Grab a pen & a notebook. We’re doing step by step goal planning to help you crush your goals this year using a method tried & tested by thousands! (This post contains affiliate links.)
Welcome to step 2 of the goal planning and setting series. I’m drawing the curtains and sharing how we set goals in Ruth Soukup’s Do It Scared coaching program recently. Today we will select our goals for the year and make a fail-proof action plan for each one using Ruth’s C.R.U.S.H I.T formula.
If you also use the living well planner, you will find the goal crushing sheet at the beginning of each month, or you can visit the living well shop to grab the goal crushing sheet only too. I think this sheet is one of the most important pages in the planner.
Here is how a goal crushing action plan example:
So, the first step was making your unique bucket list.
Now that we have our list of dreams, step 2 in your goal planning system is picking out 3 dreams you think you can accomplish this year.
Don’t be intimidated if these goals feel a bit scary.
Ruth says it is, in fact, good to feel butterflies in your stomach when you think of those goals. This feeling of fear will keep you motivated.
Also, if your goals are not scary, make them bigger.
Remember,
To fulfill your dreams you need courage.
And…
Courage doesn’t mean you’re not afraid. Courage means taking action despite your fear. ~ Ruth
Personally, I think that if a goal is logically very big for the current season of your life, you might want to chunk it down, for example, one of my dream goals is to have a 7 figure income (Rich women are the missing piece of creating peace on this planet! ~ Denise Duffield Thomas).
Since last year was my 4 figure year, so I have broken down my larger goal to be 5 figure income this year.
Now, before we move on,
It is important to note that Ruth only allows picking three goals for the year.
This means you can not have 3 health goals plus 3 house-related goals and so on for each major area of your life- just pick 3 goals overall! Three accomplished goals are better than ten unaccomplished ones. Prioritization and focus on the right goals is the key.
Pro tip:
Make sure all your goals are ones that are super important to YOU and make your heart sing.
A goal should not be a should-do. Ruth says if you are not personally driven or motivated, then you will struggle to follow through.
Once you are forced to narrow down your focus to just 3, you’ll make sure these 3 are ones that truly matter to you and make the most difference in your life.
Side note:
Does Realistic Goal Planning mean setting mediocre goals?
I wanted to add my thoughts here that when Ruth said if your goal doesn’t seem big enough to scare you, make it bigger, she certainly didn’t mean setting unrealistic goals.
For example, an unrealistic goal would be training for a self-defense technique when you are also going to have surgery this year and will need time for healing.
Make your goals big, but don’t defy laws of nature.
Now, APPLY the expert goal planning C.R.U.S.H I.T formula
Now that you have:
- picked just three dreams from your life list
- made sure you’re excited about them
- seen that even though they are big and scary, you can see yourself accomplishing them, (especially in this season of your life)
The next goal setting steps are to get crystal clear about these 3 goals. Specify how exactly these look like once accomplished. Define your metrics for success.
For this step, use Ruth’s crushing it worksheet for each one of your 3 goals. If you are a Living Well Planner user but you haven’t used this worksheet much like me or you are totally new to this, Ruth said this is the year everyone should harness the power of this sheet.
Here are mine,
She’s an acclaimed productivity expert who entirely relies on this goal-setting process for all her goals.
C: Claim Your Target
Here, you will select a dream from your life list that you want to accomplish.
Once you make a decision to make it happen, it has now changed from a dream into a goal.
Make sure you aim for a goal that is big enough to scare you so you stay inspired.
Example: Another one of my top 3 goals for the year is teaching Musa to read by year-end. It makes me nervous because he is delayed in speech. Nonetheless, he has started picking up and I’m sure he can switch to a secondary language skill (i.e. reading) this year if we work hard together.
R: Refine Your Objective
Now, you will get specific about your goal.
What exactly are you aiming for?
What specifically should you have accomplished to consider a win for this goal?
Example: I want Musa to complete his reading book levels by year-end.
U: Understand your motivation
Ruth says you need to know why this goal matters and you need to be able to look at this over and over and over again throughout the year. I read my crushing it sheets daily.
It is the only thing that will help you survive the tough phases of your goal accomplishment.
If you have trouble answering this for your goal, then you need to scrap this goal and find something that actually matters to you.
Example: My reading habit has opened so many opportunities in life for me. I want the same for my son. I want my son to never feel lost or lonely at any stage of life even when his parents are not there to help him. He can always get expert advice in books. I want him to love books. I also feel books will help me with my parenting in so many ways over the years if I can make him love books.
Every time you begin to slip, remember why you wanted to do it in the first place.
S: Step It Out
Layout your milestones, the actions you’ll take to achieve each step and how you will be tracking progress, how much time will you give to it daily, what investments will you make for any required resources? Which resources?
Example: I plan to divide months of the year into phonemes, phonics, small words recognition, vocabulary building before I jump to the reading series (1a -7c). I have subscribed to an online reading program for kids, collected letter and sound songs to practice with him throughout the day. Apart from goal planning, I also track all progress in the planner.
H: Handle Obstacles
What will your plan B be if any problems arise? In this section, you will note down all major potential issues that can happen and how you plan to combat them.
Note down all potential roadblocks and what will you do. These are things that are gonna get in our way sooner than we realize.
This part is so smart. Why didn’t we ever think of making contingency plans for our goals before?
Example: If I can not follow through and teach my child in a structured routine because of traveling or guests, I can teach him through his surroundings. I will have a backup collection of games, printables and phone videos we can use for revising our lessons… etc
I: Implement Your Plan
So far so good, but your dream is still not alive. It starts becoming a reality when you reach this step. Break down your goal into small tasks. Divide these tasks across time and implement them as you go.
I use the month at a glance spread as my activity log. So I can see how much I get accomplished overall.
In the example below, I have used it for only one goal, but I plan to write about all my 3 goals in the coming month.
If your goal is a habit goal like doing yoga each day, you may even want to use a habit tracker.
T: Treat Yourself
Finally, once you crush your goal, how are you going to celebrate? Honestly, you may find this step extra, especially as a mom. But let me show you a recent post I put into our do it scared group.
Here’s the rest of the comment:
…Find any excuse to congratulate yourself on a job well done. Success breeds success and the more “proof” you have that you are successful, the easier it will be to attract further good fortune… Celebrating an experience in that way gives you permission to be richly rewarded for your efforts. It shows the Universe how to treat you and it puts you in that success mindset. Don’t let the moment pass you by unacknowledged.” ~Lucky B by Denise D Thomas
So, attract more good things by celebrating every accomplishment.
Now do This…
Get the living planner or use three Crush It goal setting worksheets and do this for all three of your big goals. I have put my loose worksheets in my planner in the front and I try to go through each of them quickly every day so I stay on track, motivated and remember what I decided for this year to look like.
Now that you know how to map out goals, here’s a quick recap of all the goal planning steps:
- Make a life list and dare to dream big
- Pick 3 dreams out of the list and make them your goals, then use Ruth’s Crush It Action Plan for step by step goal planning (this post)
- How to stick to your goals past January
- Reflect and improve
Keep Reading: How To Choose The Correct Guiding Word Of The Year
Keep Reading: My 2020 Reading List (& Book Recommendations For Inspiration
Have you done your goal planning and mapped out your action steps yet? Remember the Six-P Formula: “Proper Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance.” How do you plan to achieve YOUR goals?
[…] Keep Reading: Goal Planning: Your Step by Step Action Plan For Crushing Goals […]