by Scott Allan
Are you planning to fail? If there’s one lesson that I have learned over the years, it is captured in this statement: If you fail to plan for the future, you plan to fail. You end up contributing to the wealth and happiness of others because you have no plan, and you failed to set any goals.
An Exercise in Goal Writing
Leverage your goals to take control of your life. Before you continue, take out a pen and paper. You are going to perform a valuable exercise that will create momentum for building your goal-management portfolio.
For the next thirty minutes, write down everything you’ve always wanted to have, do, be, and experience in your lifetime. Don’t worry about how crazy it sounds. If it scares you, that’s even better. Don’t think too hard about how you’ll accomplish these things.
In order to create goals that inspire and motivate, they have to be bigger than anything you’ve tried before. Begin thinking about what it is you’d like to aim for.
On paper, write down where you’d like to go, the skills you want to master, what you want to learn, who you want to meet, and what you desire to build and create. Make a list of all the things you’ve always dreamed of but could never find the time, energy, or motivation to do. Write for as long as you can and create a list of everything you visualize doing.
Once you are finished, hold on to this list. Tack it up on your wall. Make it visible. This is your springboard for getting started.
A Design for Successful Living
“What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals.”
— Zig Ziglar
You are the architect of your own destiny, and now it’s time to begin constructing the pillars of your life. In order to begin, you will need this set of key elements to ensure that your goals have the greatest chance for success.
The 9 Essential Components for Creating Goals
1. A Goal is the Written Word
The first essential ingredient for the success of any goal is to put it into writing. By committing a goal to paper, you are sending a message to the subconscious mind, saying, “Here is what I desire most.” Writing your goal down on paper makes it feel more real.
2. A Goal is a Specific, Clear Order
“I want to win the lottery” is not a real goal. “I want to own a new car” is also not a real goal, and neither is, “I want a new job that pays more money.” These are only wishes; they are empty desires without any real substance. Before you write anything down, understand that a goal is more than a wish. A goal is a very precise order.
Wishing for something, although fun to do, rarely brings the fortunes you want.
You have to know what you desire. Be clear and specific, as detailed as possible. The more detailed, the better your chances of accomplishing your goal. Instead of simply wanting to buy a house someday, sketch out a picture of the house you want. Make a rough floor plan, or find a picture in a magazine that closely resembles the house you want to live in someday.
Fill in the details with your imagination. The more specific your description, the more likely your dream will materialize.
3. Goals Need a Timeframe
A goal without a deadline is the difference between driving a Porsche to the beach and driving a farm tractor—both will get you there, just within different seasons.
A deadline reminds you there’s something that requires your immediate attention. Without a deadline, you are leaving the door open for procrastination—and believe me, it will come in and take over your life if you let it. Before you know it, today becomes tomorrow, and the next thing you know, the goal you wrote down six months ago that should have only taken a few weeks is still waiting for attention.
Once you fix a deadline to your goals, they become more real than you could possibly imagine. No matter how big or far into the future your dream is, always attach a deadline. A workable timeframe is the anchor that holds the goal in place. Without it, your dreams—and enthusiasm—start to float away.
A deadline solidifies your commitment and keeps you motivated and inspired. The deadline is your fixed position. Without it, a goal becomes something you hope you’ll get around to eventually.
4. A Goal Has a Plan of Action
Smaller goals contribute to the overall completion of a larger goal. These are sub-goals. Your plan of action will involve many steps that lead to the success of each goal. These steps for success may include research, making phone calls, or sending out applications.
In basic terms, your plan is like a to-do list. It is a list of step-by-step tasks to achieve your goal. By breaking down the steps for each goal, you can manage your time allocated to making progress towards each one.
5. A Goal Requires Channeled Concentration
Spend twenty minutes a day focusing your mind power on a specific task. This form of practice builds up your focused energy. When you get into the deep work of your projects, this will become a very powerful skill.
Spend time each day, at ten-minute intervals, focusing your concentration into the area that is capturing your attention. Focusing on something consciously and with intent applies a force of energy that pushes your thoughts, vision, and ideas toward that goal.
6. A Goal Needs a Solid Commitment
Making a commitment to see a goal through from start to finish can be an extremely daunting task, as well as a test of patience and persistence, especially if the goal is fixed for the long-term. If you are committed to making it happen and you keep that commitment no matter what, you will succeed. You keep pushing forward no matter what obstacles are blocking your path.
