{"id":366,"date":"2012-01-06T17:43:29","date_gmt":"2012-01-06T17:43:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/?p=366"},"modified":"2012-01-06T17:43:29","modified_gmt":"2012-01-06T17:43:29","slug":"setting-goals-for-a-new-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/?p=366","title":{"rendered":"SETTING GOALS FOR A NEW YEAR"},"content":{"rendered":"
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It’s that time of year again.\u00a0 The ball has fallen.\u00a0 The decorations have been taken down.\u00a0 The confetti has been swept up.\u00a0 It’s time to face the reality of a new year\u00a0 with the clean slate upon which each of us will write the story of what we do in the next 365 days.<\/p>\n

I like watching old movies and there is a scene in a movie where the captain of a ship instructs his navigator to “plot a course thataway<\/em>“.\u00a0 Can you imagine the thoughts that must have gone through that poor navigator’s mind?\u00a0 “Thataway?\u00a0 Whichaway?” <\/em><\/p>\n

The navigator in our<\/span> minds needs to know where we<\/span> want to go and what we must do to get there.\u00a0 He\/She needs goals.\u00a0 So, in order to give your mental navigator the guidance needed, let’s take a few minutes to focus on goal setting and what helps us set goals that take us where we want to go.\u00a0 What are the characteristics of goals that truly take us to the destinations we want to reach?\u00a0 Goals should be …<\/p>\n

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  • Written down and made public –<\/strong> a quick search of the internet will yield a multitude of websites designed to help us set goals.\u00a0 Some tell us to write them down on a piece of paper.\u00a0 Others instruct us to record them in a page on-line.\u00a0 Still others will suggest that we post them on one or more of our social media pages.\u00a0 Whichever method we choose, the important thing is that we have them written down someplace so that we can see them regularly.\u00a0 Making them public doesn’t necessarily mean that they must be posted to social media; but, it is important that others know about them and will hold us accountable for them.<\/li>\n
  • Believable –<\/strong> for a goal to truly motivate us, we have to believe that we can achieve it.\u00a0 W. Clement Stone wrote that, “Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve”<\/em>.\u00a0 To believe, we must be able to visualize ourselves reaching the goal and feeling the satisfaction that will come with the achievement.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    I once knew an agency manager named Ray who measured his own success by the number of individuals that he recruited, trained, developed, and promoted into leadership positions in the company he worked for.\u00a0 One day, he asked a young man what his ultimate career goal was.\u00a0 “To become an agency manager and replace you”<\/em> was the young man’s answer.\u00a0 While some would have thought that to be an arrogant and presumptuous answer from someone just entering into a career, Ray grinned and invited the young man to come into his office and sit in his chair.\u00a0 Then, Ray took the young man’s picture while he was sitting in that chair, handed it to him, and told him to put that picture on the bathroom mirror where he would see it every morning while he was shaving.\u00a0 “That will remind you, everyday, why you are getting up and working hard”<\/em>, Ray told him.\u00a0 He made it possible for that young man to literally see himself reaching the goal that he had set for himself.<\/p>\n

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    • Specific –<\/strong> Goals that are vague (“thataway”<\/em>) aren’t really goals.\u00a0 They are vague suggestions that provide no ultimate end point.\u00a0 One person says, “This year, I’m going to lose weight”<\/em>.\u00a0 Another person says, This year, I’m going to lose 25 pounds”.<\/em> Who do you think will be more likely to attain the goal?\u00a0 Specific goals require that specific actions be taken.\u00a0 “To lose 25 pounds, I’m going to stop taking “seconds” at dinner; skip desserts; and, walk for 30 minutes every evening”<\/em>.<\/li>\n
    • Measurable –<\/strong> For a goal to truly motivate us, we have to be able to see how we’re progressing toward it and to know when we’ve reached it.\u00a0 Let’s assume that the goal is to create an emergency fund that has 2 months of actual living expenses in it.\u00a0 Since we know that our basic living expenses are $2,000 each month, we know that we need $4,000 in the fund.\u00a0 Each month, we deposit $167 into the account and, when we get our bank statement, we can see the balance increasing by not only the deposits we make but by the addition of interest as well.\u00a0 Viewing the increasing balance each month allows us to measure our progress toward reaching the goal.<\/li>\n
    • Challenging –<\/strong> Our goals need to be big enough to make us stretch.\u00a0 Doing just enough to get by may keep our heads above water, but it won’t help us grow.\u00a0 The sales person who knows that by doing the same thing every year he can reach his\/her quota won’t grow and advance.\u00a0 But, the sales person who challenges himself\/herself to increase sales by an amount that requires a bit more effort is the person who rises to the top of the organization; both in terms of professional responsibilities and financially.<\/li>\n
    • Inspirational –<\/strong> As the great motivational speaker Jim Rohn once suggested, setting the goal of earning enough to pay our bills may be a goal, but it seldom inspires anyone.\u00a0 Goals that inspire us to “go the extra mile”<\/em> lead us to greatness.<\/li>\n
    • Have deadlines –<\/strong> Ray, the agency manager referred to above, told everyone that “goals are simply dreams with deadlines”<\/em>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      “Someday”<\/em> is not a deadline.\u00a0 “Someday”<\/em> is a dream … an illusion … a mirage that may appear to be leading us somewhere we want to go; but, is really leading us to nowhere.\u00a0 When the young man above told Ray that his goal was to be an agency manager and replace Ray, he was told to set a deadline … when was this going to happen?<\/p>\n

      The young man set a date … exactly five years from the date on which he was hired.\u00a0 Did he replace his mentor?\u00a0 No.\u00a0 But, exactly three years after the date on which he was hired, he was appointed as the agency manager for an agency that was struggling.\u00a0 He’d reached his goal of agency management; and, somewhere, I believe that there is a picture of him sitting in a chair just like Ray’s.<\/p>\n

      If the story of this new year in your life is to have a happy and satisfactory ending, the course you plot will be guided by the goals you have set.\u00a0 If you have not already done so, today would be a good day to begin writing down your goals.\u00a0 Some should be long-term goals (where you ultimately want to end up) and some should be short-term goals.\u00a0 There will be professional (career) goals and there will be personal goals.\u00a0 Some of the goals will be big goals and some will be small goals.<\/p>\n

      Short-term goals may be things that you want to accomplish within the next week; the next month; the next year.\u00a0 Short-term goals may be way stations on the road toward your long-term goals.<\/p>\n

      Professional goals empower us to grow within our chosen vocations.\u00a0 Personal goals enable us to become better spouses … better parents … better people.<\/p>\n

      Big goals could be long-term goals but are not required to be long-term.\u00a0 Small goals are little things that help us feel we are making progress.\u00a0 Don’t underestimate the importance of these small goals.\u00a0 There is something incredibly satisfying and motivating about being able to go down our list of goals making check marks as we say “got it … got it … got it”.\u00a0 The more often we are able to say “got it”, the more motivated and inspired we become to continue working toward the attainment of the goals still unchecked.<\/p>\n

      One year from today, each of us will look back at what we have accomplished.\u00a0 Will we like what we see; or, will we look back with regret for what might have been?\u00a0 Only you can determine what you will see.<\/p>\n

      Make 2012 your best year yet!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      It’s that time of year again.\u00a0 The ball has fallen.\u00a0 The decorations have been taken down.\u00a0 The confetti has been swept up.\u00a0 It’s time to face the reality of a new year\u00a0 with the clean slate upon which each of us will write the story of what we do in the next 365 days. I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[48,35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-goal-setting","category-personal-finances-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=366"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":368,"href":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366\/revisions\/368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eagleoneresources.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}