5 Immediate Tips To Stay Focused on Your Goals |
 Do you remember the new year’s resolutions you set at the beginning of this year? What are they? How are you faring in them right now? If you’re like most people, chances are you’ve long abandoned those goals. Some of you may not even recall what goals you have set. Which is unfortunate, because goal setting works; it has never failed anyone. The only reason why goals would stop working is because the person who has set the goals, i.e. you, chose to give up on them mid-way. During the past few years, I’ve been working relentlessly on my goals – be it blogging, setting up my new business, improving my diet, losing weight, making like-minded friends, improving my relationship with my parents, and so on. Over the course of the past 2.5 years, I’ve made significant progress on those goals. For example, I lost about 7-8kg this year and am at my desired weight today. I’ve switched from an unhealthy, junk food diet to a healthy, vegan diet which I’m proud of today. I created my personal development blog, and built it from 2 readers a day (me and my good friend) to over 600k page views/month – making it one of the top personal development blogs online. I’ve created a successful business out of my passion in personal development and am earning a steady, passive income from it. I resolved a deep-seated emotional eating issue which I’ve been struggling with the past decade. My previously sour relationship with my parents has dramatically improved for the better in the past 2 months. I’m not sharing the above to distance myself from you, or to put myself on a pedestal. Quite the opposite – I’m sharing the above to let you know that because I’ve achieved my goals, you can achieve your goals too, no matter what they are. It’s all a matter of staying focused. If you constantly get distracted in your goal pursuits, here are 8 tips I have for you to stay focused: |
Concentrate on 1-3 goals  If you constantly have trouble keeping to your goals, maybe you’re spreading yourself too thin. Pick 1-3 goals that are most important to you, and stick to them. Don’t bother yourself with any other goals until these goals are achieved (or unless priorities shift and these goals no longer reflect what you want in life). For me, my top priority goal is to reach out to more people through my blog, so I ensure all my daily actions ladder up to this one goal. Majority of my time in the week is spent either writing new articles for the blog, maintaining my facebook and twitter account, maintaining the blog and forums, processing my emails or creating upcoming plans. If I’m caught up with something else for a long period of time, it’s a cue to me that I’m off-track. Such laser focus has allowed me to make much more progress, compared to when I juggle across 4-5 goals and make little progress in them. |
Create a vision board
A vision board is a collage of pictures and images that represent your goals and dreams. Creating a vision board helps you to visualize your end goals more clearly, which inevitably inspires you to take consistent action. Not only that, it also serves to remind you of your goals every day when you see the board. I’ve a vision board in my bedroom which I see every time I’m in my room. Every time I see my board, it reinforces my goals to me, and reminds me to take action so as to move forward.
Create milestones  If you just set one huge goal, it can be discouraging – especially when you don’t achieve it after a short while. When that happens, some people may procrastinate on the goal altogether – which is quite unfortunate. I find it’s helpful to break a big goal into smaller goals, after which you concentrate on achieving the smaller goals in the short-run. Just like when you go on a long road-trip – You set pit-stops to rest/recuperate throughout the trip. |
Track your results
It’s important for me to track the results of what I do, because otherwise it feels like my actions are not making a difference. Hence, every time I work on a goal, I will identify 1-2 performance metrics, then track those metrics daily/weekly. They are my connection to the end goal, because they let me know whether I’m on track or off track, which in turn lets me know whether to tweak my actions or not.
Be clear on why you’re pursuing the goals
If you keep giving up on your goals halfway, perhaps you were never serious in them to begin with. For me, if I’m really serious about a goal, I’d never give up on it – I’d keep hammering away at it, regardless of the obstacles, until they give way and I’m enjoying the fruits of my labor.
