Every morning I read over my Best Year Yet Plan with my Top Ten Goals. It takes me under a minute, but keeps me focused on my direction. Seeing them daily helps me deal with the distractions that life constantly throws my way.

Experience, personally and with clients, has taught me a few things in regards to successful goal setting. The biggest thing is set action goals, not destination goals. We can easily control the steps we take and see our progress which keeps us motivated and moving in the right direction. Fully accomplishing a destination goal is more challenging and more ambiguous. For example a lot of people want to lose weight. Set your goals around how many times you are going to work out and how you are specifically going to improve your diet. These are actions that you can easily say Yes, I did do this and I will eventually reach my goal, or No, I did not and I need to get back on course. We can see our progress, celebrate our success, and keep doing the right things. Focusing on strictly the number on the scale can be discouraging and defeat the whole purpose of setting the goal.

Look at your life and your business as a whole. Set goals that take reality into account. You cannot succeed if you are completely off balance. Commit to goals that encompass your full existence. Burning out, neglecting relationships, and getting sick in pursuit of one area of your world is not the point and is self-defeating.

Set goals that cause you to work and stay focused, but don't bite off more than you could possibly chew. If you have never worked out before saying you are going to hit the gym six days a week for the rest of the year is a plan doomed to failure. Committing to three times a week will push you, keep you on track, and is much more likely to succeed.

Even if you didn't start at the beginning of the calendar year (or maybe your fiscal year) you can start now. What do you want to accomplish in the next three months? Put it in writing, draw up a basic plan, and start taking action. Now! You'll be blown away at what you can achieve with small daily steps.