Goal Setting and the Undeniable Power of Priorities: How to Reach Your Goals Faster

This is probably one of the most important topics I could share with you regarding your goals and how they contribute to improving the quality of your life.

As we have discussed before, most people do not have clearly defined Goals. It is estimated that only 3% of the population have any Goals, and certainly of that 3%, even fewer have Goals in relation to full work-life balance, a holistic life design concept with action, schedules and priorities for each. the different areas of life.

One of the most common mistakes that prevents people from reaching their goals is having a long list of interesting and exciting goals, but not having a system for determining their order of priority.

Imagine how many decisions you make throughout a given day. What time will you wake up? What will you do when you open your eyes? Will you hit the snooze button or get up and get moving? Will you be excited for the day? What will you do next, will you exercise, do some reading, listen to a personal development audio? Will you rewrite and study your Goal Cards? Will you have breakfast and if you do, what will you have? Will it be rushed, will it be nourishing?

You see what I’m talking about, you’ve just opened your eyes for just a few minutes and you’ve already made several decisions that will affect your day and over time, those minute-by-minute daily decisions become habits that accumulate to create your life. whether you realize it or not.

If a goal is worth setting, it’s worth examining its relationship to the values ​​and priorities in your life.

The goal is the what, the priority and the value is the why and where it fits in your life. When you know the what and why, the how is easy.

One of the most common complaints today is being overwhelmed. In a world where information overload is a daily occurrence, the solution to overwhelm lies in knowing what information and what opportunities are really important. And you can’t know the answer to that until you examine your values ​​and determine your priorities in life.

You need to learn The Priority Principle.

The Principle of Priority means knowing your values ​​and priorities and organizing your life so that you spend your time, energy and money on what matters. It means that you rate each goal and action by ranking the order of importance in advance.

In a world where your potential is infinite, but your time is limited to 24 hours each day, the only way to navigate life intelligently is to know what is most important to you and then act accordingly. Only when you’ve taken the time to examine your values ​​and priorities carefully will you know what opportunities, people, contributions, and actions align with them.

My first important lesson in priorities came when I was 18 years old and working as a firefighter/emergency medical technician. He was an art student by day and a firefighter by night and on weekends.

Most people don’t think about emergency services until they need them. If or when you have a situation like a fire, accident, illness, or some kind of extreme crisis, you call 911. A trained professional like a police officer, firefighter, paramedic, or EMT arrives to help and take charge of the situation. They have the tools and access to whatever it takes to control the emergency, big or small.

There are small-scale emergencies that are not life-threatening, such as broken bones and superficial cuts that are relatively simple and easy to process, for example a patient with a minor injury. And then there are the larger-scale emergencies, like auto accidents that can have multiple victims, with multiple traumatic injuries, as well as huge disasters with tens, hundreds, or even thousands of victims.

When there are more patients than manpower available to handle each victim immediately, there is a process that has to happen and it has to happen very quickly. That process is called Triage. Triage means ordering. Triage as it is done in an emergency situation means that someone has to quickly assess and classify all the victims and prioritize which patients will be treated and in what order. Even with a patient who has multiple injuries, when she can only treat one thing at a time, he must prioritize which injury to treat first.

When there are multiple patients, a person who has an open yawn would probably have a higher priority than another person who has full faculties who can walk and talk without signs of urgent distress. I don’t want to go into all the different variations of injuries here, I just want to clarify that some patients will have a greater need for urgency than others. There are guidelines to determine which types of injuries take precedence over all others. First responders are trained and practice disaster drills so that when a crisis strikes, they know what to do. Because no two crises are the same, this training and practice in advance is often the lifesaver for many.

In calm times, the instructors clearly defined in advance what the parameters were for the different assessments of urgency and priority of attention so that when we were faced with the daily activities of constant crisis, it would be almost second nature to make the right decision. decision in the midst of the circumstances that arose.

