Setting Goals, Making a Plan, and Staying Motivated

Let's face it, we all have dreams, goals, and aspirations. We ponder and imagine ourselves, living out or fantasies, no matter how intricate and detailed. We can see ourselves there and we are content. The problem with that is once we finish thinking about it, we are instantly transported back to reality and then we realize the large gaping distance between us and those fantasies.

Sometimes after imagining what your goals are we feel energized and ready to take on the world, no one is going to get in our way of accomplishing what we've set out to do. After time, we tend to see that level of enthusiasm wear off and we're left imagining what could have been or even worse depressed that we failed at attaining what it was we wanted.

Setting Goals

Think about your last New Years Resolution, "I'm going to lose so many pounds or I'm going to eat healthy..." Sound familiar? It happens to everyone, but after some time we lose sight of our goals, because we don't have a clear plan and we lost that initial motivation.

When we first imagined ourselves 30 pounds lighter, we could "see" how great we looked, we could "feel" how great it was. That's your motivation right there, how you'll feel about yourself once you've accomplished what you've set out to do. But that vision of the future isn't going to be enough to get you there, if it was, you'd be 30 pounds lighter already and you wouldn't be reading this.

Making a plan

The problem is we often set out on these long complicated journeys but we do it without a plan. If you where traveling to another state or country would you do it without a plan. Would you drive to Canada (where you've never been before) without a map. Just aimlessly fumble your way through another country.

Pursuing your goals/dreams is much like taking a long trip into unfamiliar lands. You have a starting point an ending point and pit stops along the way that will act as checkpoints to ensure your going the right way, show your progress, and to give yourself much needed breaks. Remember Rome wasn't built in one day, and you can't accomplish your dreams of becoming rich and famous in one day either. These things take time.

Make a list of the things you're going to need to accomplish you goals, just some simple/general steps. Then on another piece of paper elaborate on those steps go into in-depth detail, you'll get a good idea of just what it's going to take to get where you want and more importantly how much work it's going to take. Now break those steps up into time allotments, setting clear goals of how far along you want be and when you want be there. This will act as a reference for later, when you're sitting idle and not sure what to do next, you won't have to worry, you have a plan.


Staying Motivated


Okay, so you've set your goals, you've made a plan, but you're starting to lose focus. Don't worry it can be hard to change yourself, give yourself a break, sometimes you will stumble, don't get down on yourself. There are things you can do to help keep yourself motivated, limit your slip-ups and keep yourself on track.

-First way to stay motivated = write it down.

"The act of writing is the act of discovering what you believe."
— David Hare

Write down what you want to accomplish, your goals, dreams, ambitions, etc. Write it all down in a place you frequent and have easy access to. Then read what you write down, read it all the time, everyday, multiple times a day, for extended periods of time. These are your goals, these are you dreams, you should be familiar with them.

-Second way to stay motivated = Hold yourself accountable

If you're accountable for what you want to do, what you want to accomplish, then you know you have to do them or there will be consequences. One of the best ways is to have someone close that you trust be your accountability partner. You can talk yourself out of doing things, but you shouldn't be able to talk someone else out of holding yourself accountable for what you said you would do. And if you find yourself talking that person out of holding you accountable, then you should find a new partner. Spouses, family members, or good friends are great for this role.

-Third way to stay motivated = love your goals

You should be in love with your goals. If your goal is to be a website designer, you should be doing everything in your power to be the best website designer, in fact you should be acting like you're already a website designer. Your time should be consumed with looking at other high caliber websites, learning and reading building websites and about website design, you should be making websites of your own, and talking with other people who are interested about making websites, etc.

I'm a huge fan of the video game Halo. I enjoy playing it, I enjoy watching people play it. I know the best places to be on certain maps, the times weapons spawn, where the other team is going to spawn, what professional players are the best at playing halo, trick jumps that aren't common knowledge, the list could go on.

This is how you should be about your goals. If your passionate about your goals they'll be a way of life for you, you live your dreams you don't just plan them. Remember you're already a website designer, you just have to get other people to realize it. :)