Click here for Day Two: Determine Your Values
Day Three: Visualize Your End Point
Day Four: Chunk Into Goals
Day Five: Stumbling Blocks
Day Six: Public Declaration/Word for the Year (and a wee small contest!)
Have you ever started out on a trip and not gone to your trusty Garmin, or MapQuest or iPhone to figure out what turns to take? If you’re like me, you haven’t. We all love the magic of technology when it comes to actually getting to our destination and without getting (too!) lost. In order to get that accurate road map though, we need to know our final destination. We need to know the exact address of where we’re going.
It’s the same exact way with our goals. We need the final destination in mind. And not any destination. We need the specific address – the very specific final goal. Do you want to live in a new house? Don’t just say you want to live in a new house. Say “I want to live in a new house with 3 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms, a pond for my dog to swim in and a 5 acre yard for my son to run around in. I want that home to be in this specific neighborhood. I want this home to cost XYZ.”
Do you have a weight loss goal? A fitness goal? A business dollar amount goal? A new partner goal? Anything and everything you want in the future can AND SHOULD be incredibly specific.
For this exercise, we are going to do a free form writing exercise for 20 minutes. The goal is to not let your pen leave the page. Not once. Keep writing. Even if it feels like gibberish. You can write longer if you want but if it feels like just forcing yourself to write each and every word, just give it 20 minutes for me. I want you to answer one very specific question:
In 10 years, when my life is ideal and I have reached all of my goals, this is what my life looks like.
If you read my idealized future essay, it is incredibly specific. It details getting up in the morning, the sheets I have (yes, they’re high thread count), the state of my white hotel-like bathrobe (fluffy and soft!), my polished toenails in slippers, what I see when I leave the bedroom, who is waiting for me at the table (yes, it involves children – plural!), what we eat at breakfast, how the conversation goes, what the emotions are at breakfast (enthusiastic children, loving partner, healthy breakfast food) how I get to work, what car I am driving, where I drop the children off at school.
It’s all the details plus the global stuff – how much we travel as a family, how often we see grandma and grandpa, how my business functions with and without me, how long my staff stay with my company etc… If you read it, it reads like the most perfect idealized life in the entire world. It is absolutely reaching for the stars and more. Much much more. And as kooky as it sounds, just dream with me for 20 minutes. Just do it so you can work on your final destination and get that end point for your personal road map clear.
Ready. Set. Write!
I’m loving this idea already! I have a 10 minute timer set for myself on the computer right now, so I’m going to finish my online stuff first, and then I will set out to do this task. 🙂
PS – Congrats on your little one!
That’s exactly where I am with my planning for next year. I’m literally doing quarter by quarter goals because I have no idea what sort of wallop this little one will pack into my normally ordered life. =) And, I’m excited and delighted and so so so happy to make those adjustments.
Congratulations on the house and the baby too (of course). My little guy is almost 4 months and my goals for last year didn’t quite make it, but I’m ok with the trade-off. I think we are finally getting into a groove (that he’ll change soon I’m sure) and I will be able to get more of my goals accomplished.
Awesome! That is delightful and amazing! So cool. Strangely enough, the
‘house’ goal part of my writing that I did last year came true in July of
this year, at lower than the price I had specified. I’m not sure if it was
the writing or just that when the opportunity came up, I was incredibly
clear on what I wanted so was able to jump on the opportunity. =)
Thanks for the great idea! I got started thinking I’d be lucky to write for 20 whole minutes. One hour and 7 pages later, I’m finally finished. I always think about the things I want, but I’ve never written it down before. Thank you for sharing this.