Setting Goals - Ask Yourself These Few Questions

“All progress depends on the unreasonable man[/woman]."(Tweet me)

- George Bernard Shaw 

Alright I don't have my tweetable quotes links up and running yet, must be because I don't have a Twitter account, (yet.) So, you're going to have to old-fashioned copy and paste for now!

Going back to the quote, "unreasonable" doesn't mean criminal or crazy, just not acquiescent - don't blindly follow anyone or anything, question until you fully understand.

Then bend the rules a bit! That's what creativity is.

Here's an example (and actually one of my favorite marketing campaigns)

"Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can't do is ignore them - because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do."

- Apple Think Differently Campaign

Progress is not staying the same.

Everyone's already familiar with the "Definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over - and expecting a different result." quote yadayada. But here's another one:

"If you want things in your life to change, you have to change things in your life."

Simple right?

Start by defining what you want to change and how willing you are to adopt the mindset before the strategy - and you're 99% there.

The 1% is actually the implementation. Idle action without purpose is meaningless.

What's the 1% - it's actually the easy part.

Think about what you want - not want to change, but what's the end result?

For me, I want to go to university next year. Yet I understand that if I'm not receptive mentally, it would be a waste of an opportunity.

So what I do is clarify what I want to change. I want to make my study schedules more efficient.

Right now I'm just doing research, but I like to research a topic relative to the field I want to enter - computer science - for a few hours a day.

Sometimes I'd be reading for a few minutes, then go off to run an errand or do a chore - then go back to my computer for another half-our; this kind of sparsity in intervals is doubted to sharpen my level of focus to good student-ready level, over time.

So, I set aside some distraction-free time, from 12 pm - 3 pm to get it done; and through it all I think of the result - university - that way it unbelievably doesn't feel like "research" at all!

So start with something that you can change immediately, like:

• What time you wake up or go to bed
• What it will do for you
• What you are willing to give up to make it happen

Because maybe something has to be scheduled to another time slot, for this to go smoothly.

Be it that late-night show you can watch tomorrow morning or maybe putting the phone away so you can actually get 7 or 8 hours of sleep.


Ask you these questions!