Sean hits us right off the bat with a request: to make a list of goals.
He says if we don’t, we might as well toss the book away.
The first two times I read this, I didn’t make the list.
The first time I read it was via ebook and I was just reading it at night before I went to bed.
The second time was via audiobook and I only listened to it while showering.
The third time, I finally made that list.
This is my fourth time, and it’s time to break open that list again.
I see a lot of things on this list that I would have enjoyed to do at different times in my life.
They’re all cool things.
I don’t know how many of them are things I want to pursue anymore, but, I keep adding to this list every time I think of something.
This list will never be finished.
Nor will everything be crossed off the list.
That’s okay.
The important ones will be completed.
Sean says, “successful people are goal oriented. They project a vision into the future of what they want to accomplish.”
We made our goal lists. If yours is anything like mine, it’s mostly pretty vague.
There are some really vague ones like “learn as many languages as I can.”
Then there are some more specific ones like “help 1000 people leave abusive situations.”
That one might only need a time frame of my life.
Other goals need a time frame.
“Make $10,000 per month” is a goal that needs a time frame.
Something we need to make sure we don’t do is dream too small.
People are going to crap on your big dreams. Don’t listen to them.
Dream big and if you don’t make it, oh well.
The problem is when we dream too small and we achieve those goals.
Where do we go from there?
The smartest thing to do is to start with the big goal and work backwards.
If I want my website Online Business ONE to make $10,000 per month in profit, that’s too small.
I should be shooting for $1,000,000 per month.
Sean says something in his podcast that we haven’t seen yet in this book. He says, “10x your 10x” which means take your goal and multiply it by ten, and then multiply that number by ten.
That’s your new goal.
So that’s the goal with Online Business ONE. $1,000,000 per month.
Now I can break it down into smaller goals.
$10,000 per month is still a goal, but it’s not the goal.
Thinking in the future, but right now.
When Sean was 21 he wrote himself an email that had a goal of making $3000 or more per month, via one of two industries, and signed it off with “I’ve got it.”
He didn’t have that job yet, but that was the goal.
I believe that it is important that he wrote it in present tense rather than future tense.
He wasn’t saying “I’m going to get that job” he said “I’ve got it.”
His mindset was in the right place.
Now he just had to make it a reality.
Write it down for the good good feels.
Another important part of having your goals written down is the feeling you will get when you’ve been looking at a goal for days and days and days and you finally achieve it.
That’s a feeling you will never forget.
Sean shares a quote from Bill Gates, “most people overestimate what they an do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.”
That may be true, but I like to set the unrealistic goals.
Right now, my goal with Online Business ONE is to hit $5000 per month in revenue, not profit, by January 1st 2021.
That’s a few days short of six months from the time of writing this.
That’s okay. In my mind, I’m already there.
I’ve got it.
Top comments (2)
Really nice post.
I always have some trouble thinking about how to measure my goals, in every attempt I get frustrated about that, give up tracking it and just go blindly, pursuing something that when I get it I won't even notice. There are some goals that are quite difficulty to measure, such as speaking a language, in my opinion, you can't measure the words you know, because you don't even know if you are able to use it in conversation, sometimes you just know the meaning if you listen or read it, but you can't use that word when speaking. Some goals are really hard to measure, and if you can't measure you can't reach, right?
Btw, thanks for sharing!
Hey Douglas, good points. I’m definitely going to have to make a post that digs into the “how” of making goals...this post was more of a “why”.
Learning a language isn’t a goal with an end, but it is measurable.
Michael Hyatt defines two types of goals: achievement goals and habit goals.
An achievement goal has a measurable end.
A habit goal has a measurable practice.
Learning a language doesn’t have a measurable end. But it does have a measurable practice.
And languages are a truly “if you don’t use it, you lose it” skill, so even if you feel you’ve become fluent in a language, you need to keep it up.