Personal Goal Setting

Find Direction. Live Your Life Your Way.

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Goal setting is a powerful process for thinking about your ideal future, and for motivating yourself to turn this vision of the future into reality.
The process of setting goals helps you choose where you want to go in life. By knowing precisely what you want to achieve, you know where you have to concentrate your efforts. You'll also quickly spot the distractions that would otherwise lure you from your course.

	Click this video to find out how to set powerful goals.

More than this, properly-set goals can be incredibly motivating, and as you get into the habit of setting and achieving goals, you'll find that your self-confidence builds fast.

Achieving More With Focus

Goal setting techniques are used by top-level athletes, successful business-people and achievers in all fields. They give you long-term vision and short-term motivation. They focus your acquisition of knowledge, and help you to organize your time and your resources so that you can make the very most of your life.
By setting sharp, clearly defined goals, you can measure and take pride in the achievement of those goals. You can see forward progress in what might previously have seemed a long pointless grind. By setting goals, you will also raise your self-confidence, as you recognize your ability and competence in achieving the goals that you have set.

Starting to Set Personal Goals

Goals are set on a number of different levels: First you create your "big picture" of what you want to do with your life, and decide what large-scale goals you want to achieve. Second, you break these down into the smaller and smaller targets that you must hit to reach your lifetime goals. Finally, once you have your plan, you start working to achieve it.
This is why we start the process of goal setting by looking at your Lifetime Goals, and work down to the things you can do today to start moving towards them.

Your Lifetime Goals

The first step in setting personal goals is to consider what you want to achieve in your lifetime (or by a time at least, say, 10 years in the future), as setting Lifetime Goals gives you the overall perspective that shapes all other aspects of your decision making.
To give a broad, balanced coverage of all important areas in your life, try to set goals in some of these categories (or in categories of your own, where these are important to you):

• Career:
  What level do you want to reach in your career?
• Financial:
  How much do you want to earn by what stage?
• Education:
  Is there any knowledge you want to acquire in particular? What information and skills will you need to achieve other goals?
• Family:
  Do you want to be a parent? If so, how are you going to be a good parent?
• Artistic:
  Do you want to achieve any artistic goals? If so, what?
• Attitude:
  Is any part of your mindset holding you back? Is there any part of the way that you behave that upsets you? If so, set a goal to improve your behavior or find a solution to the problem.
• Physical:
  Are there any athletic goals you want to achieve, or do you want good health deep into old age? What steps are you going to take to achieve this?
• Pleasure:
  How do you want to enjoy yourself? - You should ensure that some of your life is for you!
• Public Service:
  Do you want to make the world a better place? If so, how?

Spend some time brainstorming (explore brainstorming here) these things, and then select one or more goals in each category that best reflect what you want to do. Then consider trimming again so that you have a small number of really significant goals on which you can focus.
As you do this, make sure that the goals that you have set are ones that you genuinely want to achieve, not ones that your parents, family, or employers might want (if you have a partner, you probably want to consider what he or she wants, however make sure you also remain true to yourself!)

Starting to Achieve Your Lifetime Goals

Once you have set your lifetime goals, set a 5-year plan of smaller goals that you should complete if you are to reach your lifetime plan. Then set a 1-year plan, 6-month plan, and a 1-month plan of progressively smaller goals that you should reach to achieve your lifetime goals. Each of these should be based on the previous plan.
Then create a daily to-do list (investigate to-do lists here) of things that you should do today to work towards your lifetime goals. At an early stage these goals may be to read books and gather information on the achievement of your goals. This will help you to improve the quality and realism of your goal setting.
Finally review your plans, and make sure that they fit the way in which you want to live your life.

Staying on Course

Once you have decided your first set of plans, keep the process going by reviewing and updating your to-do list on a daily basis. Periodically review the longer term plans, and modify them to reflect your changing priorities and experience. (A good way of doing this is to schedule regular, repeating reviews on a computer-based diary.)

Goal Setting Tips

The following broad guidelines will help you to set effective goals:

• State each goal as a positive statement: Express your goals positively – 'Execute this technique well' is a much better goal than 'Don't make this stupid mistake.'
• Be precise: Set a precise goal, putting in dates, times and amounts so that you can measure achievement. If you do this, you will know exactly when you have achieved the goal, and can take complete satisfaction from having achieved it.
• Set priorities: When you have several goals, give each a priority. This helps you to avoid feeling overwhelmed by having too many goals, and helps to direct your attention to the most important ones.
• Write goals down: This crystallizes them and gives them more force.
• Keep operational goals small: Keep the low-level goals you are working towards small and achievable. If a goal is too large, then it can seem that you are not making progress towards it. Keeping goals small and incremental gives more opportunities for reward.
• Set performance goals, not outcome goals: You should take care to set goals over which you have as much control as possible. It can be quite dispiriting to fail to achieve a personal goal for reasons beyond your control! In business, these could be bad business environments or unexpected effects of government policy. In sport, these reasons could include poor judging, bad weather, injury, or just plain bad luck. If you base your goals on personal performance, then you can keep control over the achievement of your goals and draw satisfaction from them.
• Set realistic goals: It is important to set goals that you can achieve. All sorts of people (employers, parents, media, society) can set unrealistic goals for you. They will often do this in ignorance of your own desires and ambitions. Alternatively you may set goals that are too high, because you may not appreciate either the obstacles in the way or understand quite how much skill you need to develop to achieve a particular level of performance.

