Hi, in this video, I'm going to talk about goal setting. It's the beginning of a new year and so somewhat inevitably people are talking about goals. How important is setting goals to your progress? Or another way of thinking about it is, how much should you be focusing on the day to day process, and how much on the end target? Now in the book, Atomic Habits by James Clear says that you should focus on your systems rather than on your goals. And this reasoning is quite simple. If you focus just on the destination, then it doesn't actually clarify what you have to do every day in order to get there. And it also puts your mind in a state where it's just a binary of failure or success, which can quite often demotivate you. Now, I would argue that though those are very valid points, you still have to know what kind of direction that you want to be heading in. So you need to have a goal or objective of some kind. And these could be smart goals, which are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound. So for example, if my aim is to convert this third bedroom into an acoustically treated and soundproof studio that I can work in, is it specific? Yes. Is it measurable? Yes, I'll know from my environment when it's being changed into that. Is it achievable? Yes. I've got a quote from a supplier. And then I've been saving for the last year specifically to fund this. Is it realistic? Yes, I've contacted that supplier and booked a time for them to do it. And is it time bound? Yes, it's going to be happening in the spring, hopefully.
Now, like I said before, not all goals have to be this specific. And they don't need to observe that smart criteria. It may be something quite vague, like, you just want to sleep better. And that's absolutely fine as well. But it's still going in a specific direction. And you know what the result would be in some kind of way. The essential points are, firstly, be very clear and honest about what your goals actually are for the year. Don't look at goal achievement purely in terms of success and failure. Look at where you are now compared to where you were a year ago, a month ago, or even yesterday, not compare yourself to some imaginary ideal version of what you should be. And of course, and this is easier said than done, try and find the balance between self-motivation, and self-acceptance, being a little bit more Zen. Now, of course, all these things are easier said than done. But in terms of how I approach my goal setting, specifically for 2021, well, firstly, I started by making a mood board. This is a whole collection of all the things that I would like to achieve in voiceover by the end of the year. And then my intention is to reverse engineer aspects of it to find my actionable, what I can do every day in order to achieve them. So if we take my target of a six figure income, one way of going towards achieving that is to get more commercial auditions, because that's where the best paid work is. And one of the ways to do that would be to update my commercial demo. So in order to update my commercial demo, I would research and select demo providers. I would find other people's demos that I like as a reference, and then I would book a recording session. Or an additional way towards that overarching goal will be a marketing campaign aimed at estate agents in the UK. So one step would be to find out who the estate agents are, in other words, lead generation, maybe I could hire a virtual assistant to do that for me so that I'm more time effective.
Then I would do some research on what makes great real estate promotions. How does the sector feel about video tours, especially during the time of COVID. Then bearing all of that in mind, I could create an actual video showcasing my voice doing different styles of that kind of real estate narration. And then I can work out and compose an email chain. So I can directly market and follow up effectively and systematically. This approach helps me to find the balance between being ambitious, wanting to daydream and find out what I really want, but also kind of focus in on the little practical things that I can do, so that I don't have that perennial anxiety of what should I be doing and am I doing it? I know because I've worked it out. I hope you found this video about goals of some use. If so, please do comment, like and subscribe to check out future content as well.
Wishing you a great start to the new year and look forward to seeing you next time.