Tag: goal setting

The Ultimate Cure For Boredom.

Do you ever feel bored?

I never do.

Because the foolproof cure for boredom is to have big goals.

And I am the fool with the proof.

Big goals, and many of them, help fill your days with purpose.

I have so many goals that they govern my days. (In a non-political governing kind of way.)

From the moment I wake up, my routine is constructed to help me achieve my goals.

Because when you have a strong vision for your future, it shapes your now.

And you see time as a tool for you to use to achieve your goals.

Fitness goals inspire you to exercise. Even when you would rather TexMexercise.

Travel goals squash boredom with planning, adventure, reflection and memories.

Career goals inspire you to work harder, more focused, and with more zeal. (Or a more contemporary word for zeal.)

Financial goals drive you to save and invest. Even when you have the urge to splurge, Virg.

And your financial goals will inspire you to explore and discover smarter things to do with your money, honey.

Entrepreneurial goals mean you are never bored. Ever. Like ever, ever.

Reading goals mean that you always have a good reason to log off of electronics and fill your time with something that adds value to your life. (And increases your vocabularium.)

Writing goals drive you to sit down and write every day. And it is hard to be bored when you are creating. Just ask God. Or Tyler Perry.

Domestic goals around improving your home, and yard keep you busy and productive. Not bored.

Relationship goals influence the way you invest your time, the way you treat the important people in your life, and the hashtags you use on social media.

Your goals help you make decisions all day long about the things you should and shouldn’t do with your time. Which means that goals enhance productivity, decision making, time management, and relationships. Not to mention the positive impact they have on your happiness, adventurousness, and good old-fashioned usefulness. (Basically all the nesses.)

Key Takeaway

The next time you find yourself bored, think about the goals that you could be working towards. If you find that you don’t have any, set new ones that you can work towards right now. Boredom is a signal that you need more meaningful activity in your life. And goals are the greatest way to make that happen.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned, check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media. And consider subscribing to Adam’s Good Newsletter.

Why September 3rd is the new New Year’s Day.

Happy New Year! That’s right, Tuesday September 3, 2024, is the new New Year’s Day. I know you’re wondering, what the Dick Clark is this guy talking about!?!

Allow me to explain.

January Ain’t Even Right

Americans traditionally celebrate the new year at the worst possible time. In January you are stumbling out of the most hectic and stressful time of the year. Which makes it a poor time to set new goals, quit bad habits and reinvent yourself.

new year s eve ceremony champagne sparkling wine
New Year’s is a great time for drinking. Not for resolving.

Think Fall Once And For All

The simple fact is that the fall, not spring, and certainly not January 1, is the best time for new beginnings.

It’s Grow Time!

If you were a tree, today is when your next ring would start to grow. Preschool starts in the fall. So does kindergarten, middle school, high school and college. Which means fall is the start of the next chapter for kids, parents and teachers alike. In fact, the day after Labor Day is the first day schools everywhere are back in session and fully engaged.

photo of four girls wearing school uniform doing hand signs
We’re all back to school now like Rodney Dangerfield.

Back To Full Strength

When summer break is over for kids, summer vacations are over for adults. Which means that starting today, we are all back to work. Our businesses are operating at full strength for the first time in 3 months. Factories are humming. Offices are buzzing. And farms are farmy.

white laptop
Let’s do it, do it, do it.

Can I get An Amen?

Churches now begin their regularly scheduled programs. So if you see a church, and see a steeple, open it up and you’ll see all the people.

altar arches architecture art
Take me to church.

The new television season starts now. (Remember television?)

Both NCAA and NFL football kickoff now too.

This is a great time of year.

100% Battery Life

For those of you who used your summer vacation days well, you are hitting September 3rd fully recharged. Not only did you take the last three months to fill up on Vitamin D, travel, relaxation and inspiration, you got a three-day weekend to top it all off. #noexcuses

This is where we are right now.

Go Team Go!

At The Weaponry, the advertising and idea agency that I help lead, we are fully engaged. We’re all primed, rested and ready. Your team should be too. Let’s push hard. Have fun. And make this the best year ever. And here you thought today was just another Tuesday.

