A study from the University of Scranton discovered that 54 percent of people give up on their goals in under 180 days. So, if you’re reading this as you set your New Year resolutions, there is an almost 54% chance you would give up on your goal to eat healthy, wake up earlier, or work on your business, by June.
If you’re reading this goal setting article you must know how important goals are though. It’s how we can grow and achieve success, it’s how we enable change and improve our life.
So, I bet you have wondered what makes other people successful in achieving their goals.
What is that they have and the rest of us are lacking? Do they have some kind of a secret, miracle working strategy that helps them to achieve their goals without breaking a sweat? What is it that keeps people motivated to achieve their long term goals even when everything seems to be working against them?
Nothing is impossible, the word itself says ‘I’m possible’!
Audrey Hepburn
Oh well, that sounds nice, but if you’re trying to break a bad series of failures in achieving your goals, motivational quotes might not be the best thing for you right now.
Instead, I am sharing with you three proven strategies that will help you set clear and achievable goals. No more guesswork, no more frustration.
The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a man’s determination.
Tommy Lasorda
Word of caution: if you follow these strategies to set and achieve your goals you are essentially brain hacking your way to success. Because achieving a goal (particularly one of those big ones) is a process that requires determination, accountability, and hard work. And all of that require three big changes that will teaching your brain the right systems for setting and achieving goals.
3 Proven Strategies to Achieve More Of Your Goals
Fix your mindset
I am going to break a hard truth to you right now – and please take a moment to let it sink in.
You are what you believe.
Your thoughts and beliefs impact your actions, your health and your perception of your future self.
If you’re struggling with self doubt or impostor syndrome, setting and achieving goals is a challenge.
It’s also probably one of the reasons you hate setting goals, or dream small.
Procrastination, limitations about what you can or can not do, postponing the actual work, all of these are reflections of the self sabotage that goes around in your head.
You are essentially holding yourself down and preventing you from having success. It’s not the world’s fault, it’s not your parents’ fault. Because – and this is the most powerful truth I can share with you – you are in control of your thoughts and beliefs.
Your thoughts can and will dictate what you believe you can and cannot achieve.
So if you believe that you are not good enough, smart enough, strong enough, beautiful enough, worthy enough – you are.
As a coach, I’ve heard all of the possible excuses people make when it comes to not following through their own dreams. Oftentimes, they just need permission to allow themselves to dare to dream big AND be happy.
Sp, here you go: You have permission to imagine bold goals. You have permission to build the life you want. You have the power to build this for yourself.
Surely, you might be thinking, “Awesome, Monica, thanks for the power speech, but how do I do that?”
Glad you asked dear friend. There are countless ways: try journaling, NLP, coaching, therapy, mindfulness, EFT, read psychology, personal development books, get into a mastermind, get an accountability buddy.
The underlying principle is that you need to become aware of the thoughts that dictate your actions. Here’s how you can do that.
Set a clear intention that for the next 48 hours you will write down every negative or limiting thought – this exercise will make you aware of what you are telling yourself throughout the day. It’s most likely bad shit – don’t worry, we all do it. It’s our brain’s way of “protecting” us.
As you look for some of the repetitive thoughts, you can identify the patterns in your mind that are basically keeping you stuck. Are you telling yourself: I don’t know how to do this, I just don’t know if I can do this, I am not good enough, Why even bother doing this, I am afraid, What would people (or X) say if they heard me now etc? Those thoughts are example of negative self talk that are hindering your progress.
So the next time you catch yourself thinking: I will never be able to, I am not good enough etc, change that thought into a positive one. I am good enough, I deserve to be happy. I will lose those 7 pounds by the end of this year because I have the ability to control what I eat and when.
Use systems
Using systems is most likely one of the most overlooked strategies for improving your life. A lot of people have two miss conceptions about these:
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Living your life through systems is boring
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The only reason you’d need system is if you own a large company
I call bullshit.
A system is “a set of principles or procedures according to which something is done; an organized scheme or method”.
You are using such systems every single day of your life. Your brain and body are using automated systems to keep you alive every single moment. Your brain uses systems of patterns to create action or lack of it.
If systems is too much of fancy word – or if it just sounds alien – replace systems with habits, a much more familiar term.
So how do systems impact your goals? Well if what you’re using to live your life by (or run your business) is not optimized to be effective (aka produce positive results that move you forward) then you are going to struggle to accomplish your agenda.
Take a moment and think about your morning. What you do in the first one to two hours as you wake up will essentially dictate how your day is going to be. So what are your systems around getting up and preparing for a day when you kick ass?
Do you take a couple of minutes to set up intentions for the day or do you just jump straight into it?
A good strategy is to evaluate your systems = habits around your self care routine (to identify the head trash), motivation (what you do when you don’t feel like doing the work and what happens before and after) and accountability (do you announce goals, but never actually work on them?).
With those habits identify, make a plan to change the triggers that rob you of your motivation, change how you go through you day to make sure you always have time to work towards your goal, change your routines to make sure you work towards your goal with clarity and energy.
Learn how to plan
Let’s be honest right now: with the exception of very few people who have a natural ability towards organization, as well as the people who have some education around project management, we, as individuals DON’T KNOW and ARE NOT TRAINED to know how to plan.
And if you have goals, and you have a desire to achieve them, then learning how to plan becomes an essential skill. It’s something that is true regardless of what you do for a living, profession or even life role. Yes, it’s true that a mom becomes a planning machine because she has to, but it is just as true that you need to have some good planning skills if you are a young adult trying to navigate exams and part time job at the local Kmart or KFC restaurant.
Most of us are going through “planning” without taking serious and conscious efforts to stick to a plan. Some of us are saved by our character, and values, which make us stick to the plan. But for the rest of us, making a plan, and sticking to it is a hurdle. The easiest way to figure out which are you is to look back and see how often you are late for your appointments.
Here are a couple of tips to improve your planning skills to be able to achieve more:
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Begin each day with a planning session and identify a clear agenda for that day
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Begin each week with a planning session which highlights what needs to happen that week to get closer to achieving your goal
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Break down your long term goal into quarterly/monthly milestones, then break those down into daily steps, and include them in your agenda
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Always have a proactive attitude towards planning, not reactive
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For the love of God, use technology (Google Calendar is amazing and it is free)
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Learn how to prioritize and delegate
3 easy templates to improve your goal setting skills
Sign up below to get my favorite 3 goal setting exercises. I use these in my own mindset practice, as well as with the clients who need clarity about what they want in life, what’s stopping them and how to train their brain to help them achieve more.
goal setting, marketing course
goal setting, marketing course
goal setting, marketing course