What are your goals for next year?

By that I mean…

When you raise your glass on New Year’s Eve 2019 what do you want to have achieved?

I mean really and truly.

Not the things that you post on Facebook or tell your friends…but your real hidden desires and aims.

Big life itches that you just need to scratch. They may be uncomfortable or a little scary but let’s face it – if you stay in your ‘comfort’ zone nothing will ever change.

Examples could be…

• I want to launch my own course so I can earn a good living as an entrepreneur and give up my stressful job.
• I want to be a better partner
• I want to lose weight
• I want to decorate the house, finally
• I want to get fit, properly

Don’t worry, you don’t have to say these out loud or answer me directly – some of these examples are very personal.

However, here’s my second question…

How many of these goals were in your mind this time last year?

In other words, how many goals for 2018 haven’t been achieved?

I’d hazard a sneaky guess that most are pretty much the same.

Perhaps you’ve dropped a few and added a few… but ultimately you have a very similar set of ambitions for 2019.

The same pressing issues, nagging fears, hopes and wishes.

According to Michael Hyatt, the man behind the popular planning system ‘5 Days to Your Best Year Ever’, the average person makes the same New Year’s resolution ten times without success.

Which is a bit of a worry, isn’t it?

Because, technically, each New Year should be a clean slate upon which you write a wholly new set of goals.

After all, you’ve achieved the ones you set out last year.

Or at the very least, you’ve knocked some of the biggest ones off the list.

But this isn’t what happens.

Instead, goals are either abandoned or exactly the same ones are carried over to the next year.

Of course, you might argue that life got in the way this year.

Illness, relationships, works stress, money problems, demands from family, domestic mishaps.

Weeks, even months, can get wiped out when you have to deal with a crisis.

Perhaps you simply drifted off course. Things kept coming up, you took opportunities and avoided problems, and somehow ended up where you didn’t want to be…

In other words, you got distracted.

However…

Almost EVERYONE can say that

Despite the above being very real and common problems for all of us, why is it that some people achieve their goals while you don’t?

We have all got the same 24 hours in a day.

It’s not because other people are smarter… more talented… more fortunate…

Usually, it’s because they are more organised and more focussed.

Can I tell you a rather uncomfortable truth about me?

In the past I have been embarrassingly bad at planning.

In fact it’s still something that doesn’t come naturally to me at all.

But I know how important it is.

So I’ve worked with planning experts and spent thousands on courses to fill that gap (I’m a firm believer in always improving and investing in my education).

Before I learned to plan I still managed to do some great things such as building up my 7-figure business – but I have to admit it was at a great cost.

I was stressed a lot of the time.

While my kids were still my top priority, my poor husband (and my physical and mental health) were very far down on the list.

And it couldn’t go on like that.

For me now the secret (if you can call it that) is quite simple…

Planning.

You might be having a “d’uh, yeah that’s obvious, Heloise” moment, and I understand that.

But you’d be amazed…

Most people don’t plan. And if they do, they don’t plan properly.

They think that saying “I’m going to sort this garden out next year” is a plan.

Or “I’m going to make this course creation thing work.”

But plans aren’t just something you conjure up and have at the back of your mind. They’re not just ideas you say out loud now and then.

They’re not things you say to a mate in the bar at 10.30pm after a few drinks.

Those aren’t plans. Those are dreams.

A plan is like a map. It exists on paper (or on a computer document) and it is very VERY specific about where you are going and what you need to do to get there.

With a good one in place, it’s highly likely you’ll achieve your goals next year.

Without one, you’ll probably end up right back here again, reading an email like this one and thinking, “Last year luck was against me, THIS will be my year.”

As I said I’ve spent a lot of time and money studying and testing the best planning techniques (big shout out in particular to Michael Hyatt and Todd Herman) and for me it boils down this:

Focus on the most important goals only.

Don’t write a shopping list of all your ambitions. Focus on a few key aims for the year that you can do alongside each other and which will balance your life.

For instance, choose a health goal, a money goal, a family goal and a special interest goal.

This spread of goals means you won’t focus so much on one goal that you end up causing more problems in other aspects of life that you’ll need to solve next year.

But at the same time you aren’t creating so many goals that you lose focus.

1. Ask yourself WHY?

Yes, it’s important to have a goal for the year, for instance, starting your own business, setting up a blog, renovating the loft, learning the piano.

But it’s also important to look at the bigger picture – where you want to be in 3, 5, 10 or 20 years’ time. Think about how the goals for next year fit into the grand scheme of your life.

Why do you want to renovate the loft? Perhaps to add space in the house for a new baby or a sick relative.

Why do you want to earn £1,000 a week extra from your course? Is it because you need to pay certain bills or debts, you want to leave your job, or you want to save up for a house?

Having these reasons in mind will make sure you pick goals that take you somewhere you really want to go, and help you focus on the goals that matter most in the long run.

2. Be specific about the results you are looking for

You can only know you’ve achieved a goal when you hit a specific target.

You want to save money – how much?

You want to want to launch your own product – what is the measure of success in terms of traffic, clicks and sales?

You want to spend time with your children – then what, specifically, could that entail?

Be as clear and precise as you can when you are planning or you will be more likely to drift.

3. Break down your goal

A big goal can seem daunting right at the start.

So take that goal and break it down into smaller achievable chunks that you can begin to schedule into your year.

Set deadlines, dates and clear time to do it. If not, you might find yourself in March or April still clearing a backlog of commitments without having got started.

You have to treat a plan like you would a schedule handed to you at work – something that’s largely fixed and which you have to carry out.

If that timeframe is unreasonable, you should negotiate and argue over it first, not use it as an excuse later in the year.

So make sure you sit down this month and write out a plan based on the above four guidelines.

Save it and print it out where you can easily access it.

This will your blueprint for what could potentially be your most successful year.

And I look forward to hearing about all you achieve – 2019 is going to be a big one.