The fine art of goal setting

Almost exactly a year ago, I introduced you to the video version of my Roadmap to Success program which you can watch on your computer or your TV. The video program includes monthly coaching calls for you to get the support you need to accomplish your goals. In case you missed all of this and you’re now ready to win in the game of life and take control of your business or career, I invite you to go to: http://www.unshackledleadership.com/free-success-video-ty and sign up for the platinum group coaching program which will include both the mp4 and DVD versions of the video program.

I tell you this because for the last year, we’ve had amazing monthly calls with people all over the country and the conversation has been life altering. I particularly want to share with you the conversation we had last week about goal setting because I believe that most people who set goals miss the real power in doing so.

I’m going to assume, for the purpose of this conversation, that you set goals, whether they be weekly, monthly, yearly or long-term. My first question is: are your goals means goals or end goals? Examples of means goals are: make 5 sales calls, sell 6 widgets, get a promotion, buy a new car, buy a new home, sales of $X this year, profitability of Y%, etc. Can you relate to those types of goals? I suspect that most of your goals are those kinds. So why do I call them means goals? Because they are goals you set thinking that they are the pathway to the real goal you have, which is the end goal.

Here’s some examples of end goals: I get to drive a wonderful car that brings me joy and excitement, I live in a fabulous house in the country surrounded by lots of trees, I have all the money I need to live the life-style of my dreams, I work in an environment that is fun and nurturing and allows me to express my talents for which I am richly rewarded.

Look at the difference between the first and second types of goals. Why do you care if you buy a new car or a new home if you get to drive a wonderful car that brings you joy and excitement and you live in a fabulous house in the country surrounded by lots of trees? Why do you care if you get that promotion if you work in an environment that is fun and nurturing and allows you to express your talents for which you are richly rewarded?

In other words, stop setting goals which you think are the means to the end you really want and focus on the end. The end might come in a totally unexpected way. Plus, do you really think you’re smart enough to know exactly what the best path is to what you really want? I’ll answer that question for you: No! All you know is what you’ve learned in the past and that is fundamentally limited. So focus on the end you want and let the universe show you the best way to make it happen. Giving up trying to control and manipulate the circumstances of life is one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself.

If you’re open to taking this conversation up an additional step, consider the following: What do you really want in the end anyway? Do you really want the house, the car, the promotion, the sales, the profitability or do you want what those things will bring you? You may not have ever thought about it but isn’t it true that you want those things because you think they’ll make you happy?

We talked about this extensively on our call last week. We all saw that most of the things we want in life we want because of the “feeling” we think those things will bring. But here’s the great reality: we don’t need those things to have that feeling, whatever it is. You can choose to have that feeling right here and right now. And here’s the best part: if you choose to have that feeling, whether it be joy or happiness or excitement, whatever, right now, the likelihood is that you will indeed attract to you all of the things you thought would bring you those feelings. And then, you don’t have to wait to have them to have those feelings. You can enjoy them right now.

Anyway, this call we had last week was so amazing, I’m going to let you listen in and see what’s available if you choose to participate in the Platinum Group coaching program. The dial-in number to gain access to the recording is: 267-507-0255. You will be asked for an access code after you dial in. It is: 40767707. If you have any problems accessing the call, please let me know.

Are you being the best you you can be?

I’m here at the National Speakers Association annual convention in San Diego, CA. Once a year, about 1,500 of the best speakers in the world gather to network with and learn from each other. This year, in attendance are speakers from 22 countries and people who speak on every imaginable subject, and many more that you couldn’t even imagine. We have many main stage speakers and over 50 concurrent sessions to choose from.

For me, after over a dozen years of coming to these events, the best part is not how much I learn, but how effectively many of the presenters provoke my thinking and leave me asking questions I don’t have ready answers for. This year was no exception and I’m going to offer you two questions that have really made me step back and look. I hope they will do the same for you.

The first question is: how much time are you taking each day getting better at your craft? For me, as a professional speaker, the question was intended to have me look at how much time I’m spending daily getting better on the platform, getting better as a presenter, getting better as a seminar leader, getting better as a coach, and getting better as a retreat leader. Really great questions and my obvious answer is: not nearly enough.

So I ask you: how much time are you taking each day getting better at what you do? Do you just go to work every day and do the same thing over and over again? Or do you take some time, any time, getting better at what you do? Do you take classes, go to seminars, read books, ask for help? Or do you just take it all for granted and assume you’re as good as you need to be. Here’s something I can promise you: you may be as good as you need to be, but you’re surely not as good as you could be.

I’m really going to take this question to heart and I encourage you to do the same. I’ve been doing most of what I’ve been doing for many years and I think I’m pretty good at it. But after watching some of the presenters here, I’m clear I can be a lot better than I am. And I’m confident that’s true for you to, which is why I said you’re surely not as good as you could be. I encourage you to take some time each day getting better. It surely can’t hurt and may really help take your career up to the next level.

