From my experience, at any rate, anyone can become a people magnet, even if at the moment, you are a shy, retiring kind of person, who likes to keep to yourself. Now, for those of you who have just put this article down, and burst out laughing, when you've composed yourself, stay with me here. I can assure you that just such an outcome is possible, for anyone, given the right techniques, and application, or practice. If you happen to be a little less shy and outgoing already, you may be well on your way, in any case. So, let's get started.

I ma not suggesting that you all of a sudden need to become an obnoxious, loud, and arrogant person, to be noticed. Come to think of it, you will be noticed, but hardly be magnetic. Instead, it's about developing a quiet confidence, an inner self assured knowledge that you are OK, and can achieve all you set out to be and accomplish. To explain this better, think back to the people that you admire or would like to be like. What are their characteristics? Do they come over as confident, self assured, or just at ease with life?

The possibilities are endless, as each person is different, and a lot of the time, these are subconscious issues. However, now that you are taking an active role in really thinking about this, you may be amazed at what you discover. You may find that you are attracted to people that seem quietly confident, and say little. On the other hand, you may be attracted to the really outgoing person. Either way, you will see this better, now that you are paying specific attention.

Once you have worked out what works for you, you are better placed to start being that type of person. It may well take a while to become the character you wish to be, but knowing your goals will be easier to now work with. Most things in life are about an active participation. In my case, I started off as a very reserved, and quiet person. In fact, I am still quite reserved, till I feel I am in a comfortable situation. However, I have been able to emulate the qualities I have admired, and become that type of person. Considering I was the super shy type, that is a considerable achievement. I tell you this, so that you can see it is possible for anyone to become the person they want to be, and magnetically attract others. It is all about your personality, and ability to reach out to others, to convey your point.

For some people, the title of this article may seem confronting, and as some would say, 'in your face'. However, I feel it is important to look at ourselves, and be honest. After all, more often than not, it is only us who will be so. You may have friends or colleagues who do not want to offend you, may not know more themselves, or simply, be more concerned about their own problems.

Either way, it is important to decide, and act. Your life is your own, and it is up to you to make the best of it. Many times, I have come across people who simply were so deeply bedded in a rut, doing the same things everyday, they lost their perspective, or ability to look beyond the next few hours. Having said this, I can assure you there is a much better way to approach this, and even though I may have achieved shock value to begin with, I now want to get down to the business of providing you with some ideas, and action points.

I always recommend starting with a list, and really making it your own. Take a few hours, and just start writing down everything that comes to mind, in terms of your abilities and talents. Don't judge anything yet, or reject any thing. Just start writing.

The act of letting your mind and hand wonder, and just write is not only very therapeutic, but also very revealing. The secret here is not to judge anything. Just write down everything you have ever dreamed of, and wanted to do, no matter how distant or seemingly impossible an idea it may be. This is the key to starting this process, and getting the result you want later. It can be thought of as planting seed, to start the plant in your mind growing.

Once you have started this, you will find that it is easy to continue for several hours. I have even heard of someone spending over five hours, and writing pages and pages, only then realising they had so many ideas, and things they wanted to do. Following the advice above is not only therapeutic, but very revealing, and will kick start your brain's thinking.

After a day or two, you may start to edit, and prune your ideas. However, it is important to just write, to begin with, as this will massively increase your generation of ideas, and allow you to better express your deepest inner wants and ideas.

In addition to the above list, it is worth taking the time to just relax your mind, and then, reflect and think about your list. I have personally found that going for a long walk is very helpful, as the creation of endorphins from the exercise, as well as the fresh air, help me to formulate my ideas better.

For the majority of people, true success at something is the result of application, and time investment, mixed in with a healthy dose of perseverance, and persistence.

Now, I am not naive enough to think that any of this is real news to you, as anything worth doing well, takes effort and more often than not, time, and emotion as well.

However, I want to expand on this very important issue of perseverance, from the point of view of a self employed person. This information may still be applied in other areas of your life, but I feel the specific challenges that self employed people deal with provide an excellent platform for learning about 'hanging in there', and not giving up. I would like to point out, that not giving up is not the same as making an educated change, with respect to a better, and more workable technique as an example.

I say this, as if you have been doing something specific for an extended period of time, and it hasn't worked, it won't change, and suddenly work. However, that does not mean that as soon as the going gets tough, you should quit either. For any serious and determined person, the word 'quit' falls under the dirty language category. However, changing your specific direction is not always the same as quitting. An example might be if you are developing a website, and creating traffic. If you have used a specific method to generate traffic for 3 months, and no traffic has emerged, it could be argued that you need to modify your traffic getting strategy. That does not mean you quit. It simply means you were not going to do the same thing, over and over again, expecting a different result.

I think you can see my point here.

The next point is that even though others around you may not believe in you, or your dream, you need never give anyone permission to take away your desires or dreams.

