Goals Book

Embracing Personal Responsibility in an Age of Entitlement

Biagio "Bill" Sciacca

• Publisher: Morgan James Publishing
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781683500711
• eBook ISBN: 9781683500728
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Management

Most goal setting books require the completion of endless forms, fill in the blanks and free form descriptions requiring a great deal of back end work leaving the person not quite sure where they are in the goal setting process. Goals Book, is a lively story with each chapter being a self-contained unit in the goal setting process. Each chapter is a "thread" in the goal setting process. When the book is finished each thread becomes part of a wonderful tapestry that leads the reader into, through and beyond the goal setting process.

Chapter One

Progressive—It Ends at the Beginning

It was a bright, warm Saturday morning in the city where the law firm was located. Actually, the firm was situated on the other side of town from the corporation. The young man had called Attorney Huffburg yesterday morning, immediately after making his notes in his My-Tyme and after his very uplifting and informative meeting with the CEO. He expected to call the law firm’s main number and be redirected several times to someone’s voice mail who would give Attorney Huffburg the message to call. Hopefully he would be able to call and set up a meeting tomorrow morning as the CEO suggested. To the young man’s surprise, the number on the card got him directly to the attorney’s administrative assistant. After giving his name, he was again surprised that within seconds of being placed on hold, a gruff, yet friendly voice came on the other end of the phone, “Hello, Marv Huffburg here.”

“I, ah, I was a-asked to contact you sir, ah, Mr., ah, Attorney, Huffburg.”

“Yes, yes, I know all about that. Call me Marv, all of my friends do, and to the best of my knowledge, so do all of my enemies …”

The booming laughter that emanated from the young man’s receiver was deafening. “When you really get to know me, you can call me the Jewish Cowboy!” Again, booming laughter.

The gruff voice continued, “Tomorrow morning, 8:00 AM sharp. Don’t be late, it’s the Sabbath and I have a few loose ends to tie up, then, I don’t work! Do you know where my office is located?”

“Yes, I …”

“Good, see you then … and black!”

“Ah, okay. What do you mean ‘black?’”

“Black, I take my coffee black. What did you think—that you weren’t going to pay for this meeting?” Booming laughter again. “And make it an extra-large! Don’t go getting cheap on me before we even meet, I have enough clients like that!” Booming laughter again. “See you tomorrow morning at 8:00 AM, did I mention 8:00 AM sharp?”

“Yes sir.”

“Good. And it’s Marv, see you then.” And, there was silence as the phone was hung up.

As the young man got out of his car holding four extra-large black coffees in one hand and his My-Tyme in the other, he started to laugh a bit to himself at the conversation that occurred yesterday. He thought that this guy must be a real character. He must be very smart because he does a great deal of work for the corporation and for the CEO personally.

The building the young man stood in front of was enormous. As he entered the lobby, he saw the regal splendor of the facility. He thought that this must make clients feel very at ease—knowing that because this law firm has made millions of dollars for itself, it had to have made hundreds of millions for its clients. Eclipsed only by the commodiousness of the atrium of the corporation, the young man walked toward the security guard at the far end.

The security guard, a young man with blond hair and blue eyes, who looked like he had spent more of his time at the gym than in his high school classes, looked at the young man and said, “Here for Mr. Huffburg?”

“Ah, yes, I am.”

“Elevators are behind me; take any one of them to the top floor. I’ll let him know you’re on your way.”

“Thanks.”

“No problem,” said the guard as he picked up the phone, turned his back on the young man, and punched in a few numbers.

As the elevator door opened, he heard wafting through the closing elevator door, “Yes, Mr. Huffburg. He is on the way up now.”

Rising smoothly and stopping at the top floor, as the elevator door glided open, the young man was greeted with a reception area that rivaled the CEO’s—bright, almost intense sunlight, and a grinning, five-foot, five-inch, middle-aged, portly man in Levi jeans and a dark blue tee shirt. On the tee shirt, in bright, white letters was written: The Jewish Cowboy. The man moved very quickly for his girth and as he approached the young man, he extended his hand and said, “Hello young man, my name is Marv Huffburg.”

“Hello Mr. Huffburg,” The young man said as he balanced the coffees upon his My-Tyme that he had placed horizontally on his left forearm while extending his right.

