This is the
time of year when people are trying to turn over a new leaf. The beginning of
the year marks a point where people make New Year’s Resolutions. Unfortunately,
many fail to keep those resolutions. In fact, 81 percent of resolution's fail
within two years. The top New Year's resolutions rarely change year to year.
The most popular typically revolve around losing weight, managing stress,
getting out of debt, quitting smoking, and learning a new skill.
Personally I
recommend forgetting the whole concept of resolutions and concentrating on setting
goals instead. Resolutions and goal setting may seem similar, but resolutions
typically take a let's start something and see what happens approach, while
goal setting is about planning a specific path to success.
Goal setting is
a process whereby you decide what you want to achieve and set up a plan to do
it. The very first step of goal setting
is to, first, determine what you want at the end of the journey. That is your
ultimate destination. Some people say
that goal setting is just a matter of sitting down and deciding what to
do. If you fully intend to achieve your
goals, you should perceive goal setting as an extremely powerful process of
personal planning.
These practical
tips on goal setting can help make it easier to set and reach goals:
Specific,
realistic goals work best.
When it comes to making a change, the people who succeed are those who set
realistic, specific goals. And that makes it easier to stick with.
It takes
time for a change to become an established habit. It will probably take a couple of
months before any changes — like getting up half an hour early to exercise —
become a routine part of your life. That's because your brain needs time to get
used to the idea that this new thing you're doing is part of your regular
routine.
Repeating a
goal makes it stick.
Say your goal out loud each morning to remind yourself of what you want and
what you're working for. (Writing it down works too.) Every time you remind
yourself of your goal, you're training your brain to make it happen.
Involve
others. It is always
good to involve others in the process of setting and achieving goals. Take
advice when necessary. And don’t be rigid. There are people out there who are
better at this. Their suggestions are always valuable.
Make an
action plan. So you
have set goals, written them down and now you are all set to start working
towards achieving them. First step – make an action plan. There could be more
than one method to achieve a goal. Which one suits you? Decide on it.
Track
progress. Extremely important.
If you don’t track progress, you don’t get an idea if you are going the right
way and if you would ever achieve it in the time frame you had set in your
mind. So track your progress everyday. There are various methods and tools to
track progress and I’ll discuss them in detail in my next article.
Roadblocks
don't mean failure.
Slip-ups are actually part of the learning process as you retrain your brain
into a new way of thinking. It may take a few tries to reach a goal. But that's
OK — it's normal to mess up or give up a few times when trying to make a
change. So remember that everyone slips up and don't beat yourself up about it.
Just remind yourself to get back on track.
Persist. Don’t give up. As I mentioned, there
could be many paths leading to the same destination. Try out different methods.
Learn and improve. Be patient. Be persistent.
No strategy is set in stone, which makes the goal setting process a dynamic endeavor. Consider yourself a coach on the sidelines, continuously referring to playbooks and constantly re-evaluating strategies and players or making adjustments at halftime. Set goals, and execute on them—but be sure to evaluate those goals year-round, not solely during performance reviews. The more you monitor individual objectives, the greater the likelihood that they will be on target and fulfilled.
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