Setting Goals for Your Best Year Yet

Intro: 00:01
You're listening to the flip houses like a girl podcast where we educate, empower and celebrate everyday women who are facing their fears, juggling family and business, embracing their awesomeness and wholeheartedly chasing their dream of flipping houses. Each episode delivers honest to goodness tools, tips and strategies you can implement today to get closer to your first or next successful house flip. Here's your spiky haired breakfast taco loving host house flipping coach, Debbie DeBerry? What's going
on you guys, I hope that whatever you're up to today, you're having an easy one. We are just a couple of days away from January 1 2020.

Debbie DeBerry: 00:51
So Christmas has passed. That's what I celebrate. I hope that whatever holiday you celebrate, I hope it was not stressful. I hope it was enjoyable. Hope you get some good family time in there. Now leading into a new year, the buzz is always resolutions, right?

Debbie DeBerry: 01:13
What are your New Year's resolutions? That's what people talk about. So in that spirit, we're going to be talking about goal setting. And not just goal setting, but actually understanding how to set the right kinds of goals, how to set them the right way, and how to actually achieve those goals. So when we don't have goals that we're aiming for, when we're just going through life, kind of aimlessly. We're not growing, we're not pushing ourselves, we're not striving and changing and forcing ourselves outside of our comfort zones. And that's where the magic happens, right? I mean, it's not fun, necessarily, in the process. That's the whole point. If you're outside of your comfort zone, it's not comfortable. until it becomes comfortable. Right? That's the beauty of it. You got to fake it till you make it. So you fake feeling okay, outside of your comfort zone until it's no longer outside of your comfort zone. It becomes your comfort zone just by stretching.

All right. So I think goal setting and goals in general, it's just such an interesting topic to me, because I feel like society wants us to, or maybe it's that I feel pressure from outside of myself to do bigger things than I really actually want to do. You know, like, for example, I've mentioned my brother before who flips 70 plus houses a year, I have zero desire to do that. None, no desire at all. Because if I'm doing that, I'm not podcasting. I'm not working with students directly to help them achieve their goals.

So, for me, it's balance. I have to stop and really think about, okay, what do I want? Not what am I feeling from outside myself? Not what does my spouse want? What does my kid want? What does? What do my parents want? It's not that at all. But that's how I feel like we tend to live in that space, in that space of what are the expectations of me? What am I supposed to be striving for? What should I want? And there's that word that I just don't like, I don't want people to shoot on me. I don't want to shoot on other people. And what a crazy time because not only are we going into a new year, we're going into a new decade.

Debbie DeBerry: 04:16
How crazy is it that it's 2020? That sort of kind of blows my mind? Because I started high school 30 years ago. That's just bananas. I can't believe it. Anyway, whatever. That's fine. I'm becoming more me every single day, right? So whatever. Aging is a fun process. Anyway, back to goals. So what I want you to take away from this episode are a few things. I want you to understand what actually makes a compelling goal and why is a compelling goal. important? Why is it any different than any other goal. And then I want you to take away two questions that you need to answer before setting goals for yourself. And then thirdly, I want you to walk away with the five principles of smart goals. And then once you have smart goals in place, what should you be focusing on every single day in order to achieve those goals? And then finally, I want you to walk away with an understanding of what that driving force is, that will propel you toward your goals, not other people's goals for you.

Okay, I want you to forget about everybody else, right now. And just think about you. How often do you actually achieve the large goals or objectives that are really important to you. If you're having trouble following through with your goal planning, you may be tempted to just stop trying. Oftentimes, people say things like, it's not meant to be, you know, it must just not be for me, the universe is conspiring against me. Or maybe I should settle for what I have, things like that. But frequently, what's actually getting in the way of achieving those goals are the actual goals themselves. If your goal is to, let's say, lose weight, how will you know when that goal is actually achieved, is that when you've lost one pound, or five pounds, or 100 pounds, you see, without a clear target, you'll never hit your mark.

That's why it's crucial to learn how to set goals that are clear, measurable and actionable. Otherwise, you're going to feel like either a hamster on a wheel, or, like something is wrong with you, because you aren't achieving the goals that you set out for yourself. Alright, so we're going to cover how to set goals to actually ensure you achieve them. And, again, you're gonna learn what makes for compelling goals as well as the steps you've got to take to see them through. So why should we have goals anyway? It's almost like over feeding into the achieve achieve achieve mentality if we have goals? Actually, I don't find that the case at all. I feel like when we have goals, when we have something that we're striving for, it's not that end thing. That is the most important part of going after something that all sounds super abstract, Debbie. 

okay. So if I say, I want to flip a house, in, within the next nine months, I'm going to flip my first house. Great. That flipped house is not the most important part of the goal, or setting out to achieve that goal. For me, what I think is the most important thing of setting goals and going after goals. It's who you become along the way. Not necessarily
that end result. Yes, that's freaking awesome. And that's how we know that we achieved it, right? Because you have to have an end result in order to know that the goal was achieved.
But think about this, and I talk about this with students in my coaching programs all the time. Who are you becoming? How are you changing along the way because who you are right now, if you haven't flipped a house yet, who you are right now is not going to be the person who flips their first house. What do I mean by that? Well,

you're going to have to start seeing yourself in a different way, you're going to have to start showing up in a different way. You're going to have to get uncomfortable, not knowing everything, get uncomfortable with uncertainty, in order to make those phone calls to hard money lenders, to set appointments with wholesalers to do these things that you haven't done before. And that feel uncomfortable because you're a total newbie at this. You're going to have to do those things. And by doing those things, you have then changed your comfort zone. Do you see that? That's what's so beautiful about this. So what I say I do, right is I teach women how to flip houses with confidence. But I do so much more than that. Because what I really do is I help you show up in a different way, so that you can flip your first house with caution. Finance. But if I were to say that most people would be like, well, that's weird. That's what will, it has been said that I put the woowoo and how slipping and I am totally okay with that. I'm happy to be the woowoo house flipper.

Anyway, let's get back into it. Effective goal setting is fundamental for your success, whether it's increasing your intelligence, or taking up a new hobby, or rekindling a relationship, right? Setting goals, lets us create our future before it actually happens. Setting goals helps us grow, expand, pushing ourselves to transform in ways that we probably never even imagined. In order to truly feel fulfilled. We need to know and feel like we're working to achieve something, making progress every single day toward something bigger than ourselves, I think is one of the keys to happiness. Otherwise, we're stagnant.

And we're not growing and we're not expanding, and we're not seeing ourselves in a different way. My guess is you've probably set a goal or two in your life, right? Did you see them through? Are you actually setting them in an effective way? And will your goals transform your life in the ways that you are wanting? Will they help you unlock something extraordinary inside yourself that you had no idea was there. Many times people think that they understand. They get it, they totally know how to set goals. But then they never quite achieve what they're after. And one common reason is that their goals aren't compelling or inspiring, you're much more likely to put time and energy into something that actually excites you. Right. So your goals should reflect that same level of momentum.

Now we're talking goal setting that makes you leap out of bed, totally excited to start the day. Now, I also want to, though, throw this in there. Because just because you have a goal that's really exciting, and gets you out of bed doesn't mean that there will not be adversity along the way to achieving that goal. That's part of the growing process. That's part of the expanding process that you will go through. You have to be okay. With the adversity. You have to be okay. And know that just because adversity comes up doesn't mean anything other than adversity came up. Sometimes we think like I mentioned earlier, that if something comes up to hinder our progress toward our goal, we think, Oh, yeah, it's not meant to be, yep. It's just not meant to be for me. Or, you know, this should be totally easy. If I'm supposed to achieve this thing, then it should be totally easy, and it should just come naturally. That is all bs that we tell ourselves. And why do we tell ourselves that bs? Because when adversity hits, what feels better to us, is just stopping. Just quitting? Yep, we'll put the responsibility on somebody else, the universe doesn't want me to succeed.

Yep. It's not my fault. It's the universe's fault. Because if we take responsibility, then we have to keep showing up. Even when it's really hard, even when things aren't going our way. Even when we aren't getting or seeing that progress. As quickly as we want to. We have to keep showing up. That was my motto for 2019 keep showing up. I am totally taking that with me into 2020. To keep showing up. It's so crucial. That's what I see from the students who I see who are flipping houses, they keep showing up. Even when things don't go their way. don't happen as quickly as they want it to happen. Whatever it may be, they keep showing up.

What ever it is you're after, I promise you, you will be given many opportunities to keep showing up. Alright, so think of a goal, really as a dream with a deadline. Okay, and now once you have that, all we have to do is create a blueprint to achieve that. Easy peasy. Okay, so let's circle back to what the heck makes a compelling goal. Okay. Two key questions. You've got to ask yourself in order to set a compelling goal. One is what and to is why. So, number one, what do you really want?

What is the exact objective that you desire? Is it your first completed flip? Is it seven flips? Is it to take up daily meditation? Is it to maybe get a promotion at your job, whatever it is, you need a very clear outcome in your mind. something magical happens when you take generalized desires, and start defining them more precisely, through details. Okay, detailed goal setting.

