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Goal Setting to Goal Getting

 
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PostPosted: Dec Sun 17, 2006 2:17 pm    Post subject: Goal Setting to Goal Getting Reply with quote

Goal Setting to Goal Getting

Accomplishment of worthy goals and fulfillment of our purpose – if we had to make a short list of fundamentally important things we want to do in our lifetime, these two would likely make it onto everyone's list. How many people do you know who are in Network Marketing for precisely these reasons? As most of us know from experience, though, setting a goal is one thing -- achieving it can be quite another. When you first got started, you probably began with a goal for sponsoring a certain number of people in your first 90 days, or a target group volume you wanted to achieve by a specific date. If you didn't reach your goal, you're not alone.

Achieving a goal is like opening a combination lock – you need the correct numbers in the correct right-left-right sequence. There are thousands of possible combinations. If you are aware of the numbers but the sequence is off, your efforts will prove futile. In this article, I'm going to share with you the correct combination that opens the lock of achievement. Each of the following 11 keys is part of the combination; each seamlessly integrates with the other ten, and each one counts! You will be hard pressed to find a goal that does not require each of these. Not all goals are equal, but all goals contain the same elements.

1) Be Decisive!
Success is the intentional, premeditated use of choice and decision. Unless you choose with certainty what it is you want, you accept table scraps by default. The difference between what one person and another achieves depends more on goal choices than abilities. The profound differences between successful people and others are the goals they choose to pursue. Individuals with similar talents, intelligence, and abilities will achieve different results because they select and pursue different goals. Each decision affects what you become. We form our decisions and our decisions form us. There is no escaping this; the smallest choices are important because over time their cumulative effect is enormous. The nature and direction of your life change the instant you decide what goals you want to pursue.

Once you make a decision, you start down a path to a new destination. At the moment the decision is made, your decision to pursue a goal alters what you are becoming. Just one spin of the lock's dial – a single choice – can alter your life and legacy, so establish the best goals you can. Goals are the seeds of success; you become only what you plant. The quality of your harvest is a direct reflection of the quality of your seeds – your decisions! And remember – a decision is never made only once. A decision to lose weight and keep it off must be remade every time you feel hungry. A decision to succeed in Network Marketing must be remade each time you feel like putting off a phone call. This is where the second element comes into the picture....

2) Stay Focused!
Focus is the glue that holds a goal in place – an insurance policy on your journey to success. If you have a great goal or idea but no focus, your goal or idea will remain unrealized. Focus creates a powerful force I like to call goal power. The moment you focus on a goal, your goal becomes a magnet, pulling you and all your resources toward it. The more focused your energies, the more power you generate. There is a seismic shift in performance that takes place when you move from decision to focus. If you're not focused on your business, consider your current goals – is it important to you to reach them? When your goals create for you both the perception and reality of importance, you engage in a single-minded pursuit. You focus automatically. The power of focus lies in its ability to inspire purposeful action, but to leverage focus, you'll need a pen and a pad of paper....

3) Write Down Your Goals!
Like umbrellas and pens, unwritten goals almost always get lost. Written goals are catalysts, transforming agents for success and achievement. You will achieve far greater and more consistent results when you take the time to write down your goals. Writing goals sets off a chain of events that allows you and others to see and evaluate your goals so that you can develop plans to achieve them. Goals kept only in your mind have an uncanny way of remaining figments of your imagination. The odds are against you ever acting upon them. Goals not written down fall victim to the "out of sight, out of mind" phenomenon!

We've all had the experience of going to the supermarket with a "mental list" of stuff to get. Yet we inevitably return home without one or more desired items. A simple written list would have been the perfect solution. Your goals work the same way. If you don't write them down, most of the time you'll forget them. Writing challenges you to think clearly – to articulate. The result is that by writing your goals, you take a step toward achieving them. It is an essential piece of the combination, and a tremendous ally of focus. What was once recorded on paper will soon be recorded in history as a goal achieved? However, simply writing down your goal is not enough. Achievement requires the discipline associated with the next key....

