How a Bucket of Chicken Can Help You Achieve Any Goal You Have (Part 1)

The next time you see a bucket of chicken, I hope it reminds you of my absolute favorite pneumonic device and how you can begin to work toward any goal you set out to achieve. Fortunately, this acronym is easy to remember and seen all over the world with signs of a global food franchise: Kentucky Fried Chicken, otherwise known as KFC.

Globally, KFC is one of the most recognizable consumer brands. But KFC stands for more than Kentucky Fried Chicken. The KFC Principal is as follows:

Know what you want.

Find out what you have to do to get it.

Change what you’re doing until you get it.

In this first of a special three-part series, I will go into detail with the K in KFC. This will be followed by subsequent articles exploring the F and C of this most important of acronyms to remember. Committing yourself to each and following these guidelines will help prompt you to whatever it is that you call success.

Know what you want.

While it should be obvious, few actually know what they really want out of life. Countless people spend their days (and perhaps lives) without a purpose or a quest. If you prefer to NOT spend your life wandering aimlessly, then you may consider the following 5 tips to find out exactly what you want in life. If it helps, you can answer these questions by writing them down on a sheet of paper.

1. Do some soul searching.

Stop what you’re doing and just be. Find a place without distraction and ask yourself: “If today was my last day on Earth, what would I be doing right now?” While your answer may not exactly be related to work, it can be a step toward figuring out how the answer to what you want can relate to your career.

2. To figure out what you want, first figure out what you absolutely need in this world.

This applies to your professional as well as your personal life. What are the nonnegotiables? Things you cannot budge on. Gearing this toward your work life, you can ask which of these take precedence and in what order. Money? Financial security? Job Stability? Room for job growth?

3. Determine what makes you truly happy but are less essential and may be willing to sacrifice.

There’s no waste to life if you’re happy living it. Your happiness is the root of your desires. So take a few moments and really think about what makes you happy. Is it traveling? Steady hours? Never working on weekends/holidays/overnights? This list are important but are less so than the first list.

4. Determine what makes you truly UNhappy.

In order to figure out what you want, you may have to also consider what upsets you, and be as precise as you can about it. Don’t simply say that you hate your pharmacy job. Pinpoint precisely why you hate it. Could it be a boss or coworker breathing down your neck? The workload? The lack of job growth? Its important to not only think of what bothers you, but how can you fix it. This is called a solutions based approach. And lastly, consider how much do you want or need to fix it?

5. Lastly, stay positive.

Life doesn’t go according to plan. Rather than letting setbacks bring you down, try your best to roll with the punches. Remind yourself that you are in pursuit of something that you really want and may have to endure some setbacks in the process. The road to success is rarely easy and it surely is not often glamorous. Sometimes a positive attitude is all you need to keep going. (Here's how to add positivity to your career)

Be sure that what you think you want is really what you want, because the next two steps are really where it gets tough, and will require true grit… as you’ll see in the next article in this series….