Booming: “I thought I told you to call me Marv.”

Sheepish: “Yes sir, I forgot.”

Booming: “ ‘Sir’ is not ‘Marv.’”

Sheepish: “Oh, yes sir. Uh, I mean Marv.”

“Good. Now that we got the formalities out of the way, give me a coffee, come into my office, and let’s chat for an hour or so.”

The attorney’s office was large, airy, and sunlit. All of his furnishings were a traditional motif, with pastels accenting the royal blues and regal reds. The thick carpeting had several additional area rugs over it that gave the office a look of compartmentalization. Some areas were for business, and some areas are for socializing. The attorney took the young man over to what was definitely an area for socializing.

Two love seats in deep brown leather faced each other and were flanked by small, ornate coffee tables containing decorative lamps and various knickknacks.

As the attorney sat in one of the seats, he motioned with his right hand, waving almost as a magician might do over a black top hat and a white bunny magically appears. While in the process of the young man’s seeming legerdemain, the attorney said to him gruffly, “Sit.”

As the young man got comfortable, the attorney grabbed a coffee, almost ripping it from the cardboard tray, tore off the lid, and placed the lid on one of the coffee tables. He took a sip; almost a full-fledged slurp from the paper cup, smacked his lips, and made an approving “Ahhh” sound. He placed the cup haphazardly next to one of the ornate knickknacks, spilling some coffee on the white and gold ceramic cherub. He looked at his slight mess with dismay and said, “Damn, if my wife were here she would give me hell, but, fortunately, she is not here, and if you try to give me hell, I’ll throw you out! (Booming laughter)

“Well, young man, I understand that you have made a royal pain in the ass out of yourself!” (Booming laughter) “Always asking questions. Never settling for just any answer given to you. Digging deep and deeper. Is that true?”

“Yes. But, I don’t do it to be mean-spirited. I am only looking for more, or maybe I should say truer information.”

The attorney looked at the young man. Actually, he appraised him by gazing at him from head to foot and back up again. The young man felt the power of the attorney’s intensity and knew he would never want to be cross-examined by him. The attorney pursed his lips and made direct eye contact with the young man. The young man didn’t think he was meant to purposely feel uncomfortable, but he was. The attorney knew that he was analyzing the young man with too great a degree of intensity. He broke eye contact and took another huge gulp of coffee followed by another approving smacking sound.

“So,” Mr. Huffburg said, “Let’s talk about success. Hum, how do we begin this process of defining a word that is so difficult to define? It’s somewhat like trying to grab Jell-O. The harder you squeeze, the less you have!” (Booming laughter.) “Let me ask you something young man, did you ever go on vacation with your parents?

“Oh yes, my brother and sister and I went on vacation almost every year, mostly to the beach but sometimes to the mountains.”

“Hum” said Huffburg. “Then, let me ask you something else, when did the vacation begin?”

The young man wasn’t sure about the question. Most of the time they left on Friday night or Saturday morning, then drove a few hours to their destination. Spending approximately five to six hours, to get to where they wanted to go, then, they stayed until the following Friday or Saturday. After thinking about the question for a while, he said to Huffburg, “Well, either Friday or Saturday.”

The attorney chuckled and said, “Let me see if I can clarify the question a little more. Did the vacation start when you got to the destination?”

The young man frowned in deep thought and remembered the time planning the vacation, the brochures, and the stops along the way to see some of the sights and grab a quick bite to eat. As his frown changed to a smile of remembrance, he said, “No, the vacation started long before we arrived at our destination. It included the planning, the talking and laughing, and the singing in the car on the way.”

With a smile on his face the attorney asked further, “And when did the vacation end?”

Understanding the line of questioning now, the young man responded, “In some cases, our vacations didn’t end—even today we still talk about this time or that time.”

“Ha, yes, yes!” said Huffburg. “Would you agree with me that it is not just the destination that is as important but the journey through?”

“Well, I guess so. If we all of a sudden got to the vacation spot we would have missed much of the fun!”

“You got it, young man! You have heard that success is a journey, not a destination. Let me take that further and tell you this: success is a process, it is not an event. Just as you don’t ‘all of a sudden’ get to your vacation spot, you don’t ‘all of a sudden’ become successful. As a matter of fact, you don’t all of a sudden become anything!”

