Another group will tell us that they would really like to start setting goals in their life, but they just aren't sure how to do it effectively…so they actually see results from the committment they enter into.

They are right to ask, there are some critical pieces to setting goals in order to have them directly and indirectly guide your behavior and achieve the results you are looking for.

FOCUS ON 1-5 GOALS

One of the readers of Attracting Greatness came to us with a list of 20+ goals they had come up with and wondered why she wasn't able to see any real progress toward those goals in the last year.

Goal setting requires focus, emotional attachment, attention and constant manifestation around the outcome…while these aspects are relatively simple with 1-5 goals, they are near impossible when you have a long list of goals.

I like to set 1-2 goals for each of the areas below:

• Personal growth
• Relationship
• Health
• Financial/Professional

That's it — I set these goals in a 1-3 year timeframe and then go about setting new goals (or adjusting existing goals) when the time period is up. 

BE SPECIFIC

A general goal like "I will lose weight" is simply too general to accomplish the objectives of helping you focus, allow you to have emotional attachment or to monitor progress.

Instead, a goal of losing 10lbs within 90-days is very specific, can link to highly emotinal manifestations (think about what you will look like, feel like and attract when you have lost that exact amount of weight), and can be monitored regularly until you reach the objective. 

HAVE  A DEFINITE TIME PERIOD

A specific descripton of a goal is not enough, you also must commit to a period of time over which you will achieve the desired result.  Leaving a goal open-ended is perhaps the #1 mistake people make when setting goals and the leading cause of low achievement levels

REFLECT AND MANIFEST EACH DAY

We learn best through repeated observcation.  When we learn to walk, talk, read, write and become social human beings we rely heavily on observing the end behavior in someone else, internalizing that to what is possible for ourselves and through repeated exposure to both external observation as well as repeated exposure to internal reflection.

In other words, have a clear picture of what it is you want to achieve, how you want to achieve it AND what will your life be like when you DO achieve it. 

Now go ahead, try and set your top 1-5 goals, you can post them as a comment here if you wish (that will help to manifest your goals and make them much more effective) – let's get started now!

Goal achievement is a mixture of passion and dedication, science and magic…if you bring the passion, dedication and understand the science AND you have faith that the final piece will come (the magic) you will achieve your goals. 

Let's say your goal is to develop a new breakthrough in a cure for cancer (substitute any mid-term to long-term goal here), but you can't quite see how this is going to happen over the days, months and years to come.

So how does this goal setting thing really work anyway?

I believe there are two major forces at work when you set goals…

1. By setting the goals, linking emotional pleasure to those goals (and pain with not achieving them) and reviewing them frequently you are clearing your mind to think in line with these goals so that opportunities are always recognized instead of squandered.  

This is a BIG deal given how much noise we must deal with each and every day – without very clear direction to our mind there is virtually no chance we will see opportunities to work toward our goal unless we are crystal clear on what we are looking for.   Think of this as a "filter" if you will of what information, contacts and opportunities come our way each day.

When we have no set goals there are opportunities all around us, but we don't recognize them because we do not understand how they relate directly to something we want.   So, just by knowing clearly your goals this will help you "find" the pathway to get what you want.

2. Setting your medium to longer term goals allows us to enhance our plan by setting smaller goals (interim steps) on the way to the top of the ladder.  So, what happens is that by setting the ultimate objectives you can plan backwards and at least set out on the right path.  In my experience, you may only get your short-term plans 50% right as you learn and adapt along the way, but at least you are on the right course to more quickly find a way to get what you want.

That is the science behind how goal setting will work to help you achieve in life, the piece – the magic – is purely having the faith that the science (in lock step with the universe) will work.  We've seen it work again and again  with our goals and those we have worked with.  The hit-rate is uncanny in terms of how goals do get achieved as long as they are backed by strong passion, are reviewed daily and you have faith that you will achieve your goals. 

What is your experience with goal setting?

Make sense?

Jeff

A subset of us move from dreams and wishes into goals…concrete statements about what we want to achieve.

Granted, those goals may range wildly from general goals like "I will feel better" or "I will lose weight" or even "I will make more money" to very specific goals such as "I will lose 5lbs by the end of the month" or "I will help my child get an A on their next assignment" 

Obviously more specific is better, but there is still something missing that prevents most goals from being realized – or what I call, achieving victories based on your set goals.

So what is missing?

How about Passion and Committment

Grounding your goals in deeply held, emotion-filled, passion-backed internal awareness is one surefire way to help turn goals into victories. 

