Bring On Lemons

Good morning! It's Monday morning and I'm still in shock. I cannot believe how many people are following the lemons to lemonade adventure of Crystal Casavant and Relax Consulting. I didn't think anyone would read what I was writing, but I gave it a shot because so many leaders encourage blogging, writing, websites, etc... as a way to share your stories, struggles, and victories. Here's why I'm so amazed (and keep in mind this is less than 2 weeks of blogging/writing/website): 437 view of the 'Bring on Lemons' blog:  http://bringonlemons.blogspot.com/ ,  we've reached 375 on Facebook - 18 people are talking about us - we have 43 followers on our page:  http://www.facebook.com/successwithrelax , 150 article views on Ezine:  http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Crystal_J_Casavant , 18 followers on Twitter:  https://twitter.com/#!/Relax_Consult , and 208 visitors on our Relax Consulting page:  http://www.relaxconsulting.com/ . I just want to say thank you to a...

Are you looking for a role model? A rags to riches story about overcoming troubling times and becoming a success story? Look no further, sit back and be impressed by a young man whose troubles started at birth and whose success began at the tender age of seven. Picture a drunkard of a musician who had seven children with a woman who thought herself a friend to her children. Only three of their seven children survived, and the eldest was the over-achiever. At age seven ½ he was performing in public. That wasn’t good enough for his father, who told people the child was only six…as if seven ½ wasn’t good enough to be considered above average or talented. Before he was twelve, he was writing his own music and teachers compared him to the likes of Mozart. What many did not know was that this young man was also taking care of his siblings, his mother, and filling in for his father who was often rendered useless due to his battle with alcohol. He was merely a child himself, but yet the man ...

I talk about defining ones own success. Let's start there. What do you consider success? This is a personal question and no one can answer it for you. Is it having enough money to take a family vacation, pay off the mortgage, buy a home, purchase an SUV, pay for a wedding, retire in Hawaii, children who graduate from high school, a happy spouse after 30 years of marriage, a certain position in a company, the ability to give back to the community, a museum named in your honor, a particular income threshold?? If you don't know, you'll need to start there. It's like goal setting on a grand scale. Where do you want to be in ten years? What is going to be your legacy? Do you define success by a feeling, a mark on the map, the size of your bank account? This is for you to decide. Once you have defined success for yourself, I highly recommend making something visual for yourself. At our house, we call it a goal board (and we sort of use Pinterest for some of it). If you de...