3 Key factors to accomplish your goals in 2020 - The Accountability Partner Project
The new year is just around the corner and most of us are already thinking about various goals to accomplish in 2020. People have different goals related to health, family, career and personal growth. Most often than not, we set audacious goals every year and start working on them. Towards the end of the 1st month, the freight train of determination and self-confidence slowly starts derailing from the track. Finally, we end up going back to the same life we live every year which is filled with laziness, pain, self pity and suffering. Why does this happen? How to get out of this toxic cycle?
Below are the 3 key factors to accomplish your goals and stop this recurring pattern of failure. Following these steps gives you a higher probability of achieving them by the end of the year and help lead better lives.
Key Factor 1: Goal Setting (Vision->Goals->Tasks)
1. Identify your vision
Before setting goals, we need think about our vision. To help identify the vision, ask yourselves the below questions:
How is the feeling of achieving something look like?
What is that one thing that makes you want to make a change in life?
What is the one thing that inspires you and gives you meaning in life going into the next year?
How do you see yourself several years down the line?
Are you doing something that makes a difference and positive impact in other people's lives?
For example, At the end of 2015, I was at the lowest point of my personal life and career. I was tired of living such a life. So, I asked myself the above questions and came up with a vision to "Becoming healthier and fit" in 2016.
2. Identify your goals
Once the vision is identified, the next thing to do is to identify the goals to make that vision come true. For example, to make my vision of "Becoming Healthier and Fit" come true, I set different goals. One of which was "Lose 50 pounds".
3. Identify the tasks to reach your goals
Once the goal is identified, you need to figure out different tasks that needs to be done to accomplish the goal (which adds up to making your vision become a reality). For example, For my goal of "Lose 50 pounds", I identified different tasks to help me accomplish that goal. Some of the tasks I did were:
My tasks to lose weight in 2016
Workout 3 times/week
Play basketball 2 times/week
Run 1 time/week
Track my daily food intake
Join a Weight Loss program
Educate myself on food and nutrition via books and podcasts
Following the above steps helped me lose 50 pounds in 7 months. Below are my before and after pics of my weight loss journey.
Key Factor 2: Follow the 30 day plan consistently
How many of you have been in this situation before? You join a gym, hire a personal trainer, buy expensive clothes and equipment at the beginning of the year. Then, workout for the first 3 week. Finally, get tired after 3 weeks, slowly stop whatever you are doing to become healthier and go back to the life you lead just 3 weeks ago? I have been in this situation so many times.
The reason is, we do not do things consistently for a certain period of time. Based on science, when you do something repeatedly for certain number of days, your brain starts adapting to it and it becomes a habit. For me personally, doing something at least for 30 days has helped me time and again, to make something into a habit. Consistency is the key here. You are going to have off days where you feel tired and burned out. During those times, be nice to yourself and take a break for a day. Then get back on track the next day. Everyday is a new day and a new beginning.
Key Factor 3: Have an accountability partner
You need someone or something to keep you motivated throughout this journey of accomplishing your goals. This is where an accountability partner can help out. He/she/they are the people who keep you honest, motivated, and serve as a sounding board to help you get through every day/week. For example - When I was going through my weight loss journey, my wife served as an accountability partner. For you it could be your significant other, a trusted friend or even an application that reminds you to keep doing things on a daily basis to accomplish your goals.
NOTE: It goes without saying that, having deadlines for accomplishing these goals is a MUST. I assume that most of us want to accomplish the goals by the end of 2020. But some may have shorter and longer deadlines for goals as well.
Next Steps,
Personally, I had a hard time finding an accountability partner. My wife helped in my weight loss journey but I had other goals related to career where I needed someone else's objective support. To help in finding an accountability partner for people like me, I started this new project below where I am crowdsourcing and encouraging like minded people to share their 2020 goals in the comments section and hold each other accountable to their goals.
Doing this helps to make new friends, identify people having common goals and discuss them together and most importantly makes yourself accountable to the goals you set for 2020; as people are going to ask you about how you are progressing to reach your vision.
If you are someone who needs an accountability partner, add your vision, goals and even tasks below in comments. I will try to help out as much as possible and can connect you with people with common goal as well.
Remember,what separates great people from normal ones are, great people are willing to do the things that needs to be done. Lets strive for greatness in 2020.
Hope everyone has a great year ahead. The time for change starts now!!!
Extra Resources:
I go in detail about the above 3 key factors to accomplish your goals in the youtube video.
If you are curious about the different steps I followed to lose 50 pounds in 2016, you can check out this blog post where I get into details of anyone can do it gradually with small lifestyle changes - Lose 50 pounds