Achieve Anything You Want By Setting S.M.A.R.T Goals

The main reason why many people are failing to achieve their goals is that they haven’t realized that there is the right way of setting goals and there is also the wrong way.
Those who set their goals right are the ones who always accomplish what they desire and those who don’t are the ones who never seem to reach what they want.

For example, saying “I want to be promoted to a managerial position at my workplace next quarter” and stopping there is an example of a goal that isn’t set right.

Saying “I want to be financially independent” and failing to go the extra mile in defining what that means, how you intend to accomplish it, etc. isn’t going to get you to your goal. That is why knowing the most effective ways of setting your goals is important.

Have you ever noticed how excited you are about working on your goal in the first two or so months only to lose motivation along the way? That is because your goal isn’t set right.

Knowing the right way of setting goals and setting clear, attainable goals keeps you motivated. It enables you to achieve anything you want.

SMART is an acronym that stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timely. It is a method used by millions of people to achieve their goals and has the power to help you to not only set smart, practical goals but enables you to achieve every goal you set.

How smart goals help you to accomplish anything you set your mind to.

SMART goals help you to achieve anything you want because they are:
•Specific.
SMART goals are specific and specific goals give you a clear picture of what you want. They move you in the right direction. That is why you have to be specific when setting your goal. For instance, if you want to lose weight be as specific as you possibly can. Don’t just write “I want to lose weight” and stop there. Clearly state how much weight you want to lose, why you want to lose weight, and when you are going to start. For example, “I want to lose 10 pounds because if I don’t, the excess weight I’ve gained may become uncontrollable. I am going to begin today and I will do ABC to get there.”

•Measurable.
Measurable goals keep you focused on what you intend to accomplish in a day, week, or month. They focus your attention on what has been accomplished as well as what needs to be accomplished. Tracking progress and knowing how far you have gone helps keep you motivated. You ask questions like “How much progress have I made?” and “What indicates success?”

•Achievable.
Achieve anything you desire by setting practical, realistic, and achievable goals. Break down a big goal into small, realistic, and attainable ones. Ask yourself the following questions; “Is this goal attainable?” if not, “How do I best achieve it?” “Do I have the resources?” and “Has anyone else accomplished what I’m aiming for?”

•Realistic.
Setting realistic goals means considering whether or not attaining ABC is practical given your available time or resources. It also means finding better ways of achieving what you want. Setting realistic goals keeps you motivated to continue working. Instead of focusing on accomplishing one huge goal in a month, for example, you focus on small daily goals that will give you the results you desire. You use the time you have and the resources available to you wisely.

•Timely.
Setting deadlines increases your chances of attaining your goals because goals that have no deadlines take away the sense of urgency that is important to accomplishing anything worthwhile.

So, assign specific time frames to your goal and write down when you intend to reach every goal you set.

Ensure you reach what you are aiming for by getting rid of an “I have enough time” or “I can do this tomorrow” mentality and replacing it with an “I have to get this done today or in 7 days” mentality.

Knowing you are supposed to accomplish such and such within a specific time frame motivates you to work. It helps you to get rid of distractions, enables you to prioritize, and increases your chances of achieving what you want.

SMART goals are the key to your success. Recognizing the important role they play in helping you work smart and effectively will help you accomplish anything you want.

SMART goals help you to manage your time wisely and accomplish more. They keep you in the right direction and ensure you always take the right steps.

Understanding the significance of setting SMART goals in achieving what you want ensures success in all your endeavors. So, choose the right way of working on what you desire to accomplish by setting SMART goals.

5 Benefits Of Having Goals

“The reason why most people never reach their dreams is that they don’t define them, or ever seriously consider them as believable or achievable. Winners can tell you where they are going, what they plan to do along the way, and who will be sharing the adventure with them.”-Denis Watley

The best way of turning your vision into reality is by defining it and coming up with effective methods of bringing it to life. Setting goals is the most effective way of reaching whatever you are aiming for because goals provide direction and keep you on the right path. They prevent you from living aimlessly and motivate you to continuously move forward and aim higher.

