3 (Easier) Steps to Making Your Goals Happen

Before I started training for my first marathon, I adopted a book as my coach called "The Non-Runner's Marathon Trainer". Perfect! I have always been more belly dancer than runner, so this suited me to the 't'. I opened the book and saw the training program written out on one page. That was it! There was 12 weeks of running training laid out on one page.

So why a whole book if the plan could be summarised on one page? Surely you just pick up the plan and follow it...

The authors of the book knew something that many personal development programs don't teach: you need to be a marathoner before you actually do a marathon.

Most of the book was about mindset strategies on how to build confidence, how to think and feel as a marathoner, and how to rehearse the end well before you line up at the start.

That's how I finished not one marathon, but six.

I imagined myself as a marathoner, I felt like I was a marathoner, I pictured myself as a marathoner, and I believed I was a marathoner - even before I had run more than a few kilometers.

So how here are the 3 Easier Steps in Making Your Goals Happen, whether you want to run a marathon, start your own business, or write a book.

Easier Step 1: Redefine success beyond personal gain. Why do you really want this goal? In my experience, and in my work with clients, I have found the best reasons for having a goal transcend the initial lifestyle/personal achievement reasons. These are important, but they will not sustain you when the going gets tough. We tend to betray ourselves long before we'd betray someone else.

For me, I had always wanted to run a marathon, but had never truly committed to it. When my sister's fiance committed suicide, we decided to do one together - to help her through the grief. There was no way I was going to give up on the goal then! I was doing it for her, as much as I was doing it for me.

Choose something that is important to you personally, but that you also know will have a larger reaching impact.

Easier Step 2: Decide who you would like to be, not just what you'd like to achieve. Before you take any action, you must become the person that you see achieving your goal. First, determine what that person is like. Ask yourself, 'who do I have to be in order to achieve this goal? Write a list of personal attributes you need for achieving your goals. When I was on my long training runs, I listed all the words I could think of that had to do with being a marathoner. For example, 'A' was for active, action-oriented, athletic; 'B' was for bold, brave; 'L' was for lucky, and yes, lunatic!

Easier Step 3: Be first, then do. Now that you've chosen your goal, identified who you must be in order to make it happen, start being that person now - today - before you actually do anything. Think the way that person would, make decisions the way that person would, respond the way that person would.

So how do you do 'be' what you want to be if you've not yet done what you intend to do? How do you be a marathoner if you've never run a marathon? How do you be a best-selling novelist if you've never written anything?

It's called fantasising. It's called rehearsing. It's called visualising. It's called practising.

Do whatever you can in your head and heart to give you the experience of having achieved the results, well before you even start to take action towards them.

With the marathon, I wrote out "I am a marathoner" on a piece of paper and stuck it in my pocket. Every time I went for a loo break, I read out "I am a marathoner". On every long run I pictured myself at the end of the race, friends clapping, the finish line ahead. I must have finished that marathon hundreds of times before I even stood at the start line. On the day, it all happened as I had foreseen. Except for the blisters and the sore legs!

If a bellydancer can run six marathons, then surely you can set out to manifest your dreams too. I know you can.