How to Set Goals

eorge grombacher 0:01
All right, excited to be with you today, I hope that I hope everything’s going great. I hope everything is awesome. The new year is going awesome. It’s up to your expectations and all of that good stuff. Or if it’s not so far that you are ready to make the next move in the right direction or whatever it is that you need to get moving in the right direction. So

it’s been studied. And what we find is that the majority of us give up on our goals, right around this time, give up on our New Year’s resolutions, it is first part of February 2023. And the majority of folks if they do set new year’s resolutions, this is the time where we pull the ripcord or it’s just not working anymore, and we give up on whatever it is that we had planned to get done. So what I want to do is help you get super clear on what your goals are specifically what your financial goals are, in hopes that it’ll get you on the right track. Because what I know for sure is that

well, I know a lot of things for sure. But I’ll certainly know that you can have most anything that you want, financial success is available to you. But we need to get started. The longer it takes to start pursuing these things, the harder it is to actually achieve. So the earlier the better, but no better time than the present. So let’s get into it. Let’s get into how to set financial goals. Once it happened, travelers moving along, came to a worksite. And she saw that there were three men who were diligently working, and she was curious as to what they were working on. So to answer her question she walked up to the first man said Excuse me, sir, can I ask you what you’re doing? And he looks up better? Like angrily says, What does it look like? I’m doing? Like the dumbest question anybody had ever been asked? Like, I’m cutting these stupid rocks got the worst job in the entire country. My head hurts. My back hurts. My hands hurt. Everything hurts. She said, I’m so sorry for your trouble. I hope things work out a look up for you. moved on to the second man. Should Excuse me, sir, can I ask you what you’re doing? And he looked up super focused. i The tiger said, Well, I am working to become the best stone cutter in the entire country. She said, Well, that is a worthwhile goal and ambition. I hope that that works out for you. moves on to the third man. And she got halfway there. She thought is he whistling? See whistling a happy tune. And sure enough, she got close enough. He was whistling a happy tone. She said Excuse me sir, can I can I ask you what you’re doing? He looks up at her with his gleam in his eye. He says I’m building a cathedral. So three people doing essentially the same thing. But having a completely different experience. How you look at something makes all the difference. It’s true of cutting stones. And it’s 1,000% true of your financial situation. Think about it like this. If you think that you suck at money, you’re probably going to suck at money. You think that you’re somebody who’s good at money, that you’re a good investor, you’re going to be financially successful, well, then you probably end up being financially successful. And that’s really what I want for you. So superpower. You and I have very little control over the circumstances of our life, I don’t know what’s going to happen to me, I have no control over my past, I don’t really have a lot of control over the future. What I have absolute control over is how I think about feel about and respond to those circumstances in my life. And that is one of our human superpowers. The second is goal setting. The ability to think about the future, that we want to imagine any future that we want to make plans for making that future our reality. And then to get to work to bring those plan future reality to our current reality. That’s also a superpower. And one that the vast majority of us squander. And when I say vast majority, I mean, this guy, for sure me, I was guilty of intellectually understanding the power, the importance, the impact of goal setting. Like for as long as I can remember, I knew how important goals goals were. Yeah. But it took me until I was like 35 years old to actually sit down and set goals. How about you? Are you in the habit of setting goals? Have you been doing it? Do you write them down? I don’t know. I think one of the challenges one of the things that prevents us from doing it is that it’s kind of an abstract thing. What are your goals? Just so huge if you just asked me what my goals were, but like I don’t know That’s a great question, I have not really thought about what my goals are. Okay, kind of an abstract thing. So let’s, let’s really break this down. So I think having a framework for thinking about what you want. And making