Why You Should Define Your Goals

Often times you have an idea of a goal floating around in your head of something you want to achieve.  Goals that remain simply an idea are rarely achieved.  Those goals continue to float around aimlessly because they lack specificity.  Never getting clear on your goals is a recipe for disaster.  It is crucial that you define your goals if you want to successfully achieve them.

Goal Clarity

Start by getting crystal clear on what you want to achieve.  Ask yourself, what does it look like?  Describe your goal in detail as if you were explaining it to a friend.  Then, take the time to visualize exactly what you want to achieve.  Envision achieving your goal and think about what it will mean to you.  See into the future and embrace the feelings of achieving your goal.  Immerse yourself in that experience and bring it to life.

Write Your Goals Down

Now that are clear on what you want to achieve, write your goals down.  Don’t leave them to chance, floating around in your head.  Get your thoughts out of your head and down on paper.  This makes your goals more real.  By writing your goals down, you’re making a commitment to yourself that this is something you want to achieve.  The likelihood of achieving your goal has exponentially increased by simply writing it down.

Review Your Goals Daily

It’s easy to write your goals down but it’s another thing to take action and execute on achieving your goals.  Reviewing your goals daily reminds you to take the next most important action step.  It’s imperative that you write your goals down in an area that’s easy to access.  You might even want to create a wallpaper for your phone of the goal you’d most like to achieve as a daily reminder of what you’re working towards.

Eliminate Distractions

Every day you are faced with new opportunities.  It’s essential that you have a process to filter out these opportunities if they are deemed a distraction.  Maintaining a list of goals allows you to evaluate these new opportunities to see if it will help you reach your goal or if it will distract you.  Distractions can easily deter you and prevent you from achieving your goals.  That’s why you must have your goals written down so you can assess if this new opportunity will be helpful or hinder you from achieving your goal.

Acknowledge Your Progress

Having your goals written down makes it easy for you to track your progress.  You’ll be able to see how much progress you’ve made and more importantly celebrate the milestones you’ve already achieved.  You feel like giving up when you aren’t seeing any progress.  But, goals that are written down enable you to see how far you’ve come and remind you of where you’re going.

It doesn’t take long to write your goals down.  But, doing this one task forces you to clarify exactly what you want to achieve.  By writing down your goals, you’re making a commitment to yourself that you want to achieve this goal.  Review your goals on a daily basis to keep them at the forefront of your mind so you’ll continually be reminded to take action.  Having your goals written down also allows you to assess new opportunities and therefore eliminate distractions that will prevent you from achieving your goals.  Lastly, remember to celebrate your big win of achieving your goal when you finally cross it off your list.