Your dreams and desires are your business, and belong to no one else. Hence, you need to light the fire of faith, and determination under your belt, and go for it. You may well need to periodically look at ways you can improve, along the journey, but as long as you have a determined and applied action plan, where you are regularly doing the things you need to do, rather than losing focus.

We all can suffer from temporary loss of focus, but make sure you guard your desire, and focus, like the golden goose that it represents, as your determination and desire are the mettle that will see you through when the going gets tough.

In my reading, and for that matter, personal experience, there are few times when I have not experienced times of doubt, or questioned the validity of my dreams. It was through continuous action, and the sheer determination that I wanted my goals so much, that I continued. I know you can do this as well, as long as your desire is strong enough.

This is why I recommend you have a goal sheet, as well as what I call a dream chart. This is your personal, pictorial representation of your desires, and need only be for you. I found that looking at that chart, of my dreams on it, every morning, for only a minute or so, was a starting point for me to appreciate the value of desire, and action.

Over the last twenty years, nearly everything on those charts has come true for me, and I know that it can for you as well, as long as you persist, with desire, and determination, along a planned route.

I know this is a rhetorical question for most people, as most of us tend to have lists, if we are organised. However, for most of us, they are getting longer and longer, and for the rest of us, we just have a mental to do list that we feel is more and more full.

I certainly can understand the stress, and sense of frustration at this problem, and have spent a considerable while attempting to resolve the issue, in such a way as to streamline my day, or at least, to be more productive and efficient, such that I could finish my day feeling I have accomplished something.

As a self employed business owner, I am even more aware of the need to be as organised as humanly possible, and had to work with systems that either I, or others had created that I knew worked.

Have you ever felt that you are simply doing more and more, but achieving less and less?

If so, I can understand and hope to point you in the direction of some ideas that have worked for others, and than can, in turn work for you. At the end of the day, you need to be prepared to make a conscious change that will take effort, and may even seem to be counterproductive at first. The reason for this is that our subconscious minds are used to doing things a certain way, and any change will at first, be resisted, until we persevere, and form a habit. This can take as much as twenty one days to achieve, but if you are able to look ahead, you will find the results astonishing.

To explain further, let me paint a real picture for you. I came across a small business owner, that like me, did everything herself, and naturally, being a perfectionist, always set up more systems to do better, and as her business grew, so did her workload. This in turn, lead to moire lists, and things to do, that simply reached a point till she collapsed, and ended up in hospital. Can you relate to this being a potential problem in your life?

One way to deal with this problem is work out the priority of your tasks, as this will help you to decide, as a business owner, what tasks are earning you your living. As an example, spending three hours a day reading your emails is not earning you your income. You still need to be reading, but this can be done in a block of time, rather than all day, like I used to do as well. Another example is to look at every task that only you can do, due to a specific skill set, that earn you an income, and what can be outsourced.

Even if you are worried about the expense of outsourcing, let me tell you it need not be any where as expensive as you might think, when you know the right places to go. Much of this work can be outsourced online these days as well.

If you are still resisting some of these ideas, let me ask you, "Can you still achieve an income if you are in hospital, on your back for a month?" Most people will say no, and that is understandable. However, by utilising some proper time management techniques, you are more likely to achieve more in less time, and with less stress. Just by working in blocks, and not flitting from one task to another, and back again, will massively increase your effectiveness.

At first, this may seem a very complex question, and yes, it does cover a broad range of possibilities. However, I am going to concentrate on the issue of of our actions,and our thoughts, and not only will you be able to apply this concept to your work, but to just about any other endeavour you come across in your life.I know this is a big promise, but I have proven the results of the below concept in my own life, beyond measure.

The word I am going to concentrate on is Praxis. Praxis means to integrate your belief in something with power, or put another way, actually applying, and doing those things you believe in. This may seem a very obvious statement at first, and in many ways it is. However, relatively few people actually practice what they preach, or for that matter, very few people actually do the things they know they can do, to get better results.

Many people get caught up in the trap of saying they will start their next project tomorrow, but as you can well guess, when tomorrow arrives, they find that life has gotten in the way, and they need to again, put it off until the next day, week, or month, and so on.

Whilst anyone will accept that getting started takes the most effort, it is incredible how similar this concept is to momentum in science. Once you get started, it is relatively easy to keep going, because you will be doing something you hopefully enjoy, and with faith, belief, and action, you start to see your results building on themselves.

I know that for any reasonable person, the above is extremely obvious, and it sometimes takes someone who has experienced it to convince you that it is worth doing.

I am deeply passionate about sharing my success stories with others, as in each of us, there is massive, un-mined potential, and I have found that if we just get out of our own way, and make the decision that we will do what we set out to do, no matter what, we will undoubtedly, surprise ourselves.

I have found this time and time again, and it is important to get over the fear that we may fail. In fact, the very idea of failure needs to be erased from our minds, and we can more easily start on our desired project. As a famous inventor once said, the previous failures were really just more detailed steps to arrive at a working invention. Persistence,mixed in with faith, and determination will get you everywhere.