Quad Cities Business News

Prescott, Prescott Valley, Chino Valley, & Dewey/Humboldt

You are here: Home / Archives for goal setting

goal setting

Follow a Budget, Increase Your Financial Knowledge

By Leave a Comment

Good luck and much success in achieving your financial goals! If you want to succeed, have a plan!

To grow your wealth, you need to become knowledgeable in a number of different financial areas. To not be educated in the basics will cost you in the long run. It is not that you need to be an expert, but one must understand the simple concepts in personal finance.

The following is a high-level education to put you on the path to master basic finance. Begin with these concepts and grow from there.

Learning should be a lifelong endeavor. If you stop learning, you will fall behind as the world is forever moving forward.

So, let’s get started with some basic concepts. Take these concepts and grow your knowledge in each area. Master them or hire experts in the related field to teach you and help you reach your financial goals.

Budgeting is Your Friend

Do you budget, live on less than you make, provide for your basic needs? Many folks do not budget, but I will tell you, this is a key building block. If you do not know where your hard-earned money is going, then you are in trouble.

Do you take a trip without knowing how to get there? Well, a budget tells your money where to go. When you set up a budget, every dollar gets assigned a purpose such as food, clothing, rent or mortgage. There are the essentials and then there are the savings and the niceties to consider.

If your expenses are higher than your income, you either have an income issue or you spend too much on the niceties.

Emergency Fund for Protection

Build an emergency fund for a rainy day. I can guarantee that it will rain, so at some point you will have an emergency. An unexpected car repair, a home repair, perhaps a sudden trip to see a loved one, maybe even a job loss. It will happen. If you are prepared, it will not be a big deal.

An emergency fund is a form of insurance against those unexpected life events. It is recommended that you build a fund to cover at least three to six months of expenses.

Debt Elimination

How many credit cards to you have? Do you like that car loan? Do you still have student loans? How much are you making in payments every month? What would you do with that extra money if you eliminated those debt payments?

Debt is robbing you of your wealth. As a matter of fact, the banks and credit card companies are getting rich off of you. Take a look at their headquarters. Nice, right? You paid for it.

Make a full-court press to eliminate these pesky debt payments and see how much your life becomes simplified. Pay cash for everything. Budget for it and stick to your budget. Stay away from impulse buying.

Save For the Future

This is another key concept: retirement savings, large purchases and that nice vacation. Again, the budget is the guiding tool, as these items must be included in your budget. Budget for that vacation, that new car purchase even that large home repair such as a new roof.

Retirement savings is a key component of savings. You want to make sure that you will have enough for your twilight years. Start an IRA or a Roth IRA, contribute to a 401k if your employer has one. Your goal should be to get this to about 15% of your income. Over the long term, one can accumulate a nice nest egg. Start early and contribute regularly.

Invest for Passive Income

In the savings section, we discussed briefly putting away 15% for retirement. The next step is creating a fund that grows over time. One must learn about basic investing and where you can get the best results. What do you know about investing?

Now is the time to begin to get some education. This can be very intimidating. Learn about the markets – stock, bond and real estate markets at the very least, to name a few. Learn about mutual funds. Hire a professional to help you, but make sure it is someone who is willing to teach you.

This is where you will grow your wealth exponentially. Create that passive income and turn $1,000 into $2,000. It can happen. Remember: This is a marathon, not a sprint.

Learn enough to be dangerous and hire a professional. Don’t be cheap here. Do your homework and hire a reputable firm.

Homeownership

Certainly this is a goal for many. That dream home. Well, if you do not lay the groundwork as outlined above, that dream home can turn into a nightmare. Owing a home is the great American dream, but preparing for it financially is necessary.

Then there is the mortgage. What is the best one for you? Once again, this requires more homework. The most optimum is a 15-year fixed rate. If you eliminate this payment in 15 years, you can then use that payment to invest or whatever you want.

Taxes

I probably just lost readers on this one. I want nothing to do with taxes. Well, if you learned a little, you may reduce your tax liability and keep more of your hard-earned money. My theory is to only pay what I owe – nothing more and nothing less.

Learn a little and hire a professional. Keep your taxes to a minimum.

