In his masterpiece, The Celestine Prophecy, James Redfield wrote, “Where attention goes, energy flows.” This quote inspired me to look at my life. Where was my energy going? Strengths or weaknesses? Trauma and drama or expansive possibility?

Over time, I learned to treat energy as an investment. Don’t we all want to make good investments? Investments that bring positive returns that build our futures?

I thought so! In this blog, we will learn about asking the right questions and making sure our focus is on the things that really matter. Through this, we will learn to optimise results and achieve success.

Ask the right questions

I can’t count the number of times I’ve watched movies where the wise sage or mentor has said to the younger hero, “You’re asking the wrong question.” It’s always a learning moment – a time to pause and ask what is really going on.

There was a point in my journey when I was doing my best, but things were not working out. I kept asking myself, "What am I doing wrong?" I would then find out what that was and fix it. Then I would go to the next wrong thing and fix that as well. I would keep doing it again and again, every single day, until one day, I woke up and thought to myself, "Maybe I'm asking the wrong question."

Spoiler alert: I was. I learned this through listening to Dr John DeMartini when he said “The quality of your life is based partly on the quality of the questions you ask yourself daily.”

I asked myself what I was doing wrong, and I always found another answer. Why? Because there's always something wrong. However, the minute I changed my question to "What am I doing right? What do I have at my disposal to increase my probability of success?" things started shifting for me.

It’s time for you to get your pen and paper out again. This time I want you to write down a list of ten things in answer to the question, “How is my current situation helpful to me in achieving my goals?

This is a powerful question. I'll tell you why. Being passionate is about being resourceful. Nobody's going to hand you your passion on a plate. You're going to have to go and build it up piece by piece, bit by bit, dot by dot, pixel by pixel, second by second. You're going to have to make it; it's the masterpiece of your life.

You're going to have to be resourceful, grabbing assets from everything around you. Even the air around you is a resource. The book in your hands is an asset. When you get into this mindset of being highly resourceful, the magic will manifest. So why don’t you go ahead and write down these resources that are helping you achieve your passion.

Now let's look at the next powerful thing in manifesting your magic.

Daily tasks to help you achieve your goals

The next practical exercise I have for you is a bit of an audit. It’s that of taking stock of daily tasks and connecting them with goals. I know – not every task in the day is one we love! But does that mean it can’t connect with your goals somehow? Let’s get creative.

You are about to fill out the exercise sheet below, but let me give you an example first. Let's say one of the daily tasks you hate is making phone calls. You're in sales but you hate it. Every single day, you pick up the phone to make phone calls and you ask yourself, "How is this going to help me achieve my passion?" Well, you just need a bit of creative thinking. On the left side of the sheet, write the task, 'making sales calls'. How is this helping you achieve your passion? Think about it. Wouldn't you have to make these calls if you were trying to start a business of your own?

If we were to move away from business and look at a different pursuit, we could use the same strategy. Let's say you want to work as an artist, or perhaps a speaker or coach, or maybe you want to do what I'm doing. Guess what? Even I have to make these calls every single day. I have to call the people who help me with my work, I have to call my clients. Isn't this helping my passion?

So, when you start linking the tasks you do not enjoy as much to the actual skills needed for your passion, then you will see things differently. The tasks you hate the most are probably the ones that are serving you the most.

Once you note them down, correlate them to their specific passion and value from your mind map. Here are some more examples for you, so we can make this key component crystal clear.

How are my daily tasks helping me achieve my goals?

Use what you have to get what you want

Once you are done with the above worksheet, I want you to think about this question: What resources do I currently have that will help me achieve my passion?

This is a magical exercise, and definitely one of my favourites. It is something I did when I was feeling at the lowest point of my life. I was almost broke after coming back from India, or at least I thought so till I did this exercise. I wasn't anywhere close to achieving the success I wanted. I just had to let go of a lot of business contracts to pursue my dream of talking about passion and helping people connect with their purpose in life. Nothing was working, and there I was, looking around and thinking, "I have nothing left. How am I ever going to achieve my goal?".

I grabbed a piece of paper and a pen, and I started writing down everything that I thought could be a resource. I cannot tell you how many resources I found.

Here's how you're going to do the worksheet:

1. Put a list of all the resources you have on the left side.
2. Put a list of your goals or passions on the right side.
3. Now play a connect-the-dots game, simply think "How can I use this resource to get me to my goal?"

I know some of these exercises seem simple, but I share them with you because they have changed my life and the lives of people I have coached. At my lowest point, I realised I had a watch, I had WiFi and I had a computer. Soon the possibilities began to blow my mind.

I promise you, you have enough to change your world. And once you realise that, the universe shows up and blows your mind even more.

Go on and fill out this worksheet: What resources do I currently have that will help me achieve my passion?

Allow space for new blessings

I hope this series of blogs has allowed you to take time to pull back, heal and then slingshot into your future. As I come to the end of it, I have two things to say to you:

1. It's time to allow space in your life for new blessings. When you start to align your thinking towards gratitude, resourcefulness and possibility, and when you start to change from “problem” to “opportunity” thinking, the world opens up. So you need to be open to the possibilities that arise – but always in line with your passion.
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2. Slingshot is like brushing your teeth. Don’t just do it once and expect the job to be done. The dentist tells you to clean your teeth three times a day! You don’t just do it once, and that’s it for your life! You’ll end up with no teeth in your head

I always say that Slingshot is a process to revisit often. Its about being intentional with the stories we tell ourselves, the practices we build into our lives, and the perspectives we take. It's about learning mindset mastery and recognising that it is a lifetime thing.

I’m honoured that you have joined me on this journey. I’d like to encourage you to get the book, or download the audiobook – or both! – and keep revisiting this journey so that you can keep healing yourself and launching forward into the best of your future.

After all, you are a master of your destiny, not a victim of your history!

I’m proud of you.

Moustafa Hawmi 

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