web analytics
Jan
14

Focus Your Efforts – Ten Habits Day 10

Angela’s Note – Laurie Pawlik-Kienlin (@QuipsandTips) is a prolific writer having published many articles with me at Suite101.com, in addition to print articles for Reader’s Digest, Woman’s Day and more. She is also a very successful blogger and the Quips and Tips for Writers is well worth subscribing to – I enjoy getting the emails in my inbox. :-)

Grow Your Blog Like a Tree - Plant it Today! Photo by Bert Hennes

Grow Your Blog Like a Tree - Plant it Today! Photo by Bert Hennes

Whether you have one baby blog or multiple blogging projects on the go, to succeed you need to focus your efforts – and stay focused. I’ve a full-time writer and blogger, and I’ve learned several things over the years about focus, drive, and determination. And, I’d love to share what I know with you!
To get and stay focused as a blogger, you must…

Start today.

One of my favorite quips is, “The best time to plant a tree was 10 years ago. The second best time is right now.” It’s an ancient Chinese saying (I think) and it applies to everything from deciding on a blogging schedule to searching for better-paying advertisements for your blog. Don’t postpone what you need to do, my friends; if you let things slide, you start the habit of procrastination and avoidance. It doesn’t matter how far you get today – or what you need to do – as long as you start. Remember: taking action builds confidence.

Develop habits that keep you focused on your goals or intentions.

Everything you do every day will take you one step closer to your goals, or one step further away. Take a good hard look at your daily habits, for they form the routine that will help you build a sucessful blog (or hold you back!). Your habits help you stay disciplined to stick to your goals – and good habits will save you from regret in five or 10 years. But go easy on yourself, because learning to break your bad writing habits takes time and effort.

Set – and stick to – a blogging schedule.

I created and maintain five blogs; without my schedule I’d be wrestling with frustration and paralysis! Here’s what works for me: on Mondays and Fridays, I write for Quips and Tips for Achieving Your Goals. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I work on Quips and Tips for Successful Writers. Tuesdays and Thursdays is also scheduled for Quips and Tips for Couples Coping With Infertility. On Wednesdays, I write for Quips and Tips for Spiritual Seekers. Mondays and Fridays is See Jane Soar. I stick to this schedule like white on rice, and it makes it easy for me to stay focused.

Remember that success is a process that you can enjoy.

Think of published authors you love to read, or the successful bloggers you’d love to emulate. As you admire them, let their characteristics of perseverance, faith, discipline, and constant effort motivate you to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Since achieving goals rarely happens overnight, you need to get comfortable with the fact that it will take time to get where you want to be

Fellow scribes, remember that building a successful blog isn’t a destination. It’s a journey.  (Is that hokey? It just felt right!)

To get started on “getting and staying focused” right now:

  1. Figure out what top two or three things you need to do to improve your blog (eg, set a blogging schedule? plan a series of articles instead of one post at a time? increase your readership? find guest authors?); and
  2. Break down those general goals (eg, set a blogging schedule) into specific action steps (eg, figure out what days work best for you, for blogging; put it into your daytimer so you actually stick to your schedule; ask a fellow blogger to be your “accountability buddy”).

I welcome your feedback – what do you do to stay focused on your blog?

See more tips for focusing your blog efforts, and then click over to Ten Habits, Day 11 to learn how to market yourself. Or learn more about how I manage writing for multiple blogs and websites.

Jan
13

Focus by Elimination and Smart Work – Ten Habits Day 9

Sometimes writers have to STOP one thing, in order to take on another. Photo by Emil Bacik

Sometimes writers have to STOP one thing, in order to take on another. Photo by Emil Bacik

I’ve been asked many times, especially in the last year or so, “How do you do so much?” I get a lot done because I am highly motivated, work smarter (not harder!), and because I have learned to focus by eliminating those things which either do not provide income or passion. In fact, last year was not only a time of great increase for me in my writing career, but also a time of pruning.

How do you know what to eliminate?

Here’s what I did. First I decided what to keep. After that it was easy to let things go – even things I really enjoyed.

