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Sunday, January 16, 2011

Goal Setting

The reason most people never reach their goals is that they don't define them, or ever seriously consider them as believable or achievable. Winners can tell you where they are going, what they plan to do along the way, and who will be sharing the adventure with them. - Denis Watley

It's that time of the year again. It's time to lose all that weight gained from the holidays, it's time to do this and it's time to do that. There's plenty to do, but it seems like everything you're doing is getting you NOWHERE. We all have that feeling of treading water and accomplishing nothing, but feeling tired and weary at the end. Why is that? Seldom few ever define their goals much less put them down on paper. People are whimsical, paper is not. Writing your goal down on paper allows you to benchmark your progress versus your goals. Writing your goals down allows you to focus on how to get there instead of coming up with excuses as to why you didn't succeed. Goal setting helps you avoid getting sidetracked with all the little projects that you think you want to do, but that really take you away from what you REALLY want to do. This person sounds familiar...oh wait, it's me. At the end of the day, we can all identify with this person.

I recently came across the results of a study sponsored by the Ford Foundation that claimed:

- 23 percent of the population has no idea what they want from life, and as a result, they do not have much.

- 67 percent of the population has a general idea of what they want, but they do not have any plans for how to get it.

- Only 10 percent of the population has specific, well-defined goals, but even then, seven out of the ten of those people reach their goals only half the time.

- The top 3 percent, however, achieved their goals 89 percent of the time.


Amazing huh? 90% have no idea what they want from life or have plans to achieve any goals they may have.

I decided to take the dive to define and write down my goals. How did I go about doing this? I sat there with a bottle of Jack and did a little soul-searching...Joking aside this is a soul-scouring process. Here are a few steps to start your own goal setting session.
  1. Make sure you're alone
  2. Be brutally honest with yourself and your goals - No BS
  3. Break it down into a few sections (1 year goal, short term goal, mid term goal, long term goal, and finally life time goal)
  4. For each of the sections stated in section 3) make sure you break it down to each segment of your life (Educational goals, monetary goals, work goals, personal development, spiritual development...etc)
  5. Find pictures on the internet and create a collage of images that resonate with your comprehensive life plan
  6. Create an excel spreadsheet with all the hours of the day you're awake and fill in what you're going to be doing every hour and make it a regular schedule
  7. Post this up on your bathroom wall - this ensures you see it on a daily basis and friends that see it will keep you accountable
Most of you that have been over to my place can attest to seeing something similar to the above. Yes, I am a freak. You should have seen it when I was applying to grad school. All in all I was applying to 12 schools - my bathroom wall was completely covered with timelines and question prompts. Lately though, I've fallen off the goal setting and tracking thing.

One of my major goals for this year is to exercise 5 days a week for at least an hour at a time. After my surgery last year I never really recovered physically. Now that I'm fully healed up, I've made it my goal to get back on track and exercise like I used to. There. Out in the open, so now I have to really hold myself accountable to it. Good luck with your goal setting!

If there is a topic you're interested about and would like me to blog about, let me know! Until then, have a great week.

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