Unless you’ve set a goal for yourself, how will you know what you are shooting for? Providing yourself with a desired objective is a great way to keep yourself motivated over the long haul. Those who do not have a goal in life often find themselves miserable, since they are living each day without actually achieving anything. Failing to set goals may make you happier in the short term, but it is not a good long term strategy.

The mind is a powerful tool and it can manifest any number of goals, if you are willing to put in the work necessary. But the first step to unlocking the awesome power of the mind is giving yourself something to shoot for. You’ll need to create a goal mentally, before it can be manifested into reality.

One of the reasons so many people will avoid setting a concrete goal is because it decreases their level of overall accountability. After all, how you can fail at a goal if you never bother to set one? While many will simply talk about what they want to do all of the time, without taking action, a goal oriented person does everything in their power to take steps towards their objective each day.

Your personal accountability does not have to include anyone else, however. Setting a goal means increasing the level of accountability to yourself and not worrying as much about their opinions of others. When you are considering potential goals to set, two questions need to come to mind: Is this what I truly want? Will achieving this goal make me happy?

If you don’t want your life to turn into the same old “what could have been?” that we’ve all heard ad nauseum, then you need to be setting goals. Without goals, you are essentially waiting for life to hand you opportunities, as opposed to going out and making them for yourself.

The years are going to fly by, whether you want them to or not. To get the most out of your time and discover your life’s true purpose, you need to establish goals. Not having goals is the equivalent of getting into a car and driving randomly, without having an end destination in mind.

Want to learn more about goal setting? Check out this live goal-setting presentation I did.