Is 95% Enough?

When I was at Jack Canfield's 'Breakthrough to Success' Seminar last week, one of the exercises that we did involved a series of questions similar to 'What would happen in your life if you gave 5% more effort?'

This was profound for me, and really got me thinking. I've prided myself for a long time that I live my ideals, and work very hard. As I started the exercise, I thought 'I already feel like I'm working at 95% capacity, and he wants 100%!' I felt that would be impossible - I'd have to give up any hope of free time, and never let something slide... surely 95% is enough, right?
But as I thought about it more, I realized that it wasn't about 100% work, it was about 100% integrity. And that means keeping my commitments to myself for self-care, and free time, since these are essential parts of being successful.

It means living 100% in alignment with my ideals, my vision, my goals.

The more that I thought about it, the more it seemed that the missing 5% was the difference between someone like me, (I'm pretty successful) and someone like Jack, who is super-successful. And if I could have the success, money, contacts and friends, great family life, good health, etc, all by giving just an extra 5%, would it be worth it? You bet it would!

So why not start today giving an extra 5%? You might pick one of these:
• Make an extra 5 calls to prospective clients
• Exercise one more day a week
• Give up an hour of TV a day, and replace it with an activity that moves you forward
• Look at your commitments, and see which ones aren't fulfilled - then choose one,
and do it
• Spend an extra hour a week with a spouse or child
• Learn a new skill that improves your value to clients or your employer
• Spend one hour a week studying tips to improve your business
• Read one self-improvement book a month

Don't try to make over your entire life - you'll just set yourself up for failure. That's the other magic of 5% - it's manageable, it's reasonable. And the rewards are huge!