State your goal as a positive statement

To increase your chances of achieving any goal, think of a positive goal with a positive outcome. Goals that are framed in such terms as ‘mustn’t', ‘can’t' or ‘won’t', ‘shouldn’t' or ‘stop’, ‘lose’ or ‘quit’ are unlikely to motivate you.

Instead of thinking, for example, ‘I must stop eating junk’ think ‘I want to eat more healthily’. And instead of thinking ‘I hate this job and everyone who works here. I want to leave’ think ‘I want to go to a job that I enjoy where I like the people I work with’. Thinking like this creates positive energy and momentum instead of feelings of deprivation and resentment.

Goals framed in positive terms tell you what to do rather than what not to do. You are more likely to achieve goals that get you what you want, rather than goals that tell you to avoid something.

Go back to your reasons for doing what you want to do. Are you sure they are framed in positive terms? If not, rewrite them.

Write down your options

Now, write down your options; all the possible ways you could get what you want and achieve your goal. However big or small your ideas about the different ways you could achieve something, write them down.

If you keep your ideas and options in your head, it's difficult to tap into more expansive thinking. There's only a certain amount of information your brain can hold before that information just clutters your mind. Writing your thoughts and ideas down not only empties your brain, it can also bring out more ideas.

Ideas can be realistic or unrealistic; it doesn't matter because the important thing at this stage is simply to imagine all sorts of possibilities. Ask yourself, for example, what you would do if there was nothing to stop you – you didn't have to think about money or other people. Think, too, about what has and hasn't worked in the past in relation to what it is you want to achieve.

If, for example, your long-term goal is that a year from now you'll have bounced back from redundancy and be happy and successful, then imagine all the ways that could happen. There may be several options. For example, you could look for similar employment in your area or move areas; perhaps you could work freelance, work abroad or change career direction. And if you wanted to learn to play the ukulele, you might identify four options: to find a local class, to hire a tutor, to learn through online tuition or to swap a skill you have in return for ukulele tuition.

The process of identifying your options will stretch you beyond your usual way of thinking and behaving. And because positive thinking broadens and opens up possibilities and ideas, you may find that some of your ideas spark other ideas.

Remember: write your ideas down, so that you can actually see them. Don't let your ideas stay stuck in your head. Once you've got some ideas and options written down, for each option, ask yourself some questions:

• What skills, strengths and resources do you currently have that could be helpful for each option?
• What further research and information do you need?
• Who could help?
• Who could give you advice and ideas?
• What resources might you need?
• When do you expect the goal to be achieved by?
• When could you get started? (Depending on your goal, it could take time to get all the information you need to make an informed choice.)

Now think about the ‘pros’ and ‘cons’ of each option. Write them down. Be aware of how a particular option or idea makes you feel right now, when you think about it. If you feel positive and inspired, and feel it's a realistic, achievable way forward, then it's the right option. It becomes your specific goal.

Knowing you have options gives you the power of choice; you get to decide what way forward would work best for you.

Take a step-by-step approach

‘How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.’

Whatever it is you want to do and whichever option you choose, although it may present a challenge, it shouldn't be too hard or difficult.

It can be daunting and disheartening to think how much time and effort you've got to put in – for example, if you know you've only got two months to learn to play the ukulele at your brother's wedding in August. Or that you want to lose a stone in weight by Christmas.

So, what needs to happen is for a goal to be broken down into smaller, more doable steps. Taking a step-by-step approach is the most positive way forward because it means you set yourself up for constant successes by achieving small targets along the way.

So now, write down all the things you think you'd need to do towards your goal. Just empty your mind; you don't need to write things down in any particular order just yet.

If, for example, you wanted to change career direction, the things you'd need to do could include talking to a careers advisor or coach, spending time online researching jobs and training in the career you're interested in and rewriting your CV. These are all part of the larger goal, but breaking them down makes them easier to think about and to work on.

Next, plan the tasks – the steps you need to take – and think through how and when you'll do them. Make a written list, outlining your steps. It's easier to get straight on to the next step if you have already planned what to do and how you are going to do it. It allows you to maintain a steady pace and keep the pace going.

Ask yourself:

• What are you going to do first?
• When, exactly?
• What will be the next step after that?

Tell yourself ‘This is what I’m going to do next' and have just one thing you can do right now. What's the first step you can take? What will be the next? Each time you achieve a small part of your goal, you get a sense of achievement, and see yourself getting closer to getting what you want.

Often, all that's needed to gain the momentum to tackle the whole project is to complete the first step. And then move on to the next step. And then the next one. Each step may or may not be challenging in some way. If it feels overwhelming or too difficult, break that step down into a few smaller steps.

Even with the steps that you find challenging, you can recognize that every task you complete brings you closer to the ultimate goal. For example, when I'm decorating a room, as much as I dislike sanding down woodwork, I keep in mind that once I've completed the sanding, I'm one step closer to the room being completely decorated. And that's positive thinking!

What could feel impossible in one giant leap becomes a lot more doable as a series of smaller steps. There's nothing new about this process – it's something you've done many times before. Any task, activity or goal, anything you've achieved – from getting up and going to work, to organizing a party to moving house – has been as a result of a series of steps.

Doing things one step at a time also gives you time to look at what is working and what isn't, and to decide if you need to change tactics. So, as you go through each step, review the outcome. What's worked? What helped and went well?

