Another year is upon us and you have your list of resolutions or goals you want to accomplish in upcoming year. It’s time to plan your goals so that it’s not just another conversation this year, but a focused plan for success. I will share with you five goal setting techniques guaranteed to help you achieve more out of life. Use goal setting techniques listed below to help you achieve your targets:

1. Be SMARTER with your Goals.

Make your goals: Specific Motivational Action-oriented Relevant to your situation Time-bound Encouraging Rewarding

For example, “I will increase my sales by 15% compared to last year.” Be as specific about your goal as possible. “I will start my own catering business” is a lot stronger than “I want to go into business for myself.” Challenging goals are motivating. Set goals that will push beyond what you usually think you can accomplish. Remember to set a deadline. A goal without a deadline is simply a dream. Attach a realistic yet challenging deadline for accomplishment and post this where you can review it regularly.

2. Visualize your goals. Take 15 minutes in morning and 15 minutes just before you go to bed; find a quiet place; close your eyes and relax, and visualize yourself actually achieving your goals. Remember more senses (sight, sound, smell, taste, etc.) you can involve, more real your visualization becomes. I ask during my seminars, “Have you ever had a dream that seemed so real that you woke up in middle of it?” Well reason for that is subconscious mind is at work involving all of those senses to trick you into believing dream is real. Well, you don’t have to wait; work at visualizing your goals today.

The 2004 Olympics just ended in August. As always, it was an exciting event with its dramatic twists and turns, exhilarations, surprises, and disappointments as these great athletes performed at their peak in front of millions, if not billions, of fans for glory of representing their country and possibly receiving a gold medal.

You, too, can experience same excitement in your life. What are you doing now to achieve your “goal” medal? What are you doing to realize your goals in life?

You don’t need to be a world class athlete to achieve success in life. However, you can use many of same techniques that these athletes use to accomplish their goals.

The following are five secrets that will help you stand on winner’s platform in life:

1. Create Passion with Goal Setting Take time to write down goals that excite you. Ask yourself following questions:

* How will I feel when I achieve these goals? * What is keeping me from achieving these goals today? * What are times and dates I want to achieve these goals? * What resources do I need to accomplish these goals? * What is my plan B, or secondary route, to achieving these goals?

2. Believe in Greatness Once you have created your goals, take time to visualize your achievements. World class athletes visualize victory before it happens. Take 15-30 minutes just before you go to bed or wake up in morning and do following:

* Find a quiet place. * Quiet your mind, slowing down your breathing. * Visualize that you are already achieving whatever goal you want to accomplish. What does it look like? How does it feel?

World class athletes prepare themselves yesterday, today, and tomorrow for success through intense training and sacrifice. What are you doing to prepare yourself for your success? Do a self-analysis to find out how prepared you are today in relationship to your goals and what resources and skills you need to acquire to achieve your goals. What sacrifices are you willing to make so that you can achieve your goals? If it is a promotion, find out what skills, education, and resources are required to obtain that position. If it is a six-figure income, what sacrifices are you willing to make to realize it? Less television, more education?

I always say, “If you want something bad enough, act like you already have it.” That’s what champions do. They already believe that they will win a championship, a title, a gold medal. They have a positive, self-expecting attitude and set bar for others to try to aspire. I love tennis. One of my favorite tennis players is Roger Federer, #1 ranked player in world. When watching him play, I can see he owns court. In his quiet, yet confident manner, he says to his opponent, “I am #1, I am best!” Then he goes out and wins. With his positive attitude, he expects to win every time.

How can you apply this principle? Well, one example is if you are a manager and want to be promoted to vice president, act like a vice president today. That means dressing like a vice president, making decisions like a vice president, leading people like a vice president, etc. Also what it means is delegating certain tasks so that you can learn required skills of a vice president (Read Delegate to Accelerate Success). Do you expect to succeed at any project with which you are involved?

3. Create a Mastermind Group There is a saying, “A wise person learns from his own mistakes, a wiser person learns from other people’s mistakes.” That is what a mastermind group will do for you. Winning athletes have a mastermind group so that they will make fewer mistakes and take less time achieving their goals. A mastermind group is an assortment of people dedicated to give you best advice, feedback, training, etc., so that you can achieve your goals faster. The mastermind group also gives you encouragement when needed. In sports, this might be a coach, a trainer, a physical trainer, manager, and agent. In your situation at work, it might be following: