Most of us spend a sizeable chunk of our lives working. For many, it’s a necessity. After all, we all need a way to pay the bills and feed the family. For a fortunate few, it’s a source of fulfillment that goes beyond financial reward.
Since you’re going to be spending so many hours on your career over the course of a lifetime, it’s worth planning ahead, forming goals, and putting in place strategies to achieve those goals. But what exactly might such a strategy look like? Let’s take a look.
Setting Goals
Whether you’ve been in the world of work for decades, or you’re just starting out on your professional journey, you’ll benefit from having a goal-oriented mindset. Having a goal will provide you with motivation in the short term, and allow you to troubleshoot your progress in the long term.
You might set yourself a target for earnings over the next ten years, or look at the projects you want to complete within the same timeframe. From there, you can research what it will take to realize your ambitions and devise a strategy.
Your goals should ideally follow the SMART acronym – meaning that they should be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-restricted. The last of these is particularly important – if you commit to doing something at some unknown future time, then it’s fairly reasonable to predict that it will never be achieved.
Believing in Yourself
According to survey data gathered by printing company instantprint, while just one in ten Brits strongly believe in manifesting their goals into reality (that is, speaking them out loud and then going on to achieve them), 24% ‘somewhat believe in the practice’ due to a belief that positivity can help them attract their successes.
For one in eight, the principles of the law of attraction have helped to achieve a career aspiration. If you’d like to give manifestation a try for the new year, follow these tips:
- Be clear on what you want
- Focus on the new by getting rid of the old!
- Set your intentions on how you plan to act this year
- Make time to manifest daily
- Take action! Change can’t happen unless you’re actively trying to find it.
Self-belief matters hugely to your success in the long term. Fortunately, there is a range of useful practices that can help you to build that self-belief.
Seeking Feedback
If you’re going to progress at something, whether it’s your career, a hobby, or anything else, then it’s reasonable to seek feedback from people whose opinions you value. These might be laypeople whose opinions might matter in the aggregate or people with specific expertise in a given subject. The feedback you receive should help to inform the action you take in the future.
If you ask colleagues and clients how you’re doing in a particular venture, and ask for potential ways to improve your performance, you might be surprised at what you get back. Don’t make assumptions about how well you’re doing, and make sure that you act on the feedback you receive.
It’s also important to blend in cheerleading and encouragement with troubleshooting – after all, relentless self-criticism and nit-picking can be destructive and ultimately self-defeating.
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