This is going to be my last post on goal setting for a while as I may (if not already!) end up boring people.

I’ve decided to live life without goals for at least 90 days. Instead I will focus on developing permanent habits – one at a time (well nearly….. you know me ! ).

My main focus in the short term will be health. I am going to work on establishing one permanent habit after another until I feel in a good place. No goals or expectations, just habits that I am confident will lead me to achieve the right things.

For the next 30 days I am only going to focus on establishing the following two habits:

1. Drink 1.5 litres of water per day

2. Wake Early –  Mon – Fri @ 4.30am, Sat – Sun @ 6.00am

And that’s it. I’ll check in mid Feb with an update.

So, my last post was quite a long one about my 2012 goals and my planning process and I am already seriously considering doing away with goals altogether (this is a hard thing for me to say!).

We’re nearly two weeks into 2012 and my weekly and daily planning process has fallen into exactly the same place it always does – I get too ambitious, set the benchmark too high and come in way too low. I also spread myself way too thin and end up trying to do many things half-way which means l end up feeling crap about what I achieved at the end of the week. I also cannot get out of my head that I am ultimately failing to create permanent habits that are important to me (eat well, exercise regularly etc.)

I’m also starting to realise that goals no longer motivate me. Reading back on my 2012 goals, it would certainly be great if I did everything, but reading it just doesn’t excite me – I just don’t get fired up reading it. They are just words.

I am therefore seriously considering just focusing on creating new habits, one at a time and forgetting about long term goals for the next 3 months. I’m thinking I’ll still probably have a daily planning process to keep me organised but I will let go of any planning beyond that.

This kinda scares me and is completely different to how I have approached the last 10 years. I’ve always had goals and have achieved a lot along the way, but the fact that I feel so crap all of the time and fail to develop the habits I so badly want to are the main drivers to considering a brand new approach. The one thing that is making me seriously consider this is that I am naturally someone who has a good vision for what I want out of life and what’s important to me at any one time. Because of that, comprehensive goal planning isn’t going to be the death of me. And anyway, it’s only 3 months right?

Below are some of the articles I have been reading from Zen Habits that are helping me shape my thinking. If you have any advice or feedback on this blog post or the below articles, I’d love to hear it.

achieving, without goals

the best goal is no goal

100 days without goals

How to Have the Best Year of Your Life (without Setting a Single Goal)

How I changed my life in four lines

The Half Step

The Single Changing Method

In a follow up to my previous blog post ‘A review of my progress in 2011’ I wanted to outline some of my goals and priorities for 2012. One thing to note is that I am not going to share the full details of all of my goals as some of them are obviously personal, but it’ll give you a decent idea of my focuses and my planning process.

This year, I tried to focus less on creating detailed goals and more on what my key areas of focus should be. Priorities can change so quickly throughout the year that even a 6-month plan can become irrelevant quite quickly.  I’ve found what matters the most is having a high level plan of where you want to be going and then simply having very focused weeks and days throughout the year.

This year I just laid out my key areas of focus, some key words for each (just to crystallise my ultimate vision for that area) and then some goals for each area (less detail than ever before).

I will also strive to achieve my goals through creating permanent habits, one small step at a time.  Leo from Zen Habits writes a lot about this and a few months ago it really clicked for me. Leo actually writes a lot about not having goals at all (How to Have the Best Year of Your Life (without Setting a Single Goal)) which I did try earlier in the year but I really struggled to stay focused, so I am trying something in between. Aras of focus, less detailed goals and a big focus on creating permanent habits. Maybe 2013 will be the year of no goals, but I feel I have to try a balance first.

My Areas of Focus

The value of defining areas of focus is that it keeps you thinking about the bigger picture and having a healthy balance. No point being the fittest guy in the world whilst your relationships are going down the pan and vice versa.

Below are my areas of focus:

• Health and Fitness
• Relationships
• Personal Growth
• Ella
• Passions
• Contributions
• Wealth

Note: I keep my career and work related goals separate to this process (that’s for another post!).

Health and Fitness

I’ll go into detail for health and fitness but then just post my goals for the other areas of focus.

Below is an example of my keywords for health and fitness which should give you an idea as to why I do this for each area of focus:

treat my body with respect; eat well; drink plenty of water; make good choices on food types and portion sizes; exercise regularly and hard (and enjoy it); stay active; sleep well; be lean, be injury free; live long.

My keywords get me excited and motivated and help put in perspective why the area of focus is important to progress in.