  1. I made two columns on a sheet of notebook paper. They were uneven, about 2/3 and 1/3.
  2. On one side I listed all the writing “jobs” or projects I had. On the other side of the paper I listed the revenue income amount or projected return. (For example, an ebook I was working on was full of quality evergreen content and I estimated I would make a fair amount in return for the effort.)
  3. I went through the list and put a star next to anything that was something I felt passionate about. For example, at that time my plan for Untrained Housewife was taking an enormous amount of investment and energy, with ZERO income. But I felt passionate about the site and wasn’t willing to let it go. Some things you do because they feed you emotionally and spiritually, not because they feed you physically.
  4. Next I put a star beside anything that was paying a bill. :-) You can’t exactly argue with a steady income, right?
  5. I had, at the time, about a half dozen things left on the list. Only one of them is something I’m still currently involved with – the rest I let go. Simple as that. Emailed the appropriate people, thanked them for the experience and wished them well on their future endeavors.

How do you write at so many different places?

I either have total opposite topics on different sites, or I have the same exact topics on those various sites. For example, I use all of my alternative medicine knowledge and interests to write for Examiner‘s Alternative Medicine topic. I use all of my gardening stuff as a Plants and Bulbs Feature Writer at Suite101. But for what I’m doing at Blissfully Domestic Blogging Column, I use the same topics as what I’m writing about here. So when I did the post about increasing traffic to your blog, I used the same theme to post an entry on Blissfully Domestic from the reverse view – how to kill your blog. Same idea, just written from the opposite side of the coin. Which means I did zero research or even heavy thinking about my blissdom entry.

Doubling up your research, whenever possible is a huge way to help you focus. The other way to help you focus as a writer is to write in narrow article series. Instead of trying to do one huge post about Yellow Flowers, you can turn that yellow flower garden idea into several smaller posts about yellow perennials, yellow annuals and yellow flowering bulbs. Same amount of research – but two months worth of articles instead of one, single article.

Exercise for the Day:

Work Smarter - Think about topics that are currently popular on your blog. How can you continue to expand on that information? Can you use old research to create new posts, instead of having to do completely new research for every single post?

Work Where you NEED to be – Do you need to eliminate? Is there something that is neither feeding you emotionally nor feeding you monetarily? Why are you still doing it? Is it possibly something that should be eliminated, delegated or left alone for awhile?

Read the Ten Habits Day 10 to learn more about how to focus your writing efforts.

Jan
12

True to You – Ten Habits Day 8

Angela’s Note – We are fortunate to have @JessicaKnows share with us. Jessica Smith is a Vice President in the Digital Practice at Fleishman-Hillard.  She also blogs on her personal blog at JessicaKnows.com. She is also one of the first people I ever followed on Twitter and I’ve based this #10habits series on a similar project she did on her blog called #15days of marketing. Check it out for a “Step Two” after these Ten Habits finish up!

Yesterday Angela talked about being true with regard to the acronym TRUST and John Maxwell.  Today, I want to talk about a different angle.  I am still going to ask you to be true, but rather than putting it in the context of being true to your audience or clients…I want you to look within. Don’t get me wrong, your audience and your clients are uber important.  However, if you do not remain true to yourself then you are doing everyone including you, a disservice.

Sometimes it’s easy to look at another blogger’s or competitor’s success and say to ourselves, “Maybe if I wrote more about XYZ…” or “Perhaps if we offered capability ABC…” then surely our traffic, our accolades, our awards, or our revenue would increase.

Here’s an example of what I mean:

When I first started blogging I enjoyed reading mom blogs because I was a relatively new mom and I aspired to be the domestic goddess, the super mom, the crafty queen, and the baking master I read about in so many of the blogs I was reading.  The mom blogging community was one that while sometimes drama-laden, was warm and welcoming and I felt surrounded by those who inspired me to be more like them.

So naturally, I thought, when creating blog content of my own, I should write about my experiences with mommyhood, reaching my domesticated zen.

But there was a slight problem.

While I consider myself a really good mom, I’m an utter failure when it comes to being a domestic goddess.  No.  Really.  I.  Am.

What I do know a lot about though is marketing, branding, building alliances with people, threading people and experiences together to create a rich fabric of ideas, and learning from others and communicating those lessons.

So, I found with every blog post I wrote, the more I’d try to write it from solely a mom’s voice, the less connected I was with my readers.  Here’s one stab I took at a parenting post when I talked about how much TV is too much for a preschooler. Not one of my more passionate posts.  Now here’s one where I talk about whether or not bloggers should have a separate review blog. In most parenting circles the former topic would be considered more controversial and prone to debate than the latter.  However, there was more conversation and controversy around the separate review blog post.  Why?  Because I had more to say on the subject and my readers were used to me offering commentary on blogger relations, marketing, advertising, and social media on my blog.

