The following contains excerpts from the audio-book, Goal Setting (Jim Rohn).
In our music school in Odessa, Texas, we teach students the value of setting and achieving goals in their musical journey, which also teaches them how to succeed with their life-goals and dreams.
In this audio-book, Jim Rohn discusses the importance of goal-setting and a practical, step-by-step guide to help anyone identify their goals. He gives his own personal testimony of how his mentor, Earl Shoaff, challenged him to “become a millionaire”, not for the purpose of getting rich, but rather for the what kind of person it would cause him to become, due to the higher level of work, discipline, knowledge and skill that it would require. The idea was that the real value of that goal was not the money, “you can give that all away after you make it”, but what you have become in the process of achieving that goal is where the real value exists.
- We are affected by our environment in which we live:
- Every benefit you can give, every benefit you can share, is like having intelligent self-interest because “it is better to give than to receive”.
- When you do things that the average person doesn’t, it has a tendency raise your self-respect.
- Always leave something better than how you found it.
- Be faithful when the amounts are small. If you will take care of the few, then someday you will have a high position over many. But if you’re not disciplined when the amounts are small, why would anyone trust you when the amounts are large?
- People might say, “Everyone else isn’t doing it, why should I do it?” The answer: for your own dignity, for your own self-esteem.
- We are all persuaded in some way to live the way we live, through political environment, economic environment, associations.
- Be very careful of your associations: The key to associations: 1) Limited associations, “Some people you can spend a few hours with, but not a few days” 2) Discontinue associations, “Sometimes you have to say in an association, ‘Is it causing more harm than good?’” 3) Expanded associations, “Get around people who have good ideas to share.”
We help students in our music school in Odessa, Texas identify the small areas they can improve, on a daily basis. Over time, these daily habits produce big results.
- We are affected by events: dramatic events, world-wide events, home events, personal events.
- We are all affected by our results, whether it be the results of our errors or the results of our disciplines. Here is what is staggering about human beings: It is possible immediately, upon decision, to start a new program of changing results. You can pick a different destination (arrival point) in five years, and start learning the skills and accept the disciplines, the teaching and the training, and the consistency of effort, and start going in a new direction, and in five years from now wind up at a totally different place than where it was assumed you were going to arrive, with the old plans. Only human beings have this extraordinary ability to change the outcome.
At our music school in Odessa, Texas we believe each individual has enormous potential through their personal autonomy and power to choose a direction and succeed in it.
- We’re affected by knowledge: ‘Whatever you know has brought you to where you are’. What you have missed in the past possibly prohibited you from arriving at a better place right now. Knowledge can turn it all around. It can start us on a new track. Knowledge can cause us not only to review the past but to peer into the future.
This is the value we offer each student in our music school in Odessa, Texas: knowledge and experience beyond what they are currently capable of themselves. Through increased knowledge and training, each student can reach their goals.
- We are affected by our dreams, our ability to see the future and give it design. Things, places, people, career, fortune, whatever might become important to you for the balance of your life, or over the next ten years. It is possible to reach into the future, personally. Here is why we don’t reach into the future: We’re trapped either by regret of the past or the routine of the present. We become so busy with the routine of the present, that we don’t give much time to the design of the future. Here’s the real key: to spend some time to evaluate our lives and look to the possibilities.
Goal-setting:
- Make sure that the greatest pull on you is the pull of the future.
- If you have powerful goals, well-designed, and plenty of them to stir your imagination, they will become like a magnet. The bigger they are, the stronger they are, the longer the list, the things you would like to acquire during the course of your lifetime, the stronger they pull.
- Goals pull you through all kinds of ‘night-times’, ‘down-times’, all kinds of ‘winters’. You can much more easily survive the next crisis, the next winter of your life, if you have well-set goals. You won’t be lost in the middle, because you’ll be able to see beyond.
Designing the next ten years:
- List 5 things you’ve already accomplished that you’re proud of, 5 achievements. This proves that you’ve already learned to set goals to some degree.
- List at least 50 items of goals you would like to achieve in the next ten years. It can be little things or big things. This is not a list of the things you think you can acquire, but rather a list of the things you want: just let your mind run free. It could be anything from meeting certain people, going certain places, acquiring certain skills, giving away a certain amount, earning a certain amount, investments, books to read, etc., something that would give you great satisfaction.
- Take a look at each item and give it a 1, 3, 5 or 10+, regarding how many years, approximately, you think it will take to achieve. (It doesn’t have to be exact.)
- Look at all of your 1 year goals and pick out the four most important ones. One of the most important exercises of life is to determine what is important and what isn’t important. It’s easy to give too much time and energy to ‘the minor things’ and not have enough left for ‘the major things’. Only spend major time/energy on major things and minor time/energy on minor things.
- Write a little paragraph as to why these 4 one year goals are important. It’s the ‘why’ that makes the difference. If the ‘why’ is good enough, then we can respond with a confident, ‘yes’. If the ‘why’ isn’t good enough, then we probably shouldn’t waste our time. (You don’t have to answer this question for the world, just answer it for yourself. You might have very private reasons why it’s important. Some goals are private.)
- Write down “What kind of person must I become to achieve this entire list?” Perhaps to become more educated, more disciplined, talk to some people who have experience, become more curious, etc.
We teach students in our Music School in Odessa, Texas to ponder what long-range goals for their lives can look like. Most people are not capable of imagining a ten-year goal, but it is possible. As teachers, we hope to inspire this kind of ‘big-picture’ thinking in the lives of each student.
Additional Notes and Cautions:
Purpose is stronger than object. What you want is important, it will ‘pull’. “Nothing can resist a human will that will stake its existence on its purpose.” (Benjamin Disraeli) But what is the purpose? The ‘what for’ is even more powerful than the ‘what’. The purpose is the life-force.
A lot of your goals need to be personal development: being able to have greater influence, the person you wish to become to help others.
Beware of what you become in pursuit of what you want. It’s incredible what you can become, that’s the positive side. But there’s a negative side. The two words of antiquity that are important are: “Behold” and “Beware”. We must do both. We must see the opportunities on one side and we must see the dangers on the other side. We must try to minimize the dangers and maximize the opportunities, that’s the game of life. If you can become the kind of person who can sense the dangers before travelling the wrong road, you will be way ahead.
Don’t ‘sell out’ for what you want. Don’t violate your principles. Don’t compromise good friendships. Don’t throw away some values just for some objective that perhaps has you driven too much.
“Judas got the money, a sizable sum of money.” You might say then, that’s a success story. No. His name was Judas, doesn’t that ring a bell? Why wasn’t this a success story, even though he got a small fortune? Because he sold out. It was what Judas became to get the money. Judas got the money, but he was unhappy. He wasn’t unhappy with the money, he was unhappy with himself. He hanged himself for the betrayer he had become, and it certainly wasn’t worth the money. If Judas could speak to us today, he would say, “Beware of what you become in pursuit of what you want.”
Don’t go for things too quickly.
Don’t go for things that cost you too much. You can end up saying, “This is more than I wanted to pay. Here’s what I thought I wanted, but it cost me too much.” Count the cost. “This is what I want and here’s how much it’s going to cost.” If it costs you discipline, learning some skills, getting the maximum out of your time, soliciting the help of your friends, working hard, adding a little extra time and effort, OK. But if it costs you to betray, if it costs you to be less than loyal, if it costs you to compromise, if it costs you to cross the line, then it’s not worth it. Always add up what it costs. “I know what it’s going to cost on the positive side, but I certainly don’t want to indulge on the negative side.”
We encourage students in our music school in Odessa, Texas to always seek to add value to others as their primary incentive. This will help them to avoid the pitfalls of goals that focus only on selfish motivations. A life lived to serve others is, ultimately, the most successful life of all.