Do you know where you are? Not geographically speaking but in life?

If you don’t know where you are it can be pretty tough to figure out where you are going. In 1976 Diana Ross recorded the theme song for the movie Mahogany. It was one of those songs that made people think… here are a few of the lyrics:

Do you know where you’re goin’ to?
Do you like the things that life is showin’ you
Where are you goin’ to? Do you know?

Now looking back at all we’ve planned
We let so many dreams just slip through our hands
Why must we wait so long before we see
How sad the answers to those questions can be

Do you know where you’re goin’ to?
Do you like the things that life is showin’ you
Where are you goin’ to? Do you know?

So… do you know?

Hopefully you’re exactly where you want to be in life, if not, the rest of this post is for you.

I may not know where you are but I do know how you got there. It was a decision, or more likely, a series of decisions that put you where you are. The choices you made, about where to work, where to go to school, what to study and perhaps most importantly, who to associate with, have conspired to put you exactly where you are in life.

You may not like that, you may even want to disagree with it. If you’re not happy with where you are in life you may have excuses and reasons for being there but know this: getting where you want to go will require you to accept responsibility for where you are.

Here is another bit of news you may not like: the people you associate with are almost as responsible for where you are in life as you are. Most people, there are exceptions but most people, do not achieve a greater level of success than their peer group.

I’m just not going to sugarcoat this; if you’re consistently hanging out with low achievers then it’s unlikely that you’ll reach your full potential. Your “friends” could be the nicest, kindest, most fun people on earth but if they have no desire to excel then the odds are overwhelming that they will pull you down to their level of achievement.

I know that is not a nice thing to say but it is what it is.

Successful people surround themselves with other successful people. They push themselves to succeed. They learn the habits of success from their successful peer group and it makes succeeding much more likely.

As I’ve written 100 times the most successful people also have mentors. I have been fortunate to have several incredible mentors of my life… but it wasn’t by accident. I made a decision to put myself in the presence of those people. I did that intentionally, it was a choice I made.

Believing something doesn’t necessarily make it true. Mentors, good ones anyway, will help you be honest with yourself. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve convinced myself something was true (and therefore okay to do) until I was confronted by a mentor who forced me to look at the facts.

Mentors don’t have the same level of emotional attachment to the people and things in your life that you do. They can provide you with the crystal clear logic required to balance out the emotional choices that you naturally make.

A good mentor will be honest with you when you’re not honest with yourself. Mentors are especially useful when you make a wrong turn or make a bad decision and are no longer certain exactly where you are in life.

If you don’t have a mentor then find one. Regardless of your age or level of success you’re better off with a mentor. Period!

Don’t let one more dream slip through your hands. Don’t wait another minute to see the answer to this important life question.

You simply must know where you are before you can know where you’re goin to… do you know?