A couple years ago while mulling over my new goals, I decided that I really wanted to take up meditating. I had plenty of WHY’s — work was stressful, life was busy, I felt like things were moving too fast and let’s face it, everybody’s doing it! I also had my WHAT — medidate 5 days per week for 10 minutes. It all seemed pretty straight forward really, except that I failed misserably to get any sort of traction no matter how hard I tried.
I know I’m not alone in my story of failure, we’ve all been there. “Look, I know I said I was going to the gym this morning but it’s getting dark outside/my bed was too warm/I was too tired…” The list of excuses goes on and you’ll have your own goals and your own stories.
So how to we get the traction we need to keep our goals on track? In step 1 you identified your WHY and step 2 was about getting the WHAT right, so it makes sense that step 3 is about the HOW.
You may never know the results that come from your action but if you do nothing there will be no result — Mahatma Gahndi
Step 3 is to “set clear actions” to help you achieve your goal. It’s about breaking down your goals into simple, easy to complete actions. Step 3 is an important one as it helps to give you the direction you need and keep you focused.
Here’s the low down on how to do it right.
1. Decide on the top 3 things that are going to support you achieving your goal. Of course you can have more however you want to keep it as simple as possible.
2. Schedule your actions. It might be as simple as scheduling in your gym sessions or lunch prep or you might like to schedule in time to call 3 prospective clients. Whatever it is, schedule it in as you would any other meeting.
3. Commit to yourself. We all get busy and we all get side-tracked but you would cancel a meeting with your manager so why should this be any different?
That last one is an important one. The most significant commitment that you can make is to yourself so start treating yourself like the most important person in your life. This is about staying strong in the moment of choice (thanks for that Dr Covey)! In fact, thats exactly where we’re going to start in Step 4, our final piece of the goal setting puzzle. Check it out next time.
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