On June 1st of 2012, I released a guest post on a personal branding site that went viral. I couldn’t believe how much it was shared on Twitter and other social networks in such a short amount of time. I was invited to start-off the first day this Personal Branding Blogathon, put on by Peter Sterlacci at http://www.PeterSterlacci.com. I think the reason the post went viral is because it touched upon the desire that we all have in life – TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE. As we begin this journey of creating the Ultimate Annual Personal Success Plan, I want to share a portion of this post with you, because I think it will help you in determining how high you really want to go with your own goals. If you don’t know how high, it is hard to create a plan to get there.
The full text of this article is located here: http://petersterlacci.com/2012/06/01/screw-dents-im-aiming-immense-gaping-hole/
Screw “Dents”… I’m Aiming for an Immense Gaping Hole!
“I have many regrets about the life I’ve lived—coupled with equal failures to accompany those regrets. But the biggest failure—and the regret that leads them all—was the failure to grasp my full potential earlier in life.
“ I’ve always worked hard, but I haven’t always worked smart. I’ve sought success, but I didn’t always plan for that success. Since I failed to grasp all that I could become; I never defined what success looked like, nor focused my actions toward it.
“A handful of years ago I experienced a “renewal.” After selling a company I had founded, I began to realize that I needed something more. I desired more: wisdom, success, and meaning—in every area of my life. I consumed knowledge, and I worked even harder. I wrote my first book, started a very successful leadership blog, and extended myself into every opportunity that pushed me higher.
Success came slowly, but it wasn’t enough. Soon, I realized I needed to focus my energy. I could not find any guidance to help me do this in a way that was right for me, so I created The Ultimate Personal Success Plan. For two years, I have used that, updated it, and tweaked it to fit my aspirations.
“Then recently, I saw the title of an article that had something to do with making a dent in the world. I didn’t read the article, or see who the author was. But the concept stayed with me; the thought kept piercing my mind: “What kind of dent am I making?” I was struggling with the way my life was going. The success I was having was good, but it wasn’t enough—or maybe it just wasn’t …meaningful.
“As I pondered this one night, thinking about how a dent is the result of an impact (a hammer striking a wall, a heavy object dropping to the ground), and how the size of the impact determines the dimension and depth of the dent, the thought struck me:
“Screw ‘Dents’…I want to make an ‘Immense Gaping Hole.’”
“What’s the gaping hole that I want to create in the world? I am still working on that, but I want to make a difference in people’s lives, do something useful, create something meaningful …be somebody who makes other people’s lives better, and of course improve the quality of my life and that of my family.
“So I find myself again redefining my Ultimate Personal Success Plan, almost halfway through the year. In doing this, I recognized that my aspirations needed greater impact. I couldn’t settle for slow, small impacts.
“Now is the time to start ripping open a cavernous, gaping hole! Because simply making “a dent,”…just isn’t adequate.”
I share that message because I want you to do some hard thinking about what you want out of your life, and more importantly, what you want out of the next year of your life. This is a tough question that took me months to figure out. But exploring the path of determining who you are, and where you are going is amazingly fulfilling, and clarifying.
Pondering this question, can be both enlightening, yet at the same time stressful. The idea of what we want out of life (or the next year) or what we are capable of, are often limited by our own thinking. So as you explore this question for the next few days, it is important to bring others into your thought process.
I am not suggesting that you do not have a grand enough dream, but often what we want is highly influenced by what other people close to us want, and often other people have a greater vision and hope for us than we will ever have for ourselves.
When I created the last version of the Ultimate Success Plan, I knew that it would be a crummy plan if at the end of the year my wife was unhappy. I had to review my plan with her and make some adjustments. My vision of being a good husband is severely limited in my mind, but the vision (or hope 🙂 ) that my wife has for me – is greatly expanded.
You may have portions of your plan that have to do with lifestyle, health, career, spirituality and a bunch of other things. Balancing all this can be overwhelming if you do not take the time to talk with important stakeholders or “experts” about your goals in that area. Perhaps you need to speak with an “expert” for a health portion of your plan, which could be a personal trainer or nutritionist. For a professional growth area, it might be a coach or mentor. For a financial success area it might be a financial planner. A stakeholder in a relationship area might be the person you want to develop the relationship with, like your spouse, or a friend.
When setting your goals, set your sights high. I hope you realize what you are capable of, because all of us, including you – are always capable of more, and better. Set that vision high, and make sure to work with stakeholders and experts, because they may have a vision of you that is even higher than your own!
So your homework for the next few days is to to write down all your hopes and dreams for 2013. Aim high, but make them realistic. When you think you have them figured out, talk with key stakeholders to verify that you are not short-changing yourself. The elements of what you create will come together as we move farther along with the creation of your success plan.
Please leave comments or questions below if you need help. If you are willing, please share some of your dreams and aspirations as well. Don’t forget to subscribe to get notices of all the posts as soon as they are released.
Success Plan, Personal Success Plan, Annual Plan, Resolutions, Goals… nope, lets combine it all into The Ultimate Annual Personal Success Plan, now is the time! As many of my readers have seen I have been working on an e-book for the Ultimate Personal Success Plan. As I have been working on it there has been one thing that kept bugging me. – I hate e-books… Usually when someone gives away an e-book, I download it, I browse through it, and then it goes in a folder where e-books go to rest and ultimately sit unopened forever more.
Writing this article makes me feel hugely and morbidly inadequate. This is a story of a leader that dealt with horrible odds of success, starvation, internal quarreling, physical and mental weakness of massive proportions, and the possibility of death for him and his team …every day for months and months. You may have guessed what this story is about, but I suspect, like I, that you had never really considered the leadership lessons from this amazing epic adventure. I have been involved in turn-around situations, but this is the ultimate turn-around. (If you are a skimmer, read the last paragraph).
by Dennis N. T. Perkins.
One might think that with all the topics I write about that I would be an arrogant know-it-all type. This is really, really far from the truth. In fact, the more I learn in life the more I realize that I know very little. This year as I was preparing for 2012 and making my 
Over the years I have belonged to various associations and groups. I been also been in many peer groups, hired consultants and coaches, used multitudes of products and vendors, and even worked for some crummy employers. The years of this have recently caused me much pondering. I keep wondering why a person would stay with certain employers, or industry associations, even vendors …to their own detriment?
The world is full of recipes for success, but many times we forget that success comes from within ourselves with work that we do. I would even claim that success is mainly about attitude. When you have the right attitude, you focus on the right things, obstacles are there to overcome, you feel better and work more efficiently. I am sure you know what happens if you have a bad attitude: nothing seems to work at that time. Here are some questions for you to ask to become more successful through your own attitude towards other people and life. Even though you may not have answers to every one of them, thinking about these matters will already take you towards your personal success.
The primary function of a leader in any organization is to believe. A leader is someone who must carry the torch in the darkness and light the path towards the desired end goal. They must have unwavering belief in their cause, their mission, their people and their ability to achieve what may at first appear impossible or in some cases outright ridiculous.
Accountability – I consider myself an expert on accountability and execution (I did write a 
Francis Chan stated so eloquently stated,”Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don’t really matter.” The depth of truth in that statement gives me goose-bumps. Oh how often we find ourselves, succeeding at the things we are good at and never pushing ourselves try different and greater things that will really matter in our lives, our companies and our relationships.
Have you ever been envious of 