One of the great things about having goals is that they come with many benefits that are only enjoyed by those who have them.
There is no limit to how far you can go when you live a meaningful life that is governed by not only having goals but taking the necessary steps in attaining them.

5 benefits of having goals.

1.The ability to make smart decisions.
Having goals helps you to make smart and informed decisions because you know where you are going and what you intend to achieve in the long run. You have clarity when it comes to decision-making because you recognize that every choice you make has a direct impact on your goal.

You ensure every decision you make positively affects your goal and are more capable of avoiding taking steps or making choices that will harm your end goal. You know what to say NO to and what to say YES to.

2.Constant improvement.
Reaching your set goals encourages you to keep working and gives you the motivation to keep improving. Instead of focusing on a hundred reasons why you are not “qualified” to do ABC, you fix your attention on how you can qualify as well as what areas need refining or cultivating. Accomplishing past goals gives you the determination to reach for your dreams and perfect your skills or abilities.

You focus on becoming the best at what you do which enables you to achieve more and become all you’ve ever wanted.

3.Unwavering focus and drive.
Goals aid you in retaining your focus and drive where work is concerned. They keep you focused on putting in the hours daily and taking the required steps toward your ultimate goal. Goals are the reason why you say “I can’t wait to pick up from where I left off yesterday” each morning instead of “I don’t feel like getting out of bed.” You know you have something to look forward to. Something to accomplish before the end of the day and something to be excited about throughout the day. Unwavering focus and relentless drive are two things you need to hold on to if you are to achieve anything in life.

4.The ability to act on what you desire to achieve.
The main reason why some people reach their goals while others don’t is that those who don’t achieve their goals never act on their desires. If they do, somewhere along the line they lose the drive to continue, get stuck, and quit. Realize that the only way of achieving whatever goal you set is by acting on it and moving forward despite what happens.

Having goals is an excellent way of ensuring you act on your vision, move forward, make smart decisions, and enjoy the journey.

5.Better discipline and self-confidence.
Running out of ideas is not the reason why most people fail to succeed in life. They fail because they don’t have enough discipline to act on their ideas and continue to execute despite their external environment. Self-discipline is the key to staying true to your dreams and fulfilling them. Setting personal or professional goals for yourself is the most effective way of cultivating discipline and ensuring you remain focused.

When you feel the urge to procrastinate, your goals remind you of what you are supposed to achieve in 24 hours, one week or one month and so, you continue working. When distractions come, you think of that important assignment you need to submit before the end of the day and get back to work. Goals help you to turn down things that have the power of hindering your progress and give you enough discipline to say “This is more important” and “That can wait.”

Having goals boosts your self-confidence by fixing your attention on your strong points as well as what you have already accomplished. Accomplished goals give you a reason to celebrate and look forward to achieving more as well as doing more.

Recognize the significance of celebrating every win and rewarding yourself for a job well done so that you can remain confident, stay motivated to act on your vision, and met your daily targets.

The Effect Core Values, Beliefs, and Vision Have on Your Personal Development

Every person alive has a set of core values and beliefs about life that influences the vision they have of the future and even sometimes the past. These core values and beliefs are often developed in childhood and can be strongly tilted toward success or failure, as well as abundance or lack.

You get a lot of these ideas from your parents, but they also come from general society. The TV shows you watched growing up, the friends you had, their parents, your teachers and whatever was happening in the world as you grew up that is reflected on the news affects your values and beliefs as well. Many of these things in your mind you don’t even know are there.

Therefore, you often act unconsciously to things that strike at those core values and beliefs. Sometimes those actions lead you down the wrong path. Through working on your personal development, you’re going to become much more self-aware about your core values and beliefs and why you have specific ideas or not.

Positive & Negative Core Beliefs

Everyone has both positive and negative core beliefs. The more positive thoughts you have, the more positive you will behave, as you embark on achievement. These positive beliefs include things like believing you are worthy, safe, competent and capable, appreciated, accepted, knowledgeable, and so forth.

