Do Your Goals Work?

– By Dr Nav Ropra.

Have you ever wondered why you can’t stay focused on your goals?

Do you want a magnificent life but cannot create it?  

Are you doing what others think you should rather than what you love to do?

For some 2013 equates to setting a new set of goals and a new set of priorities or action steps.  A clean fresh start to the year is what we have been led to believe will bring the greatest change in out lives and cause the greatest level of fulfilment.

If you are going to do this, then it is wise to write down your goals and to document them.  Do this in ever finer detail and place them somewhere so that you are reminded daily about them.  Visualisations, storyboards, affirmations and audio recordings all assist in this process.  Make your goals in all senses visual, auditory, kinesthetic so that you can resonate with that goal actually happening.  Relax and act as if you are already there.  Remember to update your goals every quarter and make them realistic and practical.  Chunk down your goals into daily action steps and list these in order of priority.  Whenever you accomplish a goal, remember to reward yourself and acknowledge the efforts you or others have made to make it possible.

Whatever stage you are at in life, in your perceptions there will be a void which you want to fill.  This void is something which you perceive as missing in the world.  Goals are based around filling these voids.  You will think about and act on that void in your daily lives, to equiliberate it in order to create fulfillment.  For some it may be relationships and finding a partner.  For others it may be money or financial freedom.  For dentists it may be growing their practices, managing staff or learning new skill sets.  True fullfillment comes about when the voids in our lives are filled and the mind doesn’t see anything as missing.  If you are moving towards a goal and making action steps towards it, then you will feel expansive and grateful. We are then able to move onto bigger voids and greater challenges so that we can keep growing and evolving.

‘True fulfilment comes about when the voids in our lives are filled and the mind doesn’t see anything as missing.’

Even if you do all of this, there are times when things just don’t go your way in goal setting.  Have you ever wondered why this happens and why we just end up reverting back to our usual habits?  The additional burden of having tried something and thinking that you have failed at it?  Let us explore this so that we can learn to create goals that are realistic and practical.

If you subordinate to anything outside of you and feel that someone or something has more than you have, then you will want to put them on an emotional pedestal and try to become more like them.  You may want to have the successes they have and unwisely believe that you having those same or similar successes will bring you fulfillment.  People commonly do this with celebrities or musical idols.  Their own true goals become unconsious and the injected goals start to create conflict and confusion inside of them.  This is receipie for disaster the number one reasons why goals do not work.  If you are setting goals based on someones elses expectations, be it parents, teachers, celebrities, other dentists etc then you are minimising your own autheticity and creativity.  Invariably you will self-sabotage.  Your unconscious will win and the disappointment you feel when those inauthentic goals are not achieved acts a feedback mechanism for you to become more authentic with your life.

‘Their own true goals become unconscious and the injected goals start to create conflict and confusion inside of them.’

The key to goal setting is to find out what is truly inspirational and authentic to you.  What you true values are and what you would love to create in this world.  When you set goals in accordance with your values, or change your values in accordance with your goals, then you come alive.  Your inner genius and wisdom has an expression which is powerful enough to leave a immortal legacy from your mortal expression.

‘The key to goal setting is to find out what is truly inspirational and authentic to you.’ 

You will start to attract people and situations into your life that will support this.  There no competition with anyone else as you are living your life according to what is authentic to you.  Creating goals, a business, relationships, money or anything from that wisdom will give you the greatest chance of that goal being accomplished.  You will be willing to endure the pains and pleasures that come with accomplishing that goal.  You will make decisions quickly and change them slowly as you will have a greater certainty of where your direction in life is.  You will not require outside motivation as you will be inspired from within.  In essence, goals are there to show us and bring out what is there in us.  Its about who we become on the journey of life with the goals being the stepping stones.