Wondering how to achieve your goals successfully?
You can choose the red pill or the blue pill. The blue pill means you ignore my advice, you stay in the matrix where people barely scrape by on what they can get.
OR – you can choose the red pill, we’ll break you out of the matrix, give you some solid foundations for survival and make you an agent fighting goal setting machine in no time!
Scroll if you chose the red pill.
The problem really is, not that you want to achieve. Humans are expert desirers. We want so many things.
It’s not even that you don’t have what it takes.
The issue that plagues nearly 186 million goal setters each year, is that they don’t have the right formula.
Unplug yourself.
Neo’s “How to Achieve Your Goals Successfully” Guide
- Practical Tips: Setting goals properly
- The Right tools for the job
- How to pick your goal setting system
- Where to find the goal setting experts
- Goal Setting Cheat Codes and Hacks
Use Universal Practical Steps
These are the general steps that everyone takes to accomplish their goals.
Trust the Process
Not just in yourself, but in life, in others success, and foundations. People have done more with less.
The foundation of life is a beautiful kind of math. Math like geometry or Fibonacci. It just means that there are steps that everyone can take in general to get the success they want. All you have to do is take that formula and fill in the blanks with your particular circumstance.
Regardless of your, or their thoughts about yourself, the only thing that separates you from achievement of wonderful things is loyalty to a working process.Click To TweetThe same goal setting formula that you use, is going to be the same formula thousands of others have used to build the life they want.
You’re not the random black sheep of the universe that the formula is gonna decide not to work for.
Have faith in the process given to you by those who know and have done more.
Visualize the Endgame
Develop, or imagine a scenario that represents your success. Imagine yourself and feeling successful, finally having achieved what you set out to.
- What will people say about you?
- What will you say back?
- What will do you do with the money you make?
- How will the results change the world?
- Where will you spend most of your time?
Your brain cannot tell the difference between something visualized and reality.
Be smart, and visualize your “success scenario” and keep that image close to your heart and constantly in your mind. It will have serious effects.
Write & Record Like Crazy
Some version of writing is necessary during proper goal setting. Writing on your walls, writing in your journal, writing down new ideas for how to achieve your results better. Something.
Everyone recommends writing in a journal because recording your progress is just a no-brainer.
- It keeps you focused on the results you’re getting.
- Are you getting results at all?
- What do you need to change up?
Plus, after having achieved your goals, looking back on the “day one, day two and day three” entries will show you patterns in your journey, and you will realize things because the data is right in your face.
But being a bit mystically inclined myself, I know that creation is a process, and setting/achieving goals is no different than creating better life experiences.
[pullquote align=”left” cite=”Mina Murray”]”It’s like whispering to oneself and listening at the same time”[/pullquote]Your goal will be born first in your mind, and then it will take steps to become more physically manifest.
The easiest way to do this is to write your goals down, and then map them out. This is called feedback analysis and is found in the book Managing Oneself by Peter Drucker.
Have Clarity of Purpose
I hear this word thrown around so much it almost makes me not wanna talk about it (My need to be original maybe).
But being clear on what you’re doing and why you’re doing it is as simple as having a roadmap.
A roadmap is going to tell you where you’re at, where you want to go, and what steps you need to take to get there.
[pullquote align=”normal” cite=”Friedrich Nietzsche”]“He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.” [/pullquote]With a shitty roadmap, you have where you’re at, but you could end up anywhere, wasting a bunch of time meandering through life because you don’t know what steps to take.
Clarity of purpose
- Keeps you from wasting time
- Prevents you from wasting energy
- Protects you from burning out doing stuff that’s unnecessary
- Gives you the motivation to keep going when the going gets tough
Go from Interested to Committed
Are you committed? Or are you what paidtoexist.com calls “strolling passively through life”.
Interesting feels more like “hm, It would be nice if life could be this way”.
But committed? Committed makes you and the goal one with each other. Commitment brings a level of unstoppability to your personality that is scary and admirable at the same time.
When onlookers see you in a committed state, they just kinda stand there in awe. It looks like you’re trying to dig your way out of prison with a spoon.
[thrive_headline_focus title=”Commitment is a self imposed obligation.” orientation=”center”]To them, the task is impossible, unlikely, and a waste of time, but they keep staring because they have this weird feeling that…you might just do it anyway.
