Biggest Time Management Mistake

The biggest time management mistake you can ever make isforgetting your closest partner in life. The one who stayswith you all the way from cradle to grave. Theone who drives you through your daily and nightly routines,who runs all your habits. You want it or not, this partnerof yours is the real manager of most of your time. His nameis Your Subconscious Mind.

You and Your Subconscious Mind make one tightly bound teamin everything you do. Whatever big or small project youundertake, you two depend critically on each other. Andunless you both work in the same direction, your team hardlymakes any big progress.

But how do you align those directions? Like in any team,communication is the key. You need to communicate to YourSubconscious Mind the specific target you want to hit and inwhat time frame. Of course, you can take the lead and setthe direction to go. Yet, you still need to convince YourSubconscious Mind to follow you in that direction and hityour target.

The challenge is that Your Subconscious Mind has a stubbornand inert personality. If you just tell him what to do, hedoes not listen you well. He already has strong opinionsabout what you should be doing instead. After all, he is theone who holds all your beliefs that you absorbed throughoutyour life up to now. And he has a comprehensive toolbox ofroutines and automatic reactions to get you through yourday.

But don't give up on this challenge. If you manage toconvince Your Subconscious Mind to drive you in thedirection you want to go, he has the power to make youunstoppable! The power that can keep you on course throughthe storms of every day distractions and interruptions.

But how? How do you convince Your Subconscious Mind to helpyou? You need to learn how to communicate in the way heaccepts and understands. That special way of communicationwith Your Subconscious Mind is what goal setting techniquesand skills are really all about.

While there are finer points that you can pick up in booksor on my site, here is the core essence of goal settingtechniques as a way of communicating with Your SubconsciousMind.

The most critical element of goal setting is WRITING yourgoals. For a number of reasons, this writing process isabsolutely necessary for Your Subconscious Mind to take themseriously. Writing is the basis of the communication.Anything less than a clearly written goal will be discardedas unimportant noise.

Note that the goal writing process is a two waycommunication. When you write your goal, if YourSubconscious Mind does not accept that goal as reasonable,he will try block your hand until you actually writesomething more realistic.

The second critical element is about the way you formulatethe goal when you write it. You want to get your pointacross to Your Subconscious Mind most directly andeffectively, in the language he understands best. That's whyyou need to follow certain rules of goal writing.

In particular, formulate your goal in present tense, as acomplete sentence that starts with "I". Make the goal asmeasurable and specific as you can. Correct and rewrite ituntil it is crystal clear.

Set a specific time frame. Set it by finishing your sentence with a deadline that you honestly think you can meet.

Keep those notes in a safe place and come back to themoften to review and correct your written goals. Keep thinking about them throughout your day.

Finally, take a few minutes right now and actually writedown three to five of your most desirable goals. Reconnect to that important partner of yours and start communicating. Right now, and from now on.

Sergey Dudiy, Ph.D., is a time management writer and web entrepreneur, founder of Time-Management-Guide.com, the definitive guide topersonal time management and goal setting.

He also publishes freeTime Management Fortress newsletter, dedicated tobuilding a stronger foundation for your success skills.Subscribe today and get a free copy of his report Getting Unstuck When You Have Too Many Things to Do or Under Pressure.

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