SMART Goals

A useful way of making goals more powerful is to use the SMART mnemonic. While there are plenty of variants, SMART usually stands for:

• S Specific
• M Measurable
• A Attainable
• R Relevant
• T Time-bound

For example, instead of having “to sail around the world” as a goal, it is more powerful to say “To have completed my trip around the world by December 31, 2015.” Obviously, this will only be attainable if a lot of preparation has been completed beforehand!

Gain a deeper understanding of SMART goal setting in our in our next article entitled 'Locke's Goal Setting Theory'.

Achieving Goals

Mind Tools on Goal Setting:

• Goal Setting Main Page
• Personal Goal Setting
• Locke's Goal Setting Theory
• Golden Rules of Goal Setting
• Backward Goal Setting
• Making New Year Resolutions
• Using Well-Formed Outcomes in Goal Setting

When you have achieved a goal, take the time to enjoy the satisfaction of having done so. Absorb the implications of the goal achievement, and observe the progress you have made towards other goals. If the goal was a significant one, reward yourself appropriately. All of this helps you build the self-confidence (build self-confidence here) you deserve!
With the experience of having achieved this goal, review the rest of your goal plans:

• If you achieved the goal too easily, make your next goals harder.
• If the goal took a dispiriting length of time to achieve, make the next goals a little easier.
• If you learned something that would lead you to change other goals, do so.
• If you noticed a deficit in your skills despite achieving the goal, decide whether to set goals to fix this.

Failing to meet goals does not matter much, just as long as you learn from this. Feed lessons learned back into your goal setting program.
Remember too that your goals will change as time goes on. Adjust them regularly to reflect growth in your knowledge and experience, and, if goals do not hold any attraction any longer, then consider letting them go.

Key Points

Goal setting is an important method of:

• Deciding what is important for you to achieve in your life.
• Separating what is important from what is irrelevant, or a distraction.
• Motivating yourself.
• Building your self-confidence, based on successful achievement of goals.

If you don't already set goals, do so, starting now. As you make this technique part of your life, you'll find your career accelerating, and you'll wonder how you did without it!

Source: Mindtools.com

D.U.I.T acronyms of....?

Salam all..

Every day is always another ggreeaattt day for everyone. A day full of blessings. Blessings in all our undertakings to succeed in this life and hereafter.

Always be grateful and Thankful to Allah with what you have in your life. He never charged us with a penny nor ask us for every breath that we take.

Don't be sad with what you don't have or yet to have. For Allah works in His on ways. Believe that there is always blessing in disguise for all the things that had happened to us for He's the only one who can show us the way...

It'll definately be coming your way should it belongs to you...Sabar, yakin and believe.

Always start your day with D-Doa, U-Usaha, I-Istiqamah and T-Tawakal...the result will be D.U.I.T

Jom SIMPAN!

Pay off your debts

Perhaps you're in debt and maybe one of those who keep spending on credit instead of saving. It's essential you pay your debts off first.

How to get out of debt?

1. Start by pulling out all your latest statements with a balance owing.
   
2. Use the "List your debts and make a plan to pay them off" spreadsheet below. List all your debts, including:
   • credit card balances
   • line of credit balances
   • alimony and child support
   • taxes
   • "Buy now and pay later" financing statements (furniture, appliances, etc.)
   • unpaid bills (phone, hydro, cell phone, Internet provider)
   • auto and student loan balances
   • loans from friends or family members
   • salary advances, etc.

Calculate

List your debts and make a plan to pay them off

3. Select the order in which to repay your debts
   Learn about the 2 ways to pay back your debts. Don’t forget, you can make new resolutions at any time of the year. Go ahead, make the decision to repay your debts quickly

Did you know?

Your debt repayment plans should be spread out over a maximum period of 3 years (36 months). It's been proven that after this period, most people in debt start losing steam, and start spending again at the expense of debt repayment. Some fall back into the credit trap to the point of having to declare bankruptcy. A 3-year debt repayment plan is demanding, but it's a fast way to become debt-free.

4. If paying off your debts in 3 years seems like an impossible task, there are ways to save on interest costs and other remedies to help you save time.
   • See How to reduce your interest costs.
   • See What to do about debt overload.
5. Tell someone you respect about your plan. This way you put a bit of pressure on yourself to work harder at the difficult task of paying off your debts.

Did you know?

 Nearly 37% of people are in debt. You're not the only one living with the daily stress of debt. But rest assured, solutions to the problem are close at hand. See A case like mine and a financial planner's advice.

The next step

After you're made a plan to pay off your debts and put it into practice, you'll slowly but surely have more money to put in your emergency fund. See why it's important to create an emergency fund.

Create An Emergency Fund

There's nothing worse than working hard to build financial stability, only to see it crumble due to unexpected expenses.

Why build an emergency fund?

1. You had money set aside in an account to replace your aging car, but the roof of your house started leaking. You empty your savings account to replace the roof. An emergency fund would have allowed you to have money set aside for this unexpected expense AND to buy a new car.

2. If you lost your job or got sick, you'd need cash to pay for everyday expenses (groceries, rent, etc.) An emergency fund would give you something to fall back on and peace of mind while you look for a new job or take the time to recover.

3. Everyone, including financial planners, will tell you that having an emergency fund is essential.  As to the amount you should have in it, it is almost always the same: the equivalent of 3 months worth of living expenses.

How to build your emergency fund

1. Save by instalments. Authorize your financial institution to transfer a set amount from your chequing account each month (or each week, if you prefer) to an investment account, a plan that can be easily converted to cash or a high-interest savings account. This way you can build your emergency fund gradually without having to go make deposits in person.

2. Be aware that the amount you choose to set aside each month is not as important as simply saving on a regular basis, and above all, don't go into your emergency fund unless it's an emergency. A couch on sale you suddenly cannot live without is not an emergency.

How to get started

Start by saving the equivalent of one month's worth of groceries and then work on the other monthly expense categories one month at a time.

With each paycheque, try to put aside the equivalent of 5% to 10% of your income (if you can). Don't forget to put it into a separate account so you're not tempted to dip into it.

 JOM Saving!

Follow These STEPS for Easy Financial Management

Here are some ways you can manage your money.

STEP 1
Start saving today. Make it a habit to save a portion of your paycheck on a monthly basis. Some banks have the facility of taking a portion of your money into a savings account automatically.

STEP 2
When you can borrow/rent, don't buy. Some books can be borrowed at the library without buying and some videos can be rented. You don't have to buy them and let them take up space in your house.

STEP 3
Go for high down payment and low monthly installments. It will help you in the long-run and you can sleep better at night.

STEP 4
Have good insurance coverage. You will never know when you will need a large sum of money during an emergency. So having good insurance coverage can really help tide you over through a crisis.

STEP 5
Owning a credit card is very important for establishing credit. Even if you don't ever use it, it's important to have one. If you don't trust yourself, just lock it in a drawer.

STEP 6
Have a good book on personal finance management. Learn proper finance management from the experts.

STEP 7
Save a RM a day as it will snowball to a million some day.

JOM SAVING!! :-)

Change Your Life..Decide to Do IT NOW!

These three words can revolutionize your life:

Start

Right

Now!

And change your life.

The tendency is to NOT do things.

The tendency is to procrastinate.

The tendency is to stay in our comfortable ruts.

How has staying in your rut been working for you so far?

The steps to financial freedom are easy. BUT, it’s easier to NOT do them.

If you do NOTHING different, where will you be in 1 year? 5 years? 10 years?

If you continue on the path you are on right now, will you be better off or worse off?

Think back 5 years. It doesn't seem too long ago, does it?

The next 5 years are coming, whether you do anything to improve your life or not.

Ask Yourself These Important Questions...

If I don't change anything, if I don't do something to take control of my financial future...

How will my life be different in 5 years?

5 years from now, do you want to be like you are now, or do you want to be further down the Financial Freedom Trail?

Successful people are successful because they do the things that others don’t do or won’t do.

Learn from the success of others. We are here to show you the way.

Revolutionize your life.

You CAN do this.

Changing personal finance habits leading to financial freedom is a process, not and event.

However... it takes a decision to begin down that trail.

SALE!SALE!More Year End Sale...

The year of 2010 isabout to drop down its curtain. So does all the drop down 'SALE' in most every where in Malaysia. And back to school promotion is on again..

Throughout this holiday season of shopping you might hear someone say, "I just had to buy it! It was such a good deal beacuse it was on sale!"

But here's the deal. Just because something is on sale, doesn't mean you can (or should) afford it. And just because it was on sale doesn't mean you have the money.

Another common saying in regards to purchasing items on sale is "I saved so much money!"

But you still SPENT money. So did you really save any money? Were you planning to spend what the item originally cost and then didn't have to? Or would you have not spent the money in the first place if it hadn't been on sale?

I'm ok with spending money. You have to every once in a while. There is nothing wrong with spending money. And if you can find a way to spend less, that's great. But just because you're purchasing something on sale does not mean it is a good idea.

The next time you are tempted to buy something because it is on sale, be sure to think twice.
Would you have bought that item if it wasn't on sale?

JOM saving!! =)