Key Takeaway

Fall is the very best time of year for growth and development. Now that your tanks are full and you are refocused, it is time to treat this like the new beginning you almost missed. Set new goals. Drop a bad habit. Pick a new challenge. Plan your next chapter. Grab that next rung. Or build your own ladder.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.\


+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

Goal setting allows you to make these 2 valuable evaluations.

Careers are journeys. They have a starting point, a middle, and an end. Which direction you travel, and how far you go are up to you. But setting your career goals is important because it tells you how quickly you need to paddle and which turns to make.

But if you’ve never been in a canoe, think of your career like an airplane flight. That flight starts with an origination and a destination. The interesting thing about commercial flights is that they are off-course for 95% of the flight. This is because of the air highways that pilots follow, weather, traffic, the fact that the runways are not lined up like Evil Knievel ramps, and occasionally because the pilot didn’t ask for directions and took a wrong turn at Albuquerque.

But knowing where you want to end up paints a vision of your ideal carer path and allows for a constant set of adjustments that allow you to reach your destination. And with that in place, you can use it to make the following 2 valuable career decisions.

1. Opportunity Evaluation

Opportunities of all shapes and sizes will come your way. You need to decide which ones are right for you. But how do you know? The career goals tell you if the next opportunity is aligned or misaligned with your goals. It is like choosing rocks to step on as you try to cross a stream.* Does the rock opportunity take you in the right direction? Your path doesn’t need to be a straight line. It just needs to add to your skills, knowledge or experience in a way that will serve you on your journey to your goal. (*If you are not hunting ghosts it’s okay to cross streams.)

2. Pace Evaluation

Your career won’t last forever. This is true of your work career, athletic career, music career or whatever other career you may have in high school, college, or after graduation. Although if you are sentenced to life in prison, that career will last as long as you do.

Because you have a finite amount of time to reach your goals, you need to keep yourself moving and progressing at a minimum pace. Unless you are a monk you can’t sit in any one position too long, or you won’t be able to make it to your goal before the career buzzer sounds.

Size Matters

Don’t set your goals too small or you won’t challenge yourself enough. Don’t let anyone tell you not to set your goals too big. Because big goals help you grow. And even if you don’t reach them, they will push you to go as far as you can. Which is the goal of an aggressive goal. Which is totally meta.

Key Takeaway

Establish your goals. They will keep you moving in the right direction. They will force you to think about your pace and progress. They will force you to think about the skill development work, self-education, and training you will need. And goals provide a scorecard and progress indicator that make your career a fun and interesting game to play.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

This year resolve to take important new actions.

This is an exciting week for people who own calendars. Because we have flipped to a whole new set of 365 days. The new year brings on new hopes and dreams. It is full of opportunities. Most of us come into the new year, like Wayne Gretzky, with a bunch of new goals.

But the most important thing to do in the new year to convert those goals into reality is to take action.

A goal to lose weight is only a dream until you take action with your diet and exercise. A goal to start a business is worthless until you start talking to potential customers. A goal to travel is only a dream until you buy your ticket to ride. And a goal to write a book, screenplay, or fortune cookie is meaningless until you start typing on your keyboard. (Oh lord, why don’t we?)

The familiar phrase New Year, New You is missing a key ingredient. The complete saying should be:

New Year. New Action. New You.

The action is the active ingredient. It is the change agent. It is the inflection point. Don’t forget the new action. Action is the yeast that will make this year rise above all the rest. So here’s hoping you get a lot of action in 2023.

Key Takeaway

Goals don’t change you. Actions do. As you make plans for the new year go beyond the goals to the actions they require. Write down your new actions. Put them on your calendar. As you take action you will make progress toward your goal. A journey of 1000 miles doesn’t begin with writing down your goal. It begins with that first step.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

The first and most important lesson of the new year.

Happy 2023! The beginning of a new year is an exciting time. It’s full of hope, opportunity, and college football.