Insurance

You have put all the previous pieces to the puzzle together as outlined above and now it is time to make sure you keep it.

Don’t get carried away; just get what is necessary. Certainly auto and health are No. 1 and No. 2. Then there is life insurance to protect your family, should you meet your demise.

If you own a home, homeowner’s insurance is essential. Then you have disability short-term and long- term insurance.

Do your homework here. Not every type of insurance is necessary, but some is essential. Know what your exposure is and then protect it.

Net Worth

What is this? This is how we keep score. You have done all the smart things as outlined above. Now, it is time to know where we are.

Let’s define what net worth is. Very simply, it is all your assets minus all your liabilities. In plain English, it is everything you own minus everything you owe. Calculate this regularly and watch it grow!

This has been a high level review of basic personal finance concepts that will put you on the path to financial wealth. Apply them and watch your net worth grow!

Good luck and much success in achieving your financial goals! If you want to succeed, have a plan! QCBN

By Steven Calabrese, CPA

Steven Calabrese, CPA, is the CFO of Polara Health. He also is the owner/operator of a website known as thebiweeklyadvisor.com, where topics such as budgeting, investing, paying off debt and goal setting are discussed.

Five Pounds to Perfect

By Leave a Comment

If you just, if you only, if you could, what would it be? What’s keeping you from living your best life?

Do you ever hear yourself starting sentences with, “If only,” or “When I,” or “After I?” They sound like this: “If only I had a doctoral degree, I could get the job I really want,” or “After I make my first million, I can travel to exotic lands,” or “When I lose five pounds, I’ll reward myself with a beach vacation!”

These sentence starters sort of sound like goal setters, but don’t be fooled. They can really be tricky little non-starters. Five pounds may as well be 500 pounds, because, in our minds, they are out-weighing the odds that we’re ever going to get there. They are fantasized versions of what a better me or you could achieve, acquire and attract. And they are keeping us from thinking that we qualify for something better than we already have.

When we say these words, we are declaring to everyone, the universe, too, that we’re “not enough” right now, and may well never be. Therefore, we don’t deserve this better life…yet. The worst part is that we’re telling ourselves this and we may actually be listening. These “If only’s, “When I’s,” and “After I’s” are nothing but big uninspiring blobs that are lodged between the life we are living and the life we really want. And that keeps us firmly planted in some kind of weird blob purgatory where we’re not really living yet. So let’s do some blob busting.

“Most people, unconsciously, dream themselves out of their goals,” says Abundance Now author Lisa Nichols. “They dream so far past their current reality or what’s currently possible that they end up abandoning their goals and damaging their own self esteem. They are chasing the macro-win all the time and they’re not looking at all the micro-wins that they can feel really good about to get them to that macro-win. Micro-wins lead to macro-wins.”

The problem with only being focused on the macro-win is that we’re putting our life on hold. We’re actually dismissing the present as real life as we obsess over some massive goal. And we’re also depleting ourselves by not celebrating the little successes, which is a way of punishing ourselves for not having the discipline, strength and intelligence to figure out how to lose those pesky five pounds, take those online classes or work smarter, not harder. Ouch. Those blobs are not only in our way, they’re causing us pain!

I remember reading that Oprah would know that she had “made it” when she could afford a big, luxurious bathtub. I think about the people I know who do own big, luxurious bathtubs. Do you know how often they actually soak in them, with bubbles up to the ceiling, a glass of champagne in one hand and a great novel in the other? I don’t actually either, because that would creepy, but I’m guessing they don’t use these big soakers very often. I do, however, hear people complain that these massive bathtubs take up too much space, require too much hot water, and anyway, who has the time to bask in this kind of frivolous behavior, anyway?

But that’s ok, Oprah, because that was a tangible marker for you. More importantly, I hope you celebrated like a blissed-out mermaid, because that’s what really counts – taking a moment to congratulate ourselves for reaching an important goal. So, can we please have more bubbly celebrations? Lisa Nichols says we most certainly can by creating more micro-wins.

As Lisa describes, micro-wins offer a taste of that thing we want more of. If you want to go to Paris to see the Louvre, Lisa suggests visiting your local museums now, while you’re saving money for Gay Paree!

