My Favorite (Brian Tracy) Goal Setting Technique

Happy New Year!

How is the goal setting going?

If you are feeling a bit overwhelmed with setting goals in each area of your life, or if you are overwhelmed now that you have set goals in every area of your life and you are already wondering where you're going to get the time to do it all, then you're not alone.

I've been goal setting for years, and while I (and the rest of the world) may get pumped up by all the wonderful things I'm going to accomplish and all the changes I'm going to make, what I've learn is that there is only so much time. 

It's an old story, but if you want to know how much of the goal setting (and accomplishing) really goes, just drive by your local gym's parking lot during the first week of January and compare it to the first week in March. 

I once heard Brian Tracy talk about setting goals, and he recommended a technique that not only made a lot of sense, but that turns out to be so powerful, it is life changing...

He said what you do is make a list of your top ten goals for the year. Think about what's most important to you in the different areas of your life, and write down ten things. 

Next, prioritize that list so that the most important goal is number one. The way to determine which goal is number one is to ask yourself which of the ten would have the most impact on your life if you actually reached it.

Once you have your list prioritized, throw away the other nine goals and make a commitment to making that number one goal a reality in the coming twelve months. 

And once you've made that commitment, ask yourself what one action you can take today, right now, to begin reaching that goal. And once you have identified that, do it.

Before you go to sleep tonight, identify the one action you're going to take tomorrow, and then commit to taking it.

And then do this each and every day until you have accomplished that one most important goal.

When I heard this, my first thought was, "Yeah, but what about the other nine goals? What about balance and all that?" 

And that's when he explained that despite our best intentions, most goal setting starts strong, but by March we've given up on half of them, and by the summer most - if not all - have been abandoned. 

That's why identifying one goal, the most important and most impacting goal, is a better way to go. 

Think about how much your life will change (and the lives of your family members) if you reach your number one, most important goal.

If your goal is to become a top producer in your industry and double or triple your income, think about the impact that will have on your family! Think about buying that new home, or providing for your parents, or allowing your wife or spouse to stay home.

If your goal is to finally write that novel, think about how your life will change when you finally accomplish that this year! Think about the weight off your shoulders now that it is a reality rather than just another dream.

If your goal is to lose weight, get in shape, and get off your medication and live a longer, healthier life for yourself and your family, think about the long term rewards achieving that goal will bring you! (And think of the consequence if you don't.)

Whether or not you agree with Brian, I'm here to tell you that it's more impacting for you to hit the most important goal in your life than it is to set ten and not hit any of them...

And, hey, if you reach your number one goal by July, you can get to number two!

If you've set goals for years and not been very successful at following through, then why not take the pressure off yourself and try Brian's method? Take his 14 day goal setting challenge: 

In just 14 days, gain clarity on exactly what you want to achieve in every area of your life. Create a plan of action to start reaching your goals immediately from BrianTracy.com.

How bad would it be if you actually reached your most important goal in 2017?

6 Ways Structure Can Help You Achieve Peak Creative Performance

As a business coach for freelancers and creative professionals, I specialize in working with people who are in a place of transition in their career or creative business. While their unique circumstances vary, more often than not they share one key challenge; they're not fulfilling their creative and commercial potential. I've come to believe that a successful creative business is a blend of four things: 

(1) a great product or service 

(2) good strategy 

(3) hard work and 

(4) a willingness to be out of our comfort zone more often that not. 

Hey, if it were easy, everyone would do it, right?

But the creative business is a unique and sensitive animal. If it's all about strategy and objectives, we lose the creative magic and if it's all about creativity, nothing gets done. So, how can we find and maintain balance?

After working with creative professionals for 15 years, being business owner myself for eight and benefiting from the wisdom of mentors and coaches, I've come to the conclusion that success comes down to one thing:

Creating a solid structure, within which there is a lot of freedom.

If you're in that place of transition and don't know how to balance structure and freedom, I'd like to share 6 strategies that have worked for me: 

1) Know what you want from your business

If we don't know where we want to go, we can't create a plan to get there. Set aside some uninterrupted time to really think about what you want from your business. When we're honest with ourselves, the answer is sometimes very different from what we think we want. For example:

- Are you starting a business and want to build a roster of ideal clients? 
- Are you happy with your business and clients, but would like a few more? 
- Do you want to build a business that is flexible enough to work around your family's schedule? 
- Do you want to be known as a thought-leader in your industry? 

You can see how the strategy would be vastly different for each of these businesses, so it's important to get clear from the outset. 