Staying true to one’s self has a lot to do with bring our past experiences, our education, and our expertise to the surface so that we might share it with others so that others might benefit.  Sometimes that means we also share our learning processes as well.  Bottom line: we’re all wired differently.  I’ve been entrepreneurial since I was about five years old, selling watercolor paintings to my grandparents’ neighbors.  I majored in communications and took part in leadership programs in college.  My career started over 10 years ago with a role a large consulting firm that almost immediately put me outside of my comfort zone and taught me more about business in my first six months in the position than my entire time at college.  I’ve found myself in the right place at the right time career-wise (like starting my career in the internet bubble 1999) but then had to transfer skills and reinvent myself for a new role just as many times (and when that same bubble burst 2001).  I remain true to myself by sharing what I’ve learned from these experiences with my readers.  And more often than not, I learn new lessons through the act of sharing those.

Do yourself a favor.  Don’t compare yourself to anyone when it comes to blogging or your professional career.  No one’s story is the same and your story is yours to tell.  If something doesn’t feel right, listen to your gut.  A colleague of mine said to me recently that as we get older we not only understand who we are, but more importantly…who we are not.  To me, that sums it up nicely.

So here’s your exercises for today’s habit:

  1. Do an inventory of your life’s lessons learned, your education, your professional expertise, and your talents. Then think of ways to weave those into your blog posts.  If you are not a blogger, think about how these lessons learned can be incorporated into your next proposal or the next brainstorm you partake in.
  2. Think of your life experiences as storytelling. Your summer renting beach chairs on the shore or that winter break you volunteered to distribute blankets to the homeless are relevant to the content you provide your audience and the experience your provide for your clients.
  3. Keep the story alive by continuing to learn. When was the last time you went out of your comfort zone?  Is there an opportunity that you can identify in the next month that will enrich your life?  Take it!
  4. Need help learning about what motivates you and allows you to stay true to yourself more often? Read Drive by Daniel Pink.  This book really helped me to put things in perspective and I highly recommend it to anyone who is inspired to learn more about being true.

Visit the next Ten Habits post to learn about Focusing and When to Let Go.

Jan
11

Trust. Do You Have It? – Ten Habits Day 7

The fourth habit in my original list of Ten Habits was to “Be True!” In John Maxwell’s book, 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, he says that “Trust is the foundation of leadership.” This is actually an important thing for bloggers to be aware of even if you are not “a leader” per se – the truth is as writers we are all thought leaders, as @typeamom likes to describe us. Or, we could be. :-)

So here is the acronym that John Maxwell uses and unlike my previous acronyms is not one that I made up on my own. But it’s well worth sharing! It’s based on the letters for TRUST.

T – Tested

We are what we repeatedly do” ~Aristotle

In other words, someone is considered “kind” because their actions have proven them kind in the past. Someone is considered a writer, because they write. And so on. What are calling yourself? Does that align with what you are doing? Can your readers trust that because your past actions have tested that out?

R – Reliability

Erratic behaviour breaks down trust….in web-based age change is rapid, YOU must be constant. For example, if I started this Ten Habits series but only discussed eight of the ten habits, that would erode the foundation of trust you, my readers, have placed in me. Everyone understands that life happens sometimes, but if you set out to do a certain thing at a certain time, you’d have built the expectation for that to take place.

U – Understanding

Show that you care. Show that you know your audience. Listen when they ask for more information or have questions. In a lot of ways that can even help guide content production. This series is an example of me responding to readers emailed questions. When one of my readers said they loved the ten habits but wanted more information about what each LOOKED like – how to APPLY them in real life ways, I listened.

S – Servanthood

An honest and sincere intent to set your heart on the good of people around you. That doesn’t mean door mat. Slave. It just means that you genuinely intend to help others. There are a lot of ways to do this and it can look completely different depending on your situation, but the intent for good should be there.

T – Time

Not in a day, but through daily investment. Trust doesn’t develop with a single post, a single discussion or a one-time meeting. It usually comes through multiple interactions. So in that regard it really ties in to being consistent and true to what you say you will do.

