Personal Goal Setting

                                   - Charles Brown

Every top-caliber athlete, successful businessman and businesswoman, and all other types of top achievers know the importance of setting goals.  Because they know that goal setting gives you short-term and long-term motivation and focus. After all, if you don't know where you're going, how the heck will you know how to get there?!  A clearly defined goal allows you to focus and stay on the right track.  It's all about getting the most out of life, and that means knowing what road you're on and where that road is taking you.

            Celebrate Short-Term Goal Successes 

Clearly defined short term goals enable you to measure your progress and celebrate little victories on your way to your main, long-term goal.  This keeps you "in the game;" from getting discouraged.  And charting your progress allows you to actually see the steps of completion towards your long-term goal.  This makes it even easier to "stay the course" and eliminates the feeling of being in a long, protracted grind of a Bataan Death march.  This has the wonderful bonus of bolstering your self-confidence a little more with each step forward.

                        Reverse Engineering is the Secret 

Great, but how do you go about this?  With reverse engineering, that's how:

Decide what the end result is that you want and work backwards; reverse engineer your main goal.  This will make the steps to achieve it much clearer.  For example, if your goal is to be an airline pilot, research the specialized flight training you'll need and work backwards until you get to the steps prior to the specialized training--like getting a simple private pilot's license.  Then you'd find out what it takes to be a private pilot.  Then you'd find out what FAA manuals you'd need for the private pilot license--whatever it takes.  All the way to planning when and where you will study, what steps you'll need to take to make specific time available to study, etc.  The more detailed the plan, the better.  This way you'll be able to see little steps getting checked off on the way to your airline job.

                      Major Steps to Chunks to Minor Steps

So, a big part of successful goal setting involves breaking down the major steps into smaller, more manageable chunks and then breaking down those "chunks" into tiny, easy-to-do steps.  Once you've written down your steps, then it becomes just a matter of tracking your progress.  A good way to do this is to have a daily and weekly set of goals. Everyday will give you the opportunity to check off a certain short term goal.  This will give you a great feeling of accomplishment--even though the action itself may seem trivial.

            Reverse Engineering, a.k.a. the "Decision Tree"

The reverse engineering method works whether you are making a 6-year plan or a 2-week plan.  Whatever your goal is, just start at your desired "end point" and work backwards.  This method is also known as the "decision tree" method:  In order to help you visualize your plan, get some posters from Staples or wherever.  At the top, write down your end goal, your "destination" in a hand-drawn box.

Just below it, draw another box and in it write the task that it represents; the step needed be done right before the main goal is finally achieved.  (You may have several boxes lined up side-by-side at any level--representing "lateral" steps that need to be done before stepping up.)  Connect the main goal box to the sub-steps below with lines.  Below those sub-steps, continue this until you get to just one step that begins the whole journey.  You can get as detailed or as general as you want.  But the idea here is to give you an initial "picture" of your main goal and the steps needed to reach it.   

                         Tips to Help You "Stay the Course"

Here's some tips that will help you follow through to your goal:

Since your attitude plays a huge role in setting and achieving your goals, ask yourself if any part of you or your mind is holding you back from completing your goals. Do you have any bad habits that you'll need to eliminate--or at least work around?  Don't discount going to a therapist for help with anything in this area.  We live in a time when it's "o.k." to see a therapist; as a matter of fact, nowadays people actually brag about seeing a therapist because it identifies them as "proactive" and successful.  
 
              Setting Priorities Is Done For You Automatically

Another big part of successfully achieving your goal is using your time wisely, a.k.a. "time management."  And good time management involves setting priorities.  But setting priorities into a realistic time table becomes easy when you do the "backwards planning method" of setting and achieving goals.  Because it makes you consider everything that is needed to be done before getting to the next step.  This automatically puts things in the correct order, so your priorities are set with no stressful brainstorming needed.

                      Adjustments to Your Plan Are Natural

Final words on goal setting:  Be hard on yourself, but not too hard.  Don't stress yourself out if things aren't going nearly as fast as you thought, or if additional steps keep needing to be added.  That's o.k., it's natural for you to have to continually adjust the plan. But more than likely, major adjustments at the beginning will become more and more minor once you've "found your groove."

And one other thing:  Don't take yourself too seriously.  Remember, laughter's the best medicine!