Leadership Coach Ronda Beaman has mastered the micro-win. Ronda travels the world teaching leadership skills to top-flight executives. Before this, she was raising two boys as a single mom, working full-time and taking classes on nights and weekends toward advanced degrees. She would have liked to have put her boys on a plane and show them the world, expand their horizons and have some fun together, but that wasn’t in the budget, yet. So she created some micro-wins.

As she explained it to me, she would have Italy Night, Morocco Night or Japan Night, for example. The three of them would research the selected country – through encyclopedias, not the internet then – decorate themselves and their kitchen table in honor of the celebrated culture, and prepare the cuisine of the selected nation of the night. At dinner, they might sip miso soup, roll sticky rice in nori, and discuss what they had “seen” that day when they climbed Mount Fuji.

These globetrotting events became much-anticipated mini-vacations for the family. And no doubt, the boys got to experience the world through books, their imaginations and their taste buds. My jaw dropped when I heard about the innovative, educational, family fun and togetherness these people were having on a budget right down the street from me! Guess who else’s jaw dropped? USA Today! Yup, the newspaper proclaimed them “America’s Most Creative Family.” Are you kidding me? Turning hot dogs into racecars with toothpicks and cardboard wheels at my dinner table wasn’t creative enough?

Today, Beaman is the hugely successful executive coach and chief creative officer for PEAK Learning, a leadership firm based in Arroyo Grande, California. She is the first recipient of the “Art of Teaching” award and has been “Professor of the Year” at three universities, including Northern Arizona University. In her spare time, she’s written bestselling books and was named 2018 Fitness Idol! And, she can now actually fly her family to Japan or Timbuktu if she wants.

If you just, if you only, if you could, what would it be? What’s keeping you from living your best life? What micro-wins can you have and celebrate now? Go ahead, I see you there in your toga with a handful of legumes. Write them down on your scroll during your Ancient Rome Night and consider this a double micro-win! Because really, no one will notice those five pounds under a toga anyway. QCBN

By Bonnie Stevens, QCBN

Bonnie Stevens is a public relations consultant. She can be reached at bonnie.stevens@gmail.com.

Using the Three Bucket Retirement Strategy

By Leave a Comment

Good luck with your retirement and may your funds outlast you!

After many years of hard work and diligent saving for retirement, many struggle with the fear that they will outlive their nest egg. Or, perhaps worse, that the financial systems will collapse.

So what does one do? Plan!

It is my belief that the Three Bucket Retirement Strategy will both guard against adverse market conditions and grow your nest egg so that your money will outlast you.

Laying the Groundwork

Before the Three Bucket Retirement Strategy can be implemented, you will need to determine a number of factors to allow you to set up the buckets.

  • How much will you need to have on an annual basis to do what you want to do?
  • How much will you receive in Social Security/pension?
  • How much will you be required to withdraw when you reach age 72, RMD (Required Mandatory Distributions)? An IRA, 401k, 403b or any retirement deferral account will require this. It does not matter if you need the money or not, you must take the money and pay the taxes. ROTH does not have this requirement.
  • Determine what your tax liability will be. This needs to be added to your annual income needs. For example, if you want an additional $20,000 above your social security, the taxes you will need to pay are $10,000, so you will need a total of $30,000.

Setting Up the Strategy

Now that you have determined what your needs are, we can begin to set up the strategy. Let’s work with the following assumptions.

  • Nest egg: $500,000
  • Social security/pension: $30,000
  • Desired annual amount you want to spend: $50,000
  • Tax liability: $10,000
  • Amount needed from Nest Egg: $30,000 (desired amount $50,000 plus tax liability $10,000 less social security/pension $30,000)

Bucket 1

This is the bucket referred to as the “now” bucket. The funds placed here would be for short-term use in the next two years. The rate of return will be small, if any at all. These funds would be kept in money market funds. Here, we would put in $60,000, based on our example. These funds need to be liquid.

Bucket 2

This bucket is the intermediate funds. Funds for the next five years would be placed in this bucket. The rate of return would be better than in Bucket 1. These funds would be placed in fixed-income type instruments. For example, treasury bonds, high-grade corporate bonds or perhaps a little more risky, dividend paying equities. These funds need to be semi-liquid, as this bucket will be used to replenish Bucket 1. Based upon our example, we would place $150,000 in this bucket.

