Episode #5: How To Design Your Life (My Process For Setting and Achieving Goals)

This lesson is going to teach you an easy and effective system for setting and achieving goals.  This skill is a necessary tool to building the life you want, one measurable, and achievable step at a time.  I have been using this system personally for over a decade, and it’s helped me move through chapters of life that I wanted to experience, from starting a successful business and always working for myself, to buying a piece of property, to traveling in my off season, to getting out hiking with my dog every day.  This system has helped me identify what I want, what makes me happy, and then how to go about achieving these things.  

We’re going to dive deep into the process of goal setting, that is deciding what YOU uniquely and individually want, because knowing what you want is the first and most important step you have to take towards designing your life.  We’re also going to touch on the techniques I use to start working towards these goals in baby steps that are measurable and manageable, so you don’t get awed by and then flattened by the magnitude of your goals and dreams before you’ve even begun. 

My personal goal setting process has evolved over the years.  If you’re like me, you probably grew up having to do some sort of little goal setting activity in school occasionally.It was always a fun activity, sometimes a little escape from reality, but it always still felt a bit like day dreaming.  Then, right after I graduated university, I applied to a government grant program to start a small business, and I won one of the grant spots.  As part of the program I was paired with an advisor to help me through my first year of business.  This advisor made me create a goals list for my first 1-5 years of business, and this small activity blew my mind, because it wasn’t actually a list, it was a chart, a detailed goals chart.  He taught me how to brainstorm goals freely, decide which ones were tangible and applicable to me, and most importantly how to break them down into smaller and more manageable steps, then set timelines, due dates, and markers to stay accountable and to know when I had achieved something.  From there, we met once a month, for six months, and he personally followed up on my progress.  This was a freeking game changer!  I’m talking, one of those lessons I can look back on and realize that my life would have been entirely different if I had never been taught this concept, and I actually couldn’t believe that nobody had taught me this before I was 23. 

So, if I can start my teaching here with ONE THING for you to learn and master, I recommend adding a goal setting and tracking activity into your routine. Make your map, and design your own life.  Now, I’m pretty sure this is clear already, but I’m not talking cheesy and useless new years resolutions type goals.  Most people don’t even like setting new years resolutions because it feels fake, and impossible to stick to.  The sentiment behind them is often right, but the process and follow through is just not there.  So, if you’re one of those people who hates new years resolutions I want to you to hear me here, you’re not bad at making change, or getting what you want in life, you just haven’t been taught how yet. 

Now, let’s jump into the process together and I’ll walk you through it.  First, you’re welcome to do this by hand, but if you want to follow along with me exactly I’ve linked a downloadable copy the goals chart that I use.  Just click the GOALS CHART download link, sign up, and download your copy so you can follow along. 

This is really important because you need to put a pen to paper and write this stuff down.  Don’t do it in your head, don’t write a note on your phone that you’ll delete in 6 months, get a piece of paper, get a pen, and write this down.   The important part is that you don’t just store it in your head because that doesn’t work, we are so influenced by our experiences in the moment, that it’s impossible to rely on just your brain to keep track of everything you want to do and be.  There are countless studies demonstrating that writing things down makes it so much more likely that you’ll follow though, so do yourself a solid and set yourself up for success here. 

Step 1:  Finding out what you REALLY want

The most important first step of setting goals is finding what is actually meaningful to you.  But don’t get intimidated here, because what you want IS allowed to change.  I revisit my goals multiple times a year to make sure they’re still serving me, they’re still what I want.  And I have NO problem knocking something off the list if it shouldn’t be there anymore.  So, we’re going to figure out what YOU want, not the things that society, social media, or your family say you should want.

Set a timer on your phone for 20 minutes, turn off any distractions, and start to brainstorm.  By the time your timer goes off I want you to have written down at least 20 goals.

Next, go back through your list and freely start crossing out anything that doesn’t make you excited, or wistful, or ready to jump up and take hell bent for glory action.  Get rill honest with yourself, because this is YOUR goals list, and I’m not going to ask you to share it with anybody.

Next, I want you to go through your list again, and highlight all the goals that can be considered SMART goals.  If you haven’t heard about this before, SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Timed. 

Consider each goal and decide is it Specific?  If not, can you make it so?  For example, just saying ‘I want to be financially secure’ doesn’t cut it.  Your goal has to be more specific, along the lines of, ‘I want to feel financially secure, and to do this I’m going to create an emergency savings account, with six months of expenses safely saved there. I’m going to save for this by cutting back on my variable expenses and contributing a full 20% of my salary to this account until it’s fully funded.’  

Are your goals Measurable?  You have to have a metric you can use to know when you’re achieving something, or getting closer to your goal.  For example, I want to be healthy, and I’ll know when I start feeling healthy, doesn’t cut it.  Decide how you define your version of healthy so you can measure it, and maybe you end up with something along the lines of, I want to eat meals made with fresh ingredients and no sugar 5 days a week.  Now that’s something you can keep track of and know when you’re hitting your mark!

