In today's video, we'll talk about how to hold yourself accountable for goals.
Think about it. If you don't, you won't accomplish your
goals. At the end of this video, you'll know exactly how to do that.
We throw this term around all the time. --To be accountable. What does that mean?
There are 4 levels of personal accountability. And the very first level
is YOU. Are you ready to commit to this? If you're not, don't tell yourself that
you are. Sometimes we set goals that are very lofty and we kind of know secretly
behind the scenes that we're really not gonna do that. Because we're not ready to
incur the time and the cost and the effort that are required to achieve that
goal. Are you ready for this? Think of one of your number one goals. What is that
that you've been telling yourself you're going to do? Are you going to lose weight?
Are you going to get in shape? Are you going to start eating better? Are you
going to write that book? Whatever it is. pick your favorite goal right now as
you're watching this video. Pick your favorite goal. Ask yourself. "How committed
am I? How committed am I to making sure that this happens?" And you might put a
scale on it. 0 to 100. And zero means, "No, no." And 100 means "It's got to
happen." It has to happen. For me personally, some
of the goals that I've accomplished happened because I hit a point where it
was prosper or perish. Do you know what I'm talking about here? Where that goal
is so important to you that your life as you know it doesn't get to continue
unless you complete this goal. Now, there's some psychological reasons why I
don't want you to get stuck there I believe that you can be happy now not
just after you achieve your goal. What I'm talking about though is your level
of commitment. Are you ready to do what it takes? And if you're coming in on that
0 to a 100 scale of, you know, 20 or 30 then get a different
goal. Because this one is not going to happen. Let's be personally accountable
for our goals. That's level 1. Level 2 of accountability is your time
accountability. So, we've covered personal, your personal commitment. What is your
time commitment to this goal? Saying that you will do something is a trap. I told
myself, "I'm going to write a book." For 10 years I said this to myself. "I'm going to
write a book. I am I'm going to." And it was always true every time I said it. Do
you see how it's a trap? It's always pushed out there in the future somewhere/
When am I going to write a book? And check in with this truth. Any time you do
something, it's now, isn't it? You can't do something in the future. When you're
doing it, it will be now. The time accountability is where you take your
goal and you put it into your calendar. Your schedule. The events that come up
every day for you. Here's how I define now. Now has a start time and an end time.
And your goal is happening right in there in between. Now, this will be easier
if you break it down into the next physical step. You want to lose weight,
okay. What is the next physical step for you to do that? It might include joining
Weight Watchers? It might include purchasing a book
about nutrition. It might include making a shopping list of healthy foods. Instead
of saying that you're going to do any of those things, take one of those things
and put it on your calendar. Make an appointment. If you're like me, you don't
like to do list. But you keep your appointments. Can you resonate with that?
My wife likes the to-do lists but she's actually much more organized than I am.
It just feels like a lot of unkept commitments to me. And so instead of
having a to-do list of all the stuff that I need to do to accomplish my goal,
I take the next physical step put it into my calendar, that's time
accountability. When it's on your calendar, you've committed your time to
doing this. And you'll be amazed to see what starts happening. Let's go to the
next level of accountability. Money accountability. Can you see that to
accomplish your goal will incur a cost? At the very least it costs your time and
effort. It's probably going to cost you some money. I learned long ago that you
can tell what people are really committed to by checking to documents.
Their calendar. We already talked about that and their checkbook. What are they
willing to actually put their dollars toward? That's what you're really
committed to. Look at what you need to do along those lines to accomplish your
goal. And holding yourself accountable might mean that you write a check. Now
notice how that took us right back to personal accountability. Are you really
committed to this? Are you ready to do what is required to reach that goal? I
tell you what? If you find yourself writing it in your calendar and writing
a check for it, you're going to have a whole lot higher level of confidence
that you're actually going to get this thing done. One more level of
accountability that's going to help you to hold your
accountable for your goals is social accountability. This is where you invite
other people to know about your commitment. And then they become your
accountability partners even if they're not directly engaged in whatever the
goal is. You tell someone else what it is. I've heard different philosophies about
this because some people say, "Well, you should never tell your goal to someone
else because that takes the power out of it." I really don't know what they're
talking about. I think to share your goal with people especially people who are
important to you and who will follow up with you and help to hold you
accountable, actually raises the likelihood that you're going to
accomplish that goal. Share it with someone. Well what if you don't follow
through. Won't that be embarrassing? Won't that be
detrimental to your poor fragile psyche? No. You can handle that. And
anticipating that might help you to do the things that are necessary to
accomplish your goal so that you don't have to be in that position. There's a
lot of reasons why it works. Social accountability will help you remain
accountable to your goals as well. So, the 4 areas we've covered. Personal, how
committed are you. Time, is it on your calendar? Money, are you ready to write a
check for it or have you already? And social. Who are you involving in your
goal? I hope that you found these ideas helpful. Now, let's get serious about
following through. If you need some help with your personal accountability, hire a
coach. If you don't know who to hire, go to liveonpurpose.coach. We've got a
whole team of certified coaches who know the philosophies that we talk about on
this channel. We'd be happy to help.