Set clear, specific written goals.
Goal setting is something very few people do and is absolutely essential for achieving anything extraordinary throughout your profession, whether working in movies or not. From my own experience I have always had dreams and desires (in my head) of things I wanted to accomplishment in my career but the problem was that they remained just in my head. With my dreams and desires just floating around in my head it became quite easy to be sidetracked, forget or simply give up on achieving anything worthwhile. My struggle and frustration from my lack of progress in my movie career had me searching for answers.
Was success in the movie industry really based on luck? Maybe I was not lucky? Maybe making movies was not my calling? However, everything changed for the better for me once I read a book by Brian Tracy called Goals: How to get everything you want faster than you ever thought possible. I strongly recommend that if you are not currently in the habit on setting goals for yourself and your career to read this book.
Basically, the book details how we as human beings are fully responsible for creating the type of life or career we want and the single best way to guarantee our success is through setting goals. Here are the benefits of setting clear goals for your career:
6. CLARITY:
You will have more CLARITY: You have to know where you want to go to get there. Setting goals requires you to develop clarity. This is the first and most important step to creating a career that you love and want.
5. FOCUS:
You will develop a stronger FOCUS: Whatever you focus on your get more of: if you have clear goals and focus on them, you will get more of what you DO want (your goals) and less of what you don't want.
4. EFFICIENCY:
When you get clear about where you want to go, you set up steps and actions to get there. This increases your efficiency because you are working on what is really important. When you work on what is important, you will accomplish more than you ever expected.
3. DREAMS
You will get what you really want in life, rather than settling for whatever comes you way.
2. INCREASED SELF-CONFIDENCE
As you set and reach your goals, you become more confident in your ability to do what you say and get what you want in life. Success breeds more successes.
And the number 1 benefit of setting goals is:
1. RESULTS
There are numerous studies that prove that less than 3% of people walking on the face of this earth have written goals, and according to research, these people accomplish 80% more than those who do not. That is an astounding difference,
is it not?
Your goal could be as simple:
I finished writing the first draft of my screenplay by July 20th, 2009.
Or
I directed my second feature film by October 10th, 2009.
I know for a fact that since I started setting career goals for myself starting back in 2008 that I have achieved more in my film career within the past 12 months then I have in the previous four years combined without having any writing goals.
What about you? Are you happy with the progress or stage your career is in? Do you want more or feel you have the talent, drive or ambition to accomplish more?
Man is a goal seeking animal. His life only has meaning if he is reaching out and striving for his goals
Aristotle