Bucket 3

This bucket would be funded with the balance of your nest egg, this is the later bucket. For our example, it would be $290,000. These funds would be invested more for the long term. Since you have the first seven years of your retirement funded with Buckets 1 and 2, you can take on a little more risk, potentially using equities as an investment. Basically, mutual funds that have a solid track record could result in 10% or more in average annual return. Since the fear of market fluctuations is removed, this will allow for this type of targeted return. A 10% average return over seven years would double the size of this fund, bringing it to $580,000. This amount is larger than your original next egg.

Conclusion

As stated earlier, this is a possible strategy. I would not recommend that this is implemented unless you are comfortable with this plan. One important thing to keep in mind is that the world is not perfect and the actual results may be different from this example.

For instance, the market can increase in the first four years and then have a steep decline in year five, reducing the funds available in Bucket 3. It might not fully recover when you need some of the funds in year seven.

Another possibility is that your returns can be higher in the beginning and you may choose to move some from Bucket 3 to Bucket 2.

All in all, one needs to be diligent and understand how this is meant to work and what the risks are. This may not be for everyone. I, for one, think this is a viable strategy even with the associated risk.

Good luck with your retirement and may your funds outlast you! QCBN

By Steven Calabrese, CPA

Steven Calabrese, CPA, is the CFO of Polara Health. He also is the owner/operator of a website known as thebiweeklyadvisor.com, where topics such as budgeting, investing, paying off debt and goal setting are discussed.

Nine Strategies for a Debt-Free Life

By Leave a Comment

Detailed below is how you can achieve a debt-free life.

A debt-free life, what would that be like and how do you achieve it? Living debt-free is a life that is stress-free. A stress-free life is something that you can become comfortable with. Once you achieve such a goal, you will never go back.

Detailed below is how you can achieve a debt-free life.

LIVE ON LESS THAN YOU MAKE

This tip sounds simple, but it is not for many people. Most want to keep up with the Joneses. Trust me, the Joneses are not having fun. They are actually broke!

If you make $100, then only spend 80% or 90%. Never spend it all and certainly never spend more. If you are spending more, that indicates you are most likely borrowing to keep up.

STICK TO A BUDGET

Sticking to a budget, once you have detailed it out, is what a debt-free lifestyle feels like. A budget is not a restriction. It actually is permission to spend.

Setting your budget with reasonable spending targets and living within those targets is what freedom to spend feels like. Create enough flexibility.

PAY CASH FOR PURCHASES 

When you pay cash for your purchases, actually, you create an environment that will cause you to spend less. When you pull out cash and count it out, it hurts your brain because you actually feel the act of spending.

Using plastic is not the same. Swipe the card and you are done. The money comes right out of your account or if you are using a credit card you will see the bill later when the purchase is just a memory.

SEEK WAYS TO REDUCE EXPENSES

Always look for a more cost-effective way to purchase needed items. Shop when things are on sale but make sure they are really on sale. Many times prices are marked up and then reduced.

ELIMINATE ALL DEBT

Those debt payments are only lining the pockets of the big banks or finance companies that are charging interest in the 15% or more range. Really? In most cases, you are paying for purchases for items long gone.

Do whatever it takes to eliminate these debt payments and put that money back in your pocket. Pay cash. Get off of the merry-go-round.

AUTOMATE YOUR SAVING

This strategy is the key to accumulating wealth. Use the pay-yourself-first method. When you set up automatic savings that comes right off the top of your pay, you will never miss it.

If your company has a 401k or a similar retirement plan, set up a percentage to go directly into it. This way, you do not take it home.

These savings should be invested in good solid mutual funds returning at least 10%. This is a long-term strategy.

CREATE AN EMERGENCY FUND

The thought here is it will rain almost 100% of the time. An unexpected expense will come up. These are items not included in your normal monthly budget.

An example could be an unexpected car repair, or perhaps a job loss.

Prepare beforehand and create a fund with at least three months of expenses, with a goal toward six.