Momentum is required to move from status quo of where we are today toward our goals, and that momentum can sometimes take short-term pain or reduction of short-term pleasure (the strongest kind) to get things rolling and that means you have to have an equally strong force moving you toward breaking out of the status quo as is the current force trying to keep you IN as part of the status quo. 

Attracting Greatness is a terrific source of learning more about how previously stuck, bored, frustrated people have been able to break out of their rut and live the victories they had previously wished for, sometimes for 40-years or more!

Goals can ONLY be turned into victories if we…

• Reduce the pain associated with moving beyond status quo (or where we are today) – this means breaking down fears, low self esteem, past pain in our lives, stress, and so on… WHILE
• Increasing the levels of pleasures around achieving our goals

Once this balance is tipped in favor or moving forward (a relatively easy thing to change in your life) – suddenly you move from a dreamer and goal setter to victorious achiever. 

Tony Brunelle touches on this very well in his personal blog post – setting out how he will achieve his goal of catching a bigger fish…tell me this goal isn't backed by PASSION!   In fact, his passion doesn't come from catching the fish so much, but rather from being one with nature, the meditative impact of being on the water and the sport of fishing. 

Now that is passion!

Second, goals without committment really aren't much more than dreams or wishes.   We tend to be much better at keeping promises than realizing our goals…why is that?

As Greg Reid points out in this blog post, Goals are a waste of time unless you back them with the same committment you make when you promise to do something. 

Ok,  imagine if you could tip the scale from being stuck, comfortable and afraid to move forward AND are no longer fearful of making committments to move toward your goals…you will have gone through an amazing transformation from Goals to Victories in your life.  Are you ready?

Consistency Leads To Excellence

Have you struggled to realize your goals?  More familiar with the term procrastination than achievement?  Can't seem to stick with something long enough to get results?

Wouldn't  it help to be more consistent?

You vow to eat better and for a few days, you do…but then someone invites you out to lunch and suddenly you find yourself in front of a big plate of cheese nachos or french fries…and then instead of getting back on track, you lose it completely and revert back to your old habits – but what if you could have been more consistent in your behavior?

Here are some tips to use to improve your consistency:

1. Back it with a big WHY! The reason we revert back to old behaviors is because they tend to be very well reinforced in our minds – often related to pleasant situations or avoiding pain.  So, when we strive for consistency of new behaviors, we must equally link them to a desired and pleasant outcome.  If you want to lose 10lbs by consistently eating better and exercising, then we must reinforce how we will look, what our friends and family will say and the outcome of having extra energy will bring to our lives each day.

2. Set aside a planned time for the activity.  Having several businesses on the internet that depend on regular writing, I make sure that the first hour (at least) each day is allocated to writing…that way if other important things come up during the day they don't derail my most important priority.

3. Set ambitious, but manageable goals. Understand that our minds can focus better for 10-15 increments, have a break and then again for 15-minutes.  Plan that into your schedule so you are not working against your mind

4. Check your attitudes toward discipline and consistency. Some people were brought up or taught that doing the same thing over and over is a negative – that it will make them boring and that they will never truly experience life that way.  I am all for creativity and changing things up, but for those BIG goals and objectives in your life, consistency gets results – period!

5. Get right back on that horse. When you learned to walk, ride a bike or ride a horse (for those that have), play any sport or achieve anything of significance in your life, you know there were setbacks – did you give up?  No, and so when you mess up your consistency don't let it impact the entire objective – instead, acknowledge that you slipped and then get back on track the next day.  There is no period too long between reinforcements when you truly believe in your goal.

Consistency leads to momentum, energy, confidence and in the end, results.  Identify those really important goals, objectives and related actions then commit to 30-days of consistency and watch your results soar.

Though I'm not of the opinion that setting, writing out and following your goals is 100% responsible for achievement and progress in your life, I am a firm believer (from personal experience and working with others)  that goal setting does bring the type of focus and energy to one's life that does significantly improve the chances of achieving.

What are your leading goals?

1. Do you have health related goals?  Are they linked to current ill health (where your motivation is to retain a level of health that you have experienced in the past) or is it tied more to a desire to improve your overall attractiveness or even avoid potential problems in the future?
2. What about relationship and social goals?  What are your relationships like? Do you have allot of friends or a few close friends?  Do you wish that were different? Are you confident in front of other people, if not – what situations would you like to improve?
3. How about financial goals?  Would you like to have more money,  and if so, is that tied more to having the freedom to call your own shots, the security of not having to take a step backward or to purchase something specific you don't have today
4. Now, let's talk about your kids.  What goals do you have for parenting – raising healthy, happy and confident children?
5. Many of us have goals around travel, seeing the world, experiencing different places and cultures and expanding our thinking and boundaries
6. Finally – deep down, wouldn't you like to be more confident, more at peace with who you are and more able to associate with people closest around us?