“I’m not sure I understand that.”

“Well,” said Huffburg, sounding somewhat impatient, yet understanding the young man’s confusion at the same time, “I’m divorced! I was married to my first wife for eighteen years. When do you think that the divorce happened? Let me give you a hint, it didn’t happen at year eighteen of the marriage, it happened at about the fifteenth year! But, you see, young man, there is no such thing as ‘all of a sudden.’ It took three years for the end result of what we both knew was inevitable.”

“I think I am beginning to understand what you mean by process and not an event.”

“Yes,” said Huffburg, There is no such thing as ‘all of a sudden.’ Let me go further. Tell me, do you like to eat chicken wings?”

Perplexed at the relevance of the question, the young man said, “Well, sure I do. But I don’t eat them very often.”

“Really, why not?”

“Well, they’re really not that good for you.”

“Oh?” Exclaimed Huffburg, “You think not? Are you saying that the American Heart Association is saying that a diet rich in saturated fat is not life sustaining?” Booming laughter.

Quiet laughter: “Well, kind of!”

“You’re right, and think about why. The fat from those damn wings goes right into your arteries and hardens them up. Then Bang! Heart Attack! But remember, there is no such thing as all of a sudden. You don’t get a heart attack when you eat one wing, do you? Oh no! It takes eating a bucket of wings, every Saturday night and a dozen wings a few other nights a week for twenty years before you build up enough plaque in your circulatory system for that to happen!

“Let me give you an example: Let’s say that you and your fiancée are going to a bar tonight to have a few drinks, relax, and tell her about this intelligent well-built lawyer that you met today! (Booming laughter). And, you notice a guy at the bar ordering a few dozen wings. The wings come out of the kitchen. The guy grabs one, picks it up, the grease is dripping off his elbow. (Booming laughter) He takes a bite, stands up, grabs his chest, and falls over dead!

“You ask the bartender what happened. He says that it’s those damn chicken wings. The fat from that wing went right to his aorta, clogged it up, and killed him, and that was the first wing the guy ever ate! Now, think about this: if we knew that one wing would do that to us, would we eat it? Of course not! But, it’s not one wing that does that—it’s many wings over many years. That’s why we keep eating those tasty little cholesterol bombs! (Somewhat booming laughter.) Because, there is no such thing as all of a sudden! If there were such a thing as all of a sudden, at least in this example, we wouldn’t behave that way!”

The young man, looking intently at the portly attorney, wondering how he knew that he was engaged, and understood, in an instant an important concept: Success occurs a day and a moment at a time.”

Huffburg continued, “We call that part of success progressive. Success occurs moment by moment.”

The young man smiled. Not only did he understand, he used the same basic wording as this wise, experienced man did!

Huffburg said, “Here is the beauty of success being progressive. We become successful, not when we achieve a goal, but when we define the goal, and modify our behavior so that we can attain it! Success happens at the beginning of the process of goal-setting, not at the end of it.”

The attorney was intent, firm, fixed, and focused. Let me repeat that slowly and listen carefully: We become successful, not when we achieve a goal...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgment
• Introduction
• Prologue
• Chapter 1 Progressive—It Ends at the Beginning
• Chapter 2 Realization—Just Do It!
• Chapter 3 Worthwhile—I Tickle You, Someone in China Laughs
• Chapter 4 Predetermined—Never Settle When You Can Excel
• Chapter 5 Personal:It All Comes Down to What’s In It For Me
• Chapter 6 Goals—The Heartbeat Of Success
• Chapter 7 Specific—No Generalities Here
• Chapter 8 Measurable—If You Can’t Measure It, You Can’t Manage It!
• Chapter 9 Attainable—I Do Believe That I Do Believe
• Chapter 10 Realistic—Look, You Just Can’t Levitate
• Chapter 11 Time Specific—The Vacation Spot of the Century: Someday I’ll—
• Chapter 12 Tangible—You’ve Got To “Feel” It And Smell It And See It
• Epilogue The End is the Beginning—Back to the CEO
• Post Epilogue—The Young Man Thinks!
• My-Tyme Information
• Notes, Ideas, and Take Offs…