At the end of last year we discussed the importance of FEELING
gratitude for the year that has been before you start thinking about the Goals
for this year. And that is so true because
if you think that this will be the year when you accomplish all the things that
you failed to accomplish last year then you’re really setting yourself up for
failure.
The reason I say that is because if you’re in the mindset of thinking
that there were things you didn’t accomplish last year then you’re in the
mindset of “Lack” because you’re thinking about all the things you didn’t
do. If, however, you approach the New
Year with the feeling of gratitude for all that you DID accomplish last year, then
you’ll be cultivating the feeling of gratitude.
The FEELINGS that you’ll be sending out into the Universe will be those
of ACCOMPLISHMENT and GRATITUDE for all that you achieved. And the Universe will respond by bringing you
more of the experience of ACCOMPLISHMENT and more things for you to be GRATEFUL
for, because that’s the signal that you’re sending out into The Universe.
Once you have the right mindset, then we can start to look at some Goal
Setting for the New Year. Let me just
first of all say that most of what you’ve learned about Goal Setting in the
past will probably be wrong and in most cases has been counterproductive to you
achieving your Goals. Most people learn
a simple Goal Setting strategy of “SMART” Goals. Each letter in “SMART” will mean something
slightly different depending on who you listen to, but basically a typical
example of what you may have been taught will look something like this.
Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Realistic
Timely.
Now let me just say first of all that there can be instances where this
is a really good formula for success.
But it tends to only work with very limited, short term Goals. For example, at the end of 2015 I decided to
make some changes to my Business.
Firstly, I changed Banks, and secondly I changed to a whole new Platform
where I conduct my Coaching Business Online.
Using a “SMART” Goal template for this made sense. I had some very specific steps that needed
to be done. For example, I had to ensure
my new Bank was able to provide Payment facilities so my Clients could pay me,
I had to get that all set up, make sure it was working. I had to set up my new Coaching Platform,
test that, make sure it all works. Then
I had to migrate all of my existing customers to the new Platform. These were just some of the tasks that I had
to complete!
So, there were a lot of VERY specific tasks that I had to accomplish in
a really short time frame, they were all measurable and I could track my
progress for each one to make sure I was on track. I had to ensure that both the tasks I needed
to complete, and the time frame that I set myself, were both realistic and
achievable.
Now that works really well for simple tasks that have a very short time
frame. However what I have found, and
you may have also found this yourself, is that this process seems much less
effective when you’re looking at longer term Goals such as your Goal for 2016,
or more over, your Goals for your life!
Someone once said, when you have a Goal, the BEST thing that can happen
is the Goal. When you have a “SMART”
Goal, the BEST POSSIBLE outcome is for you to achieve the Goal. You limit yourself to the possibility that
something BETTER than that can happen.
If you set a Goal that you wanted a new home or a new car, you close yourself
off to the possibility that you could have a BETTER home or a BETTER car. If you set a Goal to have a certain amount of
money show up in your Bank account, you cut yourself off from the possibility
of having MORE than that showing up.
Another problem with the traditional “SMART” Goal is that placing a
time limit on your Goal can seem inspiring at the time, but can actually become
problematical. One reason is, as we’ve
discussed, when you put a time frame on your Goal, you limit yourself to the possibility
that you could actually achieve it sooner.
But the bigger problem is not that you could have achieved it sooner,
but rather it typically takes most people LONGER to achieve their Goals then
they realise.
Even though people have the best of intentions to set a time frame to
their Goal which they believe to be realistic and achievable, the natural human
tendency is to overestimate what you’re able to achieve. It’s been said that people UNDERESTIMATE what
they can do in a day, but OVERESTIMATE what they can achieve in several
days. Just think about it, when a long
weekend comes around people have all these plans of everything that they’re
going to accomplish over the long weekend.
Then the long weekend comes and what happens? Most people would be lucky to achieve HALF of
what they set out to accomplish.
