As we come to the end of 2020 I have been taking some time to close off the years files at the office, to check in and measure performance on a few goals and objectives from last year and to look ahead at what I choose to move toward in the future.
Many people use this time of year to prepare new years resolutions and checklists for work to be done in the year ahead. Your timelines may be different, Corporations are aligned with fiscal years, a growing number of people are using the spring equinox (March 20, 2021) as the start of new goals. You should choose what feels best to you.
At work your goals and objectives will be developed for you and should be ‘aligned’ with corporate objectives. Your employer may also make organizational resources available to you such as the Franklin Covey, Covey Planner, goal setting tools, career goal handbooks, guidebook on being a multiplier. Use these with informed caution. They are productivity tools designed to maximize contribution of an individual to the corporate outcomes. They work, you will get more done using these tools and if it feels right to you use them.
When it stops feeling right, when it feels like you are headed in a direction counter to your purpose, break the habit and stop using these tools.
For maximizing your enjoyment, personal success and fulfillment keep goal planning simple.
Setting Personal Goals
For me personally I use a combination of literary goal planning, particularly with financial objectives and visual goal planning. I have come to find visualization most useful for creating my desired outcomes in other areas of focus. You will decode your mode for interpreting the world around you, certain tools will be more fun and bring you better results.
Start by trying any of these ways to bring your goal into focus.
The key in realizing success in attaining your goals is this: Make that desired outcome real in your mind, focused in your attention so that your expectation that it happens matches your desire for it.
Tools That Might Help You
If you are a literary person grab your favorite journal and write your goals down.
If you are a visual person collect images that illustrate your desired future.
There are a few items where I disagree with traditional advice on goal planning. In a career or workplace context I agree that goals should be measurable with timelines and check ins and check boxes. In your personal life these action-oriented tasks are not required for you to achieve your desired outcome. The action-oriented focus may prevent you from fully realizing your goal. If check boxes and monthly reports help you, use them. Only use them if you are enjoying the journey.
One specific area where checklists and action-oriented tasks will help you achieve goals is when you are modifying habits. A habit is an engrained behavior that you have allowed to become automatic. If you set a goal, for example, of daily exercise where you have been inactive by habit action-oriented tasks in support of an improved health goal will help you.
Change
How long will it take to change a habit? As long as you believe it will take.
Some of my biggest accomplishments come from goals that I wanted very badly and had focused on and struggled to achieve. With a number of previous goals I had to them set aside; Much to my frustration, I could not physically make it happen. They did eventually happen. It was as if the act of setting it aside after intentional focus and desire for it meant that the timing of it coming would work itself out.
I have at a few points in my career and personal life looked back at old journals and written goals that I had forgotten about and realized that came true. I did it! More accurately stated, it came when I was ready to receive it.
You don’t have to struggle to meet your goals. This no pain no gain notion is a man-made teaching. Discard it, it doesn’t serve you.
Your work is gaining clarity on this: What are your goals? What do you want to experience in your lifetime? What do you want in your life?
“Opportunities don’t happen. You create them.”
– Chris Grosser
Think about it, feel it, imagine it. Speak it or write it down. If it doesn’t feel good, its not your goal and doesn’t fit your vision.
The best goals and plans are something you believe in and have brought into focus either in writing or through other creative means. Goal planning is best when kept simple to ensure follow-through and develop clarity on your vision for your future. Your goals do not have to be simple, and there is no judge of them or you. Your goals are your goals.
Goal planning is just like driving a car, you must look where you want your car to go while maintaining awareness of potential hazards and priorities around you.
Develop your vision and let me know if I can be of any assistance.
“The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul.”
– Dieter F. Uchtdorf
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