Why is it important to set goals?
Having a goal enables you to focus your energies on devising ways to achieve it.
When someone makes a decision and begins focusing on achieving a specific goal (and even better in a specific period of time), the powerful subconscious mind goes to work and begins playing with ideas and developing strategies of various ways to bring about the successful completion of the goal.
When you set yourself a goal both your conscious and subconscious start working on it and begin to develop an action plan. You will find you begin asking yourself questions about what needs to be done to enable you to reach your goal. You may find yourselves coming up with amazing ideas and solutions to problems or obstacles that have been in the way of achieving your goal. Solutions and ideas that you are surprised you ever thought of may start popping into your mind.
Our subconscious is an extremely powerful tool. The more often you remind yourself of your goal, the more your mind will work on ways for you to achieve it. Some people find answers come to them when they are asleep and dreaming.
Have you ever noticed that there is no correlation between being wealthy and having a high IQ or a university degree? If there were, every doctor and university graduate would be wealthy, and as statistics show, most of them end up in the same situation as 95% of the population.
The main thing that the majority of independently wealthy people have in common is that they have set goals for themselves and achieved them. They invest time in reading and learning about wealth creation and are happy to learn from other people's mistakes and experiences, as well as their own. They set goals, and realize that they will be far better able to achieve them if they familiarize themselves with the ways in which other people acted and the things that others have done to succeed.
Wealthy people create wealth by carefully utilizing the income that they have available to them to their best advantage. They know that working harder and longer hours is not the way to achieve financial freedom, instead they have to utilize what they have, and make it grow.
Setting Goals
When you begin to work out your goals you need to make them as specific as possible.
A vague idea or generalization like "I want to buy investment properties and become wealthy" is not enough.
You need to be much more detailed. "I want to own my first investment property within six months. I will save for the legal and bank fees, and borrow 100% of the value of the property. I will find an extremely well priced, three bedroom brick veneer house that is close to schools and shopping centers. It will be either brand new or less than ten years old. It will be structurally sound, and require a minimal amount of maintenance. I will find a good agent to manage it, who has a lot of experience and will find me a good tenant."
This is a specific goal, and you could add a lot more to it. Because your goal is specific your mind immediately begins to ask questions such as "How much money will I need for the fees and charges? How much does that relate to if I break it down on a weekly basis? Will I have to look at my current expenses to see where I need to cut back so as to make up the difference for the amount I need to save?" Specific goals help you to create specific, realistic action plans and as the old saying goes, "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail".
You will find that if you write down your goals on a piece of paper, and put it in a prominent position, so that you will read it often, your subconscious as well as your conscious mind will start asking questions and coming up with answers, and you will find that you have already begun to take the necessary steps to achieving your goal.
It is helpful to have a series of goals, ranging from daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, etc. You can always refine and change your goals as time goes on and situations change.
You may find that it is easier to start at the 10-year mark, and then work backwards. Try to work out what steps would be needed to achieve your 10-year goal, and spread them out over the different time spans, to what you would need to achieve to end up with the final result.
Try to make your goals realistic and achievable. Do not set a goal that is too hard. Set lots of small, easily achievable goals and work step by step to achieve your road to success. Stay positive. Believe in yourself and your abilities to succeed, even if other people patronize you or try to put you off, or tell you there is no point.
Setting and achieving goals help you to create a stronger character. It is always helpful to remember that our brain cannot entertain both positive and negative thoughts at the same time.
If you stay positive you will dispel negative thought patterns. Even if you come across little obstacles that get in the way of your goals, don't give up. Focus on finding a solution, rather than focussing on the problem and utilize a positive response.
Focussing on finding solutions enables you to put your brain to work, to find ways around things. If you just see an obstacle as a problem and just accept that life has dealt you a blow, and let it stop you in your tracks, then you will never learn and grow.
Remember that children learn to walk by falling over. Focus on the long-term achievements that you want to fulfil, and it will be easier to overcome your problems.