Goal Setting: Begin with the end in mind

A big breakthrough I had when I first began my study of effective goal setting was to begin with the end and work your way back to the present.

Is that how you have been setting your goals?

Since nobody had told me this I inefficiently spent a lot of time working my way forward from where I was. Big mistake.

Think about goal setting like a magic trick. Start with the ‘effect’ that you would like to produce, and there are many different ways to pull off the trick! And keep in mind that almost any ‘effect’ is possible to produce – especially if someone else has been able to pull it off in the past.
So whereas most stories start at the beginning, with goal setting we start in the end.

But how far in the end?

For the past 9 years I have been writing myself a 5 year vision every year. You can read more about that process here: https://www.facebook.com/perceptionacademy/posts/1459167930902029

I have written 25 year visions, and if you really want to think about the legacy you would like to leave you can even write yourself a 500 year vision, but overall I think 5 years is a great amount of time to vision how/where you would like to be.

Once you have the big vision you can work your way back to the present and figure out some of the ways you can actualize the result that you would like to achieve.

Remember, the purpose of setting goals/visioning is NOT to achieve what you are writing about, but to practice exercising your power of intentionality: https://perceptionacademy.com/setting-non-instrumental-goals/

Do you have any questions of comments? Feel free to leave them here.