I have studied success, and self improvement for more than fifteen years and I learned that goal setting is one of the most powerful tools you can use to help you achieve your every desire. If you set a target for your sub-conscious mind to hone in on, it will act like a guided missile and begin moving you toward your target. It will continually adjust your actions until you hit what you are aiming for.

By and large this formula is extremely effective, but many people make a mistake during the goal achieving process. They make the mistake of thinking that after they achieve the goal, then and only then will they have permission to be happy.

But what is missing is the realization that the process of goal achieving is far longer than the actual achievement of the goal.

Achievement of a goal is only a moment in time. It is a split second calculation of measurable results. If I set a goal for myself to become a millionaire one year from today, in one year I will measure how much money is in my bank account and then I will have either achieved my goal or not. What is really important is the person I became up until that moment. The process is far more important than the goal. If you cannot find a way to be happy while you are achieving you are going to have a very unhappy life.

One example in my own life is I set myself a goal to attend and graduate the United States Military Academy at West Point. At the time, I was a new private E-1 in the Army; the lowest rank in all of the armed services. I had no money and no political connections to ask for a nomination. it was an unimaginably high goal, some would say an unachievable pipedream, but I stuck to it.

After more than two years of trying I was accepted to West Point and four years later I graduated. It took me more than six years to achieve my goal, and the day I walked across the parade field and pinned on my new lieutenant bars I was one of the happiest people on the planet.

But the euphoria was short lived. In a few days I was listless. Is this all there is? What now? So what, I graduated from college. My self talk became extremely negative for no apparent reason.

It took me a long time to understand that my expectations of what achieving my goal meant were wrong. Graduation was nothing more than a blip on the radar screen of my life. What I became during those six years of struggle and hard work contained the real lessons and value not the diploma or even the commission as an officer in the Army.

Give yourself permission to be happy while you achieve your goals. If you are not content while you are working to achieve your goals, you may need to re-evaluate where you are headed.

The purpose of your goals and your values are the two most important factors determining what will make you happy. Ask yourself is the purpose of your goal congruent with your values? For instance, if you set a goal to lose weight, do you have a strong enough why that is congruent with your values? If you want to lose weight because you are embarrassed you can’t fit into your old high school jeans, but you value the pleasure of eating over all other activities, then you are most likely going to be miserable while you attempt to achieve your goal and you will get poor results.

Set goals that are in line with what is most important to you and you will be much happier achieving than ever before.

I don’t mean to suggest we can be happy every moment of our lives that is not the case, but what we can do is be happy achieving our life’s work to the best of our ability.

Don’t wait for the big event like your graduation, marriage, promotion, or raise to give yourself permission to be happy. Allow yourself to be happy right this minute while you journey toward the fulfillment of your life’s purpose.

Anthony Butler
http://www.envisioningheaven.com