Food for thought –

Are you committed to never breaking a promise with anyone?

What are you intentionally doing to cultivate trust?

Jan
10

Inject a voice into your blog – just be yourself! Ten Habits Day 6

Angela’s Note: Diane Corriette is a Personal Growth Coach who found the joys of the internet in 2005 and now supports mothers looking to build an online business.  She also provides freelance support as Membership Manager of Blog Success http://www.todiane.com.

Blog Success Mindset Motivator and so much more! :-)

Blog Success Mindset Motivator and so much more! :-)

I have learnt a powerful lesson in life, if I hear something more than twice I need to pay attention.

In one week three people mentioned that I sounded just like my blog – or was it that my blog sounded just like me!
I waited for my mastermind group to meet and I asked them what they enjoy most about reading my blog (big assumption thinking they even read it but I got lucky!) – by the end of the discussion I had learnt something very powerful that I would like to share with you.

Blogging isn’t just about writing reviews and promoting products. It isn’t just about new clients and being search engine optimized so Google loves me – while those things are important I understood that my blog had a voice, it had a soul – it came from me and no one could replicate it. In a world wide web of millions of blogs I really was unique.

But enough about me……Let’s talk about you :-) Are you familiar with the voice of your blog? Are you informal and chatty or do you need to remain professional and authoritative? It may take you a while to find your voice but it is a journey worth exploring; here are 5 ways you can help yourself along that journey:

Follow your passion

It is the only way, when you have passion for your blog it comes out in your words. Stick to what you love and finding your voice becomes easier.

Write for your readers

Remember that your readers are real people. Don’t see them as the “target market” but write as if you are talking to a friend.

Know who your readers are

If you have no idea who you are writing for then you will have no idea what to write. Blogging becomes a chore when you can’t pinpoint who it is you want to help.

Always be you

Don’t make up a persona or lie about who you are unless you are ready to keep up that lie for a very long time! It is so much easier just to blog as you.

Never stop searching

If you are not sure about the voice of your blog don’t panic, this is a race with no end. Just keep blogging and you will find it happens quite naturally

When someone hits your blog they are looking for information initially but as they read they are then looking to connect with you. They may want to know your opinion on a particular product, or what you think about the latest celeb gossip – they want to find a person to connect with and as a blogger that is exactly what you can offer. The real you, the voice behind you, the soul that is you that flows out from your blog.

Exercise:

Which blogs do you read and love? What about them do you love? When you can figure that out you will be able to get some idea of the kind of writing style you may enjoy providing for your readers. Always remember your voice may change the more you blog so who you are as a blogger now and who you are 12 months from now may be totally different.

If you are struggling to find your voice leave a comment below and I will take a look at your blog and see if I can help you out.

Read Ten Habits Day Seven to learn about developing trust with your readership community, or learn more about finding your unique voice from Jessica Smith.

Jan
09

Be PROactive vs Reactive – Stay in Your Circle! Ten Habits Day 5

Energy and Effort in your Circle of Concern Keeps your Influence Smaller

Energy and Effort in your Circle of Concern Keeps your Influence Smaller

Steven Covey’s book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families describes the Circle of Concern and the Circle of Influence. I love this analogy because focusing your energy within the Circle Concern only makes those concerns grow larger without impacting your circle of INFLUENCE in any positive way.

If we subscribe to the idea that your energy and focus creates growth this means our focus should be in the Circle of Influence. That is what you can control. Your reach of influence. The other things are the things that you cannot change.

How does this apply to blogging?
There are a lot of things that you flat do not have control over as a blogger. How exactly Google decides to rank you. Or WHEN Google decides to finally rank you, for example. What are some other things we cannot control, but can certainly be concerned about if we let ourselves.

  • Cannot force people to read.
  • Participate.
  • Treat you nicely.
  • Click an ad.
Energy and Effort Within Your Circle of Influence, Increases Your Influence!

Energy and Effort Within Your Circle of Influence, Increases Your Influence!

What can you control? Plenty! You CAN control yourself. You can write more articles. Ask for guest post spots on influential blogs. Connect with others in your field via Twitter, Facebook and blog comments. Do keyword research to make sure relevant ads appear with your articles. Write open-ended blogs with questions to encourage feedback from others. All of these things you CAN control.

