Goal Setting for Personal and Professional Success

Last week we talked about tithing as a way of saying “Thank you, God, for all the good I’ve received” – tithing as a way of acknowledging God as our Source.  This week we focus on Goal Setting – what Edwene Gaines considers the second Spiritual Law of Prosperity.*

What do you want your life to look like?  Your business to look like?  What do you want more of?  I don’t mean in general; I mean specifically! (Edwene loves to tell the story of a woman in one of her workshops who wrote down the goal, “I want more love in my life.”  When she got home, her neighbor gave her a pregnant dog!)

As a coach and mentor, I am continuously asking my clients to set goals for themselves and for their businesses.  As an entrepreneur, encouraged by my own wonderful coaches, I do the same.  It wasn’t until recently, however, that I fully grasped the importance of writing down those goals and making sure they are specific and tied to a date by which they will be attained.  A vague sense of success, prosperity, doing good in the world just won’t get us where we want to go.

But wait…there’s more.

Edwene asks us to pray daily, “Father, what must I change about myself in order to achieve my goals?”  Yikes!  I have to change????  You mean if I want to be a respected, inspirational speaker, I have to let go of my fear and insecurities?  You mean if I want more clients, I have to get out there and network?  I can’t just work long hours at my computer?

Pastor and author Eugene Peterson says this about that:  “Busyness is the enemy of spirituality.  It is essentially laziness.  It is doing the easy thing instead of the hard thing.  It is filling our time with our own actions instead of paying attention to God’s actions.  It is taking charge.”  Hmmmmm.  Food for thought.

I gift you with the following “10 Steps to Successful Achievement,” which Edwene teaches in her workshops and seminars (Edwene Gaines Seminars, LLC).  As you do this exercise, imagine what your life would look like if there were no limitations.  What makes your heart sing?

1. In a notebook, dedicated to your goal setting program, write down all of your desires, no matter how large or small.
2. Choose the 12 most important desires and write them on this paper in order of importance to you.  Be very specific.
3. Be open and receptive to change. Pray daily, “Father, what must I change about myself in order to achieve my goals?”
4. Determine the date by which you desire to achieve each goal.
5. Read your goals at least three times every morning and every evening.
6. Imagine yourself achieving each goal.
7. Accept your success now. Act as if you had already achieved. Take positive action toward your goals.
8. Don’t tell others. Keep your goals private, between you and God.  (Exception:  your coach, mastermind group, people you trust who won’t rain on your parade.)
9. Cross off the goals as they are achieved and continue to add new ones.
10. Remember, God’s highest law is LOVE.