I call this my “peace of mind fund.” It lets me sleep at night.

HAVE LONG TERM GOALS

Setting goals is perhaps the secret formula to achieving success. You need to have professional, financial, family and spiritual goals.

A well-balanced set of goals will be your roadmap. You don’t take a road trip without a map, so don’t go through life without a map. Create long-term goals, and short-term goals to get you to your long-term goals.

Make SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time Bound). And make sure they are in writing. An unwritten goal is just a dream.

SHOP AROUND

Never make the impulse buy. You will overpay! Do some research. Are you getting the best price for the quality product?

Or are you just getting a bargain and it is cheap, but you will buy it three times because it won’t last. Many times it is better to spend a little more and get a higher quality product and only buy it once.

There is no doubt that other strategies can be used to live a debt-free life. These are the tried and true. What is your favorite? Or do you have one you use that is not listed here?

So why wait? Get started now! QCBN

By Steven Calabrese, CPA

Steven Calabrese, CPA is the CFO of Polara Health. He also is the owner/operator of a website known as thebiweeklyadvisor.com, where topics such as budgeting, investing, paying off debt and goal setting are discussed.

Home Buying: How Much Can You Afford?

By Leave a Comment

Yes, owning a home is exciting, but there are a number of things you need to do to make sure you are successful.

Many people want to live the dream of owning their own home. Paying rent is a waste of money, they say. What you don’t want to happen is to overbuy or overextend and turn that dream into a nightmare. How much can you afford?

Owning a home is special, and you must prepare accordingly. We will discuss the safeguards you need to put into place to eliminate a nightmare scenario.

Often, the concept is, “I am paying rent now so if I pay the same amount for a mortgage then I will be all right.” Well, the answer is maybe, maybe not. That all depends on a number of factors.

Our discussion will keep you out of trouble and put you on solid footing for home ownership.

Preparing for the Largest Purchase in Your Life

Yes, owning a home is exciting, but there are a number of things you need to do to make sure you are successful. What must be top of mind is to make sure you have enough money to buy food and other essential life needs.

How large should the down payment be? The goal should be at least 20%. Putting 20% down will eliminate the cost of PMI (private mortgage insurance). PMI will add a couple hundred dollars to your monthly payment. It is about 1% of the amount borrowed per year. This insurance does not protect you; it protects the bank, but you pay. Stay away from zero down and certainly don’t do anything less than 10%!

There will be other costs that you will need to pay, such as closing costs, inspection fees, perhaps legal fees. All these will need to figure into your costs to purchase. It may be possible to get the sellers to pay some, but that is not likely to happen in a seller’s market.

Get your Financial House in Order

Eliminate all other debt. Pay off those credit cards, student loans, car payments and personal loans. When you pay these off, you will free up money to use for other things.

Be absolutely certain to have an emergency fund. I cannot stress how important this will be. When you rented, the landlord fixed anything that broke. Well, now you are the landlord and you will have to fix anything that may break. Trust me on this, something will break. To learn more, visit “Emergency Fund: Six Reasons Why Having One is Important!” here: https://bit.ly/2R4D7zL.  

Create a fund to fix up your new dream home. That old furniture may not look so good and may need to be replaced. There will be other fix-up things like blinds, shades or curtains for those windows, landscaping and maybe painting. These projects can add up quickly, so have a budget and put the cash aside. If you don’t, you will run up those credit cards and create new debt, taking important dollars away from your much-needed items to live.

The Foundation is in Place; Now What?

All debt has been eliminated, an emergency fund is in place, a fix-up fund is in hand and the all-important down payment is covered. What is your next step?

How much can you afford? What should be your monthly payment? The goal is to not spend more than 25% of your take-home pay on your mortgage payment. In addition, you don’t want to have a mortgage for more than 15 years. With a shorter period to pay down your mortgage, you will actually own your home instead of the bank owning it.

What would it be like to not have a mortgage or rent payment? Now you will truly be able to build wealth. Yes, you will need homeowner’s insurance and to pay property tax but these two expenses will be small compared to your income.

What is Included in the Mortgage Payment?

