How to plan (and actually achieve) life-changing goals

By Donna Merrill on December 18, 2019 in Blogging

When you’re ready to plan life-changing goals for yourself, you immediately face two challenges.

What should your plan look like?

And how can you implement it in a way to actually achieve the goals you set up?

How can you actually achieve those life-changing goals?

Get the process started by determining what life-changing goals you want to achieve.

What are your goals?

What goals would change your life if you could achieve them?

Lose 10 pounds?

Make some extra income to help pay your bills?

Double your Twitter following?

Well, those are not really goals.

They are milestones to much bigger goals.

I suggest that for anything you start to list as a “goal…” you then add the word “because”.

Something like this

I want to lose 10 pounds… because…

Now, after the “because” you will add your REAL goal.

I want to lose 10 pounds… because… I think that would make me look more attractive.

-or-

I want to lose 10 pounds… because… I feel so tired all the time when I’m 10 pounds over my ideal weight.

You see, wanting to lose 10 pounds is only a milestone to what your really want.

In the above weight-loss case, what you really want is “make myself more attractive,” or “increase my energy level.”

Why did you choose these goals?

But now, you can take this a step further.

Why do you want to be more attractive?
Who are you trying to attract?

And then the Big Goal….
How will it change my life to reach this “attractiveness” goal?

You see, the real goal in this case is NOT “lose 10 pounds” but “be more attractive.”

Why do you want to raise your energy level?
What do you want to use that increased energy for?

And then the Big Goal might be…
I want to start a new business, but I don’t have the energy to do what it takes… so…
I want to have the energy to start a new business.

So really, the deeper you go into the process, the more you can refine what it is you Really want vs. what you only Think you want.

Usually, what you Think you want, is just a milestone along the path to what your Really want.

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When you figure that out, you will know what your Big Goals, or even just a single Big Goal… should be.

Plan the right milestone goals

Once you have a list of life-changing goals you want to achieve, you need to decipher which ones are the right milestone goals.

So, your goal for blogging might be…

Get my Domain Authority from 23 to 30 or more.

You might think that would change your life because your blog would get ranked higher in the search engines.

But why do you want to get it ranked higher in the search engines?

Just so you can brag about that?

Or because you want to get more traffic…

comprised of people…

who will buy stuff from stuff you promote on your blog?

Well, if the Big Goal is to is to sell more stuff on your blog, then improving your Domain Authority from 23 to 30 or more might not be the right goal.

It might be a milestone along the way.

But is it the right one?
Or, is it the best one?

Should it even be counted among the top 10 milestone goals you want to pursue?

Or might there be better ways to achieve what you really want?

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For instance, maybe writing guest posts would be a more effective way to get more traffic to your blog.

Or possibly, increasing your activity in Facebook groups might result in driving more traffic to your blog.

And don’t forget, you don’t just want traffic, you want sales.

So maybe a more effective milestone goal would be something like “Get more people to join my email list.”

Make sure to plan the right milestone goals to achieve your life-changing goals.

How to actually achieve life-changing goals

It’s one thing to plan life-changing goals.

But it’s another thing to actually achieve them.

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So how do you actually achieve life-changing goals?

Don’t stuff your cart with goals

Well, the first thing you have to resist when you plan life-changing goals, is stuffing your cart full of things.

Don’t see this as a wish list.

Goal planning is not about dreaming up everything you can imagine.

It’s about making a commitment to doing something you can achieve.

Most of the students I work with in private coaching get overwhelmed with goal planning.

That’s because they see it as an opportunity to plan everything they ever wanted.

Things like this…

“in the next 60 days I want to post 60 YouTube videos, write 10 guest posts, do a webinar to promote my service,” etc.

This is not really planning to achieve a goal, it’s dreaming about doing all the things you’d love to do…

but know you can’t.
or at least, you never will.

Goal planning is not the time to stuff your shopping cart with everything you ever wanted.

It’s a time to carefully select just a few things that you feel confident you can actually achieve within your specified time frame.

Don’t focus on tasks you are comfortable with

One sure sign that you will fail, is if you plan to achieve your life-changing goals by doing mostly things that won’t require you to change your life much.

Let’s say that you really like making images, and sharing them on social media.

This is your preferred method of driving traffic to your blog.

Creating images is one of your strong points.

You feel good doing them.

So you put a lot of time and effort into them.

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You may even have been doing it pretty consistently for a while.

Doesn’t it make sense then, to use this method to drive more traffic to your blog?

Well, yes and no.

It makes sense if it’s a strategy that has been working really well for you.

But, if that’s the case, then you’re probably not going to be scratching your head over how to get more traffic.

You’ve already been doing that.

Just keep it up.

But if that strategy has not delivered the results you want, then why would you try to plan life-changing goals by implementing it even more?

The reason is simple.

you feel good making images,
and you’re good at it, and
you already know how to do it.

So you probably have access to software that helps you create good images.

And you already know how to use it.

In other words, you are comfortable making image creation the main task to implement in order to achieve your goals.

The problem is this.

People usually plan “new goals” around “old strategies” because they are comfortable with them.

But just because you’re comfortable doing something, doesn’t mean it is the right thing to do.

In fact, just the opposite is true.

Things you don’t want to do

It’s the things you don’t want to do that will be more likely to fuel your growth.

You see, growth by definition means moving into new territory.

It requires you do new things.

Try new strategies.

Learn new software and technology.

Hire a coach.

Buy some new training to study.

Try some stuff you are unfamiliar with.

Do things you are completely uncomfortable doing!

That’s the best way to achieve your life-changing goals.

Change the way you do things in order to change your life.

And in order to achieve goals that always seem beyond your reach.

That’s because, by getting outside of your comfort zone, you’ll be extending your reach.

You will be moving into new skills, techniques, relationships and strategies that can take you to new levels of accomplishment.