Is each goal attainable?  While I wholly stand behind dreaming big and being audacious, reach for the moon and you’ll land among the stars kind of stuff, it’s important to set goals that can actually be achieved.  If you don’t know how to achieve it yet, set another, closer goal that you think will be a step in the right direction to get you there.

Are your goals relevant to you?  We already screened for this, but it’s worth one more kick at the can to make sure you’re choosing goals that are relevant and meaningful to you, and not some peer pressured version of you.  I can’t stress this enough, don’t waste time working towards a goal, only to realize it means very little to you and isn’t what you wanted anyways.  And if you do realize this about one of your goals, let it go and don’t spend any energy kicking yourself for it. 

Finally, are your goals something that can be timed?  It’s important to set a finish line to work towards.  It’s okay if this timeline has to change, life happens, but setting a timeline for your goal helps hold you accountable, take action, and know when you’ve achieved it.  For example, I want to run a half marathon is a great goal, but unless you say ‘I want start training today to run a half marathon by next October’, then what the heck are you even working towards!

Step 2:  Create a condensed copy of your goals list and keep it visible!

Now that you’ve gone back through your goals list, I want you to get a new page and write down your new condensed goals list.  Then, put them somewhere where you will see them, to remind yourself on a daily basis of what you want, and why you want it, because we all get a bit lost sometimes.  I have goals lists taped beside all my work stations, and inside my planner so I can be reminded daily of what I’m working towards. 

Having this simple list of goals is the first thing you need to do so that step by step, little by little, you can start designing your life.  You can have one or more lists for work, or business, or personal things, the important part is to follow this process and to write them down. 

Step 3:  Turning your goals list into an actual plan with a goals chart

Next, Like I said way back in the beginning of this episode, having a goals list was my guiding star, but learning how to tackle that list, break those goals down into steps, and track and measure them is what took me off of the bench, and into the game.  Combined with the accountability I had from my business coach, this process got things done.  

So, now you’re going to take out your goals chart, and write each of your goals down under the ‘goal’ column. One goal per box, and fill out as many as you have.  Remember they should be hyper specific!

The next box over is labelled ‘completion’, and this is where you’re going to write down your marker for  how you’ll know when you’ve completed your goal.  For some goals this may seem obvious, and for others it will help you clarify even further if it’s still a bit vague for you.  Go through your chart and fill out this column, establishing exactly how you’ll know when you’ve completed each goal.

The third box over is labelled ‘timeframe’.  This is where you’ll either write the exact date you want to have met your goal by, or the length of time it will take for you to to achieve it.  Go through, and assign a time frame for each of your goals.  This is setting your own due date, and it’s important to be both realistic and gentle with your dates.  It’s not the end of the world if you don’t meet them exactly.

The fourth box is labelled ‘steps’, and this is a really important part of each goal.  Many things we want seem unattainable because we don’t know how to get there, not because it’s impossible.  This is where your goals chart truly turns into a map.  This box will get full, because this is where you’re going to break down each little step you have to take to reach your goal.  The minute steps you’ll uncover here are what will make it possible for you to achieve your goals, and not to get derailed by feeling lost about what you should do.

Finally the 5th box is labelled ‘first step’.  this is where you’re going to identify and write down the first step you’re going to take, preferably right away.  Without a first step to take action on immediately this is all just an exercise in day dreaming, and I want you to have results when you try this.  So, pick a reasonable first step to take towards your goal, write it down in this column and DO IT.  Taking action IS the building block of achieving your goals.  You HAVE to take action.  Even if you don’t really know what you’re doing, taking action will start to create more clarity for you.  So, write down your first step, write down when you’re going to do this first step (preferably right away) and when it’s done, delete it/cross it out/whatever, and write down the next step you’re going to take and when you’re going to take it.  Bit by bit, step by step, I promise, this will get you there.

And there you have it, you should now have a filled out goals chart that will make it approachable and manageable to start working towards what you really want.  Next, I want you to print off this chart and keep it somewhere visible.  Tape it up somewhere, keep it in your day planner, save it as the background of your desktop, whatever works for you.  It should be accessible and easy for you to look at all the time to keep it fresh in your mind.  

While you might not always have good days, or months, or even years of working towards what you want, seriously putting the time and energy into activities like this is what will help you get there.  Before you can design and live your dream life, it’s necessary to identify what you really want, what your goals are, and then use a functional format like the goals chart to establish your metrics, your timelines, and most importantly the steps you need to take to get there.  Finally, remember, be gentle with yourself.  While some goals will require hard work and a head down slog sometimes, it’s only worth it if that’s what you really want, if that goal still serves you.  So don’t feel like you can’t change your mind after you’ve gone through an activity like this.  Your goals chart will be an ongoing working document in your life that you can revisit, update, and change whenever you want. 

Linked Resources

Download your goal setting chart for this activity here!

NOTE: This page contains affiliate links that allow you to find the items mentioned in this episode and support the show at no cost to you. While this show may earn minimal sums when the viewer uses the links, the viewer is in NO WAY obligated to use these links. Thank you for your support!