When we get excited about improving our lives we can come up with so many wonderful ways to do it.

Read a book a week, workout everyday at 5am for an hour, lose 20 pounds by Wednesday, be home for dinner every night, have a date night with our significant other once a week, read with our kids every night before bed, start volunteering at the animal shelter, and double our income in 60 days.

Phew — exhausting! I need a nap.

The reality check comes when we consider that it is extremely hard, if not impossible, to sustainably and sanely, take on more than one major goal at a time.

I get it. We want to do it all and do it all now. But by doing this we ultimately kill our motivation and create goal burnout. I have a suggestion...no, really it is actually a requirement.

Take your list of goals and look it over. (You do have a list of goals, don’t you? If not, stop reading this right now and write some down for crying out loud. 10 things you would be thrilled to accomplish in the next 6 months. Simple as that. And please, do yourself a favor and actually WRITE THEM DOWN!)

Looking at your list of goals, ask yourself: If I could only accomplish one of these goals in the next 6 months, which goal by achieving it would have the greatest positive impact on my life?

Once you have determined which goal that is, write that goal on a separate sheet of paper in HUGE BOLD PERMANENT MARKER LETTERS. Yes, find the Sharpie!

Write it in the first person present progressive tense. “I am running a marathon.” “I am doubling my income.” “I am reading to my kids every night.” You get the idea.

One caveat. Write the goal from a positive reference point. For example, if your goal is to: lose weight, quit smoking, or get out of debt. State these this way: I am at my ideal weight of 175; I am a non-smoker; I am financially free. Your mind will have a tendency to gravitate toward the negative words and focus there (lose, quit, get out, debt), so try to avoid using them.

Now throw the original goal list away. Seriously, throw the list away. In the trash. Gone. You do not need to look at it any more.

Take your new goal list of “Goal Numero Uno” and stick it somewhere where you will see it all of the time. Put it up in multiple places. On your car dashboard, on your bathroom mirror, on your office window, on your coffee mug, on your dog, on your kids....wherever. Look at it often. And say it out loud every time you look at it.

Doing this will cement your goal so powerfully into your subconscious that your mind will be like, “Enough already….we’ll run the damn marathon!!!” You’ll implement the Power of Focus, the Law of Attraction, the Law of Cause and Effect, and even rally up the heavenly angels, too! All of this will cause you to achieve your goal AND also (wah-lah, like magic) achieve successes in areas beyond your goal.

Because, as you determined, the main goal that you are pursuing is the one that is going to have an enormously positive impact on you. There will be a ripple effect and a tidal wave of awesomeness flowing into other areas of your life.

One goal. One focus. A multitude of benefits. Do it. You’ll be amazed at the results.