When you are committed, nothing can stand in your way for long. You must focus, work with patience, and persist through life’s challenges. You must be one hundred percent committed to making it happen.
7. A Goal Needs a Clear Vision
If you are to create the life and results you desire, develop a practice of imagining and visualizing yourself as having already succeeded. How do you feel? What has changed in your life? From sports to the boardroom, every successful achievement is made possible if there is a vision to support it.
Think of your success as having already happened, and the subconscious mind will bridge the gap between the two worlds of the present and what is yet to come. If your goal or mission involves a group of individuals, share your vision with all those involved. A collective group of people working toward a similar goal and sharing a similar vision creates tremendous momentum as each person takes on an essential role.
8. A Goal Needs Accountability
For years I struggled to hit my goals. I failed at deadlines most of the time and didn’t enjoy the process of goal setting. But finding an accountability partner changed all of that. An accountability buddy can hold you accountable in so many ways. For example, your accountability partner can:
Check in on your progress once a week
Send daily reminders of the master tasks you are working on for the day or week
Help you celebrate when you hit that goal that has taken you weeks, months or years to achieve
Accountability is a great way to stay on track, stay motivated when you feel like procrastinating, and having someone to talk with about the goals you are working towards. Find an accountability partner to work with and you will not only hit your most important goals but, you’ll enjoy the process so much more.
9. The Review
This is probably the most vital step to effectively managing your goal portfolio. By reviewing your goals on a regular basis, you can easily recognize and monitor progress. During the review process, you will…
Identify pending obstacles blocking your path.
Review and update your action checklist of tasks required for achieving your goal(s).
Assess progress and consider whether your deadline is manageable.
Add any new thoughts or ideas to support continuing progress.
Goal Categories and
Building Balance
— Norman Vincent Peale
Below is a list of categories that represent the level of balance in our lives. Now, with the list of goals you have already created, and using your goal-mapping journal or a notebook, place each category heading at the top of a blank page. Then, list your goals under the proper headings.
Set aside a time frame of ten minutes for each category. Write down everything that comes to mind. Don’t be afraid to step out of your comfort zone and get imaginative with your goals.
Family/Child Development/Spousal Relationship
Write down everything that you would like to improve in your life that relates to your relationships. This includes, but is not limited to, your relations with friends, business partners, your spouse, your children, and interactions with the people in your community.
Do you want to…
Marry the partner of your dreams?
• Start a family?
• Send your children to the best university in the country?
• Heal a relationship with a family member?
• Create a closer relationship with your spouse?
• Help your children overcome one of their biggest obstacles?
• Become a family social worker?
• Write a book on child development?
• Take a course in becoming a better parent?
Financial/Investment/Retirement goals
Write down everything that you would like to improve in your life that relates to your financial future.
Would you like to:
Double your salary over the next year?
Start the 401K plan you have been putting off?
Retire early and wealthy?
Invest in a new business to generate passive income?
Save enough money for a down payment on your first house?
Build a solid financial portfolio package?
Earn $100,000 a year? $1,000,0000? More?
Start saving 10 percent of your income every month?
Set up a savings plan for your children?
Educate yourself on financial planning?
Pay off your credit card debt?
Health and Exercise/Sports
Write down everything that you would like to improve in your life that relates to your physical condition, mental health, and overall well-being.
Would you like to:
Win a marathon?
Compete in a bodybuilding contest?
Lose weight?
Power-lift three hundred pounds?
Join a tennis club and compete in tournaments?
Become a Major League baseball player?
Learn martial arts?
Do a colon cleansing diet?
Go to a meditation retreat for one week?
How about:
Becoming an aerobics instructor?
Opening your own gym or health spa?
Quitting smoking, drinking, or overcome an addiction?
Create a new health program to help people change their diet?
Sell your program to millions of people and health organizations around the world?
Career/Business/Education
Write down goals for building a better career, continued education, and self-development.
Do you want to…
Open your own retail business or franchise?
Create a successful online business?
Start a new career that is in line with your current and future goals?
Work toward getting a promotion in your field?
Get interviewed by Business Week?
Achieve the top sales position in your company?
Take a course in business administration and change your career path?
For educational goals, would you like to…
Complete your high school education?
