The critical link between what you dream of accomplishing and what you actually accomplish can be forged this very weekend in a private, personal summit—in other words, a meeting that you hold with yourself.
How to start
Set aside a specific time in a quiet place this weekend to evaluate your past week, and preview the week ahead. This is the moment of clarity where you can gain perspective about the roles you play in life and your personal goals.
Rather than simply planning out the week based on what happens to be in front of you at the moment, you proactively determine which hours during the week will be invested in the things that you decided are most important.
Guide yourself with questions
Asking yourself questions—and answering honestly—will help you evaluate how you used your time during the past week, and how you can prioritize your activities for the week ahead.
Evaluate the past week
The following questions are designed to help you evaluate and gain perspective of the effectiveness of your activities for the past week.
- Which goals did I achieve?
- What empowered me to accomplish these goals?
- What challenges did I encounter?
- How did I overcome them?
- Was accomplishing these goals the best use of my time?
- Did my focus on these goals blind me to unexpected opportunities for better use of my time?
- What can I learn from the week as a whole?
- Which goals did I not achieve?
- What kept me from accomplishing these goals?
- As a result of the choices I made, did I use my time in better ways than I had planned?
- What unmet goals should I carry into the coming week?
Plan your coming week
These are bold questions to motivate you to set goals that will stretch and strengthen you. Let your answers scare you a bit—your goals should both scare and excite you. Set a goal that you can’t achieve until you grow into the person who can.
- What will I do this week that I’ll talk about for the rest of my life?
- What results do I want to see by the end of the week?
- Will I go as far as I am able?
- Is this a big enough challenge?
- Am I bold enough?
- What’s one or two things I could do this week that would make a tremendous positive difference in each of my life’s role?
- What’s the most exceptional thing I will do this week?
- What can I do this week that no one will expect from me?
- What will stand out for me?
- How did I go against the crowd?
- What real difference will I make to the people around me?
- Is this the best I can give?
- What will empower me to accomplish these goals?
- What challenges will I encounter?
- How will I overcome those challenges?
Final steps: planning, prioritizing, scheduling
The next step in your weekend session is to break each goal into action items—list all of the activities and put them in sequence. Force yourself to prioritize each activity to ensure you’ll have the time to accomplish your most important items.
Decide how much time each activity will require—and begin to transfer your prioritized activities to specific times during the coming week on your calendar. Assigning work to specific times reduces the urge to procrastinate—you no longer have to decide what to do during a given period—the decision is already made!
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Additional resources:
How to rock your week by weekly planning!
What will you do this week that you’ll talk about the rest of your life?
Weekly planning: how to predict the future
Work by the day, but plan by the week
Discovering your Mission Statement: When the why is clear, the how is easy