those plans is a really, really important thing. That’s what I’m interested in doing, I want to make the stick more so than just have it be a waste of your time. Now, this slide is a little hard to read. What’s important is simply that I have been a financial advisor for going on 25 years at this point, helped 1000s of people to become financially successful, I’m honored to be named to Investopedia, as listed top 100 financial advisors in the United States, many years running, I’m a dad, I’ve got two boys and my husband, got a third kid on the way, got a lot going on. And all that means it’s even more important for us to have clarity around what we want. You know, think about goal setting like this. The only way to live how you want is to know how you want to live. And goal setting really helps with that process to figure out what it is you really want. Okay, so we have a free goals course, if you are already a member of money lemon Academy, hopefully you know that. If you’re not you, this is your first introduction to me to money alignment Academy, you go to money alignment, academy.com, navigate to the Courses section, you’ll find a goals course that is free of charge. So if you want deeper, it’s a lot of the contacting content I’m going to cover today but a lot more in depth, we also have a values course which is free, and then it get out of debt course, which is also free. So I encourage you to take advantage of those. So what do you want? What do you want, it’s not what I want, who cares what I want, we’re talking about you talking about your future, your life, you get one crack at this deal. Let’s take it seriously. We do that by thinking about setting goals. weapon of mass creation, that pen probably costs a nickel. But such a powerful thing, we’ve lost touch with it, the ability to sit down to think and then to write about whatever it is that we really want. I think that that’s a really good first step is just to sit down and think about what would a great day look like to me? Where would I like to spend my time? What would I like to be doing? Who would I like to be doing it with? These are all really important questions and just let your stream of consciousness note flow out, there’s not a right or wrong way to do it. Just write out what you are thinking, to journaling as thinking about what I’m thinking and then writing it down. It’s free. If you need a pen, email me, I will send you a pen. But I think you don’t need a pen. So six key areas I like to focus on when it comes to goal setting. Here they are. Number one is family. So it’s oftentimes commonly the most important thing to us. So what do you want? From a family perspective? What do you want for your family? Maybe you want to start a family, maybe you want to have a better relationship with your kids or your folks or spouse? Who knows what it is? I want you to know what it is personal development? What are you interested in learning simply for the sake of learning, maybe you want to play pickleball? Maybe you want to learn French, maybe you want to learn about economics, I don’t know, whatever. Career and financial, it’s really what we’re gonna focus on today is the money piece of it. But, you know, we spent so much of our time working, and the majority of us overwhelmingly don’t like our work. It’s a real bummer. We’re not engaged in it. So how can we sharpen that? How can we change that? How can we shift our perspective, like the three stone cutters, and then from a money standpoint, talk about that health and fitness, we need to be stronger. We all need to be stronger, we need to be more resilient. So what am I interested in doing from a actual physical standpoint? You know, I’ve got two young kids. So I need to make sure I love energy and enough strength and flexibility and all this stuff to be able to keep up with these kids and have one more on the way Oh my goodness. So I need to stay on top of this. It’s really important to me. So I need to pay attention to what I’m eating, how I’m moving my body, how exercising all of these things from a social and community. And also from a health and fitness standpoint, I think, well being is probably a better term for that. But it’s my mental health and my emotional health also spending a lot of time thinking and talking about that talking about burning out. That’s nothing but a really, really positive thing. From a social and community standpoint. The famous Harvard grant study talked about what makes for a happy life, a rich and fulfilling life. And really the big takeaway conclusion was that it’s the quality of our connections to others that really drive whether or not you feel satisfied with your life whether or not you’re happy with your life. And then from a peace of mind standpoint.

