The essence of great leadership is being proactive and defining what is important in your life. The other alternative is to always be reactive based on the circumstances of the moment. There is no way to consistently say no to the wrong things, if you have not defined what the right things are in you entire life. The best way to do this is to create a Life Plan. This Forbes post will help get you started:
“There’s a popular quote attributed to Aristotle that goes, “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” While it turns out the famed Greek philosopher didn’t utter these exact words, they help capture the spirit of something he believed to be true about the human experience: our habits play a significant role in shaping our lives.”