The moment you achieve commitment during goal setting, you have automatically achieved the goal.
You don’t have the physical results yet, but somewhere, unmanifest to the naked eye, you and the goal are now one, because you have made the commitment to never stop until it’s achieved, and that’s what the goal needs for it to deem you worthy of receiving it.
Stay focused / Become Obsessed
Tunnel Vision is the only way to describe it. Flow, or maybe obsession. The kind of focus where you start at dawn and continue well into the night.
The people who love and care for you bring you food because they know you don’t feed yourself, you’re too busy working.
They worry about you. “How could he possibly sit in that chair for so long working on that thing”.
“What in the world is she doing up so early, it’s freezing outside and she’s still going for that run?!”
Grant Cardone call’s it obsession, and I agree.
Staying focused means that when obstacles come, you casually move them to the side in your mind and keep sprinting through.
Intense focus comes from deciding that you really want something. Your desire is not contingent upon winning or losing.
You don’t only want it if it’s possible, you want it regardless if it’s possible or crazy.
When this happens to you goals go from being set to obliterated.
Take Explosive & Consistent Action
Taking action is a necessary step, and a simple one, after you have the aforementioned qualities manifest.
You want to know
- What to do
- Where to do it
- With whom, and to whom
- For how much time?
- And what adaptations to make when the results aren’t ideal
Taking action is basic algebra: x(y)=z
X = you in your current state
Y = everything that needs to happen to get you to z. Usually as simple as doing the right thing, for the right amount of time, and adapting as necessary to tweak your results.
Z = the result. Where you wanted to be in the past.
[/thrive_text_block]Some like to make taking action a thirty-step process, but I think it’s as simple as that.
Some things that will help you take action better:
- Find someone who’s already achieved the same results and listen to what they say
- Remember that failure is an event, not a person. Failure means “not yet” more than “never”
- Download a template that makes everything simple, where it’s just “fill in the blanks”
Get my free “Action Planning Template here.
Start now, Right Now
Procrastination is a huge killer. 186 million people in the united states set new year’s resolutions each year and 3 out of 4 of them fail.
That means that 4 people have desires to eat less nasty food, lose weight to increase their health and longevity, make more money for their family and loved ones, and most of them fall flat on their faces.
Isn’t that depressing?
Procrastination can take your admirable and strong desires for better, and change in your life and make you just another goal setter who gets run over and crushed.
There are several tips for beating procrastination. So many have written books and given talks about it. But for right now, make it a habit to take the smallest, easiest step towards your goal and do it now.
Do not put your dream off until tomorrow, you don’t need to accomplish the whole thing today, but you DO want to start getting wins and results ASAP.
That’s a huge tip for how to achieve goals successfully and it will save your life.
Be Accountable to Yourself
Accountability means responsibility. Have you ever heard someone say to “take responsibility for yourself”?
When I was a kid, I always thought that meant taking the blame, but now that I’m a bit older, I realize that it means something way different.
Taking responsibility for yourself means realizing that it’s nobody else’s job to get the results you desire in life for you.
If you want good interactions with people – that’s your job to get those results.
IF you want more money in your life – that’s your job to get those results.
You were wondering how to achieve your goals successfully and you took responsibility for getting those results by doing a google search or clicking somewhere.
You first accountability is to yourself.
- Make promises to yourself and keep them
- Understand that you are valuable and worthy of great things, and go get them
- Take care of yourself, and make good choices for your health and longevity.
But above all, if you know something is stirring inside you, for better and more exciting, hold yourself accountable to go get it. Sitting around is just killing you on the inside.
Experiment: Review, Adapt & Adjust
This is the missing piece for some. Here are some goal setting myths:
- If it doesn’t work the first time it’s over
- There are some who deserve it intrinsically and others who don’t
- We’re born winners or losers
- The formula didn’t work for me, so it doesn’t work for anyone and the teacher is bogus
- It has to happen the way I imagined it or bust
All of those assumptions are wrong.
Here are some goal setting truths that you can keep in the back of your head when something goes differently to how you planned.
- When you fail or otherwise don’t get the results you desired, you might just need to combine the variables differently.
