A while back I wrote about whether or not you should tell people your goals. My research showed that telling people your goals does help, but you have to tell the right people. This is why today I’m diving into how to find the right people to share your goals with.
To find the right people to share your goals with, focus on finding people whose opinions you value because those are the type of people that research shows will actually help you reach your goals. You can find these kinds of people online in communities, among your family and friends, or by finding a mentor or coach.
By being intentional about telling your goals to only people you look up to, you’ll be able to increase your chances of reaching even your biggest dreams.
Let’s dive in by looking at the first place you might find people to tell your goals to.
1. Look Online for New Friends and Communities
A few years ago I started writing online at Medium.com. I had a feeling that I wanted to start sharing ideas about personal growth online, but I wasn’t sure where to begin.
That’s when a friend told me about Medium. I quickly created an account but I wouldn’t start to seriously consider writing until months later. I got stuck in overthinking and even sent an email to a writer I followed asking for advice. Amazingly he responded with just two words:
“Just begin.”
I did, and I quickly became part of a wonderful online community of writers.
Fast-forward six months and I’d stuck to my writing goal, published over 150 articles, and had made hundreds of dollars. Best of all, that writer I followed emailed me asking if I wanted to write for him and invited me to a group of the top writers on Medium.
Over the course of the next two years and each year since I’ve been mentored by some amazing people from that group. They helped me stay accountable as I was able to share my goal with them, and I got better faster because of their advice.
This is why I highly recommend that you start looking for people to share your goals with online.
A lot of the time your friends and family are just a little too close to be of help here. But you can quickly find someone online who has your exact same goal to get accountability and encouragement from.
If I was starting over looking for friends online, I’d start on Twitter (now known as X) or LinkedIn.
Begin by posting and following people who inspire you. After a while, you can start sending DMs to people who you think can help you.
You can even post that you’re looking for an accountability partner and see what comes up. The more you write and connect with others, the more opportunities will come your way.
2. Consider a Friend or Family Member
In the previous section, I briefly mentioned that telling your goals to someone who is already close to you might not be the best idea. They might not be supportive of certain goals of yours and most of the time they’re not trained coaches.
But family and friends shouldn’t be ruled out as an option because the right person could make all the difference.
Set the ground rule that it has to be someone you trust who will support you. Don’t get someone who will just listen. Try to find a balance between someone who will not let you make excuses and someone who won’t be too hard on you, depending on your circumstances.
This doesn’t mean you can’t share your goals with a few people you know well. It just means that if you want to get better accountability, you’ll have to be picky.
A few years ago I started sharing my goals with my wife each week. She’s great at balancing discipline and kindness and isn’t afraid to show some tough love when I need it.
With her help, I’ve been able to quickly see flaws in my thinking that previously made it hard to stick to my goals. In this and many other ways, she’s been a huge help in keeping me accountable and consistent.
If you can’t think of a friend or family member, go make new friends. You might have to raise the bar on who you spend time with, and that’s a good thing.
There’s a world of opportunity out there. Go and find it by going to the kind of places where awesome people hang out, like the gym, coffee shops, and coworking spaces.
Remember, you’re the average of the five people you spend the most time with. Choose those people wisely.
3. Get a Coach to Keep You Accountable
In 2019 I began working for myself. It was exciting to get to be at home with my family all the time. But I started to feel a little lost and disorganized. As it worsened, my productivity declined, and I knew I needed to change something.
That’s when a friend of mine, the same writer who I told me to just begin that I mentioned earlier, told me about Coach.me. It’s a website and app with affordable coaches that you connect with through chat and occasional video calls.
Not long afterward I signed up, excited at the opportunity to learn from a mentor. I still remember I had my first call while on a vacation to Glacier National Park and I had to get up early to make time to meet my coach and get started.
From there, everything started to get better. On the tough days, I could message him and he’d encourage me and help me keep going. As we’d review progress each week, he’d help me see what I needed to improve on most.
That’s the amazing thing about a coach, they can find your roadblocks in 15 minutes whereas normally it would take you months or years to discover and overcome them.
Coaches are also trained to help you reach your goals, so sharing your goals with them is probably the best option overall. There are three ways to go about this depending on your budget and needs:
- For maximum results, you can pay hundreds or thousands for an expert-level coach.
- For balance between results and cost, use apps like Coach.me.
- To get a completely free coach, you might have to do some work, but if you go on X or other websites you can find people who want to start coaching and ask them.
And if you want, I’ll coach you! Just click here to check out plans or send me an email at luke@goalengineer.com and we’ll figure something out.
Let’s Wrap This Up
To review, here’s how to find the right people to share your goals with:
- Look online in communities like Medium.com or X.
- Think about sharing your goals with a family member or friend.
- Hire a coach to keep you accountable.
Above all, get someone you trust because that’s the only way that sharing your goals will help you achieve them.
