In this episode, Richie and I share our top goals for 2017 and encourage you to think about your own goals too. We also go a step further and talk about what systems and techniques you can use to make sure you have the best shot of achieving your goals.

Gordon’s goals this 2017

First Goal

My first one is to be healthier. The way I’m gonna measure that is by losing weight. My goal is to lose 50 lbs. throughout the year of 2017. It’s a big goal for me and I definitely have to work for it, but I have a year to do it and I think if I stay with it, I’ll be able to hit that at the end of the year.

It’s not the weight that really concerns me but feeling healthier and feeling that I am in better shape than I am right now. I’d like to get back to something where I feel I am in a healthier spot in my life and I’m going to measure that with weight.

Second Goal

Number 2 for me came from a video by Gary Vaynerchuk where he was encouraging people to set up a goal for themselves to make $20,170 this year. The whole idea is by starting to sell little things around your house that you’re not interested in and then you grow that up over the course of the year to finding things that have a higher value on eBay and selling these things online. It becomes more of a side hustle with the goal of making $20,170 through the course of the year. Why $20,170? Because it’s 2017.

My real goal is not really the money end of things – but I like the idea of purging and going through the stuff that I have in my house that is just taking up space. Watching the video got me thinking about all that stuff and how it would be nice to either sell or donate them.

Third Goal

In our Phone Apps Episode before, I shared with you that I made a mobile game with one of my really good friends, Alex. Along the same lines, about 40 years ago, my dad started developing this idea that he had for a game and he was actually working with Atari at the time. Unfortunately, before it got to the end of the cycle where they were going to release it and put it in stores – the whole program got scrapped. It never saw the light of day other than the people and the relatives of people in Atari who got to play with it.

He always thought that this could be a cool thing to build. When mobile phones became a thing, he thought it would be the perfect mobile game to play because it’s a little fun game you can do on the side without having to devote a bunch of your time to get something from it.

I don’t want to overshare here but my dad’s health isn’t the best; it’s been declining – so one of the things I want to focus on this year is building out this game and engaging him with it to make sure his vision of the game is in there while modernizing it so it is still relevant in today’s culture. My third goal is to complete and publish the game by the end of this year.

Richie’s goals this 2017

First Goal

Unsurprisingly, I fit into that 75% that also share Gordon’s first goal. I’d like to lose 25 lbs. and the reason goes back to the same – it’s not about what the internet says my number should be. I am between 6’2″ and 6’3″, I currently weight about 245 lbs. But if I lose 25 lbs., I’m going to be in that 220 lbs. range. It is still way higher based on BMI standards but based on the best shape I’ve ever been in, that’s the weight I weigh. So based on my personal experience, I feel that’s a really good one.

I think it’s true for so many things too. What’s the right amount of this? What should I be doing? Do you feel good about it? If you don’t feel good about it, it’s probably not the way you should be doing it.

Second Goal

I’d like to focus only on the things that matter. The things that are really valuable so I can be fully present in them. It goes back to being busy vs. having a full schedule.

Full schedule could be busy. That’s one way to look at it but sometimes, busy is just unorganized chaos. So if I want to do a lot of stuff, I want it to be intentional. Intentionally full schedule as opposed to having a lot of things going on but chaotic, unfocused, and plenty of unintentional noise.

What I’m trying to do is instead of doing a bunch of stuff in a bunch of little pieces, and not really being in it; I want to just focus on the things that matter and be present for it.

Third Goal

For my number 3 goal, I’d like to go with “learning to learn”. I think we all have a pretty basic understanding of learning things. Some of us are visual learners, auditory learners, kinesthetic learners, or even a combination of those. I find myself to be more of a kinesthetic learner – I definitely learn more by actually doing it.

I want to go beyond that. Learning to learn faster, learning to learn more thoroughly, and having more things stick – that’s my goal. Because there’s a lot of things I still want to do in life and I want to make sure that I don’t spend 10 years learning something where I could get proficiency in a couple months.

Systems to Achieve those Goals

Breaking Barriers

A lot of times, goals are set like: “Im going to run this many miles per week” or “I’m going to hit the gym X days a week”. But a lot of times too, we build up big barriers why we can’t do that.

Maybe it’s something like “Do 50 push-ups”. The problem with lists like this is the next thing you know you’re building up excuses why you can’t do it today. You’ll say things to yourself like “I’m wearing this polo shirt, and I’m going to get all sweaty doing push-ups, then I’m gonna have to take a shower”, and then this and that.

But if your list just said, “Do pushups.” then the barrier disappears. If you do even 1 push up, then you technically win. Right? But once you do 1 push up, you’ve broken the ice. Now you can do 50.

Reducing Friction

From a systems point of view, you need to remove the things that are going to clutter up the system. Look at the failure points of your system. Things that are going to make it harder for you to achieve your next tasks – you want to remove those and you want to add things that can make it easier.

Let’s say your goal is going to the gym. Just go to the gym. Even if you just set foot in there, and you did a couple of curls, you already won. But how do you make yourself do that in the first place? Well, you know you’re going to change clothes and bring your gym bag with you, right? Put the bag down where you know you’ll be walking. You will eventually and intentionally step over the gym bag reminding you that what you’re supposed to be doing is going to the gym.

Fun Fact: Apparently, within the first 10 days of the New Year, 90% of people have abandoned their goals. By the time this is posted, 90% of you have already abandoned your goals. Get back on it!

Related: Gary Vaynerchuk on New Year’s Resolutions

Dealing with Non-stop Phone Notifications

Gordon: For emails, I use Inbox. One of the cool things about this app is it can suppress certain messages from you. When I get stuff from Facebook or promotional messages from email lists I’m subscribed to, it doesn’t give me a push notification. Now if I look at the app icon, there’s a little badge there that lets me know there’s a message, but it’s not interrupting me with those things. If you’re getting an email from a friend or family, it prioritizes those things and the app will shoot you a notification for it. Overall, it’s been really good at hiding things that you don’t really need to be interrupting you throughout the day.

Richie: I found way too often, I check my iPhone for notifications. Maybe it’s a notification from our FB group. I’ll check it on the go and now, I can’t stop thinking about it. Because it’s on the phone and it’s with you all the time. When I get this email or a message or whatever it is, I get aware of it and I want to respond to it as fast as I can. If I’m doing something, I have to drop whatever it is because I’m thinking about it and I want to act on it. All because I went and checked it when I wasn’t ready to actually work on it. So it’s best to limit your time checking your phone for notifications.

Do Less, Be More

Do less, be more, and just do it now. Go execute today. Don’t set yourself up for failure. Always set up yourself to win.

Good luck with whatever goals you guys have set up and let’s continue the conversation on our FB group too. We’d love to hear back from you guys and what systems you have found to work well for you!