The second question is: Am I providing the best ROI for the minutes I’ve been given on the stage? For me, again as a professional speaker, the question was intended to have me look at whether my client is receiving the best return on his or her investment for whatever time I was given to present my program. My first reaction was to answer yes, but I’m surely not going to leave it there. I’m really going to take a look and make sure that the answer really is yes.

So I ask you: someone is paying you for what you do, correct? Whether you work for a company or yourself, someone is paying you for what you do. Is that person or company getting the very best return on the investment they’re making in you? Are you giving whoever is paying you the best of what you have? Are they getting the best of you and your talents and abilities?

One of the saddest realities of the American workforce is reflected in the latest Gallup poll which said that 70% of full time workers are either checked out or actively disengaged. So for them, the company that is paying them is surely not getting the best ROI for the investment they are making in them. But just because the other 30% are engaged at work, the question still remains. Again, I don’t know what the answer to this question is for you, but I surely invite you to look, as that is exactly what I’ll be doing.

Are you clear about your intentions?

One of my all time favorite authors is Deepak Chopra. I have participated in weekend seminars with him and have gone to numerous events to hear him speak. He has written over 30 books and the man is absolutely brilliant. I especially like that what he teaches is totally consistent with the Unshackled Leadership philosophy and for all of these reasons, when he says something, I listen.

One of the things he says is that your life is created out of your intentions and what you have your attention on. And, given the series of posts I’ve just concluded writing, that’s totally understandable since what we have our attention on and what we are intending live in our thoughts and it is our thoughts that create.

If you’re with me so far, you can understand why I stress that it’s critical to be thinking about the future you want to create rather than your current problems, challenges and circumstances because both are what’s grabbing your attention. If you have your attention on your problems, challenges and circumstances, you’ll create more of those. But if you have your attention on the future you want to create, that’s what you’ll manifest.

What I want to focus on here is the issue of your intentions. It’s not my experience that most people focus much on that. To encourage you to do exactly that, let me share with you something we at Unshackled Leadership Co. do every week. I learned this from reading The Intenders Handbook and if you want to learn more about this, you can go to their web site and there’s lots of information there.

Bottom line: in order for all of us to spend time thinking about what we want to intend to happen, we have a weekly phone call every Monday morning. We all call into our bridge line since we’re scattered around the country. What happens on the call is as follows: Understanding that each of us has declared our intentions for the week to the group the week before, each person in the group has an opportunity to report to the others how their week was, with particular emphasis on what we had included on our intentions list for the previous week.

For example, one of the things I always put on my list is that some new, unexpected business opportunity comes my way. Well last week, out of the blue, I received a call from someone who was referred to me by two people familiar with our work, wanting to talk about my willingness to participate in a meeting of their company. Another member of our group has been intending for several months to get a brand new car and this week she was excited to report that the new car had arrived.

There may be some questions or discussions about what each of us reports but that is not a major part of the call. Anyway, after each of us has shared our report from the previous week, we again go around the circle, so to speak, and each of us shares our intentions for the coming week. As each of us completes, the rest of us say: “And so it is.” We then forward our list of intentions to everyone else in the group.

Why do we do this and what are the benefits? Well, if what we create in life is based on what we have our attention on and our intentions, the most obvious answer to that question is that it forces us to create our intentions. What most if not all of us do is to take some time Sunday evening to think about the week ahead and what we would like to intend will happen. At least for me, this forces me to look at every aspect of my life and get clear about what I want to intend will happen. Then, every morning, I not only read my intentions, but I read everyone else’s intentions and take a few moments intending that all of us will see the manifestation of our intentions.

We’ve been doing this for well over a year and we have all seen miraculous events occur which we attribute to this process. New jobs, new cars, wonderful events, breakthroughs in results, profitability, and all manner of things. So I highly highly recommend that you put together a group of like minded people and start doing this. I know many people who have been in groups like this for years where they actually meet in person. Since our group is scattered around the country, we do it by phone. But however you do it, start a group and get to work being clear about your intentions and sharing them weekly with people who will support you in whatever you’re up to in life.

Some final thoughts on the road to success

In many of the recent posts, I said I was going to share with you the essence of what The Roadmap to Success program teaches and I have done that. And please be clear that there’s a difference between “the essence” and the whole story. If you find the essence of interest, you can access the whole story at http://www.unshackledleadership.com/the-roadmap-to-success-program.

Summarizing what we’ve discussed over these past few weeks:

* You were born with the same exact power to create as everyone else.

   * You can create anything

   * And, you’re creating all the time

   * There’s never a time you’re not creating

* There’s not one thing you see with our eyes that’s the truth – it’s only a projection of your past thoughts

* Your thoughts create your experiences 100% of the time

* Your emotions are the fuel that either makes everything happen or prevents things from happening.

In the last few posts, I have begun to share how to put these principles into action and create the life of your dreams. It is now time to complete this series and I offer you the following important remarks:

Because there is no such thing as a neutral thought and all thoughts create on some level, if you want to have an amazing life, you must watch what comes out of your mouth. People say anything they darn please. We’re critical and judgment, we talk about people behind their backs, we gossip and say all kinds of negative and disempowering things. Given the opportunity to say something nice, we mostly choose to say things that are not so nice.

