Shifts to Sustainability

A goal not written is just a wish…

The harvest season is always a wonder-filled and magical time for me, a time to evaluate how the year is turning out, where I am in my goals, and what I can do to finish the year out strong.  This is not the time of year that many write goals, but it is a perfect time for me… and maybe you too.  As I have completed this ‘process’ of evaluating my life and creating a list of potential goals many, many times, I decided that I would create a system that would help facilitate the process for me as well as for clients and friends.  Here is my simple process, which is a compilation of many of the best and brightest processes I have used, as well as my own thoughts:

1.     Read this entire process first, so you will understand what is in store for you.

2.    Identify what you really want, then write it down as a potential goal.

3.    Reflect on one item (the highest priority) that you have written down, visualize it in its perfect completion.

4.    Take that item, and identify all of the potential obstacles to the accomplishment of that goal.

5.     Now, write your goal in the following way

• Present tense, write it as if it has already been achieved, or you are already in possession of the thing you desire.
• Be exact in what you want, it is not nearly as effective to say, “I want more money” as it is to say, “it is June 1^st 2010, and I am in possession of $250,000.”
• Make your goal measurable, so you can gauge whether you have accomplished it or not, and how far you have come toward its accomplishment.

6.    Establish a B-S-G level for the goal you have identified, for example,

• Bronze- “it is June 1^st 2010, and I am in possession of $50,000.
• Silver- “it is June 1^st 2010, and I am in possession of $100,000.
• Gold- “it is June 1^st 2010, and I am in possession of $250,000.

7.     Find a partner who you can delegate certain parts of your goals to, this is not possible in all goals but can be very powerful with the right goal.  For example if your goal was to organize your home office, to make it more comfortable to do business in, you could simply hire a company to come in and put together an office to your specifications, or do any of the part of the process that you are not wanting to do.

8.    Find an accountability partner, this is simply another person with whom you share your goal, who can keep you accountable and on track., this person must be willing to call you on not making progress, and you must have the respect of that person so you will be willing to take action.

9.    Next Action Step- Once you have written your goal, created three possibilities for a positive outcome, and found partners to assist you look at the goal itself and write down what the next critical action step is, the very next thing that can be done to move you toward completion.

10.  Reward- this is an extremely important step, once you have accomplished a action step, reward yourself, but remember to make the reward equal to the effort, for example if your goal is to run a marathon, and your next action step is to buy great running shoes so you can start jogging on a daily basis, do not reward yourself with taking a month off exercise, or a half gallon of ice cream, maybe you can get yourself a fruit smoothie for moving toward your goal.

11.   This last step is very simple, once you have taken your most important potential goals and have gone through this entire process of making it a well-defined and achievable goal with a definable next action step to work on, you then go back through your list of potential goals and choose the next goal, and follow this same process of steps 3 – 11, until you have completed the process for five goals.  Now get to work.