Now, that's number one, right? So you need the what? And the number two, you've got to have the why. Why do you want to achieve that goal? What will it bring you? Will it create financial freedom that you desire? Will it create time freedom? Will it allow you more flexibility in your schedule? In order to keep your goals you need to ask the right questions and seek real change in your life. So if you know what you're moving toward, you'll find ways to make it happen by learning how to set goals. Remember, this why this number two is more important than the what? Why you're after the goal that you're after? is more important than the goal you're actually after? Is that weird? Does that make sense? The Why is so important.

It's not just a successful house flipping business that you want. You want the things that that successful house flipping business will bring you. You want the time freedom, you want the financial freedom, you want control over your energy, where you're spending your energy with whom you're spending your energy, you want to be able to take road trips, or travel with your family whenever you want. You want to feel financial security. Right? Those are the things those why's are crucial.

So really dig deep, and really understand your Whys behind it. Okay, now that you've got the what, write the goal, and you've got the why the things that come with achieving that goal. Now you can actually create really great momentum. By setting SMART goals. There are a few guiding principles for effective goal setting that can help you stay on track. There's no shortage of goal setting tips out there. But none have gained as much acceptance as the one that I'm about to share with you. And that's called SMART goals. And so smart is an acronym. All right, smart, stands for specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timeframe. All right. So let's dig into specific. Like I've said before, a few times, the more detailed you can be about your goal, and what that looks like to you, the better. So how can you be more specific when you're talking about flipping house. So if your goal is I want to flip a house great, when in 20 years, or when exactly. So be really specific and say, I'm going to flip my first house and 2020 boom, that specificity, you can dig even deeper, and say, I'm going to here's the goal that I have for the students in my program, their goal? Well, my goal for them is to flip their first house in a way that makes them want to flip the second one. And that's pretty abstract. I have to keep it that way because everybody has a different measurement in mind. So some people are really happy just breaking even on their first flip. And that would make them want to do a second flip.

Some people want to hit a $25,000 profit. And that would make them want to do a second flip. Whatever it looks like to you put it in writing, Be specific. It makes it easier to visualize and actually achieve what you want if you actually know what you're aiming at and what success looks like. Secondly, so that was specific. Secondly, it has to be measurable when it comes to effective Goal setting, tracking your progress is critical. And you've got to set clear parameters and identify points along the way that will allow you to track whether you're making progress or not. Okay, so what do I mean by that? Well, I talk about chunking things down. So taking one big goal would be flipping a house, chunk it down into daily actionable items like I give my students, I teach them every single week, what they're supposed to be working on what tasks they need to be checking off. And by doing those tasks, they are measuring progress, right, because they've formed their business entity, they've done certain things that week that they can check off.

And those are mile markers, if you will, on the way to their goal. So you've got to have little mile markers on the way. Thirdly, somewhere on a smart, they have to be achievable. Okay, your goals have to be achievable. If you can't actually attain your goal that you set forth to attain, you will be incredibly frustrated, and disheartened. So make sure your goals are actually achievable. Many times when we're creating big goals, we get to lofty, making them seem impossible, and really setting ourselves up for failure.

This kind of leads to the next element actually. So the are in smart, is for realistic. So perhaps in an ideal world, you'd have six hours a day to focus solely on that thing you want to achieve. Let's say it's losing 40 pounds. So you have six hours a day to work on just that. But you live in the real world, right? So you probably don't have six hours a day to just spend working on losing weight, or whatever your goal is, can you realistically become a concert pianist? If you've never played an instrument in your life, like does that goal actually fit in your current lifestyle. This doesn't mean you can't dream big, or go after something outside of your comfort zone, you will absolutely be going after things outside of your comfort zone. Any goal you have is going to force you to be a different person than you are right now.

Any goal, because if you were already the person that had that goal, you wouldn't be setting that goal, right?

You're going to have to become a different person. All right. But be realistic, okay, set realistic goals, or else you're just setting yourself up for massive failure, and it just isn't gonna feel good. All right. Finally, the T in smart stands for timeframe, you need to have a very clear idea of your timeline, when you're setting goals, it needs to create a sense of urgency. If it's, you know, I want to flip a house, there is no urgency there. If it's I'm going to flip a house within the next nine months, there's a sense of urgency. So something really interesting about our brains. whatever amount of time we give our brains to do a task, whatever it is, our brain will take up that entire time to do that task. Okay. So, for example, let's say I'm going to write an article. And I give myself all day to do it. So eight hours, I give myself eight hours to write an article, it's going to take me eight hours to write an article. If I block that down into a two hour time block, and I'm giving myself two hours to write that same article, guess what, my brain will achieve it into hours, our brain will stretch to fit whatever time space is given to achieve a certain thing. So be sure that your goalcreates a sense of urgency, or else you may never achieve it, because there would be no reason to. So set yourself up for goal planning success by concentrating on what can be achieved in that short period of time. So learning how to set goals that are smart, puts power behind your goals, and ensures you can measure your progress more often and take new actions. Look, setting goals is imperative. It's Want to change your reality? If you want to achieve something you do not yet have, or you have not yet achieved, you have to set a goal for it. So grab some paper. All right, grab a pen, write down these goals, make sure they're smart.

