SECRETS TO GOAL-SETTING SUCCESS
by Lynn Colwell
A client told me that she had sat with an idea for a novel for ten years, but life kept getting in the way of her writing. She never seemed to find the time, and if she did carve out a sliver for herself, she couldn’t concentrate or she would be interrupted or the phone would ring with a mini-crisis that needed to be attended to. She knew she could write, but her goal of turning out the novel seemed only a pipe dream.
First, we defined her goal a little more clearly. She decided that one year would be a reasonable time frame for writing the book.
It’s obviously not enough just to have a goal. So next, we looked at what I call the secrets to goal setting success. Prior to committing to any serious goal, we need to understand what going for it really means to us and whether we are willing to “pay the price.”
We spent some time viewing her goal from various aspects and made sure she had every tool necessary for success. Once she asked herself a lot of questions around the goal and really thought it through, she realized that to be she would need to make time time, get support from her husband and take very small steps, like writing for only 15 minutes a day in the beginning. She asked her husband for help and secured his buy-in. Then she decided to write for 15 minutes six days a week. She also realized that holidays could be her downfall, so she planned to take a laptop and write at least fifteen minutes a day even when on vacation. After a couple of months, she was well on her way.
If you have a goal, but like my client, you’re stuck before you begin, you might want to think about some of the following:
1. How badly do you want the goal? Inherent in this question is the willingness to sacrifice something—time, money, sleep etc. in order to get it. If you’re not willing to give up something in order to move forward, you’ll most likely stay stuck.
2. Learn from the past. Have you ever met a goal before in your life? If so, how did you accomplish it? Each of us brings unique elements to our goal setting. Don’t feel you have to reinvent the wheel. Use your personal strengths.
3. Know your enemy. This means that there will be roadblocks on the way to meeting any goal. Prepare for them. Know what will trip you up and what you’ll do about that.
4. Learn from others. If you know other people who have faced the same situation as you, find out how they overcame and succeeded. Read, talk, but once you’ve got some ideas, begin!
5. Take baby steps. If you do nothing else, do this. Most people will set a huge goal, then want to get there immediately. Instead of writing 15 minutes a day, they will assign themselves the responsibility to write for two hours. When that proves impossible, they give up. I’ve had clients who have started with five minutes a day. Once they do that, ten, then twenty, then more become easy. Baby steps will get you there eventually.
6. Reward yourself. Too many of us expect that when we reach our goal, i.e. having that novel published, we then will be happy and fulfilled. We don’t allow ourselves joy in accomplishing the small steps. We don’t take pride along the road. But when we do, the process becomes as important as the outcome. And regardless of when or even whether we accomplish the goal, we enjoy the journey.
7. Get support. My client realized that she could not give up what she needed to without the support of her husband. She asked him to watch her girls for 15 minutes (later a half hour) in the evening so she could write. He was so happy that she had decided to do something about writing the novel rather than talk about it, that he readily agreed. If you have a friend who can support you, ask for it.
8 . Do it your way. There is no one right way to accomplish what you want in life. Some people might argue, for instance, that even the word “goal,” should not be used and that it should be replaced with “intention.” I say, whatever works for you is terrific. Use some of these ideas or none. But whatever you do, know that reaching your writing goals is up to you. Use some of your creativity to figure out how to make that happen.
(c) 2006, Lynn Colwell
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