Improving Our “Signals” and “Beings”

Goal setting is the framework for personal achievement. It is the backbone of becoming a person you desire to be. Setting and achieving personal goals will guarantee you success. Most people who do set goals have little to no understanding of goal setting and as a result fail to achieve them. We frequently hear of other’s goals or I should say ‘targets’ to find a perfect partner, lose-weight, or to help people in need. Many have personal ‘goals’ yet few achieve them. Why is this and what can you do to set yourself apart from the 95+% of people who do not achieve their poorly set personal goals?

Becoming an expert in setting and achieving personal goals is the greatest skill you can master. It ensures you desire something greater than what you have now and take the necessary steps forward to achieve them. By setting and achieving personal goals you can: communicate effectively, have the partner you want, have the friends and relationship with your family you want, look your best, feel great about yourself, no longer have self-imposed limitations such as poor confidence, and generally become the person you want to be. Setting personal goals constructs a pathway for self development but doing it correctly ensures you achieve them. It is truly the ultimate skill.

Why People Don’t Set Goals

You’d think that if goal setting was the ultimate skill and secret to success that everyone would develop their own personal goals and learn to achieve them. Unfortunately, the world isn’t that perfect.

I know with absolute certainty that everyone will experience a more successful and far enjoyable life if they learned to communicate effectively. Arguably the greatest modern day personal development Coach, Anthony Robbins said, “The way we communicate with others and with ourselves ultimately determines the quality of our lives.” Effective communication determines the quality of your life with others while self development determines the quality of your inner life. Self development forms your inner communication and progresses you towards building interpersonal relationships. There are several reasons why people don’t set goals similarly to why people don’t care about communicating effectively.

The first reason I believe why people don’t set goals is they don’t see its importance. Like people who do not develop their communication and other aspects of themselves, they do not see the importance of setting goals. I’ve met people who are unbelievably resistant to developing their communication. They have actually found it insulting to think they need to improve how they communicate! Every single person on the face of this Earth can always communicate more effectively and have their life improve as a result. Likewise, with goals there are people who do not see the importance of setting personal goals. Goal setting forms the foundations for personal achievement and it is of the utmost importance.

The second reason why people don’t set goals is a fear of others’ criticism. People criticize because they see faults in others or are brainwashed by society and other beliefs into thinking greatness cannot be achieved. They criticize to hold people back from achieving goals. Average people do not want others to go beyond average. A person can fear setting goals because each time they have set goals in the past, others have criticized and shot down their dreams. Others impose their own self-limiting beliefs through criticism instilling fear within the person. Think of receiving criticism as a poisonous needle injected into your body. It slowly controls and destroys what you want. The destructive thought of fear controls the person from achieving anything remarkable. Put bluntly, screw what people think. Screw allowing people to destroy your life with their beliefs. Society is filled with endless garbage to prevent you from achieving your goals. If you want something, go and get it by setting and achieving personal goals.

The third reason why people don’t set goals is a fear of failure. They may think success is derived from not failing. The opposite is true. Success comes from failing a lot and failing fast. Famous inventor Thomas Edison said, “I haven’t failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” Being an inventor, Thomas understand failure was apart of success. Failure was the nuts and bolts that constructed his success. Understand that failure occurs and it shows you are taking action. Learn from failure and enjoy it in knowing you are moving towards your goals instead of fearing to set out after them in the first place.

The fourth reason why people don’t set goals is a fear success. People who fear success believe it is bad. The fear is common in wealth and wanting an attractive partner because negative results will occur. They believe wealth is evil or a certain type of partner is unfaithful. The fear prevents them achieving what they want by not laying the foundations of their desire with goal setting.

The fifth reason why people don’t set goals is they do not know how. This reason relates to fear of failure where the person has set goals in the past, but hasn’t achieved them and becomes discouraged from the failure. These people become disheartened from the failure and think failure is imminent. They do not learn from past mistakes and move towards personal growth. The classic example of this is losing weight as a new year’s resolution. A mere temporary motivation inspires the person who is lucky to lose weight in January but no further progression towards achieving the goal occurs in later months. If you don’t set and start working towards a goal now, what makes you think you’ll be able to achieve it as a new year’s resolution? There are techniques such as SMART goal setting which I’ll discuss below that you can use to set and achieve goals than merely wishing a result based on temporary motivation that is to common around the new year’s period.

The sixth reason why people don’t set goals is they lack the inner desire to want something greater than what they currently have. For them, the ordinary or even sub-ordinary is sufficient. These people don’t believe they can reach or deserve success because society has conditioned them into thinking they are ordinary people and therefore must do ordinary things. It can also be caused by failure, criticism, and other reasons as to why people don’t set goals. “Concerning all acts of initiative and creation, there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too.” said William Murray, an influential climber of mountains during wars. “All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in ones favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance which no man could have dreamed would have come his way.”