Proactive Intention and Action Creates Positive Results

As you focus your energy and attention on these things that you do have control over, you will begin to see the other things you thought you were worried about fall into place. Guest posts and incoming links add up and Google increases your page rank. Engaging your community more frequently and regularly means that they leave comments more often. Thinking about your content means higher quality content and increased revenue.

But not because you focused on the uncontrollable. These things happen because you focused on the controllable. What you directly had influence over. As a result, that influence increased. Your confidence increases. Your reach increases. Because your focus was realistic all this time, instead of wasted on what you couldn’t change yourself.

What Jaeli Taught me About Acting with Proactive Intention

I saw this in action a few months ago when Baby Jaeli needed help. If you didn’t hear the story you can catch a little bit of it on the Jaeli page of this website. Basically, the level of help that she needed was way beyond what I could do by myself. What any one of us could have done by ourselves. I had two choices – 1) Sit and moan and cry about how horrible the situation was or 2) Do WHAT I COULD. And _I_ could do was little more than put the information up on my blog and tweet it out to my friends.

And you know what happened? Each of them, acting within their Circle of Influence, did what THEY could do. They retweeted. Blogged. Emailed reporters. Hosted MomTV shows w/the story featured. Starting Facebook Cause Pages and invited all their friends. And TOGETHER those individual circles of influences added up to a life-changing miracle of generosity for Jaeli and her family.

Assignment -

  1. What things have you been concerned about when it comes to your blogging and writing? List them out. List them ALL out.
  2. Now look over your list and circle anything that is not within your circle of influence. See if there is a way to rework that into a proactive comment.

In other words, if you have on your list “I’m worried about increasing my traffic“, I want you to circle that off your list and write beside it “I will apply SEO basics to my new posts this week” or “I will share my new posts via Twitter and Facebook every time I publish something new”. If you feel comfortable doing so, I’d love to see what your list looks like!

Jan
08

Learn the Basics of SEO – Ten Habits Day 4

Angela’s Note: Today’s post is a basic introduction to search engine optimization from Kelby Carr, @Typeamom, the mastermind behind the Type-A-Mom Network of websites. She’s about to release a book on using SEO in your blogging so this is a great place to start for beginners. SEO may not SEEM important, but so much of our blogging plans hinge on having good rankings and traffic it is vital to know the very basics at least.

SEO is a term that can sound so geeky it scares bloggers, but the basics of search engine optimization are quite simple. You don’t have to sell your soul to the Google gods to get traffic, either. It is possible to write for humans and search engines, and to do both well.

Think of Your Own Search Habits

First, think about your own search habits. What do you type in when you are seeking content? This very basic premise can be the core of your basic SEO toolbox. If you are tempted to use a clever, witty, abstract title, just ask yourself: What Would I Search?

Here are three basic SEO steps:

SEO is not a dirty word, it's just a way for blogs to get noticed. Photo by Ivan Petrov

SEO is not a dirty word, it's just a way for blogs to get noticed. Photo by Ivan Petrov

1. Start with the right words for SEO. You will want to find the perfect keyword phrase to both capture the essence of your post and that people actually search. This is called a keyword phrase. There are a couple of great free tools to research the best keyword phrase: the Google Adwords Keyword Tool and Wordtracker. Look for phrases that get decent search traffic, but not tons of searches since that will be very competitive. Before each post, make it a habit to do research first. It truly only takes five minutes for some basic keyword searches.

2. Use your words for SEO. Once you’ve found your keyword phrase, use it in the title, the permalink URL for the post, the first paragraph, in headers, throughout your post, as the file names for images, as the text for outgoing links, essentially anywhere you can work it in without compromising the quality of the post.

3. Check your SEO results. SEO is not an exact science. After you’ve done some posts with optimization in mind, monitor the results. Allow some time for search engines to spider your site, then examine your stats program (Google Analytics is a nice free one). Look at which keywords are driving traffic to your blog. See if the phrases you targeted are driving traffic. Look at traffic sources to see if search engines like Google are sending more traffic. If it isn’t working, tinker. You could try less competitive keywords, for example. Consider SEO an ongoing process.

It’s as simple as that. There is obviously a lot more to SEO, but these three basics are a great way to start. It’s less a complete overhaul of the way you blog, and more a shift in thinking. I like to say it’s what a writer would do anytime switching to a new medium. Writing styles are adapted for newspapers, books, TV, radio and TV. The web is no different.

