How to Set Goals

Your goals show your ambitions or aspirations that if achieved will create the most happiness, increase your wellbeing, and make you more successful at any particular point in time. Your goals can range from family, business, career, financial, health, educational, and spiritual goals. It is what gets scheduled that gets done. Goal setting is among the most important actions you need to take to create the life you truly desire. The benefits of a purposeful life gained through goal setting are absolutely amazing.

1.       Goal setting gives you a sense of control over your life.

Psychologists generally agree that having a “sense of control” is the key to feelings of happiness, confidence, personal well-being and power. This is achieved through setting goal. Through setting goal, you get to manage your time effectively. This helps to prevent us from every unnecessary distraction (unimportant things actively vying for our time) which gives us the full control our lives. You may want to check the role of focus in successful living to get practical steps on how achieve excellent focus to get the most important things done in your life. It takes self-discipline, self-control and self-mastery to enhance the quality of your life, and to follow through the process of goal setting and execution

2.       Goal setting provides more clarity to our lives.

By setting goals, you get to program your lives around the most important things that truly matters to you. It is true that your choices and decisions have combined to create your entire life to this moment. Thus, to improve any part of your life, you need to make new and better choices and decisions that are more in alignment with your ideal self, your true values and the future you desire. This is achievable through goal setting.

1.       Start by reflecting on what you really want to achieve in different areas of your life. These are your long-term goals. Write them down

2.       Then come back to the present, and allocate time for the accomplishment of these goals.

Let your actions each day be incremental towards the accomplishment of these goals. Check below for the pattern of setting goals.

3.       Review your goals.

Evaluate whether your approach to the fulfilment of your goals is yielding results or needs to be changed. Regular reviewing of your goals increases the vigor for their accomplishment as your mind sparkle with new ideas and insights on how to accomplish the goals. It also impresses your goals into your subconscious mind so that it gets expressed in your external world through your actions. When you review your goals, you get to also reevaluate the value and priority of your goals.

The best times to review your goals are: last thing in the evening before you sleep and first thing in the morning when you wake up. When you rewrite and review your goals in the evening before you sleep, your subconscious mind gets to work on the goal during your sleep. Thus, you wake in the morning with brilliant ideas to go about accomplishing those goals. While in the morning, reviewing your goals helps to prepare you to be at your very best throughout the day.

1.       Start by writing your goal in a personal, present tense statement. Then set a deadline. Goals without deadlines end up becoming wishes.

For example: “I read a book per month for the next twelve months”.

2.       State the steps needed to accomplish your goals.

For example, “I read a chapter of the book every morning around 5 a.m.”

3.       State the skill, organization or people that may help you accomplish the goals. You also need an accountability partner to help enforce the accomplishment of the goal.

4.       State the potential obstacles to the accomplishment of the goals.

For example, ‘laziness to wake up early in the morning’

5.       State the steps to overcome those obstacles.

For example, ‘I will set an alarm at 4:50 a.m. to wake me up’

6.       Make a commitment towards accomplishing the goal. Make it a working document by signing and writing the present date on it.

7.       Start taking action towards accomplishing that goal every day, no matter how small the effort is.

Thank you so much for taking time to read this blog post. I hope this has provided more value and has been quite helpful to you. Please recommend this blog post to someone that may find it helpful too. You can also leave any helpful insight you might want to share on this topic in the comment section below.

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Lebari-Dick Leteh has deepest desire to serve, improve, uplift, and enrich people's lives with his books, blog and other works. He is the author of 'Truths About Talent' and 'The Good News'.