Living Your World Class Life

"Time is limited, so I better wake up every morning fresh and know that I have just one chance to live this particular day right, and to string my days together into a life of action, and purpose."?Lance Armstrong, 7-time winner of the Tour de France

Living Your World Class Life

Last month Vancouver hosted the winter olympics. People the world over watched as the athletes competed and national pride was on the line. We witnessed inspiring feats of athleticism and victory, heroic acts of determination and courage and instances of heartbreak and disappointment.

We can learn a lot from these world class athletes to help us live world class lives.

Olympic athletes focus and build on their strengths. They have natural talents and they play to these strengths. They do not focus on trying to turn weaknesses into strengths because they understand that the best they would achieve would be mediocre results. Know your strengths and build on these.

Olympic athletes spend years developing, honing and mastering their talent to achieve world class performance. In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell writes that to achieve a level of mastery at a complex activity requires 10,000 hours of practice, or about 10 years. Whether or not you subscribe that 10,000 hours is necessary, it does take time, consistency and perseverance to achieve top level performance, whether it is in sports , music, performing arts, chess, business – whatever it is you are inspired to master. Where would you like to achieve mastery in your life?

Olympic athletes have passion for what they do. Behind the glamour and excitement of the competition are countless hours of repetitious practice, long days of working out, personal sacrifices, physical pain and injury, and extreme discipline. When the going gets tough, passion is what sustains their interest and drive to become the best at what they do. So it is in our lives. When you have passion for what you do, you find the energy, drive, determination and resources to do what is necessary to succeed. Live your passion and live with passion.

Olympic athletes have a compelling vision and use visualization and goal setting to transform their vision into reality. When you have a compelling vision for your life, you are clear about what you want to create. You can use visualization to really connect and see, hear, feel, taste and smell the reality of your vision. You can use SMART goal setting to create the focus, plan of action and measure your progress. If you don't know where you're going, anywhere will do. Don't leave your life to chance – live it by design, not default.

Olympic athletes have a diverse and multi-disciplinary team of expert professionals to help them be the best at what they do. Their teams may include coaches, sports psychologists, trainers, doctors, dieticians, physiotherapists, and sports equipment manufacturers. Top performers in life also understand the value of having a team of experts to help them succeed. We all have areas of strength and things we love to do, and we all have areas where we do not have natural talents and suffer through activities that drain our energy. Where would you benefit from expertise to offload some of those energy-draining tasks? Where would you benefit from expertise to identify and solve problem areas and transform your raw talent into optimum results?

Often olympic medals are won or lost not by huge margins, but by fractions of a second. In the 50 km cross country ski race, after 2 ½ hours of gruelling competition, the difference between the gold medal and 5th place was 1.75 seconds. The winning athletes have what we call the slight edge. The slight edge are those small things that cumulatively make the difference – the talent, passion, vision, goals, focus, drive and expert team that create the results and success of top performers.

Do you want to give yourself the slight edge, be a top performer and live your world class life? Would you benefit from some guidance and expertise to help you rediscover your passions, determine your life purpose, clarify and develop your strengths, and create a strategy for living the life of your dreams ? I have the tools and expertise to help you Take Charge & Live Large! Contact me today to discuss which of my solutions will give you the slight edge and help you live your world class life.