Do one thing that scares you. 2006, February 27, Monday
Posted by Levent in Motivation.1 comment so far
Challenge an irrational fear.
Whether you’re afraid of public speaking or meeting new people or talking frankly with superiors or something else irrational do one thing which challenges this.
Personal growth is about momentum. The beginning is always the hardest because you have to accelerate something from standstill. At the beginning you have to much harder. Sometimes you even have to take a running start and just throw yourself at it. Just do something, anything, to complete that first step.
Go, and good luck.
Setting Goals 2006, February 14, Tuesday
Posted by Levent in Goals, Motivation.add a comment
It’s Important to set goals, but sometimes this can seem extremely difficult. Sometimes setting goals doesn’t seem like a viable idea. Maybe because you feel like your goals will not have any effect on your actions.
Setting a goal can set you up for failure. If you aren’t likely to follow through with your goals you will not achieve them. This is why it is important to know how to set goals effectively. This is a skill that needs to be learnt, or rather built up; it is a skill that doesn’t have a roof. You will never become perfect at setting goals. You can only always improve your ability to set good goals.
What is a good goal?
A good goal requires two things:
- It is achievable
- It efficiently improves you
What does this mean?
Never set a goal you cannot achieve. It is pointless and de-motivating. This does not mean it cannot be hard; in fact it should be hard. And this does not mean you cannot fail to achieve a goal, we can learn from failure or mistakes; as long as you can see yourself achieving it, otherwise you will feel like you are fighting inevitability. And if it is not at least somewhat difficult for you to achieve your goal you will not have efficiently improved yourself. This then means setting balanced goals.
What is a balanced goal?
A balanced goal is one you can achieve given your current situation. This means you have to assess for yourself how much you can do. If you feel you are very unmotivated and a big procrastinator start small. Give yourself something you can achieve which will help you grow. Think of something you could improve on now. How could you break this down into steps to help you achieve your goal? Maybe you can’t think of anything to improve on right now, perhaps you can get rid of a bad habit or and addiction, or improve your sleeping or eating habits. It’s important that each goal is broken down into small steps, so that you can follow your progress. Don’t try to change too much at once. Change takes time.
Following through
Are you ready? So you’ve decided one thing you want to change. You’ve broken it down into progressive steps. Make yourself an achievement plan. Write down each step, and a completion time, then periodically check back on this and mark your progress. How far are you to completing each step? Do this at least once a day. And give yourself a mark out of ten for the day. If you grade yourself a 9 or 10, remember what you did and try to keep the effort up the next day, if you got lower try to progressively build up your grade so that you become better at completing steps everyday.
Learn and repeat; set greater and greater goals as you become better at achieving them and you’ll be well on your way to becoming the person you really want to be.
