A fresh new year brings with it the perfect opportunity to start thinking about what you want to achieve during a very significant and measurable timeline: a year.
We often set New Year’s Resolutions around this time, but we should also be thinking of them more as goals. To help you set, maintain and achieve these goals, you’ll need to follow these 5 simple rules:
- Set goals that will motivate you
When setting a goal, that goal should be important to you, for personal reasons, and potentially something that you’ve wanted to achieve for a while. For example, perhaps for a while now, you’ve thought about starting your own business one day. Now is the perfect time to put that goal down on paper.
Choose goals that represent, or contribute towards, high priorities in your life. As mentioned, maybe one day you want to start your own business. Maybe you need certain qualifications to make that a possibility. If the goal is important to you and something you really want to do, it’ll be much more motivating than a goal you’ve plucked out of thin air, or one that someone else is doing. Meaning you’re much more likely to achieve it.
- Make sure your goals are SMART
You’ve probably heard of the term “SMART goals”, but if not, they’re essentially a great way to ensure your goal will be maintainable and achievable. Although there are a few different variations of what SMART stands for, it is essentially:
- Specific – clear and well defined. It should be very clear what the goal is and how it can be achieved.
- Measurable – a way to measure the success and progress of the goal. Is it a certain time, weight, grade or skill level you want to achieve?
- Attainable – something you can realistically achieve. It should be challenging enough to make it worthwhile, but not so impossible that you will give up.
- Relevant – the goal should be something that is relevant to the direction you want to take your life or career.
- Time bound – Set a deadline to achieve the goal by, and set reminders along the way.
By making sure your goal adheres to the above, you’ll know your goals are solid, well defined and achievable.
- Write down your goals and put them where you can see them
The act of writing down a goal will make it more tangible and real. When writing your goals down, write them in such a way that hold you accountable. For example, use “will” rather than “would like” as this gives the goal more power.
When you’ve written your goals down, put them in a place you will see them every day. Having this constant reminder, will ensure you remain focused and on track. How often have you got to June, and completely forgotten you even set yourself goals?
- Make a plan of action
This part is essential to achieving a goal, but unfortunately is often overlooked. People get so focused on the outcome of a goal that they forget what is actually required to achieve it. For example—taking the goal of starting your own business—you might need to achieve a few steps before you can reach that goal. If you want to start a personal training business, you’ll first need to get your personal trainer qualifications, the Certificate III and IV in Fitness. Once that is achieved, you can then start building a client base and then your business will be well on its way.
- Stick with it and have regular check-ins
The final piece of advice is to stick with it. There’ll be times when you want to give up, or when you think it’s no longer relevant, but as long as you chose the goal for the right reasons, you’ll be glad you stuck with is when you complete it.
Set up regular reminders in your phone to make you think about the goal and measure how well you are going. You might even want to set mini goals for each check in. Again, if you’re goal is to start a personal training business, your first check in might be after 4 months, to see if you’ve got your Cert III in Fitness yet, then another 4 months for Cert IV in Fitness. Then finally at the end of the year, have the goal of having 10 clients.
Conclusion
Goal setting should go beyond just saying something to yourself that you’d like to achieve. You need to make yourself accountable and make sure the goal has every chance of becoming a possibility.
By setting goals, you’ll be able to enjoy the satisfaction of being able to achieve something you set out to do. When you’re running your own Personal Training business, you’ll certainly be glad you stuck with it.