2) Write down everything you need to do to achieve your goal

Doing a brain dump is a great way to get all of your ideas out of your head and into one place. I love the mind-map method. It's simple, effective and perfect for visual types. Here's how you do it:

Take a piece of paper and put your main topic, e.g. your business name, at the center. As thoughts come to mind, draw branches from the main topic and write down that thought or objective (use as few words as possible). You can create sub-branches for additional thoughts or action steps. 

I love Goggle for creating mind maps that look pretty too! 

3) Prioritize and calendarize 

(I know it's not a word, but it should be!) 
Take your mind map and number your goals by priority. Start with number one, let's use Networking as the example, and list action steps you need to take. They night be: 

 
(a) Research BNI and visit one chapter this month  

  (b) Become a member of Freelancer's Union and attend one event this month 

   (c) Research local AIGA chapter

Now enter those action steps into your calendar. Once it's in the calendar it moves from a "should" to a done deal. Now you're free to do something else. 

4) Bundle your to-do's

Have you ever ended your day feeling exhausted and frustrated because you ran around like a headless chicken, without much to show for it? I have and it sucks.
I now bundle similar tasks together and take care of them in one sitting. I set Friday aside for book keeping and general admin. Monday is dedicated to content development and marketing and I cluster my coaching sessions on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday so that I can stay in the zone and be as present as I can. Clustering your efforts also helps you balance "doing" and "creating". 

5) Work with your natural rhythms

It's no coincidence that my writing/content work is slated for Monday when I'm fresh and my boring admin is on Friday, when I'm spent. I go for an early morning run on one of my coaching days, knowing that I will benefit the most from the boost of energy and clarity it provides. 

6) Make time to play and create

Do you deny yourself downtime because you feel guilty that you're not being "productive?" I struggle with this and, while we may think of it as a noble trait, it's really not. The fact is, we need time to dream, play and create. It's what gives us the magic, the inspiration and energy we need to do all of the above steps. Down time should be as much of a priority as everything else. So put THAT in your calendar and stick to it!

The 7 Most Popular Life Goals And How You Can Achieve Them

If I were to ask you what your number one goal is right now, I bet it would be in this list.

1. I want to write a book  

2. I want to start a business  

3. I want to be healthier  

4. I want to travel  

5. I want to make money doing something I love 
6. I want to do something positive for the world/volunteer.  

7. I want to reduce my stress (money worries, relationship worries, etc) 

This is a pretty ambitious list of things to want to do. Do you see yourself here? And if so, what have you been doing to try and achieve one or more of these?

Dreaming and doing are two different things. If you've been dreaming of a goal for weeks, months or even years now, here are some simple ways to make any of your goals come true. 

Life Goal #1: I want to write a book

In order to write a 50,000 word book in 30 days, you'll have to write 1,667 words per day. Sound like a daunting task? Stretch it out into a three month or six month process, and the numbers drop to 556 or 278 words per day respectively.

The problem isn't in creating the book; its usually in finding the time to do it. When you look at it in a slightly different format - I'll write my book in six months - it gives you a new perspective. If you normally get up at 7 in the mornings, get up at 6 and dedicate that hour to writing your 278 words. While the first few days might be extremely difficult to get your 278 words out, by the time you're several weeks into the project, 278 words will fall out in a few minutes time.

You can also dedicate time to your new found craft to make things easier. There are many writing and self-publishing groups online and in your local area. Consider joining a group like National Novel Writing Month to keep you on track with your writing. Or read one of the many books on publishing your own book - try APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur - How To Publish a Book 

Life Goal #2: I want to start a business

Starting a business has never been easier. It doesn't take a lot of time. It doesn't take a lot of money. And it no longer takes a lot of resources. If you have a laptop and Internet connection, you can set up a portable business from just about anywhere. In the book Laptops Millionaire it provides many ways to turn ideas into something we can do from our kitchen table, no matter what city our kitchen table is currently located in.

The problem with setting up a new business is overwhelm. If you've been thinking about starting up your own business for a while now, what's holding you back? Chances are it's the complexity of your goals. Instead of saying "I'm starting up a business", change it to something more manageable, such as "I'm printing up business cards today". All of a sudden you can quickly see your goals fall into place, just by shrinking up the requirements you think about every day. 

Life Goal #3: I want to be healthier

Why doesn't a diet work? Because you're not going to the root of the problem. Ask anyone on a diet how they are doing, and you'll start hearing a list of "I can'ts". I can't have this. I can't do that. A brain on "can't" will never make it.

When I decided to go vegetarian, I never once thought of all the things I couldn't eat. Instead, I focused on the delicious foods I got to eat. When I reduced the amount of sugar I take in to almost nothing, I never looked at sweets longingly. Instead, I chose to eat things I knew were healthy and made me feel better both inside and out.