Get a university degree?
Learn to speak another language?
Acquire more advanced skills to land the job of your dreams?
Become the leader in your industry?
Hobby/Recreational
Write down all the goals for your hobbies and passion projects. Imagine if you had all the time in the world to spend on your hobbies.
Do you want to…
Learn to paint, draw, or take up another creative hobby?
Write a novel?
Build an antique car?
Learn to swim?
Learn to build a computer?
Construct the tree house you always wanted when you were a kid?
Get your scuba diving license?
Learn to play a musical instrument?
Travel/World Culture/Adventure
Write down all your goals for traveling, having fun, and living an adventurous lifestyle.
Do you dream of…
Traveling to Machu Picchu?
Visiting the Gaza pyramids in Egypt?
Walking into the Taj Mahal in India?
Going to Kyoto, Japan and taking a walking tour of the magnificent temples there?
Traveling to the Sahara Desert?
Taking a tour of the wildlife parks in Kenya?
Visiting Stonehenge?
Traveling to Komodo Island in Indonesia?
Skydiving in New Zealand?
Climbing to the Mt. Everest Basecamp?
Learning to paraglide?
Sailing around the world?
Taking a cruise around the ?
Visiting the resting place of the Titanic
Walking on the Great Wall of China?
Learning to fly a helicopter?
Traveling the world and experiencing new cultures?
Self-Development/Spiritual/ Personal Growth
Write down all the goals for your spiritual growth and personal development.
Would you like to:
Go on a spiritual retreat?
Take up yoga and become a yoga master?
Pursue higher knowledge and practice the art of being through Buddhism?
Develop a stronger faith in your purpose?
Strengthen your relationship with a higher power?
Become a spiritual leader?
Achieve enlightenment?
Develop a new character value?
Do you want to…
Overcome a self-defeating behavior?
Conquer your greatest fear?
Change a habit?
Develop a more positive attitude?
Become a more positive person and learn to master your mind?
Now that you have your goals written down and you are clear on what you want to achieve in each area of your life, let’s move on and identify your power goals within each group.
Create Your Winning Goals
“Life takes on meaning when you become motivated, set goals and charge after them in an unstoppable manner.”
— Les Brown
Now, it’s time to create your goals. Retrieve your notes from the brainstorming exercise you did earlier. If you haven’t yet done this yet, do it right away. If you have already made a list of your goals, review them and expand on what you have written. You will be mapping out your goals using these essential ingredients.
Put your goals under their proper category listings.
If your goal is to visit the pyramids of Egypt, you might want to put this under the heading World Travel. If your goal is to go to school to become a software engineer, this might go under Career and Business, or Education.
Identify your Power Goal from each category.
Refer to your list of goals. Choose one goal from each category that stands out the most. Which goal from your entire list fills you with such passion and enthusiasm that you can hardly focus on anything else?
Which idea or dream motivates you to take action right now? Once you have identified the super goal from each area, write these goals down on a separate piece of paper.
This will be your Power Goal list.
Identify your #1 Power Goal.
Now, from your list of power goals, identify the one goal that means the most to you. It is the one thing, above all else, that you desire to have. Write this power goal in the space provided on the goal creation sheet at the end of this chapter. By identifying this one super goal, you are strengthening the conviction of your great purpose in this life.
What is a Power Goal?
A power goal is your primary target. It is the one goal that will impact your life in substantial ways. This is designed to break you out of your mold and make the unimaginable come true. It is everything you have ever dreamed of doing and becoming.
Your power goal has to be the one thing in life that you have always desired the most. It is your grandest adventure, a seemingly insurmountable obstacle that scares you as much as it excites you. It brings everything in your life into direct alignment with the great purpose that governs all things.
Sub-goals.
Every power goal is divided into smaller actions called sub-goals. Think of it as a piece of cake divided into eight parts; each part represents an important segment of the whole. A goal is the combined effort of many small tasks and actions that, once accomplished, will produce results you want.
Now, write down a list of sub-goals for your number one power goal. If your power goal is to create a superior online business, your sub-goals might include activities like creating a website, developing a product, or building a business team to manage the store.
Smaller steps.
The final step is to break each sub-goal into smaller steps so they are easier to tackle. By breaking them down, you are giving yourself manageable chunks to work with, while reducing stress.