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How To Have A More Focused And Successful Year
14 Plays4 years ago
How many things are vying for your attention right now? Let's find out what we need to do to have a more focused and successful year.
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Mixing It Up' Podcast
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What's up, fam?
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Through self-development and spiritual growth, take the next step in life, love, and your leadership through the Mixing It Up podcast with your host, Sylvester Mixon.
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Hey, let's get ready to get empowered.
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What's
Impact of Distractions on Productivity
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up fam?
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How many things are vying for your attention right now?
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Your phone, text messages, emails, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, that nagging to-do list that just seems to keep on growing and growing because you're so distracted by every other thing.
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Modern technology has given us so many amazing things, yet with all of this technology, we're accomplishing so little.
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Think about this, the average office worker is distracted every three minutes.
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And according to human research from the Human Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, it can take up to 25 minutes just to get your focus back.
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Your brain is always taking in information and it constantly has to choose what to pay attention to
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What to filter out.
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Hey, tag a friend, share this podcast and let's lock in and find out what we need to do to have a more focused year.
Focus and Success: Defining and Directing Efforts
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I'm Sylvester Mixon and this is Mixing It Up.
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So what does it mean to focus?
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Merriam-Webster defines it this way to concentrate one's attention or effort on the most pressing needs.
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to adjust one's eye to a particular area or region.
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And we've got to ask ourselves today and be honest with where you are.
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This is critical.
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Am I really focusing my efforts and attention on the most pressing needs?
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Am I adjusting my eye into the area or region that I get the most return that would be most important?
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And you really have to ask yourself when it comes down to focus is what's getting your time, your attention and your treasure.
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When we talk about focusing, so many of us feel scattered.
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We feel overwhelmed.
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We feel unproductive.
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A lot of times we begin to think, I just don't have enough time.
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You probably said that before.
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Many leaders, the problem is not the lack of time.
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The problem is a lack of focus.
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And what we want to do, even out of this episode, is begin to refocus on the things that matter most to give us the best and most successful year.
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So number one, one of the ways that we'll do this is you've got to define what does a win look like for you?
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Like, what does a win look like for you in your marriage, in your ministry?
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What does a win look like in your money?
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What does a win look like in your mind?
The Power of Writing and Sharing Goals
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What does I know a lot of M's, right?
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What does a win look like that at the end of the month, at the end of this week, at the end of each day?
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What will a win look like for you?
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Is it more money?
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Is it is it is it a strong marriage?
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Are you less stressed?
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Do you have some vacation time?
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Are you are you are you better with your family?
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Are you healthier in your body?
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Right.
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Is your organization growing a more healthy culture and a healthy atmosphere?
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Hear me.
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I tell my church all the time.
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I say you can only do what you define, which means there must be boundaries in place.
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There must be definition brought to the roles and the goals that you're trying to accomplish.
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Psychologist Dr. Gail Matthews at Dominican University did a study and she found out that those who write down their goals are 42 percent more likely to do them.
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She also found out that if you write down your goals and you tell a friend or an accountability partner that you're attempting to achieve the goal, the likelihood of you achieving that goal increases by 72 percent.
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The likelihood you will reach your goals increases to 78 percent.
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Right.
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So what do you want to accomplish this year?
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What do you want to accomplish this week, this month and breaking it down to a day?
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Number two, the second thing that you can do to have a more focused and successful year is you've got to eliminate distractions.
Understanding and Mitigating Distractions
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Right.
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It was Greg Rochelle that said the best way to increase your focus is to decrease your distractions.
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So there are two types of distractions.
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There are cognitive distractions.
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These are the things that distract your mind.
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Then there are opportunity distractions.
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They distract your mission.
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And I tell people all the time that a distraction literally takes your attention off what you should be doing and put your focus on what you shouldn't be doing.
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Worry is a distraction.
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Fear is a distraction.
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Anxiety is a distraction.
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Stress is a distraction.
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Right.
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But I want to focus on these two cognitive, the distraction of your mind and opportunity, the distraction of your mission.
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One of the biggest mental distractions or cognitive distractions that you will have in your life is your phone.
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Right.
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According to Business Insider, the average person touches their phone over twenty six hundred times a day.
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And the worst offenders can touch their phone more than five thousand four hundred times in just twenty four hours.
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Y'all, we are spending more time on our phones than we need to.
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The average person is actually on social media two and a half hours each day.
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So how do you eliminate these distractions?
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Well, you've got to create a distraction free work zone.
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You've got to be intentional.
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Identify the things that cause you stress and distract you when you need to clear your head.
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And if you tend to get hungry, prepare some snacks.
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If you if your productivity suffers in a loud office, find a quieter environment.