The exciting news is that today has the potential to be an inflection point in your life. Today could be the day when you stop doing something that was holding you back. Like smoking, overeating, or cheering for the Houston Texans. Or it could be the day you start doing something that will change you forever. Like exercising, working on a major life goal, or making better friends. (Or maybe you write a blog post that amazing people read, which makes them want to subscribe to that blog, and share it with other people…)

But there is a simple truth that you must understand about the promise of a new year:

The year doesn’t make you different. You make the year different.

A new year is not a change agent. It is simply a new blank sheet of paper on which you write your life story, morning glory. Yes, your story can and should get better, starting today. But you have to make that happen.

Here are 6 things you can do to make this year different.

  1. Adopt Your New identity. Decide that deep down in your innards you are the person you really want to be. It is the first and most effective step to becoming your ideal self. Don’t say that you want to be, or will someday be like your ideal. You are now! You are an exerciser, a reader, an entrepreneur, or a Liberace impersonator. And then prove it to yourself every day by living into that identity. #SweetCandleabra

2. Surround Yourself With Better People. The people you spend your time with have a powerful impact on you. They are either tow trucks that pull you forward or anchors that keep you in the same old spot. Find people who are already doing what you want to do. Spend as much time with them as you can. And soon you will take on their best traits, habits and actions. Like in Single White Female.

3. Create Better Habits Habits are everything. You are a product of your habits. If you are struggling with a habit there is something in your process that needs to be adjusted. Keep adjusting your process, cues, and timing until you find something that works for you. To become a master of creating your own great habits check out James Clear’s book Atomic Habits. The book is phenomenal. And it has nothing to do with tiny nuns.

4. Read More. Reading provides tools, ideas, tips, and tricks. Books are full of motivation, inspiration, and any kind of ation you are looking for. Through reading and learning, you’ll discover better ways to do everything. Reading enables us to suck the knowledge and experience out of the brains of rockstars who have already done what we want to do, only without being arrested.

5. Get Scared One of the greatest gifts we have is the scarcity of time. When you recognize how little time you have to accomplish all that you want to, it should scare the fecal matter out of you. Then 2 important things happen. First, you pick up the pace. You realize that you need to take action now, or soon it will be too late. Second, the scarcity of time inspires you to take care of your health. You recognize the value of exercise, weight control and healthy eating to maximize your time.

6. Set SMART Goals. Goals provide direction, inspiration and a scoreboard. Give yourself goals to help improve your life and happiness. Give yourself habit goals to improve your daily life. And declare achievement goals to help you accomplish those big things you always dreamed of doing. Make sure your goals are SMART:

  • Specific
  • Measurable
  • Achievable
  • Relevant
  • Time-Based

Key Takeaway

You have 365 days to make this an amazing year. As JFK said, things do not happen. They are made to happen. Declare your ideal identity. Surround yourself with people who are doing what you want to do. Constantly work on your habit creation and maintenance. Read great books and articles to acquire more tools and inspiration. Realize you are running out of time. And that this year is a gift. Act now to prevent regret later. Create clear goals related to your most important habits and achievements. Then work at them every day. And never stop. That’s how you make this year different.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

I don’t recommend getting signatures on the digital version.

What a canceled flight can teach you about your New Year’s goals.

I have several friends who have had their flights delayed or canceled over the past few days. It’s a total bummer to land a starring role in The Airline That Stole Christmas. Brought to you by Southwest Airlines, the airline that won’t let you get away.

When your flight gets canceled you are forced to answer a very simple question:

Now, what do I do?

Goals vs Strategy

When you have travel plans, the destination is your goal. The flight you book is the strategy you choose to arrive at your goal. If your flight gets canceled it affects your strategy, not your goal. The key is to choose a new strategy.

You can book a different flight. You can drive. You can take a train, plane or automobile. You can ride in the back of a rental truck with a polka band from Kenosha. You can ride across the country on a scooter with a friend who is even dumber than you.

Plan B

This week, when my friends Stephanie and Taylor’s flights were canceled, they chose to drive instead. Sure, driving took longer than flying. But it got them to their destinations. Plus, when you drive you get unlimited peanuts, bigger drinks and nobody is trying to gerrymander your armrest.

