Your Goals Define Who You Are

“The trouble with not having a goal is that you can spend your life running up and down the field and never score.”

Bill Copeland

     Who are you? Wait don’t answer that just yet. You probably are ready to lay down the law and explain exactly who you are but it isn’t necessary. You know who you are and anyone else’s opinion really doesn’t matter. What really matters at this moment is what you are thinking. You have an opinion on whom you are and you own it. The real question that really needs to be answered is how do you measure yourself compared to who you say you are? Are you easy on yourself and just accept your answer to be true because that’s who you say you are? In this case evidence doesn’t matter. If you say you are a great husband, hey you are a great husband. It really doesn’t matter what your spouse thinks. It really doesn’t matter what your actions say. You are a great husband. On the other hand you might hold yourself to a higher standard by letting the evidence answer the question of who you are. If that is a case you are a great husband because you treat your spouse with respect. The evidence of that can be seen in how you communicate with your spouse. You are a great husband because of the importance you find in keeping your spouse happy. The evidence of that can be seen by the actions you take solely for your spouse’s happiness and the selflessness that accompanies those actions. However the only way to guarantee that the evidence is depicting you in the correct way is to set goals on how you want to live. How you live is the best evidence of who you are. To maximize your life who you are should be aspirational. Never settle for mediocracy in life. Set aspirational goals to live your dream. Along your journey to achieve those dreams you will find plenty of evidence to see who you really are.

     All of us have goals. Some are assumed and some are well stated. When you get hired on a job it is assumed that your goal is to give your best effort. You were hired based on that assumption. When you go on a vacation it is assumed you are going to have a good time and enjoy yourself. The whole purpose of going on vacation is to step away from work and do something just for you. When you purchase a new vehicle it is assumed you are going to take the proper actions to maintain the operability of your new ride. You purchased the car to drive it and it takes maintenance to make sure it is available to drive. Assumptions are common but they leave room for error.

Well-stated Goals

     Well-stated goals lead to better chance for success. A well-stated goal when you get hired is that in 90 days you will have demonstrated your worth to your team by learning the business and successfully accomplishing at least one appraisal worthy achievement. A well-stated goal when you go on vacation is that you will only allow for 5 minutes per day of any type of frustration throughout the duration of the vacation. A well-stated goal for your new vehicle is to do all recommended maintenance within plus or minus 50 miles or 5 days within the prescribed maintenance schedule. As you can see a well-stated goal can be tracked. Those measurements will help you see evidence of achieving that goal and getting the results that you desire.

   To get the life you desire you need to make sure you set goals in all areas of life. Neglecting one or several important areas of life could lead to unexpected unhappiness. You could be so focused on achieving a goal that when you do achieve it you find yourself quickly unsatisfied because you neglected other areas of your life. You could be so focused on your career goals that you achieve them but have no one to share them with because you neglected your relationship goals. Why become the CEO of your company if you can’t share it with your friends and family? You could be so focused on your fitness goals that you spend more than you to earn just to achieve it. What good is it to have 3% body fat and be in $20,000 in debt because of it? You could be so focused on your education that you forget the importance of rest and renewal to your health. What good is it to have a doctorate in philosophy and be too tired to work because you neglected your health to achieve it? You may never achieve full balance in all areas of life at the same time but you need goals in all the areas to keep you from forgetting them totally.

6 Areas to Achieve Balance

   There are plenty of suggested areas in life to set goals based on experts around the world. To keep things simple we will use the 6 areas suggested by destination innovation. Zig Ziglar has 7 areas if you are interested call the wheel of life and if you want to go either further Travis Robertson suggests 9 areas. The 6 areas are Career, Relationships, Health, Wealth, Personal Development and Social Life. Set a goal in all of those areas and you will have a well-rounded successful life. When setting your goals a best practice is to use the SMART model. Set a goal that is specific, measureable, achievable, realist and time bound. Also remember the power of writing the goal down. Don’t just think of the goal. Write it down to let your subconscious mind know that you are serious about achieving it.

   If you need help to get your creative juices flowing here are some examples of goals in all 6 areas.

• Career goal – Create an innovation model in your current role that leads to you obtaining a role as an innovation leader paying you 30% more than you are currently making by the summer of 2019.
• Relationship goal – For the next 18 months spend scheduled quality time with at least one category of the most important people in your life. Do not miss a month and include your closest friends, your spouse, your children, your parents, your siblings, your colleagues and new friends.
• Health goal – Complete 2 full rounds of the 15 week Metabolic Bodyweight Blasters without missing any of the scheduled workouts in the next 9 months.
• Wealth goal – Generate a sustained extra $10,000 a month of income by developing an online business that has processes that allow you to continue to work your full time job at the same time.
• Personal Development goal – Successfully speak to a group of over 100 people telling them your story to provide inspiration on how they too can Live the Dream by August 1, 2018.
• Social Life goal – Meet at least 6 new friends at a social event and meet them again a second time at an event of their choice by December 31, 2018.

You may notice that many of these goals may not seem aspirational enough to you. For example an aspirational health goal would be to have 6% body fat. However, you must be careful when setting goals. You can have the goal of 6% body fat but you will need to do a lot of work to get there. That is where the smaller goals come in to play. As you complete one small goal after another you get closer to that aspirational goal. Don’t put unnecessary pressure on yourself. Identify some small goals, achieve them and set some more. That is the best way to get to whatever body fat percentage you desire.

     I love the phrase Live the Dream. A dream is a premonition of possible things to come. We all will live some dream because none of us know exactly what is to come. There are so many possibilities on how your life can turn out. Luckily you have the ability to identify your dreams and then take the necessary actions to make those dreams a reality. You can dream and then you can live that dream. In order to live the dream you desire you must set goals and then achieve them. Luckily you are a well-rounded beautiful individual whose life is defined by many different areas. This gives you the opportunity to set goals in many areas to achieve that well-rounded successful life. Take the time to define your goals so you can then go out and achieve them. Take the necessary actions it will take for you to Live the Dream. As always I wish you the best and remind you to enjoy the journey.

With Gratitude,

Drew