“Without goals and plans to reach them, you are like a ship that has set sail with no destination.”
– Fitzhugh Dodson
This article is part 1 of a 4 part series about setting and achieving goals. This series is for you if you are looking to make some great changes in your life for the better.
I took the idea of dream weaving from Paul Chek. My friend John Tsafos introduced me to this one night when I was feeling particularly frustrated with my career. Since then I took a long hard look at my life and came up with a new game plan. I’ve got to say that this is an incredibly powerful tool and I’m hoping you all will find the same.
I’ll admit I felt a bit lost after college and was banging around here and there trying to figure out what to do. It’s frustrating. Taking some time to garner your thoughts about where you want to be in your life can be extremely powerful and motivating.
Now before you start achieving goals you’ve got to figure out what you want with your life. Set aside a time to have a date with yourself. Give yourself one hour where you can completely devote your energy to this task. In this process you’ll be working backwards. Start with the mental image of the ideal person and life you desire to have. Some great questions to ask yourself are:
What type of person do I want to be?
Where do I see myself most happy in 5, 10 or 20 years?
Where is my ideal living place and career?
What do I want to accomplish with my life?
Get excited with your thoughts. It should be fun to think about living out your dreams. If you’re having trouble finding the motivation to start try reading this post I wrote HERE.
Here are a few things that I came up with during my session.
1. I want to work in a field that I not only had a great passion for but was something where I was helping people and building value in their lives.
2. I wanted to be able to influence people positively through one on one direct communication, speaking and writing.
3. I want to be successful in my sports. At the time I was deep into strongman competition.
4. I want free time to be able to enjoy life outside of my career.
5. I want to be a public figure who teaches, motivates and empowers others with a positive message. I also want to be respected for this on a global level.
6. I want to be confident and proud of who I am both in my own thoughts and actions.
Try to really put it all out there. You can worry about fine tuning things later but for now be creative. What would really give you a deep sense of peace, happiness and personal fulfillment? Are your goals more centered around self improvement? Do you want more confidence? Do you want to be a champion in your sport, or just stay healthy and live a long and influential life? Is family of the utmost importance to you?
Make sure your ideas are an honest reflection of where you want to be. We want to make sure we’re taking steps into the right direction. Once again, feel free to think big. You’ve got one life to live and looking back on the things you wish you could have accomplished later in life is not a position anyone wants to be in.
Alright, hopefully you’ve got some good thoughts down on paper. The next step is forming those thoughts into specific goals. I’ll explain this further in my next post of the series.