- Great results want someone who is worthy of the results. See yourself as capable of adding and subtracting worthy and unworthy things to “deserve” those results
- If the formula worked once, it works, period. You might just need to change things up a bit to fit your particular circumstance.
- Humans are great at desiring, and the plan we had in our minds might have been a good one, but what if there’s a better way?
You’re in a hallway, filled with white doors on the side and one red door at the end. The red door is your goal.
You know there are tools to help you get past that door and into the valley of your amazing results, and so you decide to look through some of them.
You open one door and find an ax to chop the door down. This was definitely the right door. Now you have everything you need.
But in another door, there is a key, and special running shoes to reach the door faster than anyone else.
Sometimes life can magically lead you on a path that is confusing, but still better than the one you imagined.
Poetry aside, you might need to give up on something during your trek here on earth, but do yourself a solid by making sure first.
Adapt, adjust, and review your process to see if the results can come another way.
Empower Yourself With the Right Tools
The person who live life successfully does so with the right tools. The wheel is better than walking. Fire is better than raw, and templates, checklists, guides, and courses are way better than figuring things out by yourself from scratch.
Wanna do this? Someone has already done it. Find the expert who has packaged knowledge on the internet, or inside a book and allows them to shave years off your learning curve.
Or you can choose to waste your life and do it all by yourself, your choice.
I’d recommend doing it the smart way, this process will be challenging enough without the added difficulty of doing everything trial and error.
Apps
[one_third_first] [/one_third_first][one_third] [/one_third][one_third_last] [/one_third_last]Planners
Planners are essentially giant templates that take you through the entire process of goal setting step-by step, making everything super easy.
- They eliminate confusion
- Make sure you’re taking the right steps at the right time
- And cut down on any detours you may take that will waste your time.
They also make sure you know the foundations and cover them so you can cut down on the mistakes you make and see success faster.
The only planner I recommend right now is the Slay your Goals Planner.
[thrive_link color=”orange” link=”https://thelifesynthesis.com/SLAYYOURGOALSPLANNER” target=”_blank” size=”big” align=”aligncenter”]Get the Planner[/thrive_link]
If I could pull someone aside and recommend anything that would cut down on their planning process and ensure their success, this planner would be the companion that would be the thing to travel with.
100 percent worth the investment.
After that, I recommend my Action Taking Template, which is something I stole from Kain Ramsay without any shame what-so-ever.
Whiteboard and office supplies
You’ll end up wanting to have your entire room or office set up as a reminder of the goal you’re going after.
Whiteboards are good to hang up on your wall (I have several on my wall) so you can write new ideas, new information, tasks and ideas that you don’t want to forget.
How often have you decided to make a change in your life, only to realize that you were doing it again, without thinking and you didn’t even mean to!?
Inspirational stuff to keep you in the mood
Find a big list of inspirational, motivating and relevant quotes to consult regularly.
Like this Pinterest board here
Figure Out the Proper System to Use
Thought leaders, successful people and coaches around the world have come up with niche and perfected systems for going after your goals.
They often use “goal acronyms” which spell out words like ASAP or TGIF.
Each letter represents an idea that will keep you on track to reaching your objectives, and there’s a method that corresponds to each acronym.
Choose the one that fits your goal best. I’ve listed a few here.
Clear: good for when you want to harness the passion and power of your team to achieve something great
Heart: when you feel like your previous methods have made you focus on the wrong things and you want a more holistic and healthy way of achieving
Smart: great for making general progress in business
Hard: perfect for when you’re fed up, are at a transition point in life and need to find something intrinsically satisfying, like now.
Dumb: the method you choose to stretch yourself by setting ridiculously ambitious goals
Action: designed to get your conscious and subconscious minds in congruence to take the whole “machine” and get it moving in one direction. A good way to get your entire self on board. By Tom Willerger
Exact: Good for allowing yourself and others you may be helping release their limitations and pursue what they actually want.
Quest: by Timothy Galloway, good for learning goals and self-improvement
Take Advantage the Right Resources and Info
Whatever you desire to achieve, someone has put expert information on the internet about it.
The easiest thing to do would be to search it on google .“Your goal” with course/ info/ book / video after it.
