Building up overnight success one block at a time
How do you feel about your life? Given that you are reading this, there are likely going to be a few things where you would like to make a few tweaks to, or you have bigger changes either brought upon you or initiated by you. Maybe you have big hairy audacious goals or just a feeling "there's gotta be more to life than this" but you are not sure what that might be yet, or how to get that dream you are secretly harboring.
So, let me break this down into a few steps to get you started:
1) Imagine a point in the future when things have already worked out satisfactory. How does that look like? Engage as many senses as possible; where/how do you live? How do you look? Who is with you? What do you see, smell, wear, feel, hear etc. Paint this as vividly as you can (if you are into mood boards that is a worthy topic).
2) Detail the elements of that success. Try to get this a bit more granular. What are you successful for? What is different in the future? (this could be international, size of audience/reach, depth of topic, own brand/business/thing that you stand for, speaking, conferences etc). This might well still be relatively unformed. Look for clues as much as you can and capture them.
3) With these clues in mind think about what the steps were that needed to happen to create this success? E.g. if you want to wow the masses in public, you probably have to have a topic and an event to speak at. This requires having key points to speak about, connections to event organizers and connections to other people you know that speak. This is what starts making it practical. Try to be as practical as possible as you are doing this. Some people find it helpful to rate themselves where they currently are (e.g. 5 out of 10 steps, 3 of 10 or 7 of 10 in the different stages).
4) Think about practical steps you can take to bring the number up by one. Rome wasn't built in a day. Think about concrete actions you can do this week that bring you one step closer. Listen to that TED talk or connect with that person for a coffee that does this thing that interests you!
People jokingly say "it takes years to be an overnight success" and that's true for the most part. It's just that we normally don't get to see people's prep work.
By creating a bit more structure around your bigger dreams and goals you can start making them real bit by bit (even when you have a full-time job doing something completely different right now). Every big thing starts with the small actions. You just have to keep doing them and build on this.