Identifying goals and options and taking it one step at a time is the approach that helped Leo Babauta to get out of debt. In his blog zenhabits.net Leo explains that it all started in 2005 with his goal to quit smoking, a goal Leo attributes to setting a chain of other positive changes in motion. In his blog, Leo writes: ‘Quitting smoking taught me a lot about changing habits and accomplishing goals, and all the elements needed to make this successful. I had tried and failed to quit smoking before, and when I was successful this time, I analysed it and learned from it and was inspired by my success. Success can breed success, if you take advantage of it.’

Leo says that in order to relieve stress without smoking, he took up running. He started out by running about half a mile and slowly built up his distance and within a month was running his first 5K. Very soon, he was so into running that he decided to run his first marathon.

‘In order to get my running in, I decided to start waking early. Once I began waking early, I began to discover the joys of the quiet morning hours. I get so much more done in the morning – not work, but working on my goals.’

Leo was able to rid himself of his debts in a little over two years while supporting his wife and family of six children. ‘I stopped living paycheck-to-paycheck and learned how to stick to my budget, spend less, save and pay off debts. I started with some smaller bills in 2006, and paid off every single debt by the end of 2007. It was amazing! I now live debt-free.’

Leo's been debt-free since that time and has gone on to create one of the most popular blogs on the planet in Zen Habits. You can read more about how he did this at www.zenhabits.net/my-story/.

A warning about deadlines

Knowing when you want to achieve something by helps focus your efforts on completing and achieving what you want to do. Be careful, though, not to become overly concerned with deadlines.

You may be someone who is motivated by reaching deadlines and achieving targets. Great! On the other hand, you might be someone who is more ‘process orientated’. This means that, for you, saying, for example, ‘I want to lose a stone by Christmas’ or ‘I want to have changed my job by April’ isn't always the best mindset.

Although pressure can be positive and motivating, it can also create stress. If you don't meet the deadline or reach your target, you risk feeling like you failed (even if you are better off than you were at the start). Or you might be concerned about the time it is going to take to achieve what you want; you worry that if, for example, you start working freelance now, it could take months to build up enough clients to make it worthwhile. Or that if you leave your partner, it might be a long time before you meet someone else.

Instead of giving yourself a deadline to reach or thinking about how long it will take, know that a step-by-step plan allows you simply to work consistently towards what it is you want to achieve, however long it takes.

‘No matter how many mistakes you make or how slow you progress, you’re still way ahead of anyone who isn't trying.'

Tony Robbins

Of course, some goals have an inherent deadline – if you want to learn to dance the tango for your wedding on August 12th, you can't really change that date. What you can do, though, is give yourself a flexible plan to follow – increasing the amount of practice you need to do – rather than have the pressure of a deadline looming towards you.

Remember – you're aiming to think positively. Tell yourself ‘I have a plan. I can manage this.’ Just know to focus on one thing at a time.

Positive visualizing

Often, when you are going to do something, you visualize it first. It's a natural process. If, for example, you think about a trip to another country you have to make, you might visualize going from your home to the station or bus stop. Then you visualize the train journey to the airport, then the time you'll spend at the airport and then the flight. You then visualize arriving at your destination and making your way to the car hire place. You then visualize getting to the city or place that is your final destination.

This process of imagining is useful to help you do just about anything you want to do and ‘see’ the steps or key elements to make it happen.

When you imagine yourself doing something, your brain creates the neural pathways that you will use when it comes to doing something for real. Visualizing is like someone going ahead and beating a path for you through the jungle – they've prepared the way ready for when you come along in that direction; the path has been made easier for you.

Furthermore, this process of visualizing programs your brain to be aware of and recognize resources and information, ideas and opportunities that could help you to achieve your goals. It's positive confirmation bias; it raises your awareness of positive possibilities.

So, if you had visualized travelling to a particular area in France and someone at work mentioned restaurants in that part of France, your ears would prick up; you'd be more alert to that information. It's your brain's reticular activating system working for you; bringing to your attention relevant information.

Furthermore, if you can imagine yourself achieving something, your brain then believes and accepts that it is, indeed, possible and that you can do it. The future you see is the future you get. (If you constantly visualize not being able to do something, your brain believes and accepts that too.) Your brain can't tell the difference between having visualized making that journey to a foreign country, for example, and having done it for real.

And, as you know, if you've done something successfully once, you're more likely to believe you can do it again. This helps build confidence. And that's positive thinking!

Be flexible

Whatever you want to do and however you've chosen to go about it, you don't need to have fixed plans. As you work towards whatever it is that you want to achieve, you may need to adjust the steps you intend to take as a result of new knowledge and experience.

You will need to be flexible and open to the fact that problems might arise. Be prepared to change course in light of the unexpected. This doesn't mean that you're giving up on a great idea. It means that you're not limiting your chance of success by focusing on just one way to accomplish it.

If, when you were planning how to achieve your goal, you looked at all your options for achieving what you wanted, you would already have identified a Plan B.

It can be helpful to have a Plan B; an option that you can implement if the original one proves impractical or unsuccessful. Whether it's a journey, a change of career or getting fitter or improving a relationship with a friend or family member, things happen. The weather changes, someone doesn't want to take part, health problems come up, it costs more money than you expected. But, if you really want to get what you want, there is always a way. And, most likely, there's more than one way!