I mean from my my money. It’s one of the really, really important things You need to have peace of mind. So how can you do that? And I think money touches all of these, for better or for worse. So the more we can get financial peace of mind, I think it’s going to help. Help you position be positioned to have peace of mind in other areas. But Commonly, people are interested in some kind of religious or spiritual practice getting out into nature, meditation, yoga, whatever it is, I want you to think about it. What can you do to have greater peace of mind, get the things that you really want? That’s what I want, I want you to get what you want. We have a unique relationship with goal setting, where we think, well, once I reach this milestone, once this happens, then I’ll start feeling this way, then I’ll start doing that. And it’s the wrong way to think about it. It’s very human, it’s natural to think that way. But it’s backwards. Backwards. Think about this. What if Michael Phelps, famous Olympic champion, best competitor ever, if he had said, You know what, once I win a gold medal, that’s when I’m really going to start training, that’s when I’m going to focus on the mental side of the game, that’s when I’m going to eat right, that’s when I’m going to really focus on it. Be like, no, Michael Phelps, you need to do all that stuff. First, that to win gold medals, then you’ll be an Olympic champion. So once I, you know, once they get that promotion at work, then I’m really going to start focusing, then I got to start showing up early, and going above and beyond. Once I, you know, once I’m out of debt, that’s when that’s when I’m going to do this. Once I start making more money, that’s when that’s when I’m going to start doing this, like, No, you need to start doing whatever this is immediately. That will then position you to get what you actually want. So flip that around, change the order. So how do you want to feel what I want you to think about right now, I’m gonna go through an exercise. Hopefully, you have one of those pens I was talking about. Because although we have great delivery services these days, there’s not a delivery service in the world that if you emailed me right now that I’d be able to give you a pen and time to do this. So how do you want to feel about these different things. So I spent a lot of time thinking about the relationship between thinking and feeling. These are very, very important things. But what we need to do is create a something a compelling future that pulls us towards it, versus trying to push yourself and and got out any changes you have to make. Think about how it is that you really want to feel about these different things. So we’re going to do a little bit of word association here really encourage you to think about these things. So get your pen and paper out, get your pencil out to word association. How do you feel about these things? So when I say financially successful, how does that make you feel? Does that resonate? So yeah, I want to be financially successful. I want to feel financially successful, good with money. Now, I want to feel like I’m good with money. How does being debt free? How does that make you feel? An investor a good saver, prudent, thrifty, rich, wealthy, philanthropic, a good provider secure, loving your work, passionate about what you do? How do you feel about those, that as we are trying to set goals, trying to get you closer to figure out what it is that you really want? Okay. So what you’re inspired by what you’re triggered by if it’s any of those, if you have strong feelings, run any of those, that’s an indication to me that these are areas that you really ought to focus on and figure out how to make happen. So I encourage you to think about that. So why, why? Why? Why do you want these things? My, you know, my kids are actually pretty good. Knock on wood. They don’t constantly Why Why? Why? Why not send that? They don’t say that? They certainly do. But if you have kids, they’re curious. They want to figure things out. They they want to know why. Why can’t I do this? Why are you telling me I need to stop doing that? Why? Why Why? Why can’t I go where I want to go, I can eat what I want to eat, why kind of watch the shows, I want to watch whatever it might be. So why so why do you want the things that you want? So again, we’re trying to get to the place where you what you want, is really what your goals are really what it is that you want, create that strong, compelling vision for your future. So it’s exercise The five why’s and the whole thing here is we’re trying to really drill down deeper and deeper and deeper and deeper to figure out why it is that you want. What it is that you want. Looks like I have a pop up, says the carbonite is having trouble connecting. Oh, Carbonite. What are we going to do about that? You’re gonna have to deal with that a little bit later? Maybe? Why? Why is that happening now? Carbonite wants to know, all right. So we’re going to use the I want to be good with money. And this is one of those exercises, really wants you to follow through on get pen to paper and write down? Why do you want to be good with money? Well, so I can better understand my finances. Okay, then the next Why is? So why do you want to better understand your finances? Well, so I know that I’m doing the right things with my money. Okay, why do you want to do the right things with your money? So I can have greater certainty, going into that peace of mind thing? Okay, great. So why do you want greater certainty? So I can stop worrying about it? Why do you want to stop worrying about your money, so I can focus on other things. Essentially, my work is designed to help you get better at money. So you can live how you want. I want to give you the headspace and the personal freedom to be able to focus on the things you really want to focus on, and stop focusing on the crap that you don’t want to focus on. Now, this is just an example. Because you’re why could be because you want to be a trader, or you want to be a real estate investor, a stock market genius. I don’t know, a lot of people are interested in money, that’s great. But most of us aren’t, we just want to know and have certainty, as much as we can, that what I’m doing is going to get me the result that I want. So the five why’s, it’s a way to help you really drill down and get to the bottom of that, which I think is very valuable, which is why I talk about it, obviously. All right, carbonate, screw me up, we’re going to write about it again. So career and money goals. So let’s drill down into this here are some really, really common goals around your finances money, get out of debt. That is the worst, it is a burden, I struggle with credit card debt for the majority of my 20s. So I know how it goes. It just it’s an anchor pulling us down. It takes up headspace. It’s stressful, it’s anxiety provoking, it’s sucks. If you’re in credit card debt, we need to get out of it. Take advantage that free get out of debt course that I talked about. Gotta have a budget. Okay, need a plan for our money tells us if we’re on track, we need an emergency fund, this is peace of mind really wants you to get to six months worth of your expenses saved up in cash. Once you do that, once you’re out of debt, that’s financial peace of mind right there. And that’s one of the greatest things you can have. save for a down payment on a home, plan for your retirement, get a financial plan done, say for kids college, go on vacation every year, get a promotion at work, get new skills, which will allow you to do a better job, have a greater impact, make more money. But these are just general goals, I want you to figure out what it is that you really want. put pen to paper, write down what it is that you want. And then I want you to really be use the SMART acronym, specific, measurable, attainable, relevant time base to feel like a weather person. So the goal needs to be specific. And we want to be as aligned as we possibly can be with what my the things that I want. So fundamentally, our beliefs and our values. That’s who we are. Our goals are what we want. And our habits. Well, that’s how we do things. So we want to be as lined up with those three things as we possibly can. So the more specific we can be, the better off so I want to be good with money. Okay, fair enough. How do I measure that? How do I measure good with money? Well, it can be getting out of debt, getting my emergency fund set up, and being on track to meet my financial goals and objectives, meaning I’m contributing enough to my 401k and I’ve, I’ve put a little plan together for knowing that a at age 65 I’ve got this much money available to me and then I’ll be able to turn into income. That could be absolutely the important steps to being good with money to have financial peace of mind. Are those things attainable? Well, certainly I think that it’s available to anybody. So getting out of debt, having a budget get an emergency funds set up being on track to retire Yes.