Negative beliefs are often focused and based on your personality or inner-self, as well as on a negative thought that someone had about you or based on something you said about yourself. These can be very limiting to your self-esteem. That’s why you can meet two people, who have the same job, make the same amount of money, and one will be happy and satisfied, while the other person will inwardly feel miserable.

Finding Out Core Values & Beliefs Are Negative

You may not even realize you have beliefs that are causing you to be held back. If you’ve watched person after person succeed at something that you want to do, are you able to identify why to improve it or are you not able to accept that a core idea or belief you have is erroneous? One idea a lot of people have that is very limiting is the idea of money being finite. The truth is more money can always be made, but you may have to create it first. Once you find out that you have negative core beliefs, you can work on turning them into positives.

Willingness to Change Brings More Success

If you want to embark on a journey to personal development, be willing to challenge your core beliefs, ideas, and even the vision you have created for your life. Until you know what’s true, accurate, and based on facts rather simply on opinions or false beliefs, it’ll be hard to envision how far you can go towards the advancements you want to make. It may be the difference between deciding to become a Doctor or a Nurse. Neither career is a wrong choice. However, one might be better for you, when considering your likes, dislikes, existing skills, your health, and your interests, goals, and other preferences.

As you work through your development plan in all aspects of your life, you’ll come to many surprising realizations. Some of them will be a surprise, others, not so much. The critical point is to realize that the ideas you have right now, even your most core beliefs and values may change once you find out it’s not true. For instance, it’s not true that you can’t lose weight. It’s not true that you cannot start your own business. It’s not true that you aren’t good enough. If you find that you have limiting core beliefs and values, you will want to work on those first. Without the inside taken care of, it’s hard to fix everything else.

Best Practices for Starting Your Personal Development Journey

When you first start your personal development journey, it can be tempting to take short cuts. You think that you already know who you are, what you want, and what you stand for, and how to exemplify that. However, that’s not how the human mind works. Often, we hide truths from ourselves and are not honest with ourselves about these issues. For this reason, follow these best practices for starting your personal development journey so that you will succeed.

Don’t Skip the SWOT – It’s imperative that you perform analysis on yourself in every aspect of your life to find out what strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats you face for any of the target issues you want to address. For example, if you perform a SWOT and realize that you’re not very good at something, you then have a choice. You can find someone who is to do it for you, or you can find training to learn to do it.

Nurture Your Strengths – When you perform the SWOT for any sector of your life, you’ll also identify your strengths. The best thing to do in life is to choose to lead with your strengths. You want to keep doing the things you’re strong at and learn to do them even better since you’re obviously interested in those things.

Improve Your Weaknesses – When you find out that you are weak in some area, you’ll need to determine whether you should improve it yourself or improve it by outsourcing it. To determine which is better, ask yourself whether it really matters who does it or just that it is done.

Understand The 3 Domains of Personal Development – They are, physical, cognitive, and social-emotional. Together, these domains cover all aspects of your life, including health, work, personal growth, spiritual life, and so forth. Working on all aspects of your life usually is much better than focusing only on one as they are sometimes indistinguishable.

Plan for Action – As you work through crafting your plan, nothing is done until you’ve set up action-packed steps and put them in your calendar scheduled for you to implement them. Whether you are doing it yourself, or outsourcing it, doing is the most critical part of the plan.

Focus on The Right Target Issue First – One reason it’s helpful to go through every single domain and issue you have before setting up a plan is that it helps you to know which issue to focus on first. For example, you cannot write a novel until you can read, and you can’t learn to write until you can read, first things first.

Be Persistent – Once you have your action plan, which is developed based on reality and not on how you wish it to be, you only now need to be persistent and take the steps to success. It truly is that easy. Once you have the steps scheduled in your calendar and you start implementing them, your life will begin to change.