Common Problems in Goal Setting

There are several common problems people frequently make in goal setting. These mistakes are dangerous enough to prevent accomplishing goals:

Vague – A vague goal is general and contains uncertainties. Set a specific goal. The more specific a goal is, the more likely you will achieve it. What exactly do you want to achieve? Maybe it is a more intimate relationship with your partner. Saying “my goal is to have more intimacy with my partner” is vague. Convert it to a more specific goal such as “In 30 days, I will able to come home from work then talk and cuddle with my partner for 30 minutes everyday”. This is a great goal as it is specific and measurable. You need to be specific and define exactly what you want.

Personal – A great leader knows in order to get his followers to accomplish tasks in a successful manner, he must inspire the followers to take on the goals as if it were their own. You will be far more likely to achieve a goal that is personal instead of it being somebody else’s.

Difficulty – Setting the correct level of a goal’s difficulty can be a hard task. If it is too hard you will not achieve the goal. If it is too easy, the goal is unchallenging, your journey to success will be slow, and you’ll lack a significant feeling of accomplishment. The correct level of a goal’s difficulty is one that is challenging yet achievable. It is energizing because you know it’s reachable.

Public – You can avoid several reasons why people do not set goals by not making your goals publicly known. While it can be good to let others know of your goals, if they are likely to knock you off your pedestal through criticism, then making your goal public is a mistake. However, letting the right person know of your goal will encourage you in many possible ways. It is a great motivator and can redirect you back on the path towards success. If you’re aiming to build more intimacy, letting the other person know and working with them towards this goal will increase the likelihood of it being achieved. However, let a co-worker know you aim to double your income within 1 year, and your goal could be shot-down with criticism about how bad the company is, the lack of opportunities in society, or the impossibility of increasing your income.

SMART Goal Setting

There are several techniques to setting and achieving personal goals with some complimenting each other meaning you can use multiple goal setting techniques to increase the likelihood of achieving your goal. One particular goal setting technique I like is called SMART goals from Paul Meyer’s “Attitude Is Everything”. SMART is an acronym that has minor variations:

Specific – as discussed earlier, a good goal is specific and not vague. By making a goal as specific as possible, a path towards success is evident, expectations are developed, and clarity is formed. Having a specific goal will give you excellent awareness and understanding of what’s required to achieve it. Develop an exact long term goal and then break it down into goals for 1 year, 6 months, 1 month, 1 week, and day-to-day activities.

Measurable – another common problem discussed earlier is people not setting measurable goals. How can your progress be tracked so you achieve the goal in a certain time period? Do your best to quantify your goal. Say your goal is to overcome shyness, set a measurable goal where you aim to meet and briefly converse with ten new people next week. The number “ten” and within “one” week makes this goal measurable and specific. You would be able to track your progress precisely in this example.

Attainable – an attainable goal is one where you have or can develop the necessary skills to achieve. You’ve heard the saying “You can achieve anything you want if you set your mind to it.” In other words, if you are able to align your attitude, ability, thoughts, and emotions towards your goal, then it is attainable. An attainable goal is within your potential.

Realistic – a realistic goal is one you believe is reachable. It is closely related to “Attainable”. Your goal is realistic if you truly believe it is attainable. An example of a realistic goal is one that has been achieved in the past by someone. It is one where the necessary resources and time is available. Realism will lead to belief, motivation, and action.

Tangible – being able to hear, see, feel, taste, or smell your goal will greatly increase success. Creating as many tangible forms of your goal has amazing affects. Too often goals are simply floating around in our mind. The first step you need to take is writing your goals down on paper. Writing your goals on paper creates tangibility. You want to use as many senses to awaken a powerful inner desire to hunt down those goals. Your emotions will intensify with tangible goals. Also, track your progress not based on an uncertain feeling of your development but on tangible changes. Look for solid evidence that you are progressing towards your goals.

What you get once setting a SMART goal is a map for success. You will have a challenging yet achievable personal goal. You will have techniques to continue pursuing your goal. You will develop the enthusiasm and drive to keep working. I sit here at the computer on Christmas Eve writing this article, not because I’m stupid. I am able to do this because I have SMART goals (and am going no where this Christmas ). Completely use this powerful goal setting technique with enthusiasm and you will come closer to your goals than ever before. Master goal setting and you will have the ultimate skill to get what you want.

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I'm creator of a highly praised program called "Communication Secrets of Powerful People" program. You can read about it here and order it here.