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You've got to begin to eliminate those distractions.
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eliminate opportunity distractions.
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These are the opportunities that look good but might keep you from what's best.
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The more successful you become in leadership, the more opportunities will come your way.
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And here's the thing.
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You don't have to say yes to everything.
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You just need to say yes to the right things.
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And remember this.
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If you're taking notes by chance, yes starts with why.
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Yes, starts with why.
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Yeah, you get you'll get it later with all of your heart.
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You've got to fight the temptation to succeed at something that shouldn't be done at all.
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When you say yes to an average use of your time, you are saying no to a great use of your time.
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Right.
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I heard it said this way.
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True success isn't about doing more.
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True success is about doing what matters.
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Craig Groeschel.
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And then the final thing that I want to give you today is obsess about the process and not the results.
Process Over Results: The Path to Success
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So watch this.
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Process is everything.
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It is how you get from one place to the next, from one stage to the next.
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It's a process.
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And with everything in life, there is a process, right?
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So you don't get results by focusing on results.
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You get results by focusing on the actions that get results.
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My mentor, Ken Jocelyn, said it this way.
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He said he said you have to begin to think incremental and not monumental.
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You see, it's not thinking touchdowns.
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It's thinking first downs, which lead to touchdowns.
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You've got to start trusting and obsessing about the process.
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So many of us have such destination anxiety about when will I get there?
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When will be my time?
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When am I going to get this?
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When am I going to get married?
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When am I going to yada, yada, yada?
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When the most successful people
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Embrace the process and embrace the things that you learn along the way that prepare you for the place that you're trying to get to.
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You see, your process is literally a series of actions or steps taken in order to achieve a particular end.
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And you got to sell out to it.
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You got to obsess over that process.
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Fall in love with that process.
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Let it become a daily practice, a routine routine.
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So ultimately that thing becomes a habit.
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Remember this Dale Bronner said victory is not one in a day, but through a daily routine.
Consistency and Regular Wins
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One of the greatest enemies to your focus is a lack of consistency.
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Because distracted people, they have no consistency in their sentences, their statements, their confessions, their agreement, their behavior.
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One day they end, the next day they out.
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The Bible calls this in James chapter one, a double minded man is unstable in all his ways.
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And let not that man think that he will receive anything from the Lord.
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But I got to add some sugar in that.
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Hebrews 11 and six says, but without faith, it's impossible to please God.
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But he who comes to God must believe that he is God and that he is a rewarder.
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We serve a God who's a rewarder, but to those who diligently believe.
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Those people that lock into that process seek after God.
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You've got to become diligent in your process.
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You've got to become committed to that process.
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Fall in love with that process.
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Remember, incremental, not monumental.
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It's one in steps and in stages.
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My friend, you have the ability to change your life.
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By becoming more focused.
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You have the ability to help people discover their gifts, their dreams, their talents.
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You have the ability to reach your gifts, your dreams, your talents.
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You can inspire.
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Listen, you can literally become the best version of you that you have ever been.
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And all you got to do is get focused.
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Define your wins.
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Let go of your distractions and get locked into the
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the process what's your process remember this your life is too valuable your calling is too great and God is too good for you to keep wasting your life over things that don't really matter here's what I want you to do I want you to define your wins I want you to define your wins weekly define your wins monthly and define what a win would look like for you at the end of the year
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Defining your wins will now give you something to lock into literally a reference point, a focus point.
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Remember, Paul says in Philippians 3, 14, this one thing I do for getting those things which are behind and reaching toward that thing, which is ahead.
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I press toward the mark.
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What's your mark?
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Right.
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When you identify that mark, that one thing, then you have the ability to obsess over the process to lock into your process.
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to get moving to your next level.
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So let me ask you a few questions.
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What areas do you want to grow in?
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Where do you want to be the best leader that you can be?
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What do you want to be this time next year?
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Then what would a distraction free area look like for you?
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Is that a quiet area?
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And then how can you prepare in advance to be successful, to be more focused?
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What are some things that you could do?
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What are some things that you can do before you get to work to ensure that you're most effective and successful when you're working?
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Building those friendships.
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Building that marriage.
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Building your business.
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Enhancing relationships.
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Graduating school.
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Getting the degree.
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Preparing for a successful future.
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What are some things that you can do to make sure you're prepared?
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And then what would that process look like that you're going to put in place so that you can have your most focused and successful future?
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year.
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Hey, I'm Sylvester Mixon and this is Mixing It Up.
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Do me a favor.
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Take just a second to like it and share it.
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I believe that it will be a blessing in someone else's life to help them have the most focused and successful year this year.
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Take care.