These are just a few ideas around which it would be a good idea to have some goals…if you want to share your goals, leave us a comment and we'll help each other modify and achieve our dreams through this interim step of goal setting.

Where should these goals come from?

First, as is outlined in Attracting Greatness - it starts with an overriding core of purpose principles…such as:

• To live a clear, happy and healthy life so I can offer the most value to those around me
• To dedicate my life to helping others achieve their purpose and dreams so THEY can achieve maximum impact

These are overriding fundamental beliefs extracted from intensive internal self-examination – techniques that will help you find your purpose and underlying beliefs are meditation, yoga and various focused brain techniques that help you channel thoughts held deeply within.

Now once you have the guiding fundamental principles that will serve as your compass, then setting longer-term goals should be your objective.

For instance, to achieve the Purpose Principle #1 – you would have goals around measurable results such as % body fat, # hours of meditation, blood pressure readings, schedule, etc…

From these longer-term goals (which still must have dates attached, but those dates may be 1-5 years out), you develop periodic short-term goals (I like these to be monthly)

In the case of total body health, here are some examples:

• Week 1 – eliminate 50% of my normal weekly sugar and carbohydrate totals
• Take Acidophilus each day for this month to help steady the digestive flora in my body
• Exercise 5 times for 40-minutes where I keep my heart rate at or above 140 (cardio workout)
• Exercise 3-times each week with a mix of muscle building workouts (to build muscle density, reduce fat and improve overall metabolism)
• Take 1000 IU of vitamin D each day (as we are in a winter climate)

You get the picture. 

What makes establishing monthly goals so easy is 1) Having the BIG compass of knowing your main Purpose Principles and 2) Understanding the longer-term goals required to live in alignment with those purpose principles.  We used Attracting Greatness Blueprint to arrive at this stage where monthly goals are now so simple to set and achieve.

What are your monthly goals?  Do you find setting goals easy or hard…leave us a comment.

Especially this time of year, millions and millions of people are writing down goals for themselves – yet for many those goals will sit in a drawer, get thrown out with the trash or only stick around for a few weeks, by the end of the month you will be back in the same rut by the end of January

How do we make sure that doesn't happen?

The most common reason that goals do not become reality is that there is no associated daily action plan behind those goals. 

For instance…let's say one of your goals for this month is:

GOAL:  To lose 5 lbs taking me from 180lbs down to 175lbs

First, the goal is specific, realistic and measurable…any goal needs to follow these criteria.  For instance, it is not useful to just say 'I will lose weight this month' 

Writing the goal down and reviewing it each day is certainly a great start…but to really put hooks into goal and make sure it becomes real, you need a plan including a set of daily actions to take as part of the plan.

For example, to realize your goal of losing 5lbs in the month you would identify 2-3 areas that will help you lose that weight:

• diet
• exercise
• motivation

Next, you get more specific with the plan:

• diet: – replace toast before bed each day with a piece of fruit, substitute a salad for 3 lunches each week, replace morning cereal twice each week with yogurt and fruit, replace all juice and soft drinks with water
• exercise: – get up 45-minutes earlier Mon,Wed, Fri and do a power-walk/brisk walk; 2 sessions of resistance training each week (build muscle to help drive metabolism), one additional aerobic activity each week for 40-minutes (biking, jogging, swimming, etc…)
• motivation: – commit to 30-min of meditation 5-days each week

Now, that starts to look like a plan doesn't it?  Already you can begin to see the guidance on a daily basis in order to achieve (or even exceed) your goal

Finally, to really ramp this up and make yourself virtually unstoppable, turn this into a daily action guide that would look something like this…

1. Wakeup at 6:15 AM
2. Brisk walk until 7:00AM
3. Breakfast – yogurt (no added sugar)  and fruit with water
4. Lunch - salad with protein (cottage cheese, cheese, egg slices, seeds or nuts…)
5. Dinner – balanced meal of chicken, vegetables, lentils, etc…
6. 8:00PM – 30-minutes of meditation
7. 11:00PM – bed time with relaxing music (or other methods that help you get to sleep)

Think about how powerful having a detailed action plan like this is toward achieving your goals.  Suddenly, you don't have to wake up and wrestle with yourself each day on how you will work toward your goals, it is all there in black and white, you just have to follow the plan.