Tell the truth: you know you do this, right? And what’s worse, we don’t even give it much thought. Somehow, we assume it’s fine to do this.

It’s not, so stop it. Wake up. Think about what you’re about to say before you say it. Your words reflect your thoughts, your words create your reality, your words get planted in the fertile soil of creation and manifest. Learn to speak about what you want. Speak words of gratitude and appreciation. I was told by a student of ours that Albert Einstein used to say Thank You at least 100 times a day. So all of us have gotten into the habit of saying Thank You all day long. Try it and watch how quickly you will create things that will support you in being grateful.

And finally, if you want to have a really amazing life, forgive yourself and everyone else in your life for everything. Unforgiveness often doesn’t hurt the person we refuse to forgive at all, but it always hurts us. As long as we don’t forgive, we are bound to the other person with bonds of pain or anger or a desire for revenge. Forgiving doesn’t mean finding a way to excuse someone. There may be no excuse in the world for what they did. But forgiving does mean giving up the desire to punish them. Holding on to the need to see them pay for their words or actions is holding on to the injury itself. Forgiveness releases us from the power a wrongful action still has over us and sets us free to heal and move on.

It’s often the case that the person we most need to forgive is ourselves. We often regret actions we’ve taken or feel guilty for them. If that’s the case, surely look to see what actions need to be taken to set the situation right. But once that’s done, be willing to forgive yourself and move on. It’s been proven over and over again that true joy cannot occur in the absence of forgiveness. And what’s a life worth if it doesn’t contain joy.

I hope you’ve found these posts of value. The entire Roadmap to Success program has been recorded and is available as a download or as a 3 DVD package. If you’re interested in either, check out the program at http://www.unshackledleadership.com/the-roadmap-to-success-program. Or give us a call and we can discuss how to bring this program into your company.

ATTITUDE: Is yours worth catching

Summarizing what we’ve discussed over these past few weeks:

You were born with the same exact power to create as everyone else.

• You can create anything
• And, you’re creating all the time
• There’s never a time you’re not creating
• There’s not one thing you see with our eyes that’s the truth – it’s only a projection of your past thoughts
• Your thoughts create your experiences 100% of the time
• Your emotions are the fuel that either makes everything happen or prevents things from happening.

This week, let’s talk more about how to put these principles into action and create the life of your dreams:

Since your emotions are the fuel that either makes everything happen or prevents things from happening, you must learn to “choose” your attitude. No successful person allows the circumstances to dictate their attitude. Successful people choose their attitude and bring it to the circumstances of life.

So, what does it mean to “choose” your attitude? First, it means you choose to be satisfied and happy. If you’re waiting for the circumstances to be exactly the way you want them to be in order for you to be satisfied with your life and happy, I promise you’ll have a long wait. Your life’s the way it is and that’s that. Now you get to decide if you’re willing to be satisfied and happy. You can still want a lot more, but why not choose to be happy and satisfied now and take your satisfaction and happiness along with you on the journey rather than waiting for some day that will likely never come before you are that way? Makes sense to me. Furthermore, if I can’t trust you to be happy and satisfied now, when you likely already have an amazing life, how can I trust you to be happy and satisfied and some unknown time in the future when you’ll probably still be waiting for life to turn out.

Choosing your attitude also means to be optimistic, positive and enthusiastic and to have faith and trust in your future. Every truly successful person I’ve meet had this genuine knowingness that everything was going to turn out great and they looked forward to the future with optimism and enthusiasm.

Get in the habit of looking for things to appreciate wherever you are. My favorite way of saying this is: cultivate an attitude of gratitude. Learn to be appreciative of and grateful for all of the things you now probably take for granted, like: having a house to live in, a bed to sleep in, food to eat, a car to drive, roads to take you places, traffic lights to keep you safe, your family, friends, co-workers and customers, and most of all, when you awake each day, for the privilege it is to be alive and contribute to life.

And if that’s not enough, here are some additional thoughts to think about: Speak only about what you love and brings you happiness. What good could possibly come from speaking about what you hate or makes you unhappy. But isn’t that what far too many of us do? Makes no sense. Stop watching CNN, which stands for “constantly negative news.” Focus on what’s working in your life and the good news of the day. I personally love the way the NBC evening news with Brian Williams ends with a section called Making a Difference where they focus on people and organizations who are doing just that. I often turn on the show just for that section.

And for the grand finale, do not allow yourself to feel irritated or disappointed. Learn to accept people and life just the way they are and it is and just the way they and it are not. Give up complaining, blaming, criticizing and gossip. Could you even begin to imagine what life would be like if you did that? We so take those things for granted, as if life is just supposed to be that way. No, it’s not supposed to be that way, it’s just that we have made it that way. And the fact that we have is probably the biggest reason why people are not happy and don’t have the life of their dreams.

To be continued . . .