Success is a habit. It doesn't happen by chance, it happens by choice. Successful professionals fully embrace the concept that life must be consciously created in their own ideal.

In the next three columns, I'll be sharing specific habits and the action steps necessary to make success a habit in your life. YOU and you alone are the artist of your life!

If you don't master your time, you will forever be the slave of someone who does.

The most successful chiropractors I know set aside a time every week to consciously choose the use of their time. I teach doctors to divide their time into three categories:

... fun time

... MOA time ("major outcome activity" time to work on those activities that bear the greatest outcomes personally and professionally)

... neutral time

Every hour of every day of the week is plotted in advance so that success doesn't happen by chance but as a result of a conscious choice.

Start by setting aside at least one hour in the next 24 hours. During that hour plan your actions for the next seven days. Unsuccessful people spend their time randomly and wonder why they have so little of it!

Every moment presents us with opportunity. Successful people choose to do what's necessary and right, even when they don't necessarily feel like it. In other words, they choose discipline over regret.

Have you ever had a situation in which your "gut" said to do or say one thing and your head said to do the opposite? Of course you have!

For example, you're sharing your Report of Findings and you know that the new practice member requires a rigorous plan of care.

While you're offering your findings you note that the new member is distracted and uninterested. As you begin to present your recommendations, he sighs and rolls his eyes. Perhaps he even seems angry.

And then something happens. You abandon your original recommendations and tell him what you think he wants to hear vs. what he needs to hear. Perhaps you even reduce your care plan recommendations. You have chosen regret over discipline.

Discipline is the ability to say and do what needs to be said and done. In essence, discipline is all about living in integrity.

If practice members choose not to accept your ideal care plan, they are going to suffer the consequences of choosing regret over discipline, not you.

This is a "mirror principle," meaning that if you find yourself choosing regret often, you typically attract people that mirror your behavior. Your practice is a direct reflection of you. Life is holographic. You cannot compartmentalize your life. Every part of you is reflected in the whole.

In the next interaction in which you feel the choice of regret or discipline, choose discipline. Don't allow feelings to supersede truth. Take a dose of your own discipline. Whatever action you've been putting off in your life begin NOW. Have you blocked out the hour recommended in strategy one? Discipline!

In order to reap the harvest in the fall you've got to sow seeds in the spring.

Statistics are wonderful snapshots of where you've been. They are great for measuring your previous performance and I recommend that you maintain statistics regularly.

However, in order to reap rewards of stellar statistics, you've got to plant seeds for success.

Successful doctors know the importance of taking the time (strategy one) and making the effort (strategy two) to plant success seeds. They know that in order to obtain a referral from a practice member they must ask for that referral. In order for practice members to understand the importance of care beyond the symptomatic phase, they must be taught the value of continued care.

These are just a few of the success seeds that you must plant today to reap the benefits tomorrow.

Create a list of all strategies that have generated new members in your practice. Create a list of ways to increase the retention of your current members. Now, create a "Daily Success List" of all of the activities that generate new and retain current members. Once created, NEVER vary from the discipline of planting success seeds daily.

There you have the first three strategies for success in life and practice. Drop me a note and share a success story that has resulted from these principles!