Get a Coach – If you understand everything but your implementation skills leave something more to be desired, you may want to employ a life coach to help you. If you know some life coaches who specialize in personal development, you might want to talk to them. If you don’t know anyone, ask your colleagues for recommendations. It’s likely they will know someone or can direct you to someone who would know more on the topic.

One thing to remember about personal development is that it’s an ongoing process. You’re never done with it. There is no real finish line. For this reason, it’s best to develop tenacity and persistence as you follow the path you’ve created for yourself, adjusting as you go based on facts, and learning about what is really and truly important to you deep in your subconscious. It’s all about knowing who you are and living a life that illustrates who you are.

How To Map Out and Reach Your Ultimate Goals This Year
If you check through your experience, you will most likely have a year you feel is the best among the rest. Nonetheless, you can always have a year that can be better than the previous one.

In fact, you can make this year the best ever! How? It all depends on your plans and how you execute them. Note that it’s not all about having a fantastic plan.

Many people have great plans that peter out as the year goes on. So, executing the plan is the most important thing.

This guide will provide you with the information you need to map out the year to have awesome experiences.

Your plan is like a strategy that guides the way you go through the year. If you are in the military, you don’t make plans when you get to the enemy’s zone.

The plan to execute when the initial one isn’t working is plan B, which is still a plan. It’s only on rare occasions that a militant group has to come up with a strategy on the forefront...

Read on by downloading the eBook below!

Strategic Planning Is What Will Catapult Your Success

One of the worst things you can do to yourself as an entrepreneur is to proceed without a proper plan in place. Many people wrongly assume that as an entrepreneur, you can just sort of do whatever you feel like doing, flying by the seat of your pants.

If you choose to do that, what will inevitably happen is you get off track from where you want to end up, and eventually spiral out of control and end up dissatisfied with how your business has turned out.

Planning has many different levels that you should be familiar with. First, there are long term goals - things that you only expect to achieve after years of putting in the work. This could be anything from owning your own location and office to owning a house of a certain size using the profits made from your business.

These goals are important because they give you something to work towards, which at least gives you a destination. Next, there are short term goals, which you could hope to achieve in a few weeks or with a few months of work.

This might be something like receiving your first paycheck from your own business, or making your first big sale. These goals are also important, because if you’re only working toward far off, long term goals, then you’ll feel stuck after awhile of not reaching them.

Closer, more easily attainable goals can help you feel as though you’re making good progress. Finally, you should have milestones that you can reach, leading you toward your long term goals.

These milestones help you keep track of progress, and can range from the number of clients you’re working with to a certain salary that you’re making. These can be good indicators of when you’re moving in the right direction.

As long as you’re continuing to achieve your milestones, you’re getting closer to those long term goals. Having strategic plans doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to have every moment of every day scheduled.

Many people can get overwhelmed when they have to map out every little thing that they’re going to do, and if something goes wrong, they’re going to have their whole schedule thrown off.

By having a slightly more general plan, while still having it be well structured, you can remain flexible in the face of adversity, while keeping yourself on track as the weeks go by. Don’t hesitate to really plan out your entire pathway to your long term goals and check in on them as time progresses.

How Personal Development Leads to Success

The thing that is most exciting about the possibilities with crafting a personal development plan for yourself is the role that personal development plays in the level of success you can achieve in all areas of your life, physical, cognitive, and social-emotional.

The fact is, anyone who can passionlessly observe where they are compared to where they want to be while identifying steps and assembling a plan that is truly doable to reach (and even exceed) the goals you’ve set for life literally cannot lose. Even if you slightly miss the mark or change your mind as you go – you still succeeded.

You’ll Become More Self Aware

Being self-aware allows you to look to yourself, the only person you have any control over, for the change that is needed to reach the success you desire. For example, if you realize that you are prickly around criticism during your self-study do you just say, “Don’t critique me because I cannot handle it!” No, instead you teach yourself with the help of books, courses, classes, counselors or coaches (or all the above) to learn to handle criticism better.