My Health and Fitness goals for this year are:

GET TO AND MAINTAIN A WEIGHT OF 13 STONE

DEVELOP HEALTHY EATING HABITS THAT BECOME SECOND NATURE TO ME (I know in detail what this means to me)

DEVELOP THE HABIT OF EXERCISING REGULARLY AND ENJOY IT – FOCUS ON FUN AND INTERESTING ACTIVITIES

RUN A HALF MARATHON SOMEWHERE BREATHTAKING

And that’s it. No go to the gym 4 times a week, stretch twice a week, do cardio twice a week, bench press and squat x, y times – just some high level goals.

For example, my only focus for January is to develop the habit of drinking 1.5 litres of water per day and skipping breakfast / eating a light lunch (I will focus on the 1.5 litres of water habit first). That’s how I am balancing goals and habits.

If I am sitting back in December and I can feel good about the above goals, it will be amazing progress.

Here are some of my goals for the rest of my areas of focus.

Relationships

I don’t want to post my goals for this area as it’s quite personal but I have chosen family and friend relationships to specifically focus on and the key focus will be on having great, fun experiences and being present / in the moment.

Personal Growth

I have quite a lot of goals for personal growth, but then I am kind of obsessed about it. I’ve been the most detailed here and have potentially put down too much but I can be mindful of that come the end of the year. I guess I felt I had to get them out of my head and on paper.

DEVELOP THE HABIT OF RISING EARLY AND GOING TO BED EARLY

DEVELOP THE HABIT OF WEEKLY AND DAILY PLANNING

READ A MINUMUM OF ONE BOOK A MONTH AND CONTINUE THE HABIT OF READING MANY BLOGS / ARTICLES ON A WEEKLY BASIS

EXPAND MY NETWORK (ONLINE AND OFFLINE) – CONNECT AND DEVELOP RELATIONSHIPS WITH PEOPLE WHO HAVE ACHIEVED WHAT I WANT

WRITE AT LEAST 25 ARTICLES ON MY BLOG, PROMOTE AND BUILD THE READERSHIP – TURN IT INTO A GOOD ONLINE IDENTITY

LEARN TO MEDITATE AND DEVELOP THE HABIT OF REGULARLY MEDITATING

GROW BY DEVELOPING HABITS, ONE SMALL STEP AT A TIME – BE PATIENT

CONTINUE TO EMBRACE MINIMALISM

WORK ON MYSELF – BE HAPPY, CARING, KIND AND SUPPORTIVE OF OTHERS

LEARN THE BASICS OF FRENCH AND VISIT FRANCE TO SPEAK THE LANGUAGE 

Ella

GO ON A REALLY NICE AND SPECIAL SUMMER HOLIDAY TOGETHER – MAKE IT THE BEST TRIP WE’VE EVER BEEN ON

ENSURE THE TIME WE SPEND TOGETHER IS QUALITY AND FUN – BE PRESENT AND ENJOY EACH OTHER’S COMPANY – MAKE EACH DAY AND WEEK COUNT

Passions

DEVELOP A NEW INTEREST THAT I CAN GET PASSIONATE ABOUT

WORK ON A PROJECT RELATED TO AN INTEREST I AM PASSIONATE ABOUT

Contributions

DO SEVERAL KIND ACTS THAT ADD VALUE / MEAN A LOT TO PEOPLE

ACTIVELY VOLUNTEER AND MAKE A DIFFERENCE TO PEOPLE

Wealth

It’s not appropriate to go into detail here but I have some goals around living below my means and building my wealth to X amount.

Wrap Up

Achieving what you want in life isn’t black and white. I’ve tried so many ways to set goals, achieve things and to manage my priorities and time. It’s all a learning process and you have to just try things and then adjust when you notice what works and what doesn’t. The above feels right for me in 2012.

Throughout the year I will come back to my progress and reference these goals to keep myself honest and accountable.

If you have set goals for yourself in 2012, it’d be great to hear from you in the comments and if you need any help / assistance, feel free to comment or email me.

I spent a few hours yesterday going through what I achieved in 2011 and also thinking about areas of focus and goals for 2012.

It’s a good process to go through, as it can be easy to just keep ploughing on and never consciously acknowledge your progress and achievements – it just feels good and useful. It’s also very useful to look at what didn’t go so well and understand why.

This blog post is focused on 2011, I’ll write another one on my focuses for 2012 in the next day or so.

2011 – what went well?

House – Ella and I moved into our first house in Dec, 2010 and we’ve made a lot of progress in making it a nice home. The biggest change was we turned the garden from an overgrown mess to something that looks really nice (with a ton of help from Franco). Everything got stripped back, paving and a lawn was laid, wooden sleepers laid down each side, we built a bin shed and installed power and lighting throughout and in the shed. We also bought a nice bench and planted lots of herbs/plants in pots. We did a lot in the house too – things like mirrors, shelves, rugs, furniture etc.

Garden Bench & Herb Pots!

