Everyone has dreams. Some people achieve those dream while others do not. Why is that? People who live their dreams have learned to turn their dream into achievable goals by following these ten easy steps.
Dreams become goals when there is a clarity of purpose. Goals are well defined, specific objective that one can work towards. “I will finish the first draft for my novel in thirty days.” That’s is an achievable goal because we can then set other goals for what we will need to achieve on a day to day bases to accomplish that. Writing the first draft to our novel in thirty days is our long term goal, what we will need to accomplish on a day to day bases is our short term goals. Since a typical word count for a full-length novel is 75,000 words we will have to produce an average of 2,500 words every day. Producing those 2,500 words every day becomes one of our daily short-term goals.
Dreams become achievable goals when there is commitment on the part of the dreamer to turn their dream into a reality. Someone once said that anything worth achieving is never easily achieved. Where I heard or read that slips my mind at the moment but nothing was ever more true. Thomas Alvin Edison, one of America’s most prolific inventor, said that “Genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.” Many professional writers as well as those who teach writing have said the same thing about writing paraphrasing Edison by saying that writing is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration. There will be days when the words don’t flow easily from our finger tips to the keyboard but we have to forge ahead anyway in order to achieve our dreams. Zig Ziglar, one of America’s most popular motivational speakers and self-help authors once wrote that, “When you set goals, something inside of you starts saying, ‘Let’s go, let’s go,’ and ceilings start to move up.” Having a definite objective to strive for pushes us onward and upward no matter how difficult the climb.
Never miss an opportunity to talk about your project. Talking about what you are doing makes it emotionally real and concrete for you. For sure there will be people who will criticize you for being a “dreamer,” but there will be more who will do whatever they can to help you achieve your dream. If your significant other, your spouse, your children, your friends, etc know what you are accomplishing they are more apt to not disturb you when you are working. I’m not sure who said this, it was attributed to the famous Anonymous, “Do not fear the winds of adversity. Remember; a kite rises against the wind rather than with it.” Some people make voice negative opinions about what we are doing but just as a kite rises against the wind we can rise against the negativity of our detractors.
Commit your dream to paper. Define your long term and short term goals in writing and then post it where you can see it everyday until the goal is achieved. Convert your short term goals into daily positive affirmations. Unlike Thomas The Tank Engine in the children’s story, The Little Engine That Could, instead of saying, “I think I can. I think I can.” say to yourself over and over again “I know that I can. I know that I can.”
Start every day off by reaffirming your goals for the day. review you objectives and repeat your affirmations aloud. Zig Ziglar said that, “If you don’t have daily objectives, you qualify as a dreamer.” Many people have become successful writers so a good affirmation is the statement made by Mike Caldwell, “If it can be done, it can be done by me.”
Create a plan to achieve your overall goal. Ask yourself questions like, “Where do I want to be five years from now as a writer?” and then create a plan detailing what you need to do to bring that plan to fruition. Your plan becomes the road map leading to your final destination listing all the way points you need to pass through along the way.
Act upon your plan everyday no matter how you may feel that day. As Confucius so wisely said, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” It doesn’t matter if you don’t feel like writing on any given day, write anyway. It doesn’t matter if what you write sounds like gibberish, the objective is to produce your objective of 2,500 words. Worry about turning those words into something useful at another time.
Repeat your positive affirmation aloud throughout the day. Don’t fear failure. As Babe Ruth said, “Never let the fear of striking out get in your way.” Wayne Gretzky said, “You miss 100 percent of the shots you never take.” If you let the fear of failure stop you from trying you are assured of failing.
Review your goals and recommit often.
Celebrate your achievements. There may be days when you don’t reach a daily objective like writing 2,500 words but there will be other days when the force is with you and you exceed your objective of 2,500 words. Add up your daily word count and if it averages out to 2,500 words at the end of the week treat yourself to a reward like a pizza or something else that you reall like.