Angela’s Challenge:

Look back over the last four posts on your blog. What three words would you type into Google to find each of those posts? Are those three words included in the title and/or subheadings? If not – you know that you are the type to needs to pay closer attention to the search engine side of your writing. If so – Great!

Now look over the posts with a close eye. Do they read well? Are they easy to read and have a nice flow to them? If they sound a little stuffy and the keywords are smooshed into the post awkwardly, then you know you are the type that needs to pay closer attention to the HUMAN side of your writing.

Having trouble? Come back and leave the titles of the last four posts on your blog. We should be readily able to tell what the post is about based on your titles. :-)

Jan
07

Have a PLAN to Achieve Blogging Success – Ten Habits Day 3

Charting your course makes it more likely to achieve your goals. Photo by sanja gjenero

Charting your course makes it more likely to achieve your goals. Photo by sanja gjenero

For day three of our #10Habits adventure we are going to look at the importance of having a PLAN. I personally hate to stop with just a nebulously defined ”goal”. Unless we’re talking about my son’s soccer game, though there were precious few of those for us this season. *laughing*

Nope. We are talking about having a PLAN. As Leslie reminded us yesterday, Inspired Goals call for Specific Plans! See – it’s really common to hear people say “I hope my blog…” or “Gee, I wish my articles…” and it’s sad to me to hear.

The truth is something I’ve been saying for nearly three years now - ”Wishes will blow away in the wind of change. Hopes and dreams are directionless. Goals have both – a set direction and time.” ~ Angela England

P = Precise – Have a Specific Destination in Mind

Like an airplane heading to another airport, there is a very precise target he has in mind. He files a precise flight plan with an altitude, a line he plans to travel and a VERY precise target. Thank goodness. Really – would you want to fly with a pilot who said, “Oh when I feel like landing the plane I’ll go ahead and put ‘er down.”

For writers, each precise target is very different depending on your desires. For one it might be “I want to write 4 new ebooks this year.” while for another it might be as simple as “I’d like to increase the community with my readers by seeing 10% increase in comments on my blog posts”. Each person may have a different goal – but it should still be precise.

L = Lasting – Over a Period of Time

Your steps to success should have a period of time. Again with the plane analogy – if there was no travel time we wouldn’t get on the plane in the first place. So if you goal is to increase the number of comments per blog post by 10%, WHEN do you want that to happen by? When will those ebooks be finished? How many new articles will you post per month? Per week?

A = Arrival Point – Where are you Heading Anyway?

Think long-term. If you are planning to write three blog posts per week, how many is that over the course of the year? Why is this ultimate arrival point necessary? Because we are fickle. Life is fickle. And uncontrollable.

It’s easy to say “I am going to write three blog posts each week”. Then what happens when my kids get the chicken pox. Or the stomach bug. Or we move. Or the power goes out. I’ve missed a week’s worth of posts and suddenly – what?

Has my plane fallen out of the sky? No! I’m merely blown off course a little bit. My flight plan is no longer following it’s precise goal. However, my arrival target can still be met. I simply readjust. I post a little more often for my blog posts to catch up and get back on track.

N = Natural – What is the Realistic Next Step for YOU?

Maybe your blog is just starting out? Would it make sense for your arrival point to be “Make $1,000 per month by February, with one-million readers per month.” Um….probably not. Likewise, if I’m a stay-at-home mom of three children, with another due in April, it isn’t realistic for me to say “I am going to write three articles per day at Suite101 and triple my article total there”. That simply isn’t the appropriate next-step for me given the level of my responsibilities apart from Suite101.

Whatever plan we make, it should include the natural next step.

Assignment:

What is the precise, natural next step for you? Does that plan include a time limit? Looking back over the inspired goals you created yesterday, do these plans have the natural, logical steps needed to achieve those goals?

Jan
06

Create Inspired Goals – Ten Habits Day 2

Leslie Gail, Author and Life Coach

Angela’s Note – Today’s post is a guest post from @gr8lifecoach Leslie Gail. If you’re not yet following this brilliant life coach and author of Life Simplified: A weekly guide to creating the life you love!, you are missing out.

