A lot of people have dreams and fail to achieve it, may be they don’t have a plan, or their dreams aren’t realistic, or may be they don’t have tools that help them in achieving their goals, In this article we’ll try to teach you how to achieve your dreams or goals, but first you must know how to set your goals to achieve them and what are the specifications of successful goals?

First, to achieve your goal or dream, it must be SMART

SMART goal means (specific, measurable, attainable and time-limited) goal

As ex: let’s assume that your goal is to be a rich man, is that goal SMART? Let’s see.

Specific:

this goal isn’t specific or clear because if you asked anyone, how much money must you have to be rich? He wouldn’t answer you by a specific answer.

So this goal isn’t specific and therefore isn’t SMART.

To check if your goal is specific or not, try to answer the five “W” questions:

What do I want to accomplish?

Why is this goal important?

Who is involved?

Where is it located?

Which resources or limits are involved?

Measurable:

now your dream to be rich, right? Assume after two months of setting up your goals, you have about 15,000$ but let me ask you, How much percentage have you achieved from your goal recently?, the answer is unknown so this goal isn’t measurable and therefore isn’t SMART.

To check if your goal is measurable or not, try to answer the following questions:

How much?

How many?

How will I know when my goal is achieved?

Attainable:

when you choose a goal, choose a goal which you can achieve and don’t set yourself up for failure by letting your dreams get bigger than your abilities

When you set up your goal, you should know your abilities, opportunities, and knowledge, and you should have tools that help you to achieve your goal.

To check if your goal is attainable or not, try to answer the following questions:

How can I achieve this goal?

What are my (abilities, opportunities, and knowledge) that can help me to achieve my dream?

By other words, you should know your strengths and weakness, and can you achieve your goals with them?

Realistic:

your goal must be realistic or you must know can you achieve your goal with the available resources, and the current environment and economic situation?

To check if your goal is realistic or not, try to answer the following questions:

Are the current environment and economic suitable to achieve my goal?

Can I achieve my goal now? Or it isn’t the right time

Can I achieve my goal?

Time-limited:

every goal needs a deadline or target date to be SMART

So when you set your goal, you should set time schedule (milestones) to reach to it

To check if your goal is time-limited or not, try to answer the following questions:

When will I achieve my dream?

What will I achieve after two weeks?

What will I achieve after two months?

Simple goals examples:

I want to write a book I want to improve my health I want to learn the programming I want to buy a car

SMART goals examples:

In order to improve myself and be a writer, I will write a book (400 pages) on (education in the first world countries) by writing one chapter per week (4-6 pages per week), and The book will be completed in 10 weeks, and then I will search for a publisher. In order improve my health and be handsome, I will lose 15kg by running one hour every day and decreasing fast foods for two months. In order to enhance my experience in programming and find a good job, I will study four courses (visual basic, Photoshop, java script and HTML programming) one course every 15 days In order to go to work easy, I will buy a car (Ford Focus 10,000$) after four months, I have 6000$ and I’ll save 1000$ every month from income.

Second: set your plan to achieve your dreams

it’s highly recommended to use (plan, do, check, adjust) system; so first set your plan

Setting plan is the most important step to achieve your goal, when you put the right plan, you will save many efforts, money and time.

Set up time schedule for your dreams and divide your big dream into small goals then put your plans to achieve each goal individually

EX: assume your goal is saving 12,000$ during five months by:

working overtime for five months to save 5,000$

Saving 5,000$ from the salary

using the saved money from first three months to profit 2,000$ by FOREX during two month

Objective Action Time period Weekly goal Done or not Save 6,000$ 1- Work 120 hours overtime during three months to save 3000$ 2- Save 3000$ from your salary during three months 3 months Work 10 hours overtime Done Work 10 hours overtime …. Write a weekly goal … …………………………. …. ………………………… … ………………………… … …………………………. ………………………… ………….…………….. … save 6,000$ 1- Work 80 hours over time during two months to save 2000$ 2- Save 2000$ from your salary during two months 3- Use 6000$ to profit 2000$ by using 2 months ………………. …

List your SWOT ( Strengths, weakness, opportunities, threats)

When you set goal you should know your SWOT ( Strengths, weakness, opportunities, threats) by brain storm then list needed actions to:

1- Convert your strengths and opportunities to profit.

2- Avoid your weakness and threats effects.

# Action Strengths Weakness Opportunities Threats

Third: start to implement your plan

Implement your plan, execute all needed process and achieve your goal.

You should work hard to achieve your plan, never stop and focus on achieving your dream

Fourth: check

To succeed in achieving your goal you must check your plan every day, if there are any variations between your plan and implementation, Try to do everything in your power to achieve your plan and if you failed, may your plan is bad so make adjustments to it.

Fifth: Adjust your plan

If you did everything in your power and couldn’t to implement your plan then you should make change in your plan (adjust) to be achievable

Adjust your plan every day if needed, you may adjust the time plan, resources, activities ……etc.

finally, you have a dream, don’t let it, do everything in your power to achieve it, When you fail; try again, never stop never quit and believe in your self.

Finally, I’ve written this article to help you, Kindly share the article with your friends if you liked it to help them too.

thanks a lot