A new year brings new beginnings, and many of us are thinking of how we will improve our lives in 2010. We make New Year Resolutions, yet we don’t always experience them resolved. We get off track, and don’t get back on. The purpose of this article is to help you turn your resolutions into successful results.

First, lets look at the difference between resolutions and goals. Resolutions are like wishes. You resolve to be different. Perhaps you wish to maintain better health, improve relationships, get organized, be debt free, quit smoking, learn a new skill or get a better job. At this point, these are only resolutions without commitment. They are only dreams, yet a great start. The chances that these wishes will stick is kind of like winning a lottery – until you create a plan. Planning to succeed turns a resolution into a goal.

SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Trackable. For example: I will save $800 by August 18th, 2010. Break it down so that you can work on it regularly. $100 per month for example. You can track it along the way. Do you have $400 by April? If not, then you can push harder, if so then you know you’re on track. Anyone can look at your savings account balance on Aug. 18th and determine whether you have achieved your goal or not. I want to save more money is not a specific, measureable goal. Get clear, and set a deadline.

Written goals are the most likely to become reality. Don’t just think it, ink it! Goals need to be captured, recorded, and read daily. The ink alone makes you accountable to your thought. When you add accountability, you make a commitment. This commitment is the glue that makes resolutions stick. Share the goal with a friend or loved one, and you will feel an even greater sense of accountability, because you have publicly stated your desire. Within your organization, written goals can be saved in a ‘goals folder’ on the company intranet, giving each department access to read another departments’ goals which provides a great method of accountability.

Intention is key. You must BELIEVE in what you intend to change or create. When you believe in your goal with a clear vision of it already being achieved, your sub-conscious mind helps create the reality for you. To help you believe, write an affirmation to confirm your intention and read it when you awake and when you retire at the end of each day. Be sure to feel the success of having achieved already. The feelings part is probably the most important part in the intention. For example, “I am grateful to be investing in my financial future saving $800 or more by Aug.18/2010.” Create a goal that is big enough for you to grow, but not unrealistic. For example, add some zero’s to the end of the financial goal above, and make 800 into 8000 or 80,000) Notice the present tense of an affirmation? It’s intention for change is included as if it has already been achieved. Powerful stuff! Trust me, it works.

Stretch yourself with ‘break-through’ goals. A big goal, one that will put you way ahead of the game of life is worth setting. If another human has achieved it already, its possible. Go for great. Be audacious, courageous, believe in yourself and feel the victory when you read your daily affirmation. You will be met by fear and road blocks along the journey. These are normal challenges of the process of growing. You just need to learn to deal with them as they come up, and this part is where your goal stretches you. The real goal in life is self-mastery. The personal development that you achieve in the process of making resolutions stick, will mean that you will have been stretched forever.

Turn your resolutions into goals with belief that you can do it, a clear vision and feeling that you’ve already accomplished it, and a plan to break it down into an achievable result.

If you liked this article, you will want to be sure to read next month, where I unveil the one decision that will change your life forever. Until then, I want to wish you a very happy, healthy and prosperous 2010.

Penny

* This article is dedicated to my dear brother Brian, whom I love dearly. Our conversation over Christmas inspired me to write on this subject, as well as stick to my own new goals.