome is our selves. We simply get in the way of our own journey

This style of obstruction comes mostly from our belief systems, what we believe to be true, even if it is completely wrong. For many of us, these beliefs, about what is fair, the way things work, or what we deserve or can expect, are in place by the time we reach our late teens. The problem is most of them are wrong, in some cases not just a little bit off the mark but up to 180 degrees away from reality.

Carrying around these beliefs is in effect a disability, as it restricts us in our ability to make an informed decision about the next best move forward.

Often our beliefs are passed on by those around us. These people may be seriously under qualified to give an opinion and they just continue their cycle of belief through into us. What they know and believe may once have been true; but could now be a generation out of date, and has long been passed by with the advance of discoveries in technology, science, medicine or finance, to name a few.

The dream we have, to achieve something specific in our lives, can be easily quashed by someone near to us who doesn’t believe it is possible and voices that opinion. A dream can be diverted or diluted by someone who wants to protect us from failure and so convinces us to take a safer option. The result in the end can be a journey much further away from our original goal, so far in fact that the end result is the ‘other person safe dream’, not ours.

Many wonderful singers, who as children may have taken the brave step to sing out loud only to be told, it wasn’t good enough, or to be laughed at for trying, quietly retreat away, never to sing again.

When people pass comment about us, they are telling us all about themselves. The person, who told the child they couldn’t sing, didn’t want to sing themselves. Or did want to sing, but didn’t have the courage. They passed on their beliefs and fears to the child. The result a disaster for both parties!

So the first step to success is being careful who you share your dreams with, make sure they are people who will support you on the journey, and that they will be able to put wind under your wings.

The next step is to ensure that if you need advice; to only get it from someone skilled in that area. Why would you take financial advice from someone poorer than you? Why would you take medical advice from a builder, or take real estate advice from a restaurateur.

So you can see how others can affect your journey, and that can be much easier to see because you will have someone ‘external’ to blame.

You need to remain totally focussed on the outcome of your goal or your dream and no matter what, no matter who tries to divert you, who tries to dilute it or who tries to contain it or whoever tries to quash it, you remain true to yourself and to your dream!

But what about yourself? The number one internal terrorist to achieving your dreams!

The last step is to deal with your internal conflict, and perhaps the greatest hurdle to overcome, is getting started then sticking to the plan. A test I like to use when I have to complete a task that I don’t really want to do, but needs to be completed to get me one more step closer to my end goal is the ‘Pleasure or Pain’ test.

It is simply this, no matter how bad the next task is, how much I fear it or how much it puts me out of my comfort zone, – will the end result be more pleasurable of more painful to me.

If it is going to be more pleasurable then I do it. If the end result is more painful I don’t.

Everyone will have an opinion about why it can or can’t be done. You will be bombarded with facts and figure, opinions, strategies and ideas but….

Just remember this!

“If the dream is big enough – the facts don’t matter”.

visit my audio series at www.secretstoswonderfullife.com

– Oprah Winfrey, talk-show host, producer

for more good quotes visit my ‘Coach’ website

We usually only take photos of fun times, the moments we want to really treasure!

So if its been a while since you last took that photo, its time to look in the mirror and ask yourself how wonderful your life really is?

For more information on creating a truly wonderful life visit  my Coaching website