This is the third step in the series on How to Live a More Abundant Life in 2009 (or How NOT to Set a New Years Resolution):

ABC's of Setting Goals

When someone sets a New Years Resolution, they focus only on the goals or more specifically, what they want to be different. That strategy often fails. It is not the fault of the goals. It is the fault of the individual who doesn't change the attitutes and beliefs behind their past behaviors. New behaviors require new attitudes and beliefs. Let’s break these three elements down.

• Attitudes: Attitudes are the ways that you react to situations, and to people, based on the assumptions and the beliefs that you have learned.
• Beliefs: Your beliefs are the conjectures that you make about yourself, other people, and situations. Your beliefs are based on what you think and how you think things are. Your beliefs will make you react the way that you do and cause your expectations to remain within a certain framework of thoughts.
• Behaviors: Your behavior is how you implement the attitudes that you have adopted towards situations and people.

When people positively change their attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors they open the doors to new possibilities. Life success depends on the ability to change and be willing to learn new ways of thinking and doing things.

One of the techniques that successful people use to change their behavior is to model their personal and professional beliefs on someone in their field whom they admire and respect. Who is it that they admire and respect? When people find someone who is successful in a way that they themselves define success, they need to take a look at what these successful people are doing and how they are doing it.

Another thing that people should concentrate on is to ask themselves who they’re mixing with. If people find that they’re spending time with other people who wouldn’t be defined as successful then they need to start mixing with those people who do define success and are leading successful professional lives. This doesn’t mean that you leave behind those people in your life who have chosen poor goals. It only means that you start mixing with those people that have an attitude towards their life that is considered to be positive and winning.

What this means for you is that you encourage positive leadership and modeling in your life so that you are able to succeed and achieve the goals that you have set for yourself. Goals are personal to every individual so it’s up to you to set the bar when it comes to your attitude and determination.

We will talk more about our beliefs in step #4....In the meantime, tell a friend to catch all the steps here >> http://rehuxley.livejournal.com/tag/new+years+resolutions

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Thinking about the New Year and what your resolutions should be? Well, don't! Most of the time resolutions never turn into realizations. The cause is most people focus on what they don't want to happen in the New Year vs. focusing on what they do want in the New Year.

Over the course of the month I am going to outline 7 Steps to a More Abundant Life. I will do this be digging into the archives of this blog and my Creativity Builders Blog ( http://www.creativitybuilders.com ) and sharing new ideas and tips for how to have a successful New Year and life. Here's step number one:

Visualize your Future

New research in the field of personality and social sciences demonstrates that visualizing your success increases ones chances of success. What was especially interesting was that visualization was more successful when viewed from the "third-person" as if witnessing a movie of one self vs. seeing this success in the "first-person" (i.e., I will do this goal...). This "third-person" technique, according to the writers, increases ones acheivement motivation.

A "third-person" viewpoint focuses on personal abilities and efforts vs. luck of the situation. It has been long understood that people who see success as internal vs. external do better at specific tasks and goals. For example, if you believe that your success if based on your abilities instead of your circumstances, you are more likely to achieve a goal. Additionally, if you see your failures as external to you vs. it being about some defect in yourself, you are more likely to achieve a goal.

SOURCE: Noelia A. Vasquez and Roger Buehler
Seeing Future Success: Does Imagery Perspective Influence Achievement Motivation?
Pers Soc Psychol Bull 2007 33: 1392-1405

30 Minute Action Plan: Take ten minutes to visualize what you want out of life. To really ensure this visions success, write it down (see post about visualization journals below). Be sure to list your internal resources and abilities that you will use and objectively identify external barriers to move around.

Here's another great article I dug out of the archives by writer Karen Millard:

Make Your Dreams Come True With A Visualization Journal
by Karen Millard

My friend Beth confided recently that she'd been reviewing the pages of her old journals. Somewhere along the way she'd stopped recording her troubles and the mundane details of her life. Instead, she'd begun to jot down her hopes for the future, her wishes, her dreams.

What was interesting, she said, was how many had come true.

Have you ever thought that by looking forward to the future, you are wishing away your present? Current wisdom advises us to fully live each moment, to remain in the here and now and enjoy each day as if it were your last. In general, of course, that's good advice. Life is precious. We should appreciate it for all it offers.

But it's also important to recognize that your present is a result of thoughts you had, choices you made and actions you took in the past.

Today's thoughts, choices and actions will affect your life tomorrow. Are you optimistic about your future? Do you make positive, proactive choices that will benefit you and your loved ones? Or do you simply drift through life, accepting the default options?

Take a few moments, right now, to daydream about your future. Where are you living? What does your home look like? Are you surrounded by positive, upbeat friends and family? Are you doing what you love to do? Do you have enough money? Are you meeting your personal and professional goals?

In her best selling book, "The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity," Julia Cameron encourages readers to literally picture the life they want to lead by creating a collage of images torn from magazines, or sketches and paintings they've made.

As Beth has discovered, recording your dreams and wishes in a journal can also help them become reality. When you give them substance on paper you soon find yourself taking imperceptible steps towards achieving them.

At first, you may find keeping a visualization journal surprisingly difficult. I followed Beth's example and created a visualization journal of my own. I'm a writer and had no trouble whatsoever describing my wishes and dreams. The words fell from my pen as easily as butter from a hot knife. Just like writing a story, I thought. What startled me though, was how much trouble I had reading those words later.

It took me a while to overcome my resistance to my own dreams. Who knows, maybe my subconscious thought them unrealistic. Maybe, deep down, I didn't feel as though I really deserved to live such a fabulous life. Of course, that's all the more reason to keep at it!

Mark Victor Hansen, co-author of the best-selling "Chicken Soup For The Soul" series, and more recently co-author of "The One Minute Millionaire: The Enlightened Way To Wealth," advises going a step further and writing not "of" your dreams, but "from" your dreams. As though you're already living them. As you write, pay attention to the sensory details. Describe the sensation of champagne bubbles dancing on your tongue. Try and capture the fragrance of honeysuckle or a salty ocean breeze. Listen for the sound of the wind in the pine trees that surround your cottage, and set it down on paper.

Write down how you feel in your dreams. Express your feelings of joy, or of relief, or of freedom. Allow your imagination to run wild and revel in the sensations you evoke. You don't need poetry. You don't even need perfect spelling or grammar. All you need is heartfelt conviction and desire. Let the pages pile up and one day, when you have a quiet moment, you may want to curl up on the couch and read a few.

You'll be surprised how many of your dreams have come true!

Source: http://www.FeedYourOptimism.com

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Learn more about how to set goals and boost your creative results:



· Story about What You Want in Life
· Apply the 80/20 Rule to Everything
· What do you really want?
· Emotions and Thoughts Affect Creativity Goals
· Using Creativiey Coaching to Recognize Goals
· Goals and Motivation [+2]
· Goals: The Wheel of Life
· Attitudes, Beliefs and Behavior Determine Goals
· Determine Your Core Beliefs Before Setting Goals
· Set Lifetime Goals

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