Your Goals for 2023

As you prepare for a great new year in 2023 you should set exciting new goals to make this your best year yet. You should write the goals down. And you should create a strategy for achieving them.

However, if you are struggling to achieve your goals in 2023, remember the canceled flights. Let them serve as reminders to change your strategy, not your goal.

Key Takeaway

Your goal is your chosen destination. Your strategy is how you plan to get to your goal. When you struggle to make progress, adjust your strategy, not your goal. And remember, you can change your strategy as often as you need to until you find a plan that works.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

The first and most important goal to set for the new year.

We are 360 days into 2022. Which means the end of the year is near. For those who get the number of days in a year confused with the number of degrees in a circle, you may be thinking that tonight is New Year’s Eve. It is not.

However, within the next 5 days, we will ring in 2023. Which is exciting. It’s even more exciting to bust into the new year with a new set of annual goals. In fact, there is almost nothing more exciting than a new list of goals. Because those goals represent a new and better you. A you who is fitter, richer, happier, and maybe more sober or less cigarettey than the current you.

I am a huge fan of setting goals to become a better human. Setting goals has helped me Rumpelstiltskin my ambitions into accomplishments.

A few examples:

  • Goal setting is how I broke my high school, conference and state records in the discus.
  • Goal setting is how I became an entrepreneur and launched the advertising and idea agency The Weaponry. (Goal setting also helped my team launch our new agency website by the end of 2022. We haven’t announced it yet, but if you click the hyperlink above you will be the very first people to see it live.)
  • Goal setting is how I publish a new blog post at least 3 times every week.
  • Goal setting is how I wrote my first book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? And my second book The Culture Turnaround, with Jeff Hilimire.
  • Goal setting is why today my weight is within 1 pound of what I weighed when I graduated from high school.
  • Goal setting has enabled me to steadily increase my net worth.
  • Goal setting drives me to read a whole mess of new books every year.
  • Goal setting has kept me off the pole. (That and a lack of requests to actually see me on a pole.)

Goal #1

All of my successful goal setting has taught me that there is one goal that you should set first. A goal that will make it easier to achieve all of your other goals. Here it is:

Surround yourself with people who are already doing what you want to do.

There is nothing more valuable to achieving your goals than to spend time with others who have already achieved that goal, or who are fully committed to doing it now.

The gravitational pull of humans on other humans is very strong. And like a Peleton in a bike race, the group will pull the individual along. (Which also means that if everyone else is wearing spandex and doping, you are highly likely to too. Right Lance?)

  • The best chance to keep your fitness goals is to surround yourself with fit and health-committed friends.
  • The best way to write a book is to surround yourself with published authors. (And pens.)
  • The best way to get rich is to spend time with rich people.
  • The best way to become more positive is to hang out with other positive people.
  • The best way to become a better spouse and parent is to spend time with great spouses and parents.
  • The best way to get rid of tan lines is to hang out at a nudist colony.

Key Takeaway

Peer groups are like trains. You are highly likely to go where those around you are going. So when you set your goals, make sure you get on the right train. Surround yourself with the right people. People who are committed to going where you want to go. It is the most important step on your journey. And it is the key to arriving at your chosen destination on time.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

To have a great year start with Planuary!

For many people, 2021 was a year they would rather forget. But not me. 2021 was a year that I would take extra Ginkgo Biloba to remember. I had a remarkable year. Here’s a quick summary:

Noteworthy Happenings From My 2021:

