Sure, resolutions are easy to miss. In fact, nothing makes you feel inadequate like revisiting your resolutions from last year. But I’m not going to make resolutions – I’m going to make goals.
Is that semantics? Yep. But a goal is something I strive for year-round. A resolution is something I say I’m going to do and forget about by the third week of January. I’ve already talked about failing to reach your goals, and reviewed 2012. Now it’s time to look ahead.
The Basis for my 2013 Goals
Setting goals is always interesting, because you don’t want to set too many, yet you want to challenge yourself to be better. Here were my criteria:
- They had to be specific. Last year, I set a goal to become a better guitar player. Duh – way too vague. Guess which goal I didn’t keep in 2012?
- I needed control over them. My goals aren’t along the lines of “Lose X pounds” or “Have X number of clients”. Those are things that depend on a lot of variables. Instead, I set specific goals that I can track myself, and I can control them year-round. There’s a big difference.
- These are goals I want. Not anybody else’s. They’re not what I should do. They’re what I genuinely want to see happen in 2013.
Tracking my Goals
There are a lot of sweet apps and tools for tracking your goals, but I’m using Evernote. It’s just easier to keep it in a tool that I use every day – that way, my goals are in front of my face a lot. Plus, I can track them my own way then. I’m combining that with the chain method of goal-setting, where I mark down every day that I meet my goal, and I try not to break the chain.
So here they are!
Career Goals
- Contact each prospect on my list once a week. I was discussing my prospecting concerns with someone at the WDS Conference in Portland, and she used to work for a marketing firm. She says if you are contacting somebody up to 4 times per month, you aren’t “bugging” them. So I have 52 weeks to contact them.
- Hire 10 affiliates for TV Without Limits. Right now, my current game plan is to sell TV Without Limits through affiliates. I’m working right now with a network of several thousand affiliates to get my product in front of them. Along with that, I hope to push myself to contact other affiliates elsewhere. I want as many people selling my product as possible!
- Make $75,000. I set a goal of $50,000 this year, and I came in just a few thousand dollars short. Time to reach even higher.
- Build a list of 100-200 prospects in the health sector. I already am working with finance companies and prospects, but I’m about to add a piece of health copy to my portfolio. My goal is to use that experience to get more work in that area as well.
Development Goals
- Pay 5 things off our Debt Snowball. It will be a challenge, but it will be reachable, and definitely one that will go a long way in turning our finances around. This is a joint goal with my wife. If you’re not familiar with the debt snowball method of paying off debt, check out Dave Ramsey. We took his Financial Peace University course and absolutely loved it.
- Floss every day. Not 3-4 times a week. Every. Day. I’m tired of lying to my dentist, and bloody gums gets old after a while.
- Read 25 books. I originally thought I should read 50 books, but this is a book every two weeks, and it’s a good start to get me going. I really want to build and develop my reading habit this year.
- Practice guitar 15 minutes a day. Again, making it easy and specific for me. I’ll likely practice much more often than that.
Fitness Goals
- Three 5Ks. I loved racing in 2012, and I did two in 2011 as well. I want to take it up a notch and really push myself. And speaking of pushing myself…
- Run another ½ Marathon. It was one of my proudest achievements of 2012, and it’s one I want to beat. I almost came in under 2 hours, and I want to do it this year.
- Do yoga 4 times a week. I’m a huge fan of DDP Yoga and its benefits. I’m easing myself into a mid-day yoga routine, and it is crazy-helpful for my back as I sit at a desk all day. Plus, it’s a strength-building yoga workout, so I get a little bit of that lean muscle that the ladies (read: my wife) like.
Writing Goals
- 1K per day. This will be apart from blogging and journaling. Again, very high expectations, but necessary ones. Writers write. If I’m a writer, I need to create on a constant basis. That’s the only way I’m going to find my voice.
- Publish a book. Yep, I’ve been kicking this one around for over a year, and I’m pulling the trigger. I’m in the preliminary stages of brainstorming, but I plan on publishing at least one book on Amazon this year. It’s going to be really tough and a true test of myself as a writer, but it’s a necessary one. I want to be an author. This is the year I do it.
And that’s it! A good mix of goals, nothing too overwhelming, and a good way to track it all to keep myself from getting too confused. At the end of the day, the transition to a new year is one where we get to start thinking about being better people. Ideally, we want to do that all year round, but it’s a convenient time. My challenge to you this year is to envision what you want your life to (realistically) look like at the end of 2013? And then, work backwards: what can you do to get there?
For example: you want to be in a better financial position at the end of the year? Don’t bother with “win the lottery”. You have no control over that. How about “cut monthly expenses by $100”? That’s doable. Then you can take that $100 and put it towards a debt, or put it into savings. There are ways to do it. But you have to have goals that you control.
What about you? What are your goals for 2013?