4 Tips for Setting Powerful Money Goals

Why is it important to set and have powerful money goals?

I recently had some people complete a simple money survey. You can complete it here is you are interested (it only takes 2 minutes): https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/3VH3KYT

There have been some interesting themes in the responses, particularly in relation to your fears with money.

A common response suggested that you are concerned about not having enough in your retirement or not having enough to pay your living expenses.

So when I was thinking about how to help, I kept coming back to goals.

To be able to address these fears it has to be done with purpose. You aren’t going to magically solve them without putting some thought and effort into it.

This is where goal setting is powerful, because it is provides focus…

It shapes our dreams and aspirations.

And it gives us the ability to narrow in on the exact actions we need to perform to achieve what we desire in life.

Unfortunately, when it comes to money we tend to live short term and dream long term.

We are consumed by the obstacles that the sort term presents…

But setting goals can give you the long term focus you need to overcome the short term obstacles.

Goals provide the mechanism that enables you to stay the journey to achieve the outcomes.

The more powerful your money goals are, the more likely you will be to act on them and therefore guarantee that they will become your reality.

So to help you design some powerful money goals, here are four tips that make goal setting practical and implementable.

Evaluate and Reflect

The most powerful way to decide what you want in the future and how you’ll get there, is to first know where you are right now and to understand your satisfaction with your current situation. Is it ok?

Performing a self-evaluation will clearly demonstrate what you have to work with…

Your current money scenario will show you where you need to go.

Here are a few quick tips for how to complete a self-evaluation:

Develop Confidence: you must develop confidence to take the actions that will advance your money goals.

But I know from my personal experience, and from the coaching that I have done with clients, that confidence and money are often a difficult mix…

The key is to manage the contradictions of life and succeed by being aware of your limitations but not constrained by them.

Insecurity disables us from overcoming the mental noise…

Confidence is the balancing act of pride and uncertainty, and it’s a work in progress. The more action you take, the more your confidence grows.

Talk About it: Surround yourself with people, friends and mentors, who will be honest with you about your performance and areas that need improvement. Listen to them. Listen to yourself.

The ability to simultaneously doubt and trust yourself is the core to a good self-assessment.

For example, if I find myself constantly blocked at every turn, whether by other people or some competitive situation – I step back and regroup.

It is common in this scenario to blame circumstances or someone else. Instead, I ask, could it be me?

This internal conversation is critical to determining whether your actions are helping or hurting your progress.

Get in the Game: You can plot your own success and evaluate your effectiveness as you go, but at the end of the day, you have to get in the game…

You are never going to be fully prepared or trained for all your money scenarios.

You have to make things happen.

Trust your self-confidence and inner voice to keep you on the right course.

Define Your Dreams and Money Goals

Like me, you probably have dreams of a better life…

You have the ability to create goals to live out those dreams that establish a better outcome for you and your family.

You also have the ability to pursue those dreams.

So what are your dreams and money goals?

This is where your WHY becomes your guiding principle…

It isn’t money that you want, it is the things that money can provide that you want.

Your money goals should align with what you want to be, do and have. What would you do if you knew you would succeed?

To discover your WHY, spend some time thinking about what motivates you.

Why are you personally motivated to achieve your money goals? Why is it important to YOU? What’s at stake if you achieve your money goals? What’s at stake if you don’t?

These are internal motivations that come from YOUR hopes, values and ambitions.

I suggest you write them down, prioritize them and connect with them…

By connect I mean intellectually and emotionally.

You need to have intellectual buy-in to the motivation as to why it’s important, and emotional buy-in, where you feel what is at stake.

Make SMARTER money goals

If we want to achieve goals, we need to set them in a way that maximises their attainment.

You will have heard of smart goals before.

I want to introduce you to SMARTER goals, a concept that I learned from Michael Hyatt.

There are some subtle differences with SMARTER goals that improve your chance of succeeding if you follow this approach:

Specific – enough to focus and direct your energies. Ambiguous goals produce ambiguous results.

Measurable – so you can keep track of your progress.

Actionable – there should be a clear initiating verb that prompts specific activity.

Risky – enough to leverage your natural tendency to rise to a challenge

Time-keyed – so you are prompted exactly when to act.

Exciting – enough to inspire and harness the power of your intrinsic motivation.

Relevant – within the overall context of your life.

Dream big, but with a purpose, and use YOUR why to guide the development of your money goals.

A ninja secret is to limit your goals to three to five items. Too many becomes overwhelming. You can however break a goal into smaller parts to build momentum.

Accountability

The final tip for powerful money goals is to have some accountability.

When you share your money goals with key people in your life, they can hold you accountable by checking in on your progress.

Accountability can be daunting…

But accountability is what puts some teeth into the process.

If your money goals are a secret, do you think they have any power? Probably not…

Having some people who can check in on your progress, support and encourage you makes your money goals far more powerful.

View accountability as a gift to yourself, a voluntary mindset to ensure success, not something that you fear or dread.

Go out and ask for feedback and advice to create accountability.

True success doesn’t come from the outside, but from within. Taking greater personal accountability for your money goals is the key to succeeding.

Take some time this week to really narrow in on your money goals and leave me a comment to let me know how you go. It could be the first step in being accountable.