Keep Goals to Yourself - TED Talk

Lisa and I watched a couple TED Talks vids the other night - which is a great substitute for watching TV - seriously, pick one night a week and watch TED speakers for the evening - good for the whole family and will stimulate your brain cells.  Anyway, we re-watched this short clip by Derek Sivers which contradicts some popular goal setting tactics.  3 minutes, have a watch:

This is interesting and the opposite of what lot of "experts" recommend but the studies done actually show that you are less likely to accomplish your goals if you tell people about them. Sounds crazy because it seems rational that by telling people your goal you will be more motivated to act on it but the experiments conducted showed the opposite. When sharing your goals with people you get positive feelings and brain chemicals trigger a sense of "accomplishment" even though you really haven't moved any closer to your goal.

So... accordingly, the best method for goal management is the following:

1. Write down your top few goals (1 year / 5 year)
2. Review it daily (and refine if necessary)
3. Determine a list of sure and potential action items for each
4. Visualize what the outcome looks like until the image is clear in your mind
5. Keep it to yourself but work diligently towards accomplishing each step
6. Reward yourself accordingly for each successful step towards your goal