#achieving your goals

[caermorrighan]

Plans vs (Realistic) Planning

The inspiration for this came, from all places, from a World of Warcraft stream, talking about some of the challenges the game has faced over the past few years. But I think it has a pretty wide application. Essentially, the thesis was that there is a difference between making plans and planning.

And that rings very true. We see it every year, every half year, every quarter when we make plans in the form of goals and resolutions. Sometimes those are just a vague idea, which barely counts as a plan. Sometimes they are fully fleshed out plans. You could even go as far as working out all the steps, undertaking the first few of them. And then still fail. One reason for that might be the difference between plans and planning.

Goals are not planning, they are plans

Our goals are not going to magically achieve themselves. We need to make them happen. A part of that is setting the right goals, but another part is working out the detail of how to implement them. What steps do you need to go through to meet your goal? How will you know when you've succeed? I normally start with a backlog.

Backlogs are not planning, they are plans

I normally create a backlog for something I want to achieve. There are a lot of benefits to this - it removes decision fatigue and confusion. It lets me assess the real scale of what I am making a plan for. But, you still just have a list. The list helps, but if its just a big long list then, to be honest, its probably a bit overwhelming.

The next step is planning.

I've taken the name for backlogs from agile methodology, particularly scrum. What you do, in scrum, is take a plan and turn it into planning.

How I do planning from my backlogs?

First of all, I ensure my backlogs are prioritised. I need to know what is most important to me. Otherwise you end up wandering around in the corner getting something done that doesn't really align with your overall goals. For example, if I have a backlog to read a book for work, and a backlog to read a book for personal development, I need to decide which book takes priority. All things are never equal.

Then, once I have things in an order, I start by scheduling some of them. How many depends on how big they are vs how much time you have. So the second thing you want to do with backlogs is understand the scale of each item. Say one of your books has 5 chapters and another 20 chapters. Are those equal? If a chapter in book one takes 20 minutes to read, you have 100 minutes of reading. If the chapters in the other book take 5 minutes to read, you still have 100 minutes of reading. If you have 10 minutes to read a day, you can get through either book in 10 days. But how you schedule that work will look a little different.

In scrum, you don't actually size your work items by minutes taken. Because you don't know how long they will take up front. But you can probably compare them. If reading one chapter in the 5 chapter book is a large task, then reading one chapter in the 20 chapter book is a small task. An approach I think suits personal planning here is t-shirt sizes. Mark items on your backlog as XS, S, M, L, XL. If you want to do numbers instead, a common scale used is a modified Fibonnaci sequence - 0.5, 1, 3, 5, 8, 13. You can keep going but at some point estimating above a certain number in the scale just means your task is too big and you should break it up.

Now you can move on to the final step of planning - figuring out how much you can do in a day or week - however you prefer to plan. Scrum generally works in 'sprints' which are generally two weeks. But I tend to plan monthly and weekly in personal terms.

This will take some trial and error but eventually you'll get an idea of how much you can do. I suggest, while you work it out, that you keep the number of tasks low. You can always pick up the next thing on the list if you complete everything.

Now you have both a plan and planning, and a much better chance of success, right? Assuming your plan survives contact with the enemy. Which is never. The enemy here being life. Being the unexpected things that crop up. Being the day you lose to a migraine. Being the news that sweeps in and leaves you unable to focus. Being the new obsession you develop.

So lets add a few modifiers.

Apply the principles of slow productivity. Do less. Even when you discover how much you can do in a month, put less things in. Spend time making sure the ones you do pick are done well. And if you get those done, you can go ahead and work on the next thing and 'get ahead'.

Schedule in your filling the well activities too. Make sure you have a backlog for this. Not in a 'here's an endless list of books I will never read' way. More in a 'here are a couple of books I am excited to read so I don't have to make a decision when I come to this' way. It's very easy to not do these things. I backlist just books, but the things I want to do in games, or podcast episodes. If you don't add it to the to do list, it will get buried. You can schedule specifics or just 'pick an activity' each day. I do a mix, depending on how I am feeling.

Make sure your plan is flexible. I picked three specific days of the week on which to post to Tumblr. And then realised that I needed to be more flexible because the rest of my life is flexible and there would be different days of the week on which I was more or less able to write. So now my goal is 'post three times in the week'.

Think about your planning horizons. I tend to set up my week in advance for regular tasks and then add others to a 'sometime this week list'. I have to keep reminding myself to do this because I love to plan in advance, but I know that if I do it, I'll end up 'failing' because life is complex.

Lastly, keep the why in mind. If all else fails, forget it all and go back to the reason you set this goal in the first place. Think again about how you are going to get there in a way that will actually work.

And this is the true way to move from plans to planning. What we often think of as 'planning' is only part of the story. Planning means making your plan happen. Realistically. Which means your plans have to reflect your reality and not some dream where you perfectly fill every spare hour with productive activity and never have to change plans. So by all means set goals, write lists, schedule activities, but don't forget to build in flexibility, relaxation and ways to make your plans achievable and sustainable.

[mycelestial001]

What’s Preventing You from Achieving Your Goal According to Your Zodiac Sign? Discover Here

[successalchemist]

The Comfort Zone Trap: How to Break Free and Manifest Your Dreams

Do you have goals and dreams that you want to manifest but you’re afraid to step out of your comfort zone? Believe me, you’re not alone. It’s a common problem and one that is a major block to achieving success. What is the Comfort Zone? The comfort zone is where you feel at ease and in control and experience low levels of anxiety and stress. It’s where you perform tasks and activities without…

[dark-wackademia]

How to plan and structure your life to achieve literally anything.

[blog-n-go]

.."But" Its...

