How to Live Life the Right Way by Setting Goals
New Year New Me, right? What if I told you only 8% of people who set New Year’s Resolution goals follow through with them?
Goal setting can be scary sometimes. By keeping expectations low or non-existent, you attempt to avoid disappointment.
“If I have no resolution, then I can’t disappoint myself this year.”
The reality is you’ll continue to dig the hole of disappointment deeper and deeper until you no longer see the daylight. You’ll spend your life reacting to unfortunate circumstances instead of actively setting yourself up for success.
Life is more meaningful, exciting and rewarding when you live the way you want to. Goals allow you to stay motivated and happy with ourselves.
This post describes how you can live life the right way by setting goals.
Write Down an Attainable Goal
The first thing you must do to start accomplishing your goals is to bring them into existence!
Write down goals and put them where you can see them every day to be reminded of your why. Choose something you can easily access, whether that be a journal, the notes app in your phone, or a sticky note on your mirror.
Over time, these goals embed in your mind and become second-nature.
2. Be Specific
Only by having a clearly defined goal can you then focus on how to accomplish it.
If your goal is to invest more of your money, decide how many dollars per month.
If you want to lose weight, decide how many pounds a month.
When you have a crystal-clear goal, the actions required to accomplish that goal naturally reveal themselves to you. If you don’t specify and narrow in on what you want to accomplish, then you’ll struggle to reach the desired outcome.
“If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there”
3. Establish Realistic Time Frames
Can you change your entire lifestyle overnight? Maybe, but highly doubtful. Allow yourself some time to see results from the changes you make before deciding your goal isn’t worth it anymore.
What you don’t want to do is overwhelm yourself with huge goals, only to give up on them entirely. Instead, set up small milestones and use your momentum of accomplishments to achieve bigger and better goals.
It’s 100% fine if you don’t meet every one of the goals you set for yourself. You’ll be doing much better than you would be doing otherwise, so do what you can and keep up the good work!
4. Small Goals are Big Goals
Everyone has big goals in life they want to achieve. Despite this, people convince themselves day after day their goals aren’t realistic or worth the time. If only they could see how wrong they are!
Once you decide what your goal is and when you want to accomplish it by, take time to evaluate. Weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly goals are like stepping stones on your climb to the top of a mountain; not only do they help you reach your goal one step at a time, but you can look back and marvel at how far you’ve come! This is the path to living life the right way.
Small goals, compounded over time, are what big goals are made of.
5. Measure Progress
Only things that get tracked, get measured. Make sure you track your progress!
Only by comparing yourself to your desired outcomes can you determine the correct next steps to take.
Having the ability to track the progress of your goals is not only important, but essential. It allows you to see how far you’ve come, make corrections, celebrate what you’ve accomplished, and continue to improve.
6. Create a Positive Feedback Loop
Think back to a time when a teacher, mentor, or parent gave you a difficult task to complete as a kid. The task was probably challenging, but once you were done, weren’t you invigorated and pumped full of pride and confidence? Weren’t you ready to face the next challenge that lie ahead?
In our case, feedback loops occur when you’re faced with a challenging goal, and you successfully accomplish it. This gives you feelings of reward and achievement, causing you to want to set more goals to complete.
When you use a positive feedback loop, you wire your brain for success and a snowball effect takes place.
7. Minimize Procrastination
When your goals are in place and you know the steps needed to accomplish them, you’re able to recognize when you’re procrastinating. Procrastination is simply anything that doesn’t help you reach your goals in the qppropriate time frame.
When you consciously recognize where your inefficiencies are, you can watch for and minimize interruptions in the future. One of the easiest ways to avoid procrastination is by turning your goal into powerful habits.
Conclusion
I challenge you to write down a clear, achievable goal that can be accomplished by the end of the day. Be specific and acknowledge any interruptions that may cause you to deviate from your path so as to proactively avoid them.
After you accomplish this goal, what is something you want to do by the end of this week? The month? The year? Your life?
With persistence, a positive attitude, and a clear plan of action in mind, nothing can stop you from achieving your hopes and dreams. Live life the right way by setting goals!
