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He looked at me as if I had just asked him to pull out his thumbnails. The look of pain was so amusing that I laughed out loud. "Can't you just acknowledge that maybe I'm right about this? Won't you at least just think about it? All I want you to do is think about what steps people need to take in order to reach goals. Is that so difficult?" His answer was marvelous in it's simplicity, because I know he really meant it. "I've never had to do that before."
This was a sales meeting attended by half a dozen experienced salespeople. Some of them had been in the business more than ten years. I was supposed to make them realize that the refi boom, which was filling their hours with new applications, was only a temporary solution to a long-range challenge, a theme that many of them had experienced before. The challenge I proposed was "What will you be doing to earn money after the phone stops ringing?" My opening remark received all kinds of responses. From "swimming in the backyard pool" to "calling all my old clients". "Well", I acknowledged, "these are all fun filled ideas, but I need you to really direct yourself at the future and imagine how it will be. What I want to talk about is also something that you can use even now. What I want to discuss is the idea of setting and achieving goals. Real goals. Attainable goals. Goals that will help you all the time, not just when the phone stops ringing. So, how many of you set daily, weekly or monthly goals? And further, how many of you review those goals, amend them, think about them?" Silence. Dead air. A void as complete as a sucked out black hole deep in space. Pained looks on otherwise blank faces. My laugh broke the silence. "OK, let's start at the beginning. It's really simple. If it weren’t, I wouldn't understand it myself. Goal setting is as simple as one-two-three-four-five-six. Goals have a set number of parts, all of which need to be included in the building or the house will fall. One- Realize. Make real the realization. Make a real goal. Create a goal that you can attain. Make a goal that is so real that you can see it. Make a goal that is so real that you can feel it. Make a goal that is so real that you can feel all the good that comes from attaining it. Realize that attainment will produce an emotion of well being, and that is really what we are after. Reaching a goal produces a feeling only thought about, only imagined. Sure you think a goal is a physical thing, but it really isn't. A goal is the possession of a feeling that you only envisaged. What emotion do you want to possess? You want the feeling that driving a big car will give you. You want the emotion that living in a ten thousand square foot house will give you. You want the emotion that being able to take a vacation every four weeks gives you. Emotions are feelings, like happy, sad, anger, frustration, excitement or loneliness. You can feel any of these if you chose. You can feel anything you want, if you try hard enough. It takes work. You can't just sit back and let the feelings wash over you. You need to take an action so you can possess them. Two- Decide that you want it. Whatever it is, decide that it can be yours. Buy it without paying. The paying comes later. Do you know what you want? Do you know what you decided? Can you see it? Is it real? You can only have what is real to you. If it is only a dream, a ghost of a thought, then it will vanish as easily as smoke. Make a firm decision that THIS IS WHAT I WANT. Be sure you know it, not just in your head, but also in your gut. Make sure that it is the most real thing you’ve ever created. Three- Write it down. This will make it more real than if it is just a thought. Writing things down make them appear in the reality portion of the mind. The reality portion allows us to see things as actual objects, actual things. Writing it makes it more specific and specificity is good. Having a goal to MAKE A LOT OF MONEY is just so much nonsense. Specifying a certain amount is what we are about. What kind of car do you want? Specify it down to the color of the carpet in the trunk. Four- Believe it, for without believing in it, it will not be. Sometimes I think that this is the most important part of goals. Even though I am reminded that we need all the parts, if you just believe hard enough about what you want, you will try anything to get the dream. And everyone knows that no one can take away your dream. Believe that you can, and it is. Act like it already happened. Five- Have a deadline. Be able to, in your imagination, know how long it will take to achieve the goal that you've created. When you write it down, write when you want to have it. By what date. If there is no specific time frame then there is an open door to fail, and open door to put it off. Goals must be achieved in real time. Six- Take action, for without action the dream of your life will become the nightmare. Be pro-active, not reactive. Be a doer, not someone who is done to. If someone tells you that your goal cannot be done, just keep on doing what ever it takes to get there.
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