The year 2013

First I want to wish you all a blazing 2013. Hope you celebrated your way, either raising a glass or dancing on the roof top, enjoying the fireworks or like me staying up late with my love reminiscing the good old times in 2012. It's been a while now since I stopped making resolutions. Why? Simply because for some reason I don't ever stick with them. And having an obsession for making list wasn't helping me either. So after collecting list after list, year in year out, I finally was convinced that maybe I wasn't a resolution making girl. Thus I needed a more goal oriented approach. 

Synonyms for goal are aim-purpose-target-object-end-mark. All these nouns suggest some sort of action. In my teaching days I used to guide my students in making SMART goals.

Approaching your goals the SMART way, will give you a sense of direction. Not only will you make visible what it is you want to achieve, this method is also a great way to define your behaviour. 

Step 1 
Decide on the W's. 
Who, what, where, when, why, etcetera.  The more you can explain in this step the more solid your goal will be.   
Step 2
Think about how you will know when your goal is accomplished. What concrete criteria will help you achieve your goal?
Step 3
Describe a result.  What will be the outcome of your efforts?
 Step 4
Yes, be bold, go for that challenge but keep it balanced by taking relevancy into account. 



Make sure your goals are realizable. It's all about staying connected and grounded with your reality.  
Step 5
Just add a start and ending date. And stick to it. This will work best if you keep it short-term. 

By following these steps you unconciously reset yoor mind in motion to start working towards your goal. If still this sounds a little to abstract for you, let me try and share one of my SMART goals for Mode Plus in 2013. Instead of saying : I'll comment more on other blogs. I choose to state this : I'll plan one day in the week to comment on 10 blogs during January. At the end of the month I've showed love and support to at least 40 different blogs. It's do-able, I have a start and finish, my task is clear -commenting one day a week- my target -different 10 blogs- is also clear. I even know when I've reached my goal. 

How do you set your goals? Or do you just go with the flow and do?

Share your thoughts with me!

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