You’ll Develop a Better Sense of Direction

When you really know who you are, who you want to be, and you know how to get it you’re going to have a much better idea of where you’re going from here than the average person. Knowing what you want to get out of life is an important aspect of what helps you set your own course. You also learn not to overwhelm yourself trying to do too much at once because you know that when you set your goals right you will achieve them.

You’ll Become More Focused & Effective

One of the things that you want most from personal development is clarity. Developing SMART goals for your life in all areas of your life is one way to develop that clarity. Once you have it you can become more and more focused on doing the right steps to get there that you will also become more effective at realizing each success. You’ll be able to toss away roadblocks, obstacles, and threats because you’re doing it with a plan.

You’ll be Much More Motivated

Motivation can be hard to come by for some people. However, with experience and success, comes motivation. Think about how motivated you feel if you earn a few bucks from an affiliate offer you posted about six months ago. Think about how motivated you feel any time you get good news about an action you took that turned out positive. That’s why you will become more motivated. You’ll have more experience with success due to following your personal development plan.

You’ll Become More Resilient

When you are sure of yourself and where you’re going, something happens along the way. You’ll feel good about the things you’re doing, too. You become a much stronger person. One of the first things you may notice is that you can bounce back faster from issues and roadblocks.

When you know how to plan using actionable steps, to get to where you want to go, there seems to be fewer problems, issues, and roadblocks, simply because you know you’re capable and know what to do. You will have tools, crafted from the development of your personal plan, to help you overcome issues that would ordinarily delayed your progress. There is no way to control the negativity around you; however, you will have more control your actions and reactions.

You’ll Be a Better Friend, Spouse, Parent, Etc.

One of the things you will learn very well as you work on your personal development plan is that you have full control over your own actions. It’s true that you cannot control sometimes how you feel but you can control how you react. It can be hard to realize it but once you fully accept it your relationships will improve dramatically.

The role personal develop plays in your level of success in all areas of your life is clear. People who spend time developing themselves tend to experience life more fully, make more money, have better and more fulfilling relationships, and are more satisfied with their place in the world. The reason is that you cannot get to where you want to go without taking small daily actions to get there. Your personal development plan will be the map that guides you to where you want to go.

The Purpose of a Personal Development Plan

Personal development is a process that you will work on for your entire life. It will help you assess your skills, qualities, and will help you build the lifestyle and life that you envision that you desire for happiness and a high quality of life. The personal development plan can help you with all aspects of your life and help you become more self-aware at home and at work.

Perform a SWOT on Your Life

A well-designed personal development plan will address your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and roadblocks or threats in all areas of your life that you develop. Your plan will identify your strengths so that you can improve them, your weaknesses are so that you can make up for them, and new opportunities, so you know when a door (or window) is open, as well as noting any roadblocks or threats along the way.

Recognize Development Areas

When you perform your SWOT in each area of your life, you will discover internal and external things that are blocking your success. For example, you may hold the belief you’ll never have enough money to save for the future. Because of that, when you do get “extra” money, you tend to blow it right away on all the things you feel you missed out on before. This is a limiting belief about money that a lot of people have because most people think money is a finite resource when it’s not. It’s manmade. Therefore, we can make more.

Identify Your Resources

You may do some work that helps you look at the resource you have available to do a specific task. For example, if you decide you want to start a coaching business, what resources do you have to start it. What things do you need, what things can you live without, what can you do yourself, what does someone else need to do. This works in every single aspect of your life. You may realize you already have all the skills inside to do exactly what you wanted to do. However, you may realize that you need to pay for additional brainpower (resources).

Build Better Relationships

One of the most shocking aspects of creating a self-development plan is how much it can help relationships. When you realize that you only control your own behavior and actions, it starts to get easier to manage relationships. Treating them how you want to be treated is an excellent start but becoming self-aware enough to go farther and realize that not everyone likes what you like so you may need to treat someone the way they like to be treated instead.

Whatever you want to work on can be done via the personal development plan. Whether you want to lose weight, start a business, change jobs, or go back to school – the goal doesn’t matter as much as developing the plan that you need to get where you want to go. Your plan will not be the same as anyone else’s because you are different. That’s why it’s so consequential and unique because it’s just for you.

