Achieve Your Goals Faster Using These 6 Keys

 Now, friends, as you commit more of your time and resources into building your small business, you realize that not everything you do is necessary for your success.

In the early stages of your venture, you are virtually lost in a vast ocean, everything looks the same.  You have no idea what you need to do to steer yourself towards profitability.

Since you are lost and need direction, you subscribe to all the email newsletters that seem to be leading in the direction of your desired outcome.  You buy into all kinds of coaching courses, magical turnkey systems and fail-proof software that was supposedly designed to bring you overnight success.  Based on the age-old adage that knowledge is power, you download a whole host of e-books, but you never find time to read them because you are so overwhelmed with all the advice flying around all over the internet.

Most of the products that you purchase are nothing close to what you expected.   The rest are totally worthless and time-consuming, with no apparent return on investment.

During this period, your inbox overflows with lame and dodgy advice from all types of self-proclaimed gurus and overnight millionaires.  The confusion gets worse and you begin to doubt if your dream ever stood any chance of survival.  You start to wonder if your time will ever come.

You need to understand that it is okay to be critical of yourself sometimes.  In fact, being critical allows you to walk on the straight and narrow, and thereby reach greater levels of excellence. You need to evaluate your game plan and goal achieving strategies to determine whether they are still relevant and appropriate for your current situation.

It is natural for humans to seek instant gratification in all that we do, but getting it right is never easy.  To succeed, you need to constantly evaluate your action steps to determine whether you are still moving in the right direction.  It’s important for you to be in control – you need to hold the reigns.  It is your goal after all, therefore it only makes sense that you make the final decision about the best way you will make it happen.  You must be the decision maker, and you must assume responsibility for your goals.  You must have a plan of action and hold yourself accountable for the performance of the necessary actions that will result in your success.

Now, here is a handy checklist that you can use as a guideline to get stated towards fulfilling your true potential.   I personally use these guidelines in my life and career to produce positive results.

P.S.  These tips will be completely useless if you don’t take action.

Having deadlines helps you to schedule your activities according to specific timeframes, and give you a sense of urgency.  Deadlines will put pressure on you to stop procrastinating and to start performing.

Be sure to have a list of actions that you must perform. 

A to-do list helps you eliminate unnecessary activities

that will cost you time, energy and money.  You will be able to track productivity and optimize your time as well as your resources.

The main objective of this step is to encourage you to persevere in spite of the setbacks you will definitely encounter.  By now you are well aware that nothing will ever be achieved without effort and persistence on your part.  So, prepare yourself to face major challenges along the way.  You could read motivational poetry, put up inspirational posters on your wall, read inspirational quotes, or anything else that will encourage you to take action.

Everything that you have done up to this point is totally worthless if you do not take action.  Having a plan will not bring you results.  Motivation will inspire and excite you, but it will not bring your dreams to life unless you act on it.  Remember that faith without work is dead, and if you don’t act now to bring your dreams to reality, you are dead too.  You are nothing more than a dreamer.

Every little step counts, even if it seems tedious.  Try to do something that will move you closer to your goal everyday.  No empire will ever be built in a day.  And no business will ever be able to grow itself without your participation.  Don’t give up on your dreams even when it is an uphill battle to keep moving forward.

Now that you have a clear target and a well defined plan to achieve success, it is important that you continually review your progress.  Call yourself to order if you have derailed.  Find new and effective methods of producing the results you want.  Keep up with the developments in your particular niche or industry.  Never stop taking action and improving your performance. Research and arm yourself with knowledge.  Create milestones that will direct your action steps towards achieving your goals.  Breaking down your goal into smaller goals makes it less overwhelming and more believable.  It is also motivating because you grow in confidence with each milestone that you achieve.

Realizing that you are not too far off your target encourages you to put in the extra effort. In Switch, Chip Heath and Dan Heath talk about shrinking the change in order to be more successful.  The same principles apply to your goal achieving. Shrinking your goals into quick and easy action steps has tremendous benefits to your psyche and gives you major confidence. The more challenges you surmount, the more short term goals you reach, the more you grow in confidence. So Shrink the change to get the best outcome.