Do you have goals?

When we start a business we all have these aspirations. We all tend to imagine what  it would feel to crush our goals and wear the crown of success. But are your aspirations goals that you can achieve or are you just dreaming?

It is easy to think that something that you aspire for is your goal, but in reality, sometimes, it is just a dream. For it to be a goal that you can achieve and get the exhilaration of success, it needs to be a lot more evolved. How can you know whether it is a goal or are you dreaming?

Here are five questions that will answer that :

1. Is it generalized? Something like “I want to earn a lot of money” is generalized. If that is how your aspiration is, it is a dream. For it to be a goal, you should be very specific. “I want to earn a six-figure income every month” is a specific  goal.
2. Are you able to determine its value? Can you measure it? Is there any scale that you can use to measure how far you have come? No? then it is a dream. “I want to loose weight” is a dream but “I want to loose fifty pounds” is a measurable goal.
3. Is it realistically possible to achieve? You know yourself better than anyone else. Is you goal practically achievable? This is an essential but frequently overlooked question. Think about your limits – inner as well as outer – and then decide whether it is a practically achievable goal. “I want to climb Mount Everest” is not a goal for a couch potato, but “I want to go hiking on that local mountain trail” is an achievable goal.
4. Is it in line with your big picture? You should not have a dream just because everyone else is trying to do it. If you are trying to increase your reach to your audience, “Introducing costly classes” would be a dream, whereas “Offering freebies” would be a relatable goal.
5. Does it have a timeline? Do you have a fixed end date in sight to achieve what you want to achieve? “Some day I will travel to Europe” would be a dream, but “I will visit London in the next 3 years” will be a time-bound goal.

The questions that I asked above are nothing but determining if your aspirations are SMART goals.

S – Specific

M – Measurable

A – Achievable

R – Relatable

T – Time-bound

Once you have asked yourself the above questions, it will be easy to modify your dream into a SMART goal and create a road map to work towards achieving it. 

What does your dream look like now that you have made it into a SMART goal?