In order to be healthier, you have to learn to turn your can'ts into cans. Commit to something you believe in - becoming vegetarian for instance - and do everything you can to turn that into a lifestyle. Buy a vegetarian cookbook - The Happy Herbivore is one of my favorites - and pick out one recipe for every day of the week. Add those ingredients to your shopping list, and make the time to incorporate them into your meal planning. 

Life Goal #4: I want to travel

What does travel mean to you? Do you like to get away for the weekend? Or does around the world travel, 365 days of the year fit more into your plans?

One of the best ways we've found to get more out of our travel bucks is to rent apartments and homes instead of staying in a hotel. Last year we spent six weeks in Spain and Italy, and rented two bedroom apartments in every city we visited. We had beautiful kitchens and used them almost daily for breakfast, lunch and dinners. We packed picnics when we went sightseeing for the day, and only rarely took in fancy restaurants. I guarantee we saved hundreds of dollars this way (and its healthier too) - which meant we could easily boost our travel time to six weeks on the savings. HomeAway and Vacation Rentals are two great resources for you to find cute vacation rentals right in the heart of everything.

Life Goal #5: I want to make money doing something I love

Let's face it, we all get sick of "life" on occasion. But if you find yourself sick of your day job every single day, it may be time to re-evaluate what makes you happy.

If you are one of the people that exists at work because you don't know what else to do, and a "big idea" has never hit your consciousness, it may be time to focus in on what will make you happy  right now.

Looking for one great idea puts too high of expectations on your lifestyle. Instead, simplify it and look at what you enjoy today and what you can see yourself doing right now. Focus in on the present, not what is feasible a decade or more into the future. By turning to who you are today and what's possible with your knowledge right now, its easier to focus in on things that are possible.

Life is full of opportunity. You just have to focus on what's possible right now in the present.

Life Goal #6: I want to do something positive for the world/volunteer

Sometimes a change of scenery is all you need to make you look at the world a little differently. Why not volunteer? You can take the traditional road and volunteer for something right in your own community, like Habitat for Humanity. Or combine your volunteering with a travel opportunity with organizations like Heifer International.

Volunteering can quickly set you up for finding a passion in your life. From there you may decide to help others set up their own life's purpose with places like Kiva. Or fund your own ideas with a place like Kickstarter. 

Life Goal #7: I want to reduce my stress (money worries, relationship worries, etc)

Think stress has to be a part of your life? Think again. Get to the root of the problem and eliminate it.

Stress doesn't go away without working at it. Stress is simply an outward expression of your reaction to something going on in your life. And if you don't change the pattern, it will continue to fester and grow until it impacts your life and/or your health.

You can start by taking control over your health. Meditation is a great way to put everything else aside and increase the peace you feel from the inside out.

Have specific issues going on in your life right now that you want to change? Don't go it alone. Sometimes an outside perspective can help you see things in an "a-ha" way. I've helped hundreds of people through my coaching programs. Being able to see things in a new light, and change your approach can truly put you on an entirely new path.

Do you see yourself in any of the above? Quit dreaming about it and just do it.

The Importance of Goal Setting

Goal setting is the first step toward successful goal achievement. It marks your first point toward success. It is what put your life into real action mode. Without this step, the other steps of goal achievement cannot take place.


Here are a few reasons why goal-setting is very important. 

Clarifies Your End Vision
Without setting a goal, you will be driving in a road where you are not sure where to go. It also gives you a clear vision of what you really want. Setting a goal would help you clarify what you really aiming for. It wouldn't be good to have an ambiguous goal for you will surely be confused. 

Look for the right words to express your goals. This way, you will know what truly excites and motivates you.


Drives You Forward
Your goals are a representation of your inner desires - desires which motivate you in life. The point when you set goals marks one the points when you are most connected with your source of motivation. It is when your motivation is at its peak. Having goals at your side serve as constant reminders of your motivational sources. They are the fuel which drive you forward and keep you going when the going gets tough.

Gives You Focus

Goals can help a person stay focused and maintain motivation to maintain certain activities required to achieve a goal, such as exercising to lose weight or saving money to buy a certain item. Goals can help direct behavior and define a person's priorities, report educators at the University of Illinois Department of Disability and Human Development. Setting goals breaks down the process needed to achieve a specific outcome.