#This post may contain affiliate links Consistency in a nutshell is being able to show productivity, growth, endurance. In our daily habits we can create ways to build our strengths and weaknesses through consistency. When we use our time effectively, our ability to understand what we do is strengthened. As we build on our life’s goals we are able to identify more and more what may be problems…

[monicascot]

How To Reach Your Goals | Podcast Full Episode

Welcome to our empowering podcast series, where we provide practical insights and strategies to help you achieve your goals and unlock your true potential. In this full episode, we dive deep into the topic of goals-setting and share valuable tips to help you turn your dreams into reality. Setting goals is essential for personal and professional growth, but it can sometimes feel overwhelming or challenging to know where to start. In this podcast episode, our expert hosts break down the goals-setting process into actionable steps that anyone can follow.

[darkshadliy]

Reminder For Those Who May Need It

Let this be a reminder for those struggling with their dreams and goals. Don’t give in to the thoughts that say “you will never be destine for greatness, you will never achieve your dream” that’s what they want, those thoughts are only there because you are doubting your worth.

It’s not healthy to doubt yourself, because in the end that’s only going to drive you far away from your dream, yes you see people having their dreams and life goals but how do you think they got there? Hard work! Not everything is handed to you, and not everything is willing to come for free, it takes hard work and dedication to get to where you are willing to go, focus and patience are the main factor in achieving your dreams.

But those who tell you “wait and everything will come in due time” isn’t always true, while yes it does take hard work and patience, waiting by doing nothing isn’t going to get you anywhere, and will only make you angry, use that anger to your advantage! If your tired of feeling like your not getting anywhere do something about it, use that rage within you to channel that inner focus while maintaining patience, patience and fury is the key to focus and focus is the key to achieve your goals.

Fury is a burning desire to achieve something, while patience helps you maintain that fury within an accepting control and calmness while keeping the main point of what you desire, creating focus and determination.

If you want something so badly you take it, through hard work and devotion for that goal! 

[poeticheistblog]

Stories

I’ve always loved storiesso much so, that I have multiple inventories.filled with words of love, wisdomAll shelved away in a neat system. I like to take away from the words I readSoak up the lessons they exorbitantly bleedAnd when I run out of emotions to feelI run right back to these and steal. It was one such day that I was stocking up,listening to her talk about the things she lovedThere was…

[personalcoachingcenter]

Self-Coaching Essentials

New Post has been published on https://personalcoachingcenter.com/self-coaching-essentials/

Self-Coaching Essentials

Elite athletes and top executives understand the importance of coaching as a means of achieving exceptional results. Coaches hold you accountable, support goal-setting, and encourage you to maintain discipline. But can you coach yourself?

This book illustrates proven concepts which you can use to propel yourself to higher levels of personal and professional success through a process of self-coaching. As you read through the book, you will find various exercises to support you in establishing a strategy for your career and for your life.

You will also find FREE VIDEO SUPPLEMENTS for every chapter on www.selfcoachingessentials.com to support you along the way: – Establishing and emphasizing strengths, rather than weaknesses – Formulating your personal and professional value proposition (“your story”) – Identifying elephant-sized goals – Building systematic strategies to conquer your goals – Fostering robust creativity levels – Managing fear and ensuring a winner’s mindset – Savoring your experiences along the way Let this book serve as your personal coach to unlock the power within you to accomplish more than you thought possible.

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[bitchesgetriches]

What Does Your Dream Cost?

NEW POST! What Does Your Dream Cost?

Have you ever sat down and truly asked yourself: What does your dream cost? It’s a new year. Lots of folks use this time to buckle down and set new goals. Personally, I’m eschewing any kind of quest for productivity or self-improvement this year. Both Bitches had an incredibly stressful holiday season, so we’re too busy being in emotional recovery hibernation mode. Declining with…

[modelawer-blog]

Goal setting refers to listing the things that you would like to achieve your goals. One of the reasons that make you fail in achieving your goals is by trying to achieve too much too quickly. So, you should choose smart goals.

[thedawnofinspiration]

How to achieve your goals in the New Year

You want to know how to achieve your goals? Check out my five easy steps  😍

Hey my loves,

In today’s blog post I am going to talk about how you can achieve your New Years goals and what I like to do to make sure I reach mine. If you want to know my goals for 2020 check out my blog post where I talk about them. 

“A dream written drown with a date becomes a goal. A goal broken down into steps becomes a plan. A plan backed by actions makes your dream come true.” –…

[poeticheistblog]

Lost At Sea

For sometimes we need to get lost, in order to be found.

[personalcoachingcenter]

Self-Coaching Essentials

New Post has been published on https://personalcoachingcenter.com/self-coaching-essentials/

Self-Coaching Essentials

Elite athletes and top executives understand the importance of coaching as a means of achieving exceptional results. Coaches hold you accountable, support goal-setting, and encourage you to maintain discipline. But can you coach yourself?

This book illustrates proven concepts which you can use to propel yourself to higher levels of personal and professional success through a process of self-coaching. As you read through the book, you will find various exercises to support you in establishing a strategy for your career and for your life.

You will also find FREE VIDEO SUPPLEMENTS for every chapter on www.selfcoachingessentials.com to support you along the way: – Establishing and emphasizing strengths, rather than weaknesses – Formulating your personal and professional value proposition (“your story”) – Identifying elephant-sized goals – Building systematic strategies to conquer your goals – Fostering robust creativity levels – Managing fear and ensuring a winner’s mindset – Savoring your experiences along the way Let this book serve as your personal coach to unlock the power within you to accomplish more than you thought possible.

GBS_insertEmbeddedViewer("OwQxnwEACAAJ", 500,400);