Setting goals is easy. Sticking to your goals isn’t.
Effective goal planning takes dedication, motivation, patience, and perseverance. If your approach to goal planning is simply to think about something you’d like to achieve and then hope that it happens, you’re in for a rough ride.
People who regularly achieve their goals are people who take the time to write their goals down, plan the process for achieving their goals, and put that plan into action. This task is never an easy one, and the more worthy the goal, the harder the steps will be. But with the right attitude and confidence in your own abilities, your personal goals can be achieved.
So how do you attain the right attitude? And how do you build confidence in yourself? These are complicated questions, and there’s no tried-and-true answer that will work for every person. You may not always be able to control the things that are happening around you, but if you can learn to control your mindset, you’ll be way ahead of the game. Consider our first quote:
“When you believe and think ‘I can’, you activate your motivation, commitment, confidence, concentration and excitement – all of which relate directly to achievement.” – Dr. Jerry Lynch
Dr. Lynch is talking about positive affirmations, the idea of reminding yourself what you’re capable of on a regular basis. Figure out what your motivations are – why you want to achieve the goals you’ve set out for yourself – and your attitude and confidence will follow. If you’re not sure what you’re trying to achieve, take a minute to think about this:
“If you don’t design your own life plan, chances are you’ll fall into someone else’s plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much.” – Jim Rohn
Along those same lines:
“The purpose of life is a life of purpose.” – Robert Byrne
If you’re not sure what the purpose of your life is, stop what you’re doing right now and figure it out. Going through life day-to-day without any sense of what you’d like to achieve is a surefire path to a midlife crisis. You don’t have to love every moment of your life or enjoy every single thing that you do, but your actions in work and in your personal life should build toward a purpose that you find meaningful. Perhaps what’s most meaningful to you is spending time with your family. Or perhaps you’re most interested in changing the world for the better. What are you doing to achieve these goals?
“Life is never made unbearable by circumstances, but only by lack of meaning and purpose.” – Victor Frankl
Where you’ve come from and where you are right now don’t have to have a negative impact upon where you’re going to be five years down the line. Your circumstances might make your goals more difficult, but they shouldn’t deter you from trying to find meaning and purpose in your life. Once you know what you want for yourself, set goals to help yourself get there, because:
“Setting goals is the first step in turning the invisible into the visible.” – Tony Robbins
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