Included in the mortgage payment are a number of costs. The actual amount you borrow to purchase is part of the payment. This will be the repayment of principal and the payment of interest (P&I). Then you will need homeowners insurance. Property tax and any HOA (Home Owners Association) fees will be included.

When shopping for a new home, you need to take these costs into consideration. The higher they are, the less will be available for the principal and interest and the less house you will be able to afford.

For example, if we assume that your take-home pay is $5,000 per month, 25% would be about $1,250 per month for your mortgage payment. Now, if property tax is $200 per month, homeowners insurance is $100 per month. If there is an HOA (homeowners association) fee, you would reduce that amount as well. For our example, we will only take property tax and insurance into consideration. $1,250 less $200 less $100 will leave $950 for principal and interest.

Interest rates are low right now – around 3% – so let’s use that for our example. Our mortgage payment cannot exceed $950 for principal and interest. This means you can borrow about $137,000. Add in a 20% down payment of $34,250, and you can afford a home valued at $171,250.

To buy a home of higher value, you will need to have a larger down payment or increase your income to be able to afford a larger mortgage payment.

Other Factors

In many markets, the ability to buy a home is very competitive. Get yourself preapproved for a mortgage. Know what you can afford. Stay away from any variable rate mortgage. Rates are only likely to increase from where they are now.

Work with a knowledgeable real estate broker. A good broker will know the market and what it will take to be successful once you have found your dream home. Make this a happy process and enjoy it!

One last thought: your forever house does not exist. We bought ours three houses ago. The average time spent in one home is seven years.

Good luck! And thank you for reading. QCBN

By Steven Calabrese

Other articles on home buying can be found here: https://bit.ly/3cNSC7G . Steven Calabrese, CPA, is the CFO of West Yavapai Guidance Clinic. He also is the owner/operator of a website known as thebiweeklyadvisor.com, where such topics as budgeting, investing, paying off debt and goal setting are discussed.

Practicing Powerful Daily Routines for Success

By Leave a Comment

With small, incremental changes, you’ll reflect and see that you are successful because of the following powerful daily routines.

Most Americans wake up feeling tired and sluggish. Many of us wake up with a mood that is neutral or slightly negative and we spend most of the morning trying to get caught up.

This article does not promise to makeover your entire life or guarantee that you’ll become a morning person ready to run five miles before the sun rises – unless that’s your goal, and if so, rise and grind! This article will, I hope, provide some opportunities for a shift in perspective. With small, incremental changes, you’ll reflect and see that you are successful because of the following powerful daily routines.

Only you can define what success means for you

Before you go out and buy planners, journals and organizers, spend some time in self-reflection. What is it that you want to achieve that would mean success?

The key to this is to be specific. When defining success, try to be as exacting as you can. Many people like to create SMART goals: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely. There are reasons for this.

It boils down to developing habits of success. If you can set personal SMART goals, you will find them achievable, thereby establishing a successful routine.

You’re re-wiring your brain. There are plenty of TED Talks, podcasts and books that talk about success and happiness. It can all be distilled into a specific area of psychology referred to as cognitive behavior therapy. You didn’t develop your habit of staying up late or not exercising in just a day, so it’s going to take that much more to unlearn and re-learn a new pattern in its stead.

Once you have a Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely goal laid out for yourself, write it down! There is no exception to this. Neuroscience research proves that the act of writing makes your mind more efficient by helping you focus on the important stuff.

Find a system of accountability

There’s a reason why so many New Year’s Resolutions never make it past February. We as humans are a fickle sort and are easily distracted. If we can think of an excuse not to do something (such as cultivate a routine for success), we will find that excuse. And then the habit fizzles out.

Make it a routine

This may seem obvious, especially for an article entitled “Practicing Powerful Daily Routines for Success,” but humans are creatures of habit. If you want to give yourself the best chance of success, plan your SMART goal in a way that you can achieve it routinely, preferably, daily. Here are some examples of goals that can quickly become routines, therefore having the most excellent chance of sticking and making you feel successful:

Make the bed every morning.

Lay out work clothes the night before.

Meditate before bed.

Turn off electronics by 11 p.m.

Again, your un-habits weren’t formed overnight, so it will take that much more effort to unlearn and then practice new habits in their place. You can do it!