  • I sold 2 homes during the hottest real estate market in history.
  • I bought the home I spent more than 2 years looking for. (Which means the soundtrack in my head finally switched from U2’s I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For, to Kenny Loggin’s This Is It!
  • I coached high school track and field for the first time. (My daughter Ava made it to state in the discus as a freshman. Which made me look good as a freshman coach.)
  • I helped coach my son Magnus’s 5th-grade tackle football team. (I specialized in coaching the boys on their volume and hypeitude.)
  • I planned my high school class reunion in Hanover, New Hampshire. (And there was almost no drama. But enough to keep it interesting.)
  • I traveled to Vermont, New Hampshire Florida, Louisiana, Georgia, Ohio, Alabama, California, Texas, Minnesota, Indiana, Mississippi, Illinois, Pennsylvania New York, Rhode Island, Tennesee, Massachusettes, Kentucky, Connecticut, Arkansas and Missouri.
  • The Weaponry, the advertising and ideas agency I launched in 2016 celebrated its 5th birthday. (I invited Marilyn Monroe to jump out of the cake but she didn’t return my calls.)
  • I bought 2 new cars. Because the old ones (10+ years old) asked for a rest.
  • I published my first book titled What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say?
  • My Milwaukee Bucks won the NBA Championship
  • The Atlanta Braves and my guy Austin Riley won the World Series.
  • And my man Tom Brady won yet another Super Bowl.
  • (The last 3 are just fun for me. I had nothing to do with any of them.)

How To Make Your 2022 Great.

Great years don’t just happen. They are made to happen. And it all starts with planning. That’s why I call January Planuary. Because now is the time to plan your great year ahead.

What makes a year great is up to you. But if you don’t know what makes a year great feel free to use my plan, and adjust it to suit your own goals.

The 10 Things I plan in January. (Or Planuary)

  1. Travel: Especially the Places I gotta See Before I Die type of travel.
  2. Things I want to learn: This includes stuff like music, language, how to perform standup comedy, how to perform crouch down comedy, taking a hunter’s safety course, CPR certification, or getting my motorcycle license.
  3. Books to read: I pick some important books to read each year. Or set a goal like reading a book per month. Or 3 books per month. Audiobooks count. And they are one of my great life hacks.
  4. Career goals: I pick new challenges, set new targets to hit, make a change, or start a new business.
  5. Life goals: Like writing a book, hiking the Appalachian Trail, coaching or volunteering
  6. Connections to make: I ask, Who do I want to meet next? If you haven’t planned this before try it. It could change your whole life.
  7. Reconnections to make: Like planning a class reunion, team reunion or a friend meetup.
  8. Making time for big progress: I block time for progress against my goals. Like writing every morning between 6 am and 7 am. Or time for exercise. Or beard grooming.
  9. Timelines: I determine when I will do the big stuff. And I create timelines and deadlines to bring the more complicated goals to life.
  10. Other: This could be anything. Except for the 9 things above. Because if it is one of the 9 things above you don’t need a 10th category.

Key Takeaway

Great years don’t just happen. You have to make the year great through your plans and actions. Now is the time to create the plans. Put dates on the calendar. Make your year look amazing in January. Then make your plan your reality by living into it all year long. Then look back on New Year’s Eve at all you experienced and accomplished. Do this year after year, and you will have created a great life.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

If you like this idea and wonder if I have any more good ideas, check out my new book What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

8 great ways to overcome your setbacks.

Long-term success is hard. Partially because short-term success isn’t that hard. It’s easy to string together a couple of quick improvements when you start anything new. Because you start everything new at your lowest level. Which means the first few steps often offer quick wins, confidence, and rewards. You just follow the yellow brick road, and all the little people cheer you on and give you new shoes.

Things Get Harder

But then you run into a non-improvement event. Or the unthinkable: Deprovement. Then you take a few steps back. This is especially common when you have really great success right out of the gate. Because you set the bar higher than you have the capacity to clear with your early skills and experience. #childactors

It Happens To The Best Of Us

But setbacks also occur when you have loads of experience. Because what used to drive better and better results stops working. Frustration sets in. Your confidence takes a kick in the tenders. And there you are at the crossroads of success.

This is your movie moment. This is when too many people quit or give up. Which is the only way to truly fail. When you face such challenges, and challenges will be faced, here’s a recipe to move beyond the swirly-whirly swamp of stalled progress, and fulfill your personal legend.

8 great ways to overcome your setbacks.