Read lots – I managed to read a LOT in 2011, mainly since I sold my car and started getting the bus to work aswell as making more time for reading in the mornings and evenings. A kindle makes things super easy too. I’d say I probably have read 10 books in the last 6 months, which is more than I read in 2009 and 2010 combined! My favourite was the Steve Jobs autobiography; I just couldn’t put it down. I also used Google Reader to keep up with the blogs I follow. Reading is important to me, as I believe it’s an essential part of continual learning and overall just a relaxing activity ☺

Here are a few of the books I enjoyed the most and found particularly useful:

• Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography by Walter Isaacson
• Lying by Sam Harris
• Anything You Want by Derek Sivers
• I, Partridge: We Need To Talk About Alan by Alan Patridge
• How to Win at the Sport of Business: If I Can Do It, You Can Do It by Mark Cuban
• The Art of War for Executives: Sun Tzu’s Classic Text Interpreted for Today’s Business Reader by Donald G Krause
• How to behave and why by Monroe Leaf
• Minimalism: Live a Meaningful Life by Joshua Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus
• The Education of Millionaires: It’s Not What You Think and It’s Not Too Late: It’s Not What You Think, and It’s Not Too Late by Michael Ellsberg
• Focus by Leo Babauta

And here are some of the top blogs I enjoy:

• Zen Habits
• The Nate Green Experience
• The Minimalists
• Only Once
• Both Sides of the Table
• Seth Godin
• A VC
• Venture Beat: Games
• Games Industry.biz

Embraced Minimalism – This was probably the most significant change for me in 2011 as it had a big impact on my life. I stumbled across Zen Habits around the middle of the year, which prompted me to read much more on minamilism throughout the year. In the last 6 months I’ve got rid of a lot of things that I never used and tended to just hang onto for the sake of it – clothes, kitchen appliances, gadgets, even my car! Before I embraced minimalism I never seemed to be able to keep the house tidy, whereas now most surfaces are always clear, tidy and uncluttered. Having less stuff feels so good. As I got further into minimalism I also started to think differently about goal setting too (more on this below and on my next blog post).

Minimalism = a nice clean work space!

Living Below My Means – I’ve managed to invest in areas like our house this year aswell as save significantly, largely down to living below my means. Selling my car (M3’s = fun + money drain!) and embracing minimalism definitely helped. In general, I’ve just had a more cautious approach to spending and where I did spend, I did so in areas that make a bigger difference to my life. I can still do much better in this area and will do in 2012 – watch this space.

Rising and Going to Bed Early – I know this sounds a bit of an odd achievement but for large parts of 2011 I have managed to get myself into the habit of rising early (around 5am – Ella calls I the middle of the night! ☺) and going to bed early (before 10pm). Often I would get into the office for 6am. It’s amazing how much more personally effective and self-motivated I am when I do this. I lost my way a little towards the end of the year, but will nail it again first thing in 2012.

Goals vs. Developing Habits – Not really an achievement, more a significant realisation. I have always been an avid goal setter and a bit of a perfectionist. I tend to have expectations of myself that are far too high to achieve and as a result I find I am constantly beating myself up. This is good in a way as I have no doubt I achieve more being like this, but constantly beating yourself up and feeling inadequate isn’t a great feeling to have. Developing habits and taking incremental smaller steps came into my reading a lot this year and it’s getting me to think about how I achieve things in a different way.

VP & COO – I returned to Jagex this year as VP of RuneScape, which whilst it was probably on par with my previous levels of responsibility, was a new challenge for me. Jagex had new shareholders; a new board and we had some lofty goals for RuneScape. Around the middle of the year I was promoted to COO which is definitely a big step in my career and importantly one I felt ready for. As with any job there have been ups and downs this year, but in summary I am very glad I returned to Jagex and I’m incredibly focused on making a serious impact and progress in 2012.

2011 – what didn’t go so well?

Health & Fitness – I exercised rarely, slipped back to bad eating habits and put on about a stone and a half. Wow, it hurts to write that. I basically just failed to manage this along with the other priorities in my life. Not good at all and something I will absolutely address immediately. The good news is I am very knowledgeable on being healthy and fit and have done it before, I just need to get back into the habit and be consistent with my eating and exercising.

Me – I’ve allowed myself to become stressed and overwhelmed at times this year and it translated into me becoming impatient, snappy and probably just not a nice guy to be around at times. What’s worse is I know when it is happening and often just allow it to, rather than take control of it. Again, something I will be focusing on in 2012.

Relationships – I’ve neglected some key relationships this year. I got stuck straight into work at the beginning of the year and allowed it to consume my life – often at the expense of Ella, my family and my friends. It was common for me to miss a call or receive a text and not reply back. I still intend to make work one of the highest priorities in my life next year, but I will be ensuring a balance and will focus in on the relationships that are important to me.

