Make Big Happen - #bookperweek2019

In 2018 I started my year off on a high as my company started from nothing had just reached a $5mm run rate, and everything seemed to be clicking for longterm success. Then over the next six months, my entire world would be rocked and end up with my company failing and being forced to start over deep in the hole.

It took about a year to get back on my feet. A lot of humbling moments, but most of all, it took a shifting of my focus. Make Big Happen by Mark Moses, along with several other books, was critical in helping shape the new future I am building today.

A big part of the importance of Make Big Happen in my life comes from the simple four questions Mark uses as the basis of his process:

1. What do you want?
2. What do you have to do?
3. What could get in the way?
4. How do you hold yourself accountable? 

When I looked back ten years ago, my answers to these questions point to why I ended up where I did. My want was wealth and power, but when I achieved it, I realized I had wanted the wrong thing. By the measure of the world, I had reached the pinnacle of success at an insanely young age. When I pivoted to find fulfillment, I took yet another wrong turn, which led me to 2018.

What I needed to do instead was use a brilliant assessment Mark shares in his book as well. A personal life inventory of sorts that I promise you if done honestly will scare you to death; I know it did for me.

Below are the questions. Mark pushes you to reflect on and answer. These questions will force you to see the actual cost of your ambition and hopefully help you course correct.

• Do you feel you are taking care of your health with a proper good diet and sufficient sleep?
• How do you feel about your business or career—are you passionate about it?
• What is the state of your family relationships, particularly spouse and children?
• How do you view your spiritual development, and how might you improve it?
• Have you learned to say no, and how often do you say yes when you mean no?
• Are you doing the things that increase your energy or deplete it?
• Are you living the life you want?
• Do you have the friends you want, and are you spending enough time with them? 

I find myself in a season of inspection of my personal/professional life. Maybe this comes from the fact that I am starting to execute the plan for the next phase of my life. Whatever the reason is, this book has become a critical building block to help me shape what my focus for the next ten years will be. It has helped me see that my family must be at my center and then everything else built around it. Without that structure, there is no way to achieve "success" and be fulfilled.

To Your Success & Prosperity,

Michael McMillan