A.I.M.: The Powerful 10-Step Personal and Career Success Program

Chapter 7. Cashing a Reality Check

Where is there dignity unless there is honesty ?

—Cicero

At this stage of the process, you have completed the key self—assessment portions of A.I.M. You will have reviewed them and begun to develop an understanding of your "story" a narrative based on reflection and self—examination. In doing so, you have identified your central challenge, looked at your motivations, values, and past experiences, and then brainstormed about some options you might like to explore.

At this point, the next logical step would seem to be that you should immediately begin exploring the new directions that you have identified. You have moved from perhaps feeling frustrated and stuck in the mud to glimpsing a new world of understanding and possibility. Why not move ahead and begin to act on it right away? Have you determined that you might want to start your own business? Well, there's no time like the present—let's start setting it up! Have you identified that you are stuck in an unhappy job or relationship that is just an extension of past failures? If we've identified a new direction that breaks that pattern, let's get to it!

These are all logical steps that one might think are appropriate at this stage. And they are completely wrong. If you were to immediately act on your analysis to date, you would run the significant risk that you will go off in a direction that may be completely unsuited to you.

People are fallible. We often make mistakes, and in many cases, our mistakes ...