Goals are great if they are the right goals and if you are prepared on how to achieve them. This time of year millions of people are writing down resolutions, even though only a small fraction of those people will succeed. I have learned over the years the secret formula to setting and achieving goals in your life. As a lifestyle expert, author of the book Life Simplified-A weekly guide to achieving a life you love, and MomTV webshow host my life revolves around helping others create their best life. And a critical piece of this is clarifying goals and then creating a road map to achieve them. I am going to offer some simple and practical tools to get you started in 2010.

Create goals you want to achieve

Year after year people write down the same goals. Most goals are ones you think you should achieve instead of the goals you really want to achieve. If you “think” you should lose weight, or if you “think” you should quit smoking, or if you “think” you should start meditating, you are simply setting yourself up to fail. Make sure you come up with goals that inspire you! Come up with goals that are motivating and positive and you will improve your chances of achieving them. Throw away a goal if you have had it year after year without succeeding.

Write them down and share it with others

One surefire way to achieve your goals this year is to write them down and share them with others. Get out a journal and write down specifically what you would like to achieve this year. Don’t be vague here. Writing down losing weight is too general and hard to achieve. Be as specific as possible. Use the SMART tool- Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time sensitive. By sharing your goals with others, you are adding the accountability factor. Others will help you stay on track.

Detail the plan

People often fail because of this missing element. If you want to drive from Los Angeles to New York, you need a road map to get you there. The same applies to your goals. You need a specifically laid out map that details how to get from where you are today to where you ultimately want to go. Do your research and take the time to complete this step. You will be much more prepared to venture out there this time around. If you need a little help with this step you can contact me for guidance at leslie@newlifefocus.com

Exercises to get started on right now: Buy a journal and write down the goals you truly want to embark on. Share this goal with friends and/or family. Write down specifically what you are going to do daily/weekly/monthly to get you there. Good luck!!

Angela’s Note – Tomorrow we are going to take Leslie’s mention of creating specific plans to the next level and break down how to do that. Meanwhile, please do the suggested action step – what are your goals? Are they YOUR goals? Inspired just for you?

Jan
05

Ten Habits Day One – First Habit Networking – Speak Up!

OK, so I realize that in the original post I wrote up about the ten habits, I had this as part of the tenth habit. But I wanted to touch on this first since we’re doing an interactive series. Speak up!

Make Introductions for Others

Sometimes this means being willing to introduce two different people in your network to each other. Something I actually did twice just today. Two mothers with a common medical interest and cause so I said, “Hey! Have you met @SoAndSo on Twitter yet? She’s dealing with this exact issue right now.” In another case it was two writers, one with an opportunity she couldn’t do alone, and another with fantastic qualifications to help! An email introduction meant that both parties knew who the other was and were able to connect to work on mutually beneficial projects I wasn’t personally the best suited to take on.

Are you speaking up? or staying silent? Is this the image you present to your community? Photo by StillSearc

Are you speaking up? or staying silent? Is this the image you present to your community? Photo by StillSearc

Leave Comments and Introduce Yourself

If you’ve never left a comment on someone’s blog before, you should really consider doing so. A comment says, ” I see you. I am paying attention. I find you of value.” A comment can be a great way to introduce yourself to someone new you hadn’t previously connected with.

Join in the Conversation

Over one hundred people read my Ten Habits of Successful Blogging post the first day. Several commented to me privately via Twitter DM or email but relatively few left a public comment. Sometimes one of the scariest things, especially for those who are just starting out and don’t feel “qualified to contribute” is to speak up and put themselves out there. It can be very tough unless you think of it as just sharing your opinion vs contributing an expert tip. Everyone has an opinion. And yours is every bit as valid as mine, right? So don’t be afraid to share.

So then – any guesses what today’s “assignment” is?

1.Leave a comment below. Be sure to put your blog website in the link and include your Twitter ID in the comment field. Take a second to introduce yourself, your blog, and share what you hope to gain from this series.

2. Look for ways to introduce people in your community who may not know each other, but should.

3. Take the time to click through onto one of the other participants blog/website and check out some of their posts. When something catches your attention, leave a comment offering an opinion, thought, different point of view or expanding on what was said.

And of course – if you have an opinion about speaking up, leaving comments and sharing your thoughts on others’ blogs I’d love to hear it below! :-) Or blog about it on your site and link back here – just let me know so I can come and comment! Lol!