Entrepreneurial Success Is for Energetic Individuals

To achieve entrepreneurial success, you need a certain level of energy. Just being aware of your need for it won’t always make it materialize. Sometimes, you may have to put forth effort to cultivate the energy that you need.

Those who do well in a niche they choose know that energy is the for getting things done and in deciding which direction to take whenever there’s a problem or choice to make.

Lacking energy can affect your business. Mental energy means you have the mindset, attitude or emotional capacity to do whatever type of mental work needs to get done - such as brainstorming an upcoming project or working on completing a design step for a product launch.

Having the physical energy that you need is important, because when you feel drained, you’re not going to want to do anything. If you do try to get tasks done, it’ll take you twice as long and you’ll use more of your physical resources.

If you’re struggling with feeling energetic, there’s something that you can do to remedy the situation. Understand that energy attracts energy. If you stay stagnant, that will create more inertia.

To overcome your lethargy, challenge yourself to do at least one thing a day that benefits your entrepreneurial endeavor. This might be something like outlining a blog post or reaching out to affiliates.

Whatever you do, just accomplish one thing each day and you’ll find that what happens is the movement, which is a form of energy, will create more energy that you will then feel and benefit from.

It can also help if you have someone that you check in with - such as an accountability partner who is also an entrepreneur. You want someone in a similar business because they’ll often have strengths in the area in which you’re struggling.

Set up a plan to text or email this person daily so that you can go over what you were able to accomplish. Then you can discuss or brainstorm ways to add to that accomplishment.

Connecting with like-minded individuals will often help to boost energy and your mood as well. Make sure that the tasks that you’re working on each day are money tasks. When you start seeing the money come in, it creates momentum.

It’s a tangible reward of the effort that you’re putting in. Your brain’s reward center will be triggered and that will further boost your energy and enthusiasm. You can develop physical energy by limiting stress, which drains you physically and also by deliberately choosing to exercise.

Exercise boosts your endorphin levels, which give you energy. Embrace other healthy habits like getting plenty of rest and eating a nutritious meal plan. If you’re not feeling energetic, put something in plan today so you don’t put off your goals.

Live By Your Goals But Learn to Be Flexible

One of the most important and helpful things you can do in order to be more successful is to set goals for yourself. These can be both short term and long term goals. They help provide you with more structure when you’re trying to figure out what you should be doing, because it at least provides you with a destination to reach.

However, one of the largest detriments that you can have with your goals is when you’re not flexible enough with them. Many people get so hard headed when they’re working towards their goals that they actually end up doing more harm than good.

A bit of stubbornness can work in your favor, since it helps you push forward through some difficult times. But sometimes, you get so belligerent with your goals that you end up stuck, unable to move past it, when a little flexibility could have helped move things along.

For example, if you were creating all of your own products and you were adamant that you would never, ever outsource to others, that can work in your favor sometimes. It might help you save money by doing it yourself, and the project might seem more cohesive.

However, if you reach a point such as designing graphics where yours end up looking pretty amateurish, then you should be a bit flexible and bend the rules to make an exception.

If you are so dead set in your ways that you’re not willing to change, some of these barriers that you encounter along the way will either stop you dead in your tracks, or they’ll force you to do something poorly that could negatively affect you later on.

In general, it’s good to be flexible, as long as you can maintain rigidity when you need to. By not being flexible, you’re actively removing options that could help you get closer to your goals.

Sometimes, you may need to take a step back in order to take three steps forward. Not everything is going to work in your favor constantly, and you can’t let that trip you up. When you’re more flexible, and something doesn’t go your way, you’re able to simply make the adjustments that you need to and continue towards your goals.

By being flexible, you’re not giving up on your goals, but rather you’re figuring out a better way of getting there by being able to avoid or overcome obstacles. Sometimes, you start out with a plan and along the way, you find a better way of doing things, so being able to adapt to necessary changes can improve your business as an entrepreneur.