Effective Goals
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Effective goal planning is a time consuming endeavor. It requires considerable insight into what inspires you, what kind of life you want to live and how you want to be remembered.
When planning your goals, answer the following questions
1. Why do you want to achieve this goal?
The answer will provide your motivation to take action. You need to find the right motivation for you, whether it is improved health, wealth or well being. If your goal is to exercise more often, what is the perceived benefit: improved fitness; your appearance; or the ability to participate in more social gatherings?
Identifying the right motivation is critical to follow through.
2. Is your goal Urgent and Important?
Your goals should be relevant for you. Urgent goals are those that must be done to maintain your health, your well being, your relationships and they must occur immediately. Important goals fulfill your desires; to travel, to contribute, to start a business. Your goals should be challenging. Have high expectations for yourself.
“Challenges make us define our commitments and implement a "do what it takes" attitude. Stretching yourself expands your horizons.” Robert L. Cox
Don’t underestimate your ability to achieve your goals. Your expectations will drive you to accomplish what you set out to do: lower expectations; lower results; higher expectations; greater results.
3. Do you believe you can achieve it?
You must believe your goals are possible. Negative expectations are a self fulfilling prophecy. Henry Ford once said “Whether you believe you can do a thing or not, you are right.” Your goal may require years to be fully realized, but you must know that it is possible and never lose faith in your abilities. If you have doubts, you will constantly second guess yourself. Tips to be more productive and write more.
4. Are you looking at the Big Picture?
Whatever you do consistently today will yield results tomorrow. When you are planning your goals, take a close look at your habits today. Are they supporting or sabotaging your future success. You need to look at the big picture and not act with only short term goals in mind. For example, a short term goal may be to lose weight before a big event. There are numerous ways you can achieve this goal, but if you look at the larger picture: life long health, you will realize that not all the options are appropriate, such as: starvation, purging, using laxatives or diet pills.
5. Have you made time to take action?
You’ve defined your goals, your motivations and you’re looking at the big picture, and now you have to take action. You need to prioritize so you are able to take make progress towards accomplishment. In order to make time for you goals, identify activities that are urgent versus activities that are important but not urgent. Urgent activities MUST be done NOW. Important activities need to be done, but you don’t have to drop what you’re doing right this minute. Your goals are a roadmap to success but you have to start the journey.