So they're specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and there's a timeframe attached. So I'm going to give you three steps to follow when you're setting goals. So grab that pen and paper, if you're driving, do not grab a pen and paper do this later. Okay, the three steps are one, give yourself five minutes to just brain dump. Okay, write down anything and everything you'd like to do have achieve, create, give and or experience in the next 20 years. Write as many things down as fast as you can, in that five minute timeframe.

Okay, goal setting. Step number two, give yourself 90 seconds to do this part. This is supposed to be gut reactions. Okay, you're going to go back through that list that you wrote. And you're going to put either 135 10 or 20 years next to each goal to indicate how long it will take to achieve them. So if it's a huge goal, let's say I'm going to amass I'm, let's say I'm starting at 00 assets, I'm going to amass $10 million worth of assets. Now, doing that within a year is setting yourself up for failure. Okay, so let's say it's a, that's a 20 year goal. Great. Put 20 years next to it. Be realistic, okay? Again, give yourself 90 seconds, it should be quick, go with your gut, do not think with your head. Okay. Step number three, go over your list. Choose your top four, one year goals. These are the goals that really excite you. They pump you up, they make you feel so freakin great. They make you happy, just thinking about them, makes you really happy. write a paragraph for each of those four goals. explaining why you absolutely will achieve that goal within the next 12 months. why it's important. Why that must happen.

Give yourself 15 to 20 minutes to do that part. Okay, so maybe five minutes per goal, to really get down to the why. Now, if you really want to take this to the next level, share what you've written down with a friend, or a family member, or anybody that you trust. If you're a member of our Facebook group, write it in our Facebook group, okay? If not, at least say them out loud. Because here's the thing, when you give them voice, they all of a sudden have more energy behind them. If they're just written down and just stuck in our heads, they aren't really breathed into existence yet. I know that was super weird. Well, just hang with me. Okay. hang with me. All right. But really, you've got to breed these things into existence, you have to say them out loud, you have to give them a voice. Okay, now that you've got your goals, you've got to put them where you're going to see them daily. Write them down, know the action steps you're going to take every single day. To accomplish that goal.

You've got to break these things down, okay? Put it on your bathroom mirror, put it on your whatever your laptop, put it somewhere that is in your face every day. Because we're really good at out of sight out of mind. So put it where it's confronting you every day. Now, the final thing you've really got to do is you have to be able to visualize yourself already having achieved that thing. And I know that's really hard for some people, because it's like, well, I don't know how I'm gonna feel you do know how you're going to feel because your feelings are driving your action, your feelings, how you think you're going to feel when you achieve that thing.

That's 100% why you have that goal. Otherwise what's the point of the goal so you absolutely know how you're going to feel. And you've got to feel it, you've got to feel it. Now, before you have the thing. I know that's weird, but you have to do it. And then finally, think about the pain of not achieving that. It's more of the same, right? It's more of I'm not gonna be able to call my own shots, I'm going to have to show up to this job I hate every single day. I'm not gonna have any control over my time, or energy or finances. That's pain, y'all. And you don't have to feel that. And then on the flip side, think about the pleasure from having achieved that goal. Okay. All right.

I am stoked about 2020. I don't know, man, there's just this awesome momentum that's happening. And the students in my program are making some awesome strides and progress. And it's just so freaking exciting. I want to invite you to join us on this journey. If you need help flipping your first house, or if you need help fine tuning your house flipping business. Join us. We're making huge progress. And we're doing it together. It is totally a tribe mentality. And it's just an awesome vibe. It's so supportive. So encouraging. so empowering. Okay, so it's not just the step by step, which that's important. But the support, aside from the step by step plan, or processes that you need to follow that support is the game changer. All right. So go to first flip dunrite.com to see the different options for working with me, and actually getting your first flip done with total confidence. Okay. All right, you guys. That's it for this episode. If you would, if you're getting something of value out of any of these episodes, would you please do me a huge favor, and help me reach more like minded women like you by leaving a rating and review wherever you listen to podcasts. Alright, you guys, I'll see you on the next episode. Until then go out there, flip houses like a girl. Leave people and places better than you find them and make it a great day. Bye.