The point here is that the longer the time frame to achieve your Goal,
the harder it is to accurately estimate how long it’s going to take. Once you get to the point of not being able
to accurately estimate how long something is going to take, the natural human
tendency is to UNDERESTIMATE how long a Goal will take.
This becomes a problem when you’re tracking your Goal and you start to
realise that you’re not on track. Say
you have a Goal that you think you can achieve in 6 months. In reality, it’s actually going to take you a
minimum of AT LEAST 9 months to do. So
you get about 3 months in and suddenly realise you’re way off track and start
to panic. Then, if you’re like most
people, you’ll do 1 of 2 things. Either
you’ll get into a total panic and start rushing to try and get stuff done. You’ll start compromising on the quality that
you need to produce just to “get it done”.
In the end you’ll still fall short AND what you’ll do will be absolutely
crap quality because you’re trying to rush to get it done.
The other alternative would be that you’ll feel totally defeated
because you realise that you’re not going to achieve your Goal so you’ll just
give up completely. Instead of just
adjusting your time frame, you’ll admit to yourself that your Goals were
unrealistic and say to yourself, well there’s no way I’m going to achieve my
Goal so I may as well just quit now. So
you’ll quit all together and not try to achieve anything else until the next
time you set a Goal, which will be unrealistic AGAIN, and the whole process
starts all over again.
Personally, I NEVER put a time frame on any Goal that I set that’s
going to take any more than about 2 weeks to achieve. As I said, “SMART” Goals can be great when
you’ve got a simple little Goal that you need to do in about a week or so. Any longer than that, you’re going to start
feeling that pressure which is counterproductive to the achievement of the
Goal. I also make a point of not setting
a Goal that is too specific because that limits your potential.
The important thing that I always teach my Clients about Goal Setting
is to not get too bogged down with specifics or time. For example, when you start focusing on a
specific Goal such as a new car, you cut yourself off from the possibility of
actually achieving a BETTER car. When
you put a time frame on it, you cut off the possibility of achieving it
sooner. Plus you’ll start to feel
pressure if you feel as though you’re falling behind on your Goal.
Instead, let’s say that you wanted a new car. Even if you know exactly what sort of car you
want, what you want to do is to focus on the FEELING that you will have when
you get that car.
The Universe likes speed. If you
ask The Universe to deliver you a new car, The Universe will always find the
quickest way of bringing that car into your reality. A time frame therefore becomes irrelevant
because The Universe will ALWAYS be delivering it to you as quickly as
possible.
The more you focus on the FEELING of already having acquired the car,
already owning it, driving around in it, the stronger the frequency will be that
you’re sending out into The Universe which is drawing the parallel back to you.
Another couple of tricks that I teach people is to imagine doing
something very “unexciting” in your new car.
For example, if you wanted a new convertible, most people would be
visualising themselves driving around on a beautiful sunny day. Whilst visualisation is important and this is
definitely a good start, you may without realising it start to think of this
reality as being more of a fantasy rather than a reality. If you imagine doing something really boring
like driving down to the shops in pouring rain to buy the milk, it will make it
seem more real to you.
Another tip I give people is that it often helps to imagine having
already had that car in your past, rather than imagining having it in the
future. The reason is that when you
remember something that has already happened, you already know that this is
FACT. You have absolute certainty about
that. When you associate your new car
with that certainty, you will also start to sub-consciously associate that same
certainty with your new car!
That certainty will be fused with the FEELINGS that you are sending out
into The Universe. The Universe then
knows that it needs to produce a reality for you in which you feel the feelings
that you’ve been sending out. The more
feeling and certainty you attach to this, the more powerfully it will be
attracted to you. We explore this in
more detail in my Goal Setting For Goal Getting Program that I offer. Head on over to the website at www.dreamfulfilmentlab.com for
more information on how we can work together to achieve YOUR Goals for 2016 and
beyond !
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