When it comes to medical emergencies, seconds mean life or death and decisions are made in milliseconds. Fortunately with your Goals, you don’t have as much pressure unless you’re in a crisis, and most crises can be prevented if you take the time to carefully examine your life regularly over time.

When I was 20 years old I went through an interesting phase where I went from poverty to earning enough money to support myself and enjoy some of life’s luxuries. I really didn’t know what to do with my money. I’ve never had one before! But he was learning to win it and could breathe a little easier. I bought a new car and 2 motorcycles. I was making more money than ever, but there didn’t seem to be enough cash to invest in the things I needed to grow my business. There is always a next level and I wanted to reach it. He wanted a bigger business, more income, more financial security, and a bigger house.

One day I looked at my motorcycles and thought, look at the money that is invested in those motorcycles. They also served as a distraction since my biker friends were policemen and firefighters and worked different shifts, so I would get invitations to ride together at all hours of the day and night. I hadn’t fully developed the habit of discipline yet, so there were times when I was riding motorcycles when I should have been working on myself and my business.

When I think of my bikes, in the realm of life, they are toys. I needed to rearrange my priorities. I realized that if I valued my financial future more than my toys, then I should sell the motorcycles. After all, you could always buy another one in the future. So I went back to clarify my values. I needed to start valuing my financial future more than I valued those motorcycles.

So I sold them and invested the money in my business. Things grew so fast that I could barely keep up. Within a few months I found a 6,000 square foot home at the White Eagle Country Club in Naperville, IL. The girl who grew up in a 2-bedroom ghetto shack was suddenly living among CEOs, NBA stars, and part of Chicago’s social elite. I’m not trying to impress you, I just want to illustrate how quickly your life can change when you are clear about your values ​​and priorities and back them up with your actions. I became a self-made millionaire in my 30s and never looked back.

You have to invest the time in evaluating your goals, dreams and responsibilities in life. In a major emergency, if not properly classified, people die unnecessarily. In your day to day life, if you don’t Triage your Goals and apply the Priority Principle, your dreams die. I want you to live your dreams.

I teach people how to be crystal clear about their goals and priorities in 2 hours by simply asking themselves a few easy but critical questions. Whether you are in a crisis or not, it is very important to take the time to see what matters most to you in life. If you don’t, you’ll spend a great deal of time feeling overwhelmed, putting out fires and responding to one crisis after another, wasting your energy, instead of reaching your Goals with ease.

The good news is that when it comes to setting goals and designing life, you have the luxury of deciding what your priorities are in advance IF you will invest the time and effort in learning the success system to do so.

You are already deciding which Goals will be achieved and which will not, whether you realize it or not. But now, by learning a new level of awareness regarding your priorities, you can achieve your Goals faster and have a lot more fun in the process.

He had the goal of having a motorcycle. But in the realm of life at the time, it meant nothing compared to my other goals and priorities. Because I cleared that up, I was able to take decisive action and move forward quickly and easily.

Do not specialize in minor things. -Jim Rohn

Don’t focus more time and attention on Goals that are minor in your life.

It is not our abilities that define who we really are, it is our thoughts, choices and actions.

If you’ve never thought about it consciously, you may be wondering, “How do I know what my current values ​​and priorities are?”

The answer, whether you like it or not, is that they reveal themselves in your current actions, patterns, and habits. If you value time, don’t waste it. If you value honesty, you don’t lie. If you value money, you invest it wisely. If you value growth, you work on self-improvement. If you value family, you invest your time and attention in caring for them. If you value your spouse/partner, your words and behavior reveal that as well. You are not what you say you are, you are what you repeatedly do.

Ultimately, what you spend your time, energy and money on is a clear indicator of your values ​​and priorities.

And if what you’re currently doing isn’t working for you, you can change it and rearrange it today in the next 120 minutes.

If you’ve never done this before, it’s worth investing your time. It will change your life.

Live your dreams.