Setting goals - the route to motivational supremacy!

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I began setting goals back in June last year, and it has been a huge motivational tool for me since. There are loads of people out there who recommend goal setting and offer loads of advice. My main port of call when I began was Natalie Bacon (www.nataliebacon.com) whose blogs made me rethink how I did stuff and how I could push myself to do more. Ultimately it was to get my business off the ground, but it has been so  much more than that!

Since that time, I have read more and more about goal setting, mostly in a business sense, but this has helped me with using it in my everyday life too. Who wouldn’t want a chance to do something you had dreamed about just through planning the little steps that would make it happen?!

GOALS open up a new way of thinking about your life and what you want to achieve in it. I set myself goals from 7 different areas: career, health, finance, recreation, contribution, environment and personal. I set an overriding aim for each (something I wanted to achieve in my lifetime) and then split it into 3 to 5 goals for the year. It was about really focussing on the things that would push me into action towards that goal. Not all the goals are achievable in one year, and that’s ok. Most of mine are lifetime goals, but some are for the next year or two. However, all are achievable if I stay focussed on them and take steps towards them all the time.

Review your path...

Review every couple of months, and have a big final review at the end of the year. It means adapting and changing the goals if they need to be broken down further or if they have been achieved quickly and easily (Yes, I do have some I know I can achieve quickly. It gives me a boost of momentum to take the next step!). Having easily achievable goals pushes you on. If they were all hard work, then it would become a strain and all the motivation you felt when you wrote your first goal will be gone within the first month, so take care!

Plan the route...

Each goal needs a plan. Here you can break down the goal to smaller steps that will get you there. Now these steps can be as small as you like, but they need to move you forward. Plan to increase fitness by adding 1k to your run each 3 months, say. Tick them off as you achieve them. Give yourself a reward too. It all helps with the motivation!

Make it special...

I do all this in a beautiful clothbound notebook given to me by my mum, with the words “Use this to plan your future” written on the gift tag. Little did she know at that time that it would come in so handy! I have split the book down into sections and regularly review my goals. Last year’s goals are now soon to become next year’s goals, but they won’t go away until I fully achieve them.

Need some help to take your first steps? I have created some downloadable worksheets just for you! Use the links below to access then for FREE. I hope they will get you started thinking about what the future holds...

In the meantime, here are some thoughts taken from my own aims for each area so you get the idea and might be motivated to start your own goals planning:

Career: to build a business of my own and run it successfully. Now that is going to take time, so I am pacing myself with my goals for this, but each time I get distracted or lose the will to live because it’s not going how I want, I pick up my notebook and review my goals and plans. If they need a tweak because of a glitch, then I do it and re-plan.

Health: to feel fit and strong. This has been split down into goals for different fitness areas so that I continue to develop different skills and get a rounded experience for my body.

Finance: to be financially free from constraints.  Wow! This is a biggie!!!! Obviously it has a lot to do with my business, but also about saving money regularly and ensuring I’m not wasting it when it could be put aside for an early retirement (that’s the goal!!).

Recreation: to travel. We all need something we are going to enjoy in our lives and sometimes it seems a bit weird to be planning for it, but I can tell you now, I really focus on making sure I get to travel to places I haven’t been at least once a year. Mostly through saving in a dedicated account  but also remembering to shop through Avios for air miles and using supermarket reward vouchers for airmiles too. It all helps! Every time I review this one, I give myself a little reminder – that’s all it takes!

Contribution: to trek the Himalayas for charity. Yep, that’s the goal. I had hoped for it to be this year, but it’s looking like next. I am getting a group together to trek for our dear friend (my daughter’s best friend) who died of cancer last year. Date will be set by the end of this year!

Environment: now this is an aim I have struggled with.... it’s to do with my environment. I thought at the time that the important thing to me was getting a bigger garden and more space in the house – so move! But I like my home and at the moment it suits us. The garden isn’t huge and I’d like to be able to entertain more, but hey, I have a beach in the doorstep practically and it’s enough... for now. This aim is going on the back burner for a while.

Personal: to make time to enjoy my hobbies. I had a lot of time off last year, and yet until I started planning my time, my hobbies fell by the wayside and on top of that I wasn’t doing anything new! I now plan daily to do craft projects and drawing and starting my blog is a way to get me writing regularly (even if nobody reads it!).

That’s it. Some ideas that might spark something for you (if you are reading my blog! Thank you 😊) and set some wheels in motion for a more fulfilling decade to come. Now it's your turn. What challenges are you going to set yourself this year? Use my free downloadable worksheets to plan your journey:

Grab your Yearly Goal Setting Worksheet here!

And now for the 'Break It Down' sheets. Use these to plan your smaller steps:

Career Goal Breakdown Worksheet
How about your Finance Goals?
Your Health targets...
How will you improve your environment step-by-step?
Planning an ADVENTURE?!
Breakdown your contribution plans here.
Finally the most important one - YOU!

I'd love to hear how you used the sheets to motivate yourselves. Or do you have another way to share?  Let me know!  I'd love to hear them. There must be some very motivational and inspiring 50 somethings out there! Share your stories :)