[GOALS] 12 STEPS TO SETTING GOALS BY BRIAN TRACY

12 Step Goal-Setting

By Brian Tracy

Rewritten by NGY PHANITH

1.Decide exactly what we want in our lives

Start off by Idealizing. Imagine there are no limitations on what we can be, have or do. Imagine we have all the time and money, human resources, and material objects that we need to accomplish any goal we can set for ourselves.

 

Imagine that we could wave a magic wand and make our lives perfect in every key area of life. If our lives were perfect in each area, what would it look like?

Write down our three most important goals in life now. Write whatever our answers to this way of writing these goals; it is probably an accurate picture of what we really want in life.

2.Write our goals down 

Our goals must be in writing. They must be specific,  measurable, achievable, realistic and timebound. We must write out our goals as if we were placing an order for our goals to be manufactured in a factory at a great distance. Make our description clear and detailed to easily understand. Those who write their goals will then be bosses while others who fail to do them shall eventually be their staff.

3.Set a deadline

Our subconscious mind uses deadlines to drive us, consciously and unconsciously toward achieving our goals on schedule. If our goals are big enough, set sub-deadlines for smaller ones as well. If we want to achieve financial independence, we may set a 10 or 20-year goal, and then break it down, year by year, so that we know how much we have to save and invest each year. 

If for some reason we don’t achieve our goals by the deadline, simply set a new deadline. There are no unreasonable goals, only unreasonable deadlines.

4.Identify the obstacles to overcome and achieve our goals 

Why aren’t we already at our goals?

There is always one limiting factor or constraint that sets the speed at which we achieve our goals. What is it for us? The 80/20 Rule applies to constraints. Fully 80% of the reasons that are holding us back from achieving our goals are inside ourselves. They are the lack of a skill, a quality or a body of knowledge. Only 20% of the reasons we are not achieving our goals is on the outside. Always start within ourselves.

5.Identify our competency we will need to achieve our goals

Identify particularly the skills that we will have to develop to be in the top people - great achievers. Our weakest key skill sets the height of our income and our success. We can make more progress by going to work on the one skill that is holding us back.

“What one skill, if we developed and did it in an excellent way, would have the greatest positive impact on our lives?” What one skill, if we developed and did it consistently, in an excellent manner, would help us to achieve our most important goals? Whatever the skill, write it down, make a plan and work on it every day.

6.Identify the people  required to achieve our goals

Make a list of every person in our lives that we will have to work with to achieve our goals. Start with the members of our families, whose cooperation and support you will require. List our bosses, coworkers and our subordinates. Especially, identify the customers whose support we will need to sell enough of our products or services to make the kind of money that we want.

Once we have identified the key people whose help we will require, ask ourselves this question, “What’s in it for them?” 

To achieve big goals we will have to have the help and support of lots of people. One key person at a certain time and place in our lives will make all the difference. The most successful people are those who build and maintain the largest networks of other people whom they can help and who can help them in return.

7.Make a to-do list to achieve our goals

Combine the obstacles that we will have to overcome, the knowledge and skills we will have to develop, and the people we will require. List every single step that we can think of that we will have to follow to ultimately achieve our goals.

As we think of new items, add them to our list until our list is complete. When we make out a list of all the things we will need to do to achieve our goals, we begin to see that these goals are far more attainable than we thought. “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” 

8.Organize our list into a plan. sequence and priority.

We organize this list by arranging the steps that we have identified by Sequence – what do we have to do before we do something else, and in what order?

Priority – what is more important and what is less important? The 80/20 Rule says that 80% of our results will come from 20% of our activities.

The 20/80 Rule says that the first 20% of time that we spend planning our goal and organizing our plan will be worth 80% of the time and effort required to achieve the goal. Planning is very important.

9.Make or write a full plan

Organize our lists into a series of steps from the beginning all the way through to the completion of our goals. When we have a Goal and a Plan, we increase the likelihood of achieving our goals by 10 times, by 1000%!

■ Plan each day, week and month in advance.

■ Plan each month at the beginning of the month.

■ Plan each week the weekend before.

■ Plan each day the evening before.

The more careful and detailed we are when we plan our activities, the more we will accomplish in less time. The rule is that each minute spent in planning saves 10 minutes in implementation. This means that we get a 1000% return on our investment of time in planning our days, weeks and months in advance. 10 Select our number one, most important task for each day. using the 80/20 Rule. Set priorities on our list

Ask ourselves this question: “If we could only do one thing on this list, which one activity is most important?” Whatever we answer to that question, put a number “1” next to that activity. Then, ask ourselves, “If we could only do one other task on this list, which one task would be the most valuable use of our time?” Then write a number “2” next to that task.

Keep asking this question, “What is the most valuable use of our time on this list?” until we have our seven top tasks, organized by sequence and priority. 

Here is another question we can ask, “If I could only do one thing all day long, which one activity would contribute the most value to our work and to our goals? Focus and Concentration are the keys to success. Focus means that we know exactly what it is that we want to accomplish and concentration requires that we dedicate ourselves to doing only those things that moves us toward our goals.”

11. Develop the habit of self-discipline

Once we have decided on our most most important task, resolve to concentrate single-mindedly on that one task until it is 100% complete.

Our ability to select our most important task and then to work on it single mindedly, without diversion or distraction, will double and triple the quality and quantity of our output and our productivity.

Single Handling is one of the most powerful of all time management techniques. This means that when we start with the task, we avoid all distractions and stay with that task until it is done. Once we have developed the habit of completing our tasks, we will earn two and three and even five times as much as other people.

12. Practice visualization on our goals. 

Create clear pictures of our goals as if they were already a reality. Create clear, vivid, exciting, See our goals as though they were already achieved. Imagine ourselves enjoying the accomplishment of these goals. If they are cars, imagine ourselves driving these cars. If they vacation, see ourselves on the vacations already. If they are a beautiful home that we want, see ourselves living in a beautiful home.

In visualizing, take a few moments to create the emotions that would accompany the successful achievement of our goal. A mental picture combined with an emotion has an enormous impact on our subconscious and our superconscious mind. 

When we use a combination of clear goals, combined with visualization and emotionalization, we activate our superconscious mind. Our superconscious mind then solves every problem on the way to our goals. Our superconscious mind activates the Law of Attraction and begins attracting into our lives people, circumstances, ideas and resources that will help us to achieve our goals even faster.