三大决定改变财富人生

本文为与《创业者》杂志的合作内容。原文发表于Entrepreneur.com网站。

如果你有钱，但是内心充满愤怒和不快乐，这能叫过得好吗？这种情况每天我都能见到。它源自于一种极度失衡的人生：期望过高，不懂得珍惜当下。

如果对现在所拥有的不懂得感激和珍惜，你就永远无法得到真正的满足感。那样你又怎么能取得人生的平衡？成功又有什么意义？

近40年来，我有幸为各行各业的人提供激励指导，其中包括了一些世界上最具影响力的人物。我接待过的既有美国总统，也有小企业主。

然而无一例外的是，我发现几乎每时每刻人们都在做着三种关键的决定，而这些决定主宰着他们的人生质量。

如果你作出以下决定时不假思索，你将落得和大多数人一样的下场：身材走样、情绪沮丧而且财政吃紧。相反，如果你是有意识地作出这些决定，你就能在当下改变自己的生活轨迹。

决定1：谨慎选择关注的焦点。

生活中随时会有千百万个事物争夺你的注意力。你既可以着眼于当前发生的事情，又可以将焦点放在未来的计划上，还可以关注过去。

随着焦点的变化，人的精力随之而动。你所关注的焦点和行为模式塑造了你的整个人生。

对于生命中拥有的和失去的，你更关注于哪一个？

你的答案肯定是两者皆有。但是，审视一下自己的惯性思维，你的时间主要花在了哪一方面？

或许，你不应该一门心思想着自己并未拥有的东西，嫉妒那些比自己富有的人。而是应该承认，自己拥有不少值得感激的事物，其中有些与金钱无关。你可以庆幸自己拥有健康、家庭、朋友、机遇和头脑。

养成珍惜自己已经拥有的一切，这一习惯可以将幸福感和精神充实带到一个新的高度。但是真正的问题是：对于自己的头脑、身体、情感和心灵，你是否真的努力去感恩？这些才是快乐、幸福和成就感的源泉。

还有第二种影响人生质量的关注模式：你更关注自己能够控制的东西，还是那些不能控制的方面？

如果你着重的是自己无法控制的事物，生活中就要承受更多的压力。你可以影响自己生活的诸多方面，但是通常无法控制它们。

当你决定采用这种关注模式，你的大脑就需要作出另外一个决定：

There’s nothing worse than a rich person who’s chronically angry or unhappy. There’s really no excuse for it, yet I see this phenomenon every day. It results from an extremely unbalanced life, one with too much expectation and not enough appreciation for what’s there.

Without gratitude and appreciation for what you already have, you’ll never know true fulfillment. But how do you cultivate balance in life? What’s the point of achievement if your life has no balance?

For nearly four decades, I’ve had the privilege of coaching people from every walk of life, including some of the most powerful men and women on the planet. I’ve worked with presidents of the United States as well as owners of small businesses.

Across the board, I’ve found that virtually every moment people make three key decisions that dictate the quality of their lives.

If you make these decisions unconsciously, you’ll end up like majority of people who tend to be out of shape physically, exhausted emotionally and often financially stressed. But if you make these decisions consciously, you can literally change the course of your life today.

Decision 1: Carefully choose what to focus on.

At every moment, millions of things compete for your attention. You can focus on things that are happening right here and now or on what you want to create in the future. Or you can focus on the past.

Where focus goes, energy flows. What you focus on and your pattern for doing so shapes your entire life.

Which area do you tend to focus on more: what you have or what’s missing from your life?

I’m sure you think about both sides of this coin. But if you examine your habitual thoughts, what do you tend to spend most of your time dwelling on?

Rather than focusing on what you don’t have and begrudging those who are better off than you financially, perhaps you should acknowledge that you have much to be grateful for and some of it has nothing to do with money. You can be grateful for your health, family, friends, opportunities and mind.

Developing a habit of appreciating what you have can create a new level of emotional well-being and wealth. But the real question is, do you take time to deeply feel grateful with your mind, body, heart and soul? That’s where the joy, happiness and fulfillment can be found.

Consider a second pattern of focus that affects the quality of your life: Do you tend to focus more on what you can control or what you can’t?

If you focus on what you can’t control, you’ll have more stress in life. You can influence many aspects of your life but you usually can’t control them.

When you adopt this pattern of focus, your brain has to make another decision: