Book Summary: Goals! by Brain Tracy

The book is about what goals are, the benefits of setting them, and how to set them effectively.

Let’s look at some of the big ideas in the book. The Big ideas are

Benefits of goals
Taking full responsibility in life
Determine your goals
Setting your goals
Measure your progress
Reviewing your goals
The power of persistence

“Success is goals, and all else is commentary”
Goals!: How to Get Everything You Want
Brian Tracy

Benefits of Goals

Let’s discuss the benefits of goals. The setting of goals is the foremost step in achieving all that you can ever desire. You have unlimited potential. You have the power to change your life into whatever you desire.

Realize that you have unlimited potential to be, have, or do anything you want in life. If you want it badly enough and are willing to work long enough and hard enough to achieve it.

The human mind has the power to create almost every aspect of your life. You become what you think about most of the time. Your outer world ultimately becomes a reflection of your inner world.

Taking Full Responsibility

Let’s talk about taking full responsibility. You must accept complete responsibility for your life. You are responsible for everything that happens to you and refuse to make excuses or to blame others. Instead, make progress toward your goals every day. Become “the master of your fate and the captain of your soul”.

Determining your Goals

The third big idea is to determine your goals. There must be a single goal that will help you to achieve your other goals more than any other. You need a central purpose to build your life around. Decide what it is for you and work on it all the time. The following 7 principles can guide you in deciding your goals:

Be clear, specific, detailed, and write down your goals.
Your goals must be measurable and objective.
Be time-bound, with schedules, deadlines, and sub deadlines with your goals
Your goals must be challenging.
Be congruent with your values and in harmony with each other.
Goals must be in balance with your career or business, financial, family, health, and spiritual life.
Have a major definite purpose for your life. You must have one goal. When accomplished, can do more to help you improve your life than any other single goal

How to set your Goals?

Now, how do you set your goals?

Your goals must be written and described in the positive, present, and personal tenses.
Decide Exactly What You Want. Be specific.
Write It Down. A goal that is not in writing is like smoke: It drifts away and disappears.
Set a Deadline for Your Goal. Pick a reasonable period and write down the date when you want to achieve it
Make a List of Everything You Can Think of That You Could Possibly Do to Achieve Your Goal (Minimum of 20 ways)
Organize Your List by Both Sequence and Priority. A list of activities organized by sequence requires that you decide what you need to do first, what you need to do second, and what you need to do later.
Act on Your Plan Immediately. Take the first step—and then the second step and the third step.
Do Something Every Day That Moves You in the Direction of Your Major Goal

Measuring Progress

Peter Drucker in The Essential Peter Drucker said “What gets measured, gets managed. You must develop the ability to set specific measures on your goals. Also, you must keep an accurate record, and track your performance each day. This will help ensure that you achieve your goals. You must track your goals to enable you to stay on the path of achieving them. Whatever your goals, make a list of all the tasks that you will have to do. Put a deadline on every one of those tasks.

Review your Goals

Finally, review your goals. You must write and rewrite your goals every day without looking at them. This will enable you to reprogram them into your subconscious mind.
Do this every day, day after day. Write your goals in the positive, present, personal tense.
The best time to write and review your goals is the last thing in the evening and the first thing in the morning.

Power of Persistence

To wrap up the big ideas, let’s talk about the Power of Persistence. In most cases, your ability to persist longer is what will guarantee great success in life. Persistence is self-discipline in action. It is the true measure of your belief in yourself. You must resolve in advance to never give up.

My Take

The importance of goals cannot be understated. The act of writing down your goals helps to structure your thinking. It gives you direction and it makes a huge difference in how your world turns out. You truly can achieve everything you ever wanted if you set your mind to it. To wrap up, write down your goals, make plans to achieve them, and work on your plans every single day.