This time of year, goals are all the rage. As there are a lot of resources on goal-setting readily available to you, I won't go into it now. Rather our focus will be on actual achievement of the goals.

But before we even venture into that, there's something you need to be sure about.

You're familiar with the phrase 'the ladder of success', right? Probably are on it right now, aren't you? All your efforts are directed towards making you a success at whatever you're doing. That's all good, but are you sure your ladder is leaning against the right wall?

Here's what I mean.

If your ladder is leaning against the wrong wall, you'll find yourself expending your energy and effort faithfully, only to reach the top and realize it's not where you desire to be. You get there and discover you're still as miