(By Tal Gur)

After working firsthand with hundreds of people from all around the world, and in my own personal experience, one of the main reasons resolutions fall through is that most people don't take the time to lay the necessary foundation for realizing big dreams. In fact, people spend more time planning their birthday party than designing their future.

In order to achieve big goals, you need more than wishful thinking and sincere commitment to make it happen. You need a solid process that will support you along the way.

Often, we're too quick to pursue our goals, not considering the already overloaded schedule we routinely have, the sacrifices we might have to make, and the elements that already work well in our lives. Instead, we may want to pause for a while, reaffirm our commitment, adjust our routines and lay some groundwork to carry us forward in our journey. 

These are the steps I recommend to take:

STEP ONE: Looking Into the Far Future

Five to ten years. That's how long I’d like you to be looking into the future. Why five to ten years? Because jumping a few years into the future removes immediate constraints and empowers you to dream big. What’s more, if you don’t align with the big picture, you’re at risk of losing the overall context, and that in turn can affect your choices throughout your journey.

With a good bird’s-eye view, prioritizing becomes easier, which allows for better decision-making. Furthermore, when you hold onto a clear vision, you’re more likely to realize it. Here are some questions that can help you to get clearer: 

• What is your ultimate destination? What is the most exciting vision you have for your life? What are the biggest, most exciting dreams you want to manifest into your life?
• What would you do if you knew you could not fail? If anything was possible, what is the first change you would start to make?
• When you were younger, what were the top things you wanted to accomplish in your lifetime? What are the things you’ve always wanted to invent or the places you’ve always wanted to explore?
• Who are some of the people you admire the most? What would you like to emulate about them?
• What are you currently most enjoying in life? (Think of the things you absolutely love to do. These can be hobbies, work-related activities, spending time with friends or family, exercise, or anything else you can think of.)
• What do you want more of in your life? What do you want less of? What does not support you?
• What is your legacy going to be? What is your soul mission and ultimate destination?
• What would you like to do before you die? What would you like people to say about you when you die? What would you most like to be acknowledged for?
• What’s one way you could have more fun in your life? What can you do right now that would really put a smile on your face?
• Who do you want to become? What do you value the most?
• What do you really, truly want...?

Remember, everything starts in the mind so don’t underestimate this initial step.

STEP TWO: Visualizing Your Ideal Vision

At some point in your life, you’ve probably heard about the power of visualization and imagination to enhance performance. Basically, by taking your big dream and making it more vivid and realistic in your mind, you harness the power of mental imagery on your side.

And when I say mental imagery, I’m not only referring to visuals, but also to the emotions and feelings that go with them. In fact, the more multisensory, detailed, and alive your vision is, the more power you feed to your subconscious mind, and the more your vision imprints itself.

In research directed by Richard M. Suinn, Ph.D., a sports psychologist for several U.S. Olympic teams, it was discovered that skiers who visualized skiing downhill produced muscle patterns almost identical to those found when the skiers hit the slopes. 

In another study conducted by psychologist, Alan Richardson, a group of basketball players were divided into a few groups in order to test each player’s ability to make free throws with and without visualization. The results were mind-boggling. The group that only visualized themselves making free throws but had no practice were almost as good as the group that practiced 20 minutes every day.

Of course, no amount of visualization can fully substitute for taking action, but visualization can indeed help in enhancing motivation, improving performance, overriding outside influences, and priming your brain for achieving the results you want. I personally attribute a lot of my focus to it.

Even if you don't believe in the visualization process, it would still be wise to envision where exactly you’re heading. Olympic athletes, Fortune 500 CEOs, and world-class entrepreneurs do it, so why don’t you?

STEP THREE: Evaluating Your Yearly Options

Now that you have a good bird’s-eye view for the far future, it’s time to think about your upcoming year. 

Deciding on your yearly goals is not always easy, especially when there are several paths to go in and they all feel valid and important. Your task is to evaluate which option may provide you the most optimal path for the year. 

Here are some questions that can help: 

• In order to manifest my long-term vision, what would have to change? What would be the best first step?
• Which areas of your life must be transformed? What area of your life, if upgraded, would make the biggest difference to your vision?
• What character muscles will you have to grow in order to manifest your vision?

Some people use a long, drawn-out process of analysis to make a decision, but I personally find this to be too tedious. My suggestion is to simply think about which one of the items on your list would radically transform your life and give you the most benefits. 

Then write down the deepest reasons you can fathom why you want to bring this into reality. If you don’t feel aligned with that reason, keep revisiting it until you feel a strong emotional resonance with it.

STEP FOUR: Clarifying Your Yearly Goals

Now that you've thought about where you want to be 12 months down the line, it's time to clarify your goals and make them more specific. This is a fundamental step in order to maintain motivation and to make sure your goal has enough emotional appeal to strike your inner desire. Without clear goals, you can wander aimlessly and most likely will end up losing interest or becoming distracted.

Here are a few questions you may want to ask:

•     What exactly do you want to accomplish?
•     What are the biggest rewards from pursuing your goal?
•     What is at stake if you don’t achieve it?
•     Would working toward your goal bring you satisfaction?
•     How important is it for you to achieve your goal?

Now, you’ve probably heard the acronym “SMART goal” before. SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-based. I usually use this approach when I set smaller goals later in the process, but I find it too rigid and uninspiring at this point. I find that this method puts the concept of goal-setting and dream-attainment in a linear framework that works only on the left side of the brain.

As an alternative, I clarify my chosen goal by being specific about what the goal means to me and by considering the major rewards along the journey. When goals are both extremely significant and rewarding, they create a greater impact on our minds and provide a long-lasting source of energy.

A more “right brain” tool that can be effectively used for identifying rewards (and obstacles) is drawing a consequence map diagram: you start with your goal as a center node and draw it in the middle. You then brainstorm different kinds of consequences and draw them in subsequent nodes.

STEP FIVE: Planning Your Yearly Goal

Once you’ve made a decision on which goal to pursue, your first instinct may be to tackle your goal right away. This can work well with smaller and lower risk goals, but large goals, by their very nature, often need some more groundwork.

You see, having a clear goal is important but without the structure of what you need to do, your chances of turning the dream into reality are significantly lower. Here are some questions to consider:

•     How much time or resources do you have available for your goal?
•     Would you need to acquire new skills or knowledge?
•     How would you find motivation and discipline when you most need it?
•     Do you have the right people or support group around you to succeed?

My belief is that your commitment to your goal is represented in your planning. More specifically, it is represented in your well-intentioned schedule and your newly planned action steps. 

The most effective way I know how to tackle a big goal is to break it down into more manageable steps. Smaller projects are less scary, and when you see that you are taking small steps forward, you will tend to stay motivated.

Setting intermediate goals will also help you mark your progress along the trail. Achieving these benchmark goals means you’ll have frequent victories and build your momentum with each one you complete.

You see, in my opinion, most goal methods do not work because we try to change everything all at once. This is quite tempting, but in my experience, it translates into mediocre outcomes. When you try to take on many goals at once, you simply spread your energy and focus thin.

STEP SIX: Evaluating Key Yearly Habit

One step that is almost always ignored, and yet has a tremendous impact on whether or not you’ll achieve your goal is forming supporting habits. 

You can harness your willpower each time you start a task, but if you do it too often, you’ll eventually burn out and revert back to the same behavioral patterns. Not surprisingly, it has been reported that 95 percent of people who try to lose weight on a diet, regain it. Self-control is a limited resource and needs to be treated as such.

This is where habits come in. Habits help us to continue working on our goals even when we are not motivated. They allow us to transition through our day on autopilot and conserve our limited energy. By harnessing the more primitive part of the brain in which habits are formed, you’ll have the opportunity to make lasting changes.

Remember, for better or for worse, we are creatures of habits. Take advantage of it.

STEP SEVEN: Connecting with the WHY

It’s relatively easy to set goals. Most people can do this with minimum difficulty; however, far fewer take the time to connect with the WHY behind their dreams.

I believe that WHY we're doing something is more important than what we’re doing or how we're doing it. A deeper understanding of that WHY keeps us motivated throughout a long journey and is the starting point to everything we do.

In fact, the bigger the WHY and the stronger our reason for action, the more energy we'll bring to our dream. As Simon Sinek, author of Start with Why, wrote: “When you get really clear about that and can communicate that effectively, you’re going to attract those people who believe what you believe and who share your values and some of your passions.

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