What are you working towards? We are all working towards something. If you don’t currently have something specific you’re working towards, then now is the time to quickly set that goal.
With a bigger goal in mind, it is important to keep yourself going along the way. With some goals, such as, “be debt-free,” it can take years to achieve. The same goes for career goals. Or if you are self-employed maybe it is monthly profit goals.
Whatever the bigger target is, you should have lots of smaller ones that are part of it. They could be monthly or weekly goals. Or a certain part of a target. For example, if you are £5,000 in debt, each time you reduce it by £500 you could have a small reward.
It can be a long road to achieving a bigger goal, having small pitstops along the road is important.
Decide your smaller goal
The first thing to do is decide what your smaller goal(s) are within your bigger goal. Write it down, or save them somewhere easily seen. Do it right now.
For example, if you do surveys you could say something like, “I want to average £5 per day from surveys, that’s £150 per month.” If you achieve that then the reward is yours.
Okay, have you got that written down? Excellent, if it’s a goal related to profit and you are using the money drip method, keep the details with that. Now the fun bit, the reward!
Decide ahead of time what the reward will be
The reward doesn’t have to be expensive, just something you love. It must be something you can not have during the time you are working towards the smaller goal. For example, if the goal is a weekly one, and the reward a bar of Cadbury’s chocolate. Make sure you don’t eat any the rest of the week! Only have some on Sunday night when you’ve confirmed the goal has been met.
How do these chocolates look as a reward?
Or perhaps it could be related to a hobby. I love golf but rarely practice. I tend to just play regular rounds on the course. However I have recently set targets, and if I achieve them I can pick an evening and go up the driving range for a bucket of balls. Total cost: £4.50. But I get a lot of pleasure from it because I very rarely go up!
I find doing this small work ‘goal and reward system’ helps over time. To begin with, it makes no difference. But the times you miss the goal and don’t give yourself the reward, it hurts. It can also help strengthen willpower. Which is always a good thing. Try it and hopefully it works for you too. Go and start it right now!