Confidence & Self Doubt – At times this year, my confidence has taken a knock and self-doubt has come knocking. I think this is natural for most people and there’s probably not much to say here other than I need to be conscious of it next year and push it aside when it occurs. I know that when I am focused, determined and positive I can achieve whatever I want and just need to always remember that.

Goal setting and planning – I lost my way several times this year. Part of it was me figuring out what was working and what wasn’t working with my goal setting process and I tried a few things which didn’t work for me. I feel I have a good understanding of what will work the best for me now, which I will take into 2012.

Passion and Contribution – Outside of work, I lack something I am really passionate about. I need to find that in 2012. Also I certainly haven’t contributed to things outside of my own life and I really want to. I just need to figure out what and why and am determined to do that in 2012.

Wrap Up

All in all, I feel 2011 was a decent year. I made some serious progress in many areas that I set out to achieve and made a few really important realisations. However, I seriously neglected health and relationships and struggled to find the right balance between them and my career/personal growth – something for serious consideration in 2012.

I’m nearly done with my focuses for 2012, expect another post in a few days!

For those that know me well, you’ll know that I am very focused on personal development and growth. I have goals and plans in many areas of my life (my next blog post will be on my new take on goals and plans).

However I’ve always struggled to make truly permanent changes. Being naturally ambitious, I tend to shoot high and change many things at once and then as soon as one thing goes wrong, everything falls apart.

Take being fit and healthy as an example.

I am good at making the perfect plan – train weights three times a week, cardio twice a week, eat clean for 6 days a week, drink 2 litres of water daily and stretch 3 times a week. Everything is planned out in excruciating detail – every exercise, every calorie. I start off the week with the goal to stick to this plan and inevitable fall short very quickly. I simply revert back to my original habits as soon as one thing fails because as I cannot complete it perfectly.

Then very recently I read this post on one of my favourite websites (zenhabits) and suddenly it all became clear. I don’t need to try and change everything at once (I’ve tried it for over 10 years and it has rarely worked longer than a week, normally no longer than a day). I just need to start with one small habit and practice it until it becomes second nature. Then repeat with another small habit until eventually I will have one big habit that sticks.

Also I need to let go of trying to be perfect. If I make a mistake, I just need to put it behind me immediately and get back on the wagon rather than sabotage things further with opposite behaviour.

So, my new health goals are only food related. I am not even going to worry about exercise goals (these will come after I have nailed the eating bit).

Whilst the end goal is:

• detox everyone Monday with fruit, vegetables water and green tea only
• drink 6 glasses of water per day
• skip breakfast every day
• eat a clean low carb, high protein, moderate/high fat meal for lunch on weekdays
• eat a clean meal (low carb on non active days, medium/high carb on active days) on weekday evenings
• eat reasonably clean, but relaxed over the weekends
• generally be very aware of portion sizes

But as promised I will start small.

This week my habit is to drink 4 glasses of water per day and detox on Monday with just fruit, vegetables, water and green tea. That’s it. Whatever happens around that is fine. As long as I nail the detox and water habit, I’m good.

I know this is changing two habits, but I feel it’s very achievable for me to nail these and it’s about 10% of what I normally set myself as a health and fitness goal! (Note: At 19.14 on Monday I have have stuck to the detox perfectly and have drank 4 glasses of water). I want to do this for at least one month after which it should be second nature and then I will set myself some additional eating habits to change.

I feel like this is a bit of a breakthrough in terms of how I achieve goals, which ultimately rely on building a new set of habits.

I’ll leave you with a couple of pics.

My evening meal - vegetable Soup - hmmmmmm

Ella rebelling against Detox Monday as she chows down a Jacket Potato, Cheese & Coleslaw!

This is my first blog post and I thought I would use it to share an experience I had recently.

For my birthday just gone, Ella (my girlfriend) dug through some photos of my childhood and collated them into a nice photo album. It was a lovely present, the type of thing I always wanted to do myself, but never got round to.

Looking back at my childhood pics, the key thing that struck me was how happy I was in the pictures and then a few things came to mind……

As a child we are curious, imaginative, live in the present and find fun in things that are not materially expensive. We’re also not concerned with money and don’t have the pressure of goals and expectations we put on ourself as we get older.

It also reminded me that family is one of the most important things we have in this world and that my parents sacrificed a lot so that me and my brothers could grow up happy.

As we grow up, it can be easy to lose these childhood qualities or take your family for granted. I certainly have and do at times and it was a good reminder for me to be more conscious of these things.

Below are a few of the pics from the album – you can find them all on flickr here – childhood pics.