You also have a way to hold yourself accountable – each day you have a way of measuring your progress toward the goal.  If you miss one day, pick it up the next.  If you miss a few days, then re-visit your desire to achieve the goal, alter your plan and go back at it. 

If you are tired of setting goals that never get results, then try expanding those goals into actionable plans – it really does work. 

If you want a more comprehensive, powerful action plan for truly Attracting Massive Greatness into your life including health, emotional mastery, stress management, confidence building – they keys to overwhelming achievement and happiness, pick up your own Blueprint inside Attracting Greatness.

"Visualize this thing you want.  See it, feel it, believe in it.  Make it your mental blueprint and then begin" – Robert Collier

In order to visualize what it is you want, you will have identified the BIG goals in your life – these should be in line with a strong sense of purpose and congruency with your inner beliefs, desires and values.  Once you know WHAT it is you want, you have more than half the battle one on the road to getting more focused and getting better results.  If you are having trouble identifying or narrowing in on your purpose and bigger goals, work through the exercises in Attracting Greatness.

The next sentence is critical – having "thoughts" about your goals and objectives is not enough…we need to make sure these thoughts drive action.  That's the reason why visualization and experiencing both the ultimate outcome as well as the journey on the path to achieving your outcome is so important.  By internalizing and believing in our goals and objectives we cultivate the correct thought process that will drive behavior (our actions)

Finally, working through a set of steps – breaking down the path to achieving our goals is necessary in order that we can take consistent and persistent action toward those outcomes.

Try applying these concepts to your own life and enjoy the benefit of achieving improved focus leading to stellar results.

Show me someone struggling with low motivation, unhappiness, health challenges, high stress and a negative outlook in life and typically they will also be sitting on the sidelines, either too afraid or overwhelmed to take action.

Here's a tip I try and live by each day (this is one of the proven tips outlined in Attracting Greatness, the BluePrint to Personal Success and True Happiness)…and so far this tip has meant massive improvements in all areas of my life so I urge you to give it a try too. 

Force yourself to do something that makes you uncomfortable each week.  Something that extends your comfort zone, that makes you feel nervous, unsure or slightly queezy!

I'm not talking about brain surgery or even walking on hot coals, but rather focus on some actions that have seemed just out of reach in the past:

• Striking up a conversation with someone that intimidates you
• Stepping up and volunteering for a task that you may not be sure you can do
• Take a public speaking course
• Sign up for a personal training course
• Organize a group activity around a hobby or personal interest
• Start up a small business based on a passion or talent you have

Trust me, as you learn to step out of your comfort zone more often it becomes very natural, fear is no longer a factor in holding you back and within a very short time you gain momentum, self-confidence and deeply held personal belief that you are becoming unstoppable building momentum and motivation - in other words, you are GROWING again!

What needs the most attention in your life?

Where would you like to be 1-month from now, and more important, what are your personal goals for 1-year and even 5-years from now? 

Sure, it can be overwhelming to think BIG – to plan massive personal improvement and then have trouble getting started.

You need two important factors to make big change in your life…

A BIG idea – a big goal or plan for various areas of your life and…

A series of "next steps" that will allow you day-by-day and week-by-week progress in-line with your ultimate goals and objectives. 

You will be amazed how easy planning "next steps" in your quest for personal achievement will be when you link them to a larger BIG goal.

Let's say our goal was to lose 10 pounds within the next 30-days…and your plan is to keep it off for the remainder of the year – that is a BIG goal.

What little steps can you focus on each day that will help you achieve that major goal?

1. Step 1. Exercise 30-minutes each day at 60-75% of my heart rate
2. Step 2. Stop eating after 8PM – substitute some herbal tea or water if need be
3. Step 3. Be more consistent with your sleep patterns – go to bed 11PM, sleep to 6:00AM
4. Step 4. Reduce your consumption of alcohol from 4 drinks a week to no more than 1
5. Step 5. Drink at least 8 glasses of water each day – in effect this replaces other sugar-laced drinks

ETc…

In the package "Beyond Greatness" – you'll see a 5-step system that will make achieving great things in your life – through consistent, simple action each day, can make a massive difference in your life. 

Unlike ever before, you will finally have a formula that ANYONE (not just the super-motivated) can apply to their life instantly and see consistent results in overcoming procrastination and seeing massive change in your life.