New Year’s resolutions often fail because they focus on negatives, are based on other people’s dreams or are too broad.
Let’s look at how to set realistic goals that help guarantee your success:
* First off forget about the whole ‘New Year’ time frame
If you can’t think of anything that you want to achieve right now don’t panic.
It might occur to you when you’re doing the gardening, sitting on the loo or taking the dog out for the walk.
It’s far better to find something that sparks a passion in you than set yourself unachievable goals.
* Write down your end goal – but be realistic!
Write down your goals. If you want to start making a little extra money this year, try to fix on a figure (an extra £200, £300, £400 a month?)
If you’re struggling here, think about what would enable you to do the things you’d like to do. How much time realistically do you have to set aside to do it? Forget about the fast cars or holiday mansions here. Aim too high and you’ll be sat at your computer screen in blind panic telling yourself off because you haven’t made £2,000 in a week. Successful goals are reached in step-by-step stages.
* Not all risks have to be expensive, take a leap of faith!
I’ve got a couple of friends who are diving head first into Kindle publishing. It’s something that’s really sparked their imagination and I’m sure they’ll make it work.
I’m addicted photography and this year I want to take it to the next level and try and sell some of my pictures. Even if I sell just one print I’ll be thrilled because it’s something I really like doing anyway. Pick something you enjoy and you won’t mind putting the hours in.
Got an old biz opp lying around that you haven’t got stuck into yet? Dust it off and give it a try. Not feeling inspired by that one? See what else is out there.
* Start small – set yourself manageable challenges to begin with
Maybe you want to start writing a blog about football or gardening. Maybe you want to try your hand at Forex trading?
Whatever it is break it down into bite size chunks that you can tick off as you go along. For example: 1) set up Betfair account 2) learn how to place a simple trade 3) target of £5 profit in week one following X strategy.
It’s worth repeating the point about financial expectations here. Rather than saying you want to be earning an extra £1,500 by the end of next month set yourself short-term reachable targets.
You could set a very achievable target of just £50 by this time next month just to get the ball rolling. Once you’ve hit that try increasing it to £100 or £200…
Even if you don’t make enough money to quit your job, you might find you’ve made enough to go away on holiday or pay off some debts.
* Set realistic dates and deadlines
Deadlines are good because they make us accountable – but only if it’s for something that we genuinely want to achieve.
Write down some simple steps like we did with the betting example above and then give yourself realistic ‘to do by’ dates. Here’s another example:
Week One: Set up WordPress Website
Week Two: Set up Google Adsense in Sidebars
… and so on.
Despite what a lot of self-help gurus would have us believe, success is not found in the endless farting around, over analyzing and cosmic gazing. Success is in the doing. That’s the ‘big secret’.
Successful people learn from their mistakes not because they’re making mistakes but because they’re constantly doing and doing and doing. Nothing succeeds if you don’t at least try.