Nicole Koch is the founder of Mandala Mind, a blog about mindfulness and transformation. You can connect with her on Facebook and Twitter.

I have been helping hundreds of people setting goals, being accountable and letting go of limiting belief structures. In my work with people I always have listened to the four conditions of how to set well-formed goals, which specifically reveals itself when I ask the question "What do you want?". That question really forms the basis of any conversation, along with the exploration what is present for you in this moment.

What is interesting is that most times, we will not be able to set a goal that meets all four criteria of a well-formed goal, which then invites an exploration of how we can allow ourselves to move beyond limiting structures within ourselves.

To read more about limitations connected to our vision you can read the post here.

What is particularly important is that each well-formed condition relates to a specific obstacle or inner constellation of beliefs and structures that can prevent us from accomplishing our goals.

What are the 4 conditions of goal setting

1. State your goal in the positive.

Often times, our mind habit is accustomed to focusing on what we don't want. That means we move away from what we want to avoid instead of focusing directly on what we want.

Transformative pointer: work on issues related to vitality and energy.

2. Set one specific goal and your goal needs to be self-maintained.

When we don't set one goal at a time we can get entangled in inner conflict and it will limit our ability to take the first step. So setting one specific goal at a time is important. Furthermore, a tendency I have observed several times, is for people to set goals that rely on others in the form of: "I want more appreciation from my team..." or a variation of this.

A self-maintained goal would turn this back to you as the source or the cause rather than being dependent on someone else's to fulfill it.

Transformative pointer: connect to your inner guidance on what specific goal is important.

3. Your goals need to be process oriented.

It helps to have a specific behaviour for the goal. It is more important to focus on the process than the end result. The more you focus on the process the more you will experience joy and not skip over the process of living to get to the result. For example...instead of "I want to have better communication with my co-worker..." you might say "I want to calmly communicate what is important to me...". Perhaps play with using verbs instead of nouns when setting goals.

Transformative pointer: focus on the joy of the process.

4. Set a specific time frame.

A common tendency I have observed is to forget to set a time frame. Or to just simply leave a goal vague without a specific end date. This is usually a way to avoid failure or keep the inner critic out of the way. It is important to set a time frame, so that you know when you have accomplished the goal.

Transformative pointer: allow yourself to feel celebration and contentment for your achievement.

I invite you to consider these four conditions next time you set a goal for yourself. I am available for sessions and can be contacted here.

Please subscribe to the blog to receive updates of the latest post.

Topics

Latest Posts

June 27th 4 Fixations To Limit Your Goal Setting (And How To Transform Them…)
May 30th 6 Coaching Tools To Inspire Your Day
May 16th 30 Quotes On The Loving Heart
April 27th The Mandala Principle