  1. Short-term goals. Set easily achieved short-term goals that get you moving in the right direction again. Make some of them laughably easy. That way you will both meet your goals and laugh. #winwin
  2. Long-term vision. Remember the big picture. Your long-term goals will not be achieved in one straight push. Keeping the long-term perspective reminds you that this is just a chapter in your story. And adversity helps make every story better.
  3. Focus on the most impactful area of improvement. Find your one thing to focus on that will have the greatest impact. There are almost always small actions that have huge consequences. Find those actions and take them.
  4. Forget your failures. Don’t dwell on your failures. Move past them as quickly as possible. Nike Founder and CEO Phil Knight said, “The art of competing, I’d learned from track, was the art of forgetting. You must forget your limits. You must forget your doubts, your pain, your past.”
  5. Identify with your successes. Remember that the successful you is the real you. The setbacks and stumbles are temporary and will soon be purged. Like Chris Gaines or Sasha Fierce.
  6. Take responsibility for your failures. Take complete ownership of your failures and shortcomings. By taking ownership of them, instead of blaming others or making excuses, you are taking full ownership of the solution too.
  7. Look at other areas of your life. Humans are complex machines. Often a disruption in one area of your life has an impact on other areas. Examine your sleep, your nutrition, your relationships, your other stresses, and your time commitments. Chances are that the challenges you are experiencing in one area of your life are having an impact on other areas of your life as well. Because the hip bone’s connected to the thigh bone.
  8. Believe in yourself. Have faith in your ability to identify the problem and make the necessary adjustments. Lead your own fan club. Because the person who thinks they can and the person who thinks they can’t are both right.

Key Takeaway

Setbacks are a key part of any great story. They force you to improve. Which ultimately makes you stronger, smarter, and more capable to face the next challenge. So embrace your challenges. Then go write your next great chapter.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message please share it with them.

How to move your most important initiatives down the track.

We all have big goals we want to achieve. However, the goal setting isn’t the hard part. It is not enough to know what you want to do. It’s what you do do that matters. In order to achieve your goals, you have to take action. A lot of action.

The good news is that to accomplish your most important goals you don’t need to make things happen in giant steps. You simply have to make steady progress. I find it useful to think of my most important initiatives as trains. The objective is simply to move the trains down the track.

The Process

1. Identify your trains.

Start by focusing on your 1 to 5 most important initiatives. Remember, 5 is the max. More than 5 dilutes your attention and your energy. This is why we don’t have the Jackson 6, or go around high six-ing each other.

2. Start each day with your list of trains.

They could be businesses you want to build, fitness goals, work projects, passion projects, volunteer efforts, or travel plans. In fact, your trains can be anything you want to do, make or accomplish. Heck, your train could be to catch drops of Jupiter or to meet Virginia.

3. Write down an action you can take that day to move each train down the track.

Determine the next step in the process that will help you make progress. Always be thinking about the next task to take on, like A-ha said.

4. Take that action.

Some actions will move you inches. Some will move you feet. Some will move you yards. And others will move you miles down the track. However, all actions, large or small, will get you closer to your goal.

Keep Moving

The key is to get your trains movings. Your biggest goals, hopes, and dreams are like locomotives. They are heavy, powerful, and hard to get going. Simply getting the wheels to start turning can feel like a monumental task. Especially if your goal is to build a monument.

But once your trains start moving it is easier to pick up speed, like Sandra Bullock. You will soon find yourself taking more and bigger actions faster. Before you know it you will have momentum on your side. Your actions become habits. And you will start ticking off tasks like the clicking and clacking of a train speeding down the track. (By ticking off I mean completing. Not making-mad, like my parents used to say to me.)

At the end of each day, check to see if you moved your trains down the track. The answer should be clear. You either took action or you didn’t. If you did take action, note whether you moved inches, feet, yards, or miles. Of course, these are meant to be symbolic relative measurements. They translate to small, medium, large and Neil Armstrong-sized steps forward.

If you take no action your train will remain in the station. But through consistent action, your trains will reach their destination. It’s as simple and certain as that.

Key Takeaway

Move your most important initiatives farther down the track every day. Small, consistent actions start the wheels turning. Then come bigger actions with bigger results. Which ultimately help you build momentum. A train with momentum is very hard to stop. A person with momentum is nearly impossible to stop. Make yourself that person.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.