4) Plan Thoroughly!
A well-defined plan properly executed can virtually guarantee your success in any endeavor. If you know who you are, what you want, where you are going, how you will get there, and what you will do once you arrive, you will arrive.

Planning before you act helps you to do things better, faster, and cheaper! In addition to saving you 10-to-1 in execution, planning offers a host of other benefits as well. Among the most important... It promotes focus. Planning helps you visualize the promise of the future by cutting through clutter. It coordinates efforts. Planning allows you to iron out the wrinkles in your goal. It provides standards. Planning helps you size up your performance and measure your progress. It provides a reality check on the good, the bad, and the ugly of achieving this goal. It prepares the planner. Planning gives you the tools you need to deal with sudden and unexpected problems. It reveals roadblocks. Planning gives you a clear picture of how different tasks and activities interact to ensure success. To be forewarned is to be forearmed. It stimulates thinking. Planning leads you onward and upward by providing the stimulation you need to avoid dead-ends and blind alleys. It's a catalyst for new insights and ideas. It offers an exit plan. Planning gives you a sneak peek of what is expected and allows you to judge for yourself if the investment is worth the risk. It serves as an early warning system allowing you to bow out gracefully rather than be thrown out later on. A short time spent in planning can save you a long time of regret and misery.

The benefits of planning sound almost too good to be true, but in this case, the hype is legitimate. Planning is everything it's cut out to be. Your goal is going to end in one of three conditions: victorious, watered down, or failed. Go into it with your eyes open, a good plan, and....

5) Involve Others!
No matter what your goal is, somebody has already been there and done that. There are no new battles. You can earn good judgment and knowledge the old-fashioned way – through the school of hard knocks – or you can reach out, tap into experience, and make significant performance improvements. The choice is up to you. As you pursue a goal, knowledge is your greatest ally. With it you advance, without it you stumble. Progress is dependent upon momentum, and momentum is dependent upon information. Useful knowledge obtained from others' experiences allows you to build and maintain momentum. Trying to achieve a goal without obtaining knowledge from others is a recipe for false starts and performance hiccups.

Purposely, systematically solicit and import useful information. How? Read books, ask questions, attend seminars, observe – pay attention. Teachers are everywhere, both living and dead, among strangers and friends alike. And when Murphy's Law presents itself and your best-laid plans unravel, a well-chosen group of confidants can help you through....

6) Welcome Failure!
The dreaded "F" word – failure – is so important, yet so misunderstood. The key to understanding how to succeed rests on knowing a thing or two about the role of failure in the larger scheme of progress. You can think of failure as both the "teacher's pet" and the "black sheep" of the family of success! People are naive about the benefits of failure. Misguided assumptions about failure prevent many from understanding that it is, in fact, essential to success. It has an ulterior motive – not to get you to quit, but to stop you long enough so that you may learn something, re-strategize, and re-launch again more prepared for success. Failure measures your personal investment in your goal – it tests your character, commitment, and courage. We all live a life of close calls, belly flops, and missed opportunities, and the truth is we're all afraid of failure – some of us just refuse to cower in the face of it. Your persistence when faced with failure is a measure of your belief in yourself and your goal. Failure is a form of turbulence. It serves as a wake-up call that challenges you to get ready, get set, and....

7) Take Purposeful Action!
The odds that you'll succeed without taking action are about the same as winning the lottery without buying a ticket! For those times when you feel trapped, stressed, or in a prison of your own making, take purposeful action. It's your Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free card!

In real estate, it's location, location, location. In goal-setting it's action, action, action! You can't just stick out your thumb and hitchhike your way to success. You have to roll up your sleeves and do the work that needs to be done.

A good plan will almost always get you in the door, but it is action that seals the deal. You want a guarantee? Here it is: Without purposeful action, the only guarantee is failure and mediocrity! When thoughtful attention, goal-setting, and purposeful action click into position, suddenly you begin to see results. Don't tiptoe toward your goal, walk confidently -- before it waltzes off into the arms of neglect. Dreams become reality through one simple mode of transportation: purposeful action. It is tragically un-hip to procrastinate, and yet it remains a most common bad habit. The vast majority of people never display their true potential; it never has an opening night, never makes a debut. The bulk of potential resides deep within each individual just waiting to come out. And it stays there because people are afraid.
Now that purposeful action is in and procrastination is out...