Practice Gratitude Daily

Whether your daily gratitude practice is in meditation, prayer or journaling, this is a powerful daily routine that is transformative. It can be as small as finding gratitude every morning before your feet hit the floor or writing out something you’re grateful for while writing the day’s to-do list. Every person is different, but if you can incorporate, “Today I am grateful for…” as a daily routine, it will guarantee your success.

Practicing gratitude eases symptoms of anxiety and depression, fosters better moods and is linked to positive feelings and a sense of well-being. With a daily gratitude practice, you provide your brain with the neurochemicals that allow it to be primed for positive habits. Your daily routines for success will compound and you’ll find it to be easier to add new goals. Practicing gratitude is foundational to building your personal, powerful daily routine for success – one that only you can define.

Best wishes on your journey! QCBN

By Jamaal McCoy

Jamaal McCoy is the general manager of Findlay Auto Group Prescott. He can be reached at 928-443-8300 or jmccoy@findlayauto.com.

Setting Goals for Success

By Leave a Comment

Setting and achieving goals will set you up for a cycle of success and personal satisfaction.

It has often been said that unless we have goals in our personal or business lives, how do we know when we have had success? Many of us work hard, but our lives still lack fulfillment. What can we do to invoke change in our lives? Before you can change your life, you must change your thinking. It starts with visualizing what we want from life and setting goals that resemble that vision. Your vision is a detailed description of where you currently are and where you ultimately want to be. Your vision will be a reflection of what your destination looks and feels like. For a goal to be effective, there must be a “why” to achieving it. Ask yourself “why” your goal is important and what achieving it or not achieving it means to you. When you can visualize a “why,” you can set your goals that will be your “what.” You must first have a meaningful “why” relative to your “what,” then you can work on the “how.”

The power in goal setting is that it forces you to think about what is important to you and visualize what your reality would be if you accomplish these goals. Goal setting is motivating in nature and is an integral step in achieving success. By identifying what you want to achieve in life and what your ideal future looks like, you know where to channel your energy and efforts and what distractions you need to eliminate. Goals provide a sense of direction, which allows you to focus on a target so that you can concentrate your aim. Goal setting is fuel for ambition, giving us the inspiration to aim for things that may have previously seemed unattainable.

By setting SMART (Specific Measurable Attainable Relevant Timely) goals, you can track your progress and celebrate your achievements along the journey. These celebrations will confirm your efforts and highlight your progress toward realizing the ultimate end results. Having small victories along the way will increase your confidence and reinforce your ability in achieving the goals that you have set. When you consciously set goals for yourself, you naturally have a greater sense of being.

Utilize your “why” to create a big picture of what you desire to accomplish with your life or what you are determined to accomplish by a specific time period. This big picture will provide you with your ultimate large-scale goals. Once identified, divide the large goals into smaller “benchmark” targets that you can drill down and focus on. Create a detailed and time specific action plan to start progressing toward achieving each “benchmark” on your journey to achieving your goals.

Each goal should be set in the affirmative and expressed in a positive, motivational tone. Your goals should be definitive, detailed and specific so that once you have achieved them, you are able to rejoice in your accomplishment. Give each “benchmark” and each goal a priority level, which will allow you to concentrate your attention and reduce the feeling of being overwhelmed by attempting to achieve too many goals at one time. Your goals need to be written and reviewed often. Once a goal is written, it increases its feeling of validity, which makes it more impactful.

Setting and achieving goals will set you up for a cycle of success and personal satisfaction. Consistently having goals can give you a sense of purpose and the drive needed to persevere each and every day.

Your goals should inherently be your own and not ones set for you by others. For a goal to be effective, it must be meaningful to you and not just something others want you to achieve. No one can want it more than you want it yourself, then and only then will you focus your efforts on achievement and realizing the vision of success.

In closing, set goals to take control of your life and be the success that you were meant to be. Use your goals to empower yourself, expect more from your life and create the life of your dreams, designed by you! QCBN

By Jamaal McCoy, QCBN

Jamaal McCoy is the general manager of Findlay Auto Group Prescott. He can be reached at 928-443-8300 or jmccoy@findlayauto.com.