Is that relevant to who you want to be and what’s most important to you? I have to assume that it is but is it and then time based? Need to give yourself Have high expectations and short deadlines, short deadlines, high expectations. So how do we do that? Well, with each one of those goals, we need to put a time on it. So let’s, let’s, let’s just focus on getting out of debt. So let’s say that you’re like the average American, you have around 65 $7,000 of credit card debt, how long will it take you to pay that off? Well, this is why we need to be focused on every aspect of our money. Because if we have no idea what our budget is, or what our cash flow is, we really have no idea how it is that will free up money to be able to put towards paying that balance off. But let’s say that, okay, I can free up an extra $400 a month. So over the course of a year, that’s around five grand. So I’ll give myself 18 months, a year and a half to pay off my credit card bill. Great. 100%. That’s awesome. We’ve, we’ve we’ve hit every one of those. It’s specific, we can measure it, it’s attainable, it’s relevant to what I want, and it has a deadline. Okay. So it’s a framework for every single one of your goals, I want you to be thinking about that. Now, I mean, a global more or more, whatever, broader sets, we human beings have a tendency to overestimate what we can do in one year and underestimate what we can get done in three years. To be totally debt free in a year, maybe. Could you be totally debt free in three years? For sure. Could you lose 100 pounds in a year? Maybe? Could you lose 100 pounds in three years? Most definitely. So I want you to link every one of your goals to the appropriate time horizon. So short term, I like to think about zero to three years, mid term, three to 10 years long term 10 Plus, okay. But think about it like this, if you knew over the next three years, if I really buckled down and focused on doing the things that I need to do to hit all those goals. You really set yourself up for the next three years and the three years after that and the three years after that. You create virtuous cycles you create awesome habits you create self discipline, you create confidence you you you you will learn new things and figure out how to do them nothing but a super positive thing. All very superpower Super Cat Calif. Tragic. expialidocious. Just just great. Nailing it, killing it. Let’s go. To begin begin. Well, how do I get started? Well, you got the pen. Or if you don’t yet, if you still have been able to unable to locate a pen, send me the email George at money, lemon academy.com. I will put a pen in the mail for you right now. To begin began, write down what you want. Apply this week SMART framework to it. Go through the steps complete. Create a compelling vision for your future that pulls you towards it. So that you’re not pushing and pushing and pushing. There’s no magic way to do it. I’ve given you a framework which I which I know works, just helped a lot of people to get done whatever they’re interested in getting done and it can help you get them what you want to get done. You just have to get started.

Now, as you’re going along, I talked about right at the beginning how it’s that time of year where we set new year’s resolutions. Let’s go We’re ready. Come February, we fall off our bike doesn’t work. I’ve failed in some capacity. I don’t want that to happen to you. I don’t want you to give up on everything. I don’t want you to throw the baby out with the bathwater I want you to get back on that bike and start riding again. Give yourself grace, give yourself some patience. Allow yourself to screw up a little bit. shameless self promotion. Let’s talk about me. Talk about my goals. I am an author. I wrote the your on CFO business like approach to personal finances. It’s a super accessible, easy to read short book that will give you essentially everything you need to get on the right track with your money to get to where you want to go check it out Bureau and CFO Amazon. Appreciate the time and attention. I am super cognizant of the value that our time and our attention has. So thank you for giving yours to me for a little bit today. Go to money Lamin academy.com Check out the great resources if you’re a member getting into the courses come check out an office hours get to get your questions answered. It is free for you to do that. Email me if you want a pen. If you have questions, whatever it might be GA money lineman academy.com and I will do my best to answer them as the Dalai Lama. That’s a story for another day. We will leave it at that darling llama thank you so much again appreciate your time and attention and look forward to hopefully connecting with you soon

Transcribed by https://otter.ai