“Commitment means staying loyal to what you said you wanted long after the mood you said it in has left you.” – Author Unknown
My last blog focused on Stage 1 of transforming ideas into action – getting clear about what you really want in 2017. Now that you have done some reflection and gained some clarity, it’s time to get realistic and make a deeper commitment to change.
Working towards goals that don’t inspire you is a hard trek. This phase is about building commitment by making sure your goals you listed are really going to make a difference before you go any further. You need to be clear about what you need to change and why.
The next stage after this is creating a plan to achieve your goals. Why waste time making a plan for goals you aren’t really committed to achieve? Take another look at your list of “wants” for 2017. How committed are you to each idea? What’s really a priority for you now?
Changing requires being ready and willing to follow through on behavior that will actually make a difference. And it usually hurts a bit to move out of our comfort zone. The focus in Stage 2 is to turn your “want to do’s” into “will do’s.”
To get the most out of this exercise, I want you to be completely truthful with yourself and lose the self-judgement. Just take one of the goals you wrote down from the previous exercise. Choose the first one that stands out (or got you excited) and reflect upon the following questions:
What circumstances in my work and life make this goal important me right now? Why not next year?
What will achieving this goal give me that I don’t have now? How will I benefit? How will others?
How will achieving this goal leave me feeling?
On a scale of 1 to 10 how motivated am I to achieve this goal?
If my motivation score is less than 8 why do I have this goal? Is this really my goal? Is this goal what I want, or what I think I should want?
If this really isn’t your goal, what is another one that does reflect what is truly important to you? Be honest. Commitment to a goal is a decision and it needs to reflect what you value.
“When confronted with a challenge, the committed heart will search for a solution. The undecided heart searches for an escape.” – Andy Andrews
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