8) Inspect What You Expect!
Change is inevitable – growth is optional – and change can knock the wind out of all good plans unless you review performance and evaluate progress regularly. Attention increases productivity!

Inspection has a dual purpose: First, inspection tells you where you are in relation to where you want to be. Second, it actions you are taking are going to produce the results you desire. This step carries vital importance in Network Marketing – the common casualty excuse of "this doesn't work" is directly linked to skipping this step.

Only by continually evaluating your expectations against your actual results will you know if a change needs to be made. When you identify which actions aren't producing the results you expect, adjust them so they will – then perpetuate and amplify them. Good intentions, while honorable, are of little use if tells you how you are doing in the process of pursuing your goals. You must evaluate whether the you let years of potential and possibility slip by uninspected.

9) Reward Yourself!
A funny thing happens on the way to success – you build integrity, character, discipline, and a host of other qualities that add credence to the old saying, "the journey is its own reward."

Goals are generators of value, often because of what you learned and became en route. But having something that symbolizes achievement – a reward – is a powerful extrinsic motivator for continued progress. Preflight instructions always inform you to put on your own oxygen mask before attempting to help others. That's because we can't possibly help others until our own needs are met. If your "flight" is the pursuit of a goal, one of your basic needs is the need for appreciation. And the person to meet that need is the one looking back at you in the mirror! Make rewarding yourself standard protocol. Imagine all the effort a new lover takes to get your attention -- flowers, chocolates, a song dedicated to you broadcast from your favorite radio station, a surprise call or personalized card that tells you how special you are. How long has it been since you've paid yourself such consideration?

A goal, once achieved, is the poster child of commitment, concentration, and courage. It deserves to be rewarded! Your succession plan from one goal to the next should include both celebration and introspection. Getting to that point, though, rests on perhaps the most important action you'll take in relation to your goal....

10) Exercise Personal Integrity!
What's the point of setting a goal if you have no intention of ever achieving it? You've come too far to give up now. Personal integrity is the final spin of the dial, the one that springs the lock and allows you to swing open the vault of success! It's personal integrity that fundamentally unites each of these elements of goal achievement.

Your biggest concern should not be your skill, ability, or intelligence -- it's your commitment. And personal integrity requires keeping your word and honoring your commitments. Think of commitment as the heartbeat of your goal. In order to keep your goal breathing, you rely on the oxygen of integrity. Turn to personal integrity to keep your dream alive and to provide the staying power needed to cross the finish line to achievement!

Failure to honor your commitments to yourself is the biggest mistake you can make; it reinforces incompetence, and worse still, reflects an absolute disregard for the sanctity of your own goal. Without integrity, your goal becomes a whim, not a vision. It ensures false promises and broken dreams. Don't tarnish your goal by quitting just because things get difficult. The moments you feel like quitting are the times you must take a flashlight to your soul and inspect yourself for will, courage, and spirit.

11) Dream Big Dreams!
You can never achieve more than you aspire to! Since the nuts and bolts of achieving any goal are invariably the same, neither the size of the goal nor the person achieving it matters. Successful people...cannot be vague or ambiguous; they must decide on what is wanted! Remain focused from beginning to end! realize that writing down all goals adds clarity, depth, and objectivity! Are master planners. They create the necessary strategy to achieve their goals! realize that no one goes through life alone and that their successes largely depend on the people with whom they surround themselves! understand that failure is part of the equation that leads to success! understand that there is a time for planning and a time for action, and they take purposeful action because only action produces results! appreciate the value of progress checks and regular inspections! reward themselves for their efforts. They applaud their hard work and sacrifices and enjoy the success they sought and created! keep their promises; their resolve is firm, deliberate, and in place until the goal is achieved!

Successful people succeed because they work the entire combination to turn dreams into reality.
Gary Ryan Blair
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