Goal Setting 101

Lifeline 1. On a piece of paper, write “LIFELINE” in big letters at the top of the page. 2. Now draw the longest line you can along the length of your paper. This represents your life from beginning to end, your lifeline. Write “The Beginning” at one end of the line and “The End” at the other. 3. Draw short perpendicular lines across the lifeline to represent each decade of your life, past, present, and future up to one hundred. Make a mark and write “Now” at the place that represents your present age. 4. Start at the beginning of your life. Write in the significant events from your birth to the present time. Focus on events where you experienced significant growth, major life events, tragedies, and times you attempted or accomplished an important goal. 5. Now take a look at your future. Write in the big specific goals you have created for your future. 6. How did you do? If you were able to write in more than a very few goals in the future, you are among a tiny minority. Most people find they can’t write much, if anything, in the future part of their lifeline. Few people write anything more specific than “graduate, go to grad school, get a good job, have a family, retire.”

Creating your future How would you know that you did a really good job at something?

2 kinds of answers External Answers Internal Answers You know you did a good job because your boss gave you a raise, your picture was in the paper, your record went platinum, or you could afford that mansion in Beverly Hills. You know you did a good job because you were happy with the result, you felt satisfied, you enjoyed using your talents fully, it was fun, you kept a promise to yourself, you fulfilled an important goal, you made a contribution that mattered to you, you built some sort of “inner wealth.”

Accomplishment Cycles 1. Formulate a goal. What goal do you want to achieve? 2. Commit to reaching the goal. Wishing has no place here. 3. Plan how to get to the goal. 4. Get in action. This is the “work your plan” part. Deal with obstacles. Move it forward. Most projects are 90 percent action phase. 5. Persist, problem-solve, adjust. Once in action, you’ll find roadblocks and the unexpected (both help and hindrance), so you need to keep updating your plan and adjusting your actions. At this stage you have to remember to act consistent with your commitment even if the road gets rough. 6. Declare the project complete and celebrate!

Mastering the steps of the accomplishment cycle: easy project example PB&J 1. Formulate the goal.

2. Commit to reaching your goal. This commitment is much simpler than bringing forth a new nation so you skip the public declarations. Most likely, you commit to the PBJ without even thinking about it. (In this case, your stomach mainly drives the commitment.)

3. Plan how to get to the goal

4. Get in action Make the sandwich.

5. Persist, Problem-solve adjust. You persist even if the peanut butter tears the bread. You consider starting over, maybe heating the peanut butter first to soften up, then decide to just fold the bread over and forget about it. You have no commitment to aesthetics.

6. Declare the project complete and celebrate!

More about goal setting Make your goals correspond with what you really want. Create goals for every important category of your life, not just career goals. For example: family, friends, relationships, self-expression, health, fitness, fun and adventure, emotional well-being, self-development, spirituality, education. State goals clearly. Make them highly specific and measurable. Setting clear goals is like having a compass to navigate with; you know where you are heading. Write them down!!! Create both short-term and long-term goals. I recommend creating a comprehensive life plan along a timeline to map out your goals. Turn your important life goals into projects. Otherwise they’ll never happen.

Don’t cut corners Afraid you won’t formulate the “right” goals, you don’t formulate any and live life at random. What you need to realize is that there are no “right” goals. Without a coherent, well-thought-out plan, your actions will be reactions, hit or miss. It’s one way some people invite failure. Without getting in action you are only pretending to have a project. Some people never get beyond talking about all the great things they are going to do. If you don’t persist and deal with obstacles (and there are always obstacles; that’s life), you will never arrive at the destination. Some people become attached to continually working on the same obstacles, which is another way of never arriving. Without declaring the project complete and checking out what worked and what didn’t, you rob yourself of both triumphs and lessons for the next project.

Any Questions?