That “expert” (and you should use your critical thinking skills to make sure they’re qualified) is going to give you basic 101 information, and probably provide you with a formula.
Going to people like this is the easiest way to avoid all the common mistakes you could make on your journey to success, and embrace the behaviors and actions that will have you seeing the most success.
Your Idols, Entrepreneurs, Youtube People, Coaches
- Find someone who has already done what you set out to do, and consume their content
- When you’re ready to take it a step further, buy the courses, CDs or other paid versions of the process they offer
- Make sure you surround yourself each day, with the information of that group.
Grant Cardone calls it “drinking the kool-aid”. Kool-aid obviously referring to the jargon and beliefs that certain groups have around themselves.
Drinking the kool-aid is normally a phrase we use to describe a person who’s been duped or fooled by someone.
But here, it means that there are people who think as you do
- That great accomplishments are real and we’re capable of getting those same results ourselves
- That anyone can achieve what they set out to achieve
- That we all deserve the best if we put in the work and effort
When Mr Grant says “drinking the kool-aid” he means “Don’t listen to your parents, friends or teachers who tell you to live small, think small and go for small. Don’t believe them when they tell you to live a safe quiet life. You’re not mean for a small life, you’re meant for a big life. Hang around me and MY friends and we’ll show you how to do just that. Start drinking our kool-aid rather than small peoples kool-aid.”
You’re drinking kool-aid either way, so drink the kool-aid that leads you to the life you desire.
Amazon “Best books”
The bare minimum for up-to-standard humans is one book per week. Anything less than that and you’re cheating yourself.
Whatever is going on in your life that makes you busy and tired needs to be adjusted to make certain you get at least one book a week in.
- Reading exposes you to more knowledge
- It allows you to be on the cutting edge doing and saying things that nobody else knows
- It keeps you on part with your competition
- It exposes you to the genius of your fellow humans
- You’ll earn more money
- You’ll have more friends and a larger network of colleagues
- You’ll be more interesting in conversation
- You will understand yourself, others and your environment more
- An increased understanding of what makes the world “tick and tock” will be in your mind, allowing you to live within it more effectively.
Reading allows you to gain more knowledge, which is a powerful weapon. We use knowledge and keen instinct in the jungle as animals, but also in civilization.
No one has ever read more books and felt like they were worse off for it. Fact.
Courses and presentations
Courses and information like courses go hand in hand with books. Many times we don’t at all or put off stepping towards our goals because we feel we’re not qualified.
Taking courses should be seen for what it’s worth: book knowledge is not everything. But a growth mindset is also necessary in life, and whatever skills you need, you can easily get them.
The greatest places to look for courses are
Big sites like that work, but qualified individuals also have their own tools ready for you to use. So look out for those too.
Cheat with Goal Setting Hacks
Along your goal setting/accomplishment trek, you’ll need to get more advanced and start refining your process.
Eventually, you’ll get to the point where the average formula just isn’t getting you the results you want.
This will lead you to find better ways to:
- Eliminate procrastination in your life
- Have your brain on your side and achieve a state of perpetual motivation
- Learn how to start automatically instead of falling into the “I’ll do it later” trap
- Change your beliefs about yourself and life in general so that you have full faith in your ability to achieve great things.
- Learn how to set up a track of small wins to fuel you along the way
These are the goal setting hacks that all professional goal-setters know well.
You’ll also eventually get into
- Having a better strategy and backup plans
- Maximizing the results you get from fewer actions taken
- Setting goals based on intrinsic results and letting the extrinsic results come from that
- Hacking your self-discipline, motivation, and willpower so that you’re nearly unstoppable setting your goals
Wrap Up
There we have it, now you know exactly how to achieve your goals successfully.
We went through the basic formula that you will always follow. You have a list of expert resources to use, you know it’s possible for you to achieve all your goals, and you even have some secret hacks that most don’t know.
So what do you do now? How do you get started?
Resources Mentioned in This Article
Read These Other Articles
- How to Stop Procrastinating and make Starting Harmless
- Setting Intentions: How To Actually Make Things Happen
- Goals: What Are They and How To Do Them Well
- How to Unlock your Brain for High Energy Goal Setting
- 11 Magical Quotes about Dreams and Goals