First 3 Steps to Total Life Change

Goal setting and achievement should be easy right? You have something you want to do, you set a goal and you do it. What’s so hard about that?

Honestly? A lot.

As renowned as goal setting is for leading people to find success in any area of life they desire it just as many people fail to follow through on their dreams, which begs the question:

If goal setting gets you what you want, why is it still so hard to get from point A to point B?

The answer lies in how goals are set. The art of goal setting is a valuable practice for fully understanding what it is you really want, deciding if you’re really ready to follow through on what it’s going to take and then deciding exactly how you’re going to get there.

The how is important, but so is the why. The why triggers internal motivation so that even seeming failures will be used to your advantage and seen as learning opportunities to keep you driven and creative about how you’ll try again. Without clarity on your how and why, goals can become insurmountable, aimless tasks piling up year after year.

The reason getting from point A to point B is so hard is that people forget to start by gaining clarity. By identifying their vision – what they see in the future, what they see now, and what they’ve seen in the past – they’ll have better information to create goals that are attainable. Their vision shapes their how and why.

My Goal Setting Worksheet will help you get clear – really clear – on what it is you really want, why you want it and how you’ll take those first steps to drink less alcohol, to start working out in the mornings, to start your own business, or even to create total life change.

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Goal Setting Worksheet: Identifying Your Vision

Step 1: Identify Your Future Vision

• What do you really want? ____________________________________________________
• Why? What feeling will achieving this goal give you? ____________________________________________________
• How you will behave once you achieve this goal? ____________________________________________________

Step 2: Identify Your Present Reality

• What feelings do you feel now without having achieved this goal?
  ____________________________________________________
• How is your current behavior preventing you from achieving this goal?
  ____________________________________________________
• What are you willing to change in order to achieve this goal?
  ____________________________________________________
• What are you not ready to change?
  ____________________________________________________
• What do you believe will be the hardest part of achieving this goal?
  ____________________________________________________

Step 3: Identify Your Past Constraints

• Have you tried to achieve this goal in the past?____________________
• If yes, in what ways did you experience success? What were the roadblocks you faced? What stopped you from fully achieving or maintaining this goal?
  ____________________________________________________
  ____________________________________________________
• If no, how long have you wanted to achieve this goal? _______________
• What are your biggest fears about achieving this goal now?
  ____________________________________________________

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Answer these questions about your current beliefs — identify your vision — and you will have a very clear understanding of how your own mindset might be working for or against your success in achieving the goal.

With the insight and understanding of what you want, what you’re doing now, and where you anticipate difficulty based on past experience you will be prepared to create step-by-step goals that take your mindset into account so you can set yourself up for success.

Next week we’ll dive into breaking your goals into attainable steps based on the information you gleaned from the Goal Setting Worksheet above.

In Love & Gratitude,

Missi Holt