I’m going to tell you a story and you tell me if it sounds at all familiar...
You've got your goal. You've mapped it out. You are ready to go. You go to sleep. You get up the next day. You go about your life just like you did before and absolutely nothing changes. Then when the due date for your goal rolls around you are all kinds of disappointed because it didn’t happen.
This is one of the three biggest mistakes I see most people make when trying to achieve a goal. They spend lots and lots of time creating the plan, planning some more, mapping it all out, figuring out exactly what they want, all of that. Then they forget to translate the goal to their calendar. They don’t schedule time to DO the activity.
I don't know about you but when I sit down to do the work each day, I look at my calendar and check what I'm supposed to do. If something is not on my calendar it doesn't get done. It's very unlikely that I'm going to remember everything I have to do, so I must put it in my calendar to make sure it gets done. If it's not there, it's not happening.
If you have a big goal that you really want to achieve you've got to take the activity you need to do and schedule time in your calendar to do it. For example…
- If you want to post on social media more consistently you probably would like to schedule 30 minutes a day to post on social media.
- If you want to generate more leads for your business you might love to schedule some time for some networking events and follow up meetings.
- If you want to get better at bookkeeping and get on top of it before the next time taxes are due, you might like to add a recurring event in your calendar so you can do your bookkeeping a couple of times a month.
- If your office is always messy and you would love for it to be more organized, you might want to block off 20 minutes a week to clean.
If you want something to happen, schedule the time to make it happen. Once you’ve scheduled the time, keep that appointment with yourself! If your goal is important enough to be a goal, the activity to achieve it is important enough to earn a spot on your calendar. If you can't find a spot on your calendar, reassess what's on there and figure out which other activities are not currently earning their place. Figure out what can be bumped to give your goal priority.
To learn about all 3 common goaling mistakes and discover how to set yourself up for success, watch my free masterclass Get Goaling.
Enjoy the journey.