Forces You To Work on your Action Plan

Having a goal enables you to focus your energies on devising ways to achieve it. When someone makes a decision and begins focusing on achieving a specific goal (and even better in a specific period of time), the powerful subconscious mind goes to work and begins playing with ideas and developing strategies of various ways to bring about the successful completion of the goal. When you set yourself a goal both your conscious and subconscious start working on it and begin to develop an action plan. You will find you begin asking yourself questions about what needs to be done to enable you to reach your goal. You may find yourselves coming up with amazing ideas and solutions to problems or obstacles that have been in the way of achieving your goal. Solutions and ideas that you are surprised you ever thought of may start popping into your mind. Our subconscious is an extremely powerful tool.

Reminds You of Priorities

You will not stray away anywhere if you have set a goal for it can surely remind you of what needs to be done. Doing your priorities is a sure way to reach your goals but of course, you have to know what those priorities are. You can write them down on a post it so that you can be reminded anytime.

Encourages You To Always Do Your Best

Sometimes, you think that you won't be able to do something. But when it is already there, you discovered that you can actually do it because you were motivated to attain your goal. Setting goals can also let you go beyond the limits that you already know and be a better, stronger person. You can even discover other skills along the way.

Gives You Self-fulfillment

For sure, when you are able to set goals and attain them, you will feel fulfilled and this will even fuel you more to do better in life. You will also feel happy that you were able to do something valuable in life and that you have discovered new things about yourself due to reaching a certain goal. Having the feeling of fulfilment can surely make you a happy person leading to better work attitudes and perspective in life.

Be Your Very Best With These Personal Development Tips

Each person is unique, and so personal development should be customized to your way of life. With that being said, you need to try and learn as much information as possible to help you in your personal development. The below article can assist you in this regard because it contains a variety of tips that can be used for improving yourself.

Many people often have goals that are too broad, when they are trying to grow through personal development. Create a specific goal for yourself. Well defined goals will garner targeted results. 

Before you begin working on your personal development, you first need to understand your place in the universe. The more humble you are, realizing that there is room for growth, the more willing you are to gain knowledge. Once this idea gets instilled in your mind, you will want to know, understand and learn new things, therefore, improving yourself.


Do you consume more alcohol than you should? Do you make a habit of smoking or engaging in other harmful vices? 

The body is considered a temple, and it needs to be treated with care and respect. Try getting rid of your bad habits; it can be important to making your life better. Take a look at your overall life and the habits you engage in to figure out if there is something you can eliminate.


A positive attitude can be a powerful way to grow your spiritual nature. Living your life with a poor attitude will only attract more of the same to your life. Instead, be "pragmatically positive." This is the idea that a positive attitude will yield instrumental gain.


Someone might have told you that listening skills are just as essential as speaking skills. This truth applies even more to those who are making a concentrated effort to develop themselves on a personal level. 

Don't just listen to other people. Listen to yourself. You will have a hard time finding what your goals are if you are not listening to yourself.


One important aspect of personal development is deciding what you want out of life. You can plan more effectively and enjoy a more accurate perspective on personal development when you have set long-term goals.


To be an effective leader, you must combine humility with power. You can redirect people in a gentle way, and keep in mind that it is best to lead by example. Being a great leader requires that you uphold a standard of integrity and values that others are proud to follow, no matter what the capacity is in which you lead.

If you want to grow and change, you have to consciously make the choice to change. Accepting change will allow you to grow on your path to self development.

You should always want a higher level of self restraint when working hard for personal development. Learn to develop a strong sense of self control. Overcome your body's desire to overindulge in pleasure. Eating is uncomfortable and unhealthy when it becomes overeating; lustful or drunken behavior will harm your body as well. 

Being able to control your desires and restrain your urges will keep you from harming your mind and your body.


If you experience anxiety in social situations, ask a friend to join you at the movie theater. This activity will force you to be around others, but you do not have to talk to them very much, which will minimize your discomfort. This will help get you used to being in the same vicinity with lots of different people.

There are things you can do throughout the day to accomplish more work while at your job. This can be achieved by taking frequent breaks from work. This might sound counterproductive, but breaks allow you to refocus and re-energize, allowing you to return and work more efficiently.


Try to be content with developing and enhancing your existing strengths. We need all kinds of people in the world, because diversity helps us to stay strong. Don't fret talents you have not yet developed, and spend your time building off of the skill set you have already mastered or been blessed with. 

One of the most important elements of personal development is taking proper care of your health. When you are healthy, you feel better and have more energy. You can think more clearly, and even save time and money, by not having to go to the doctor on a regular basis. 

Make a concerted effort to adopt healthy practices.


As you can see, personal development is simpler than it looks. By breaking your personal development process into small, manageable goals, you'll find yourself closer to your goals by the end of every day. You'll be able to practice what you're seeking to adopt as habit, and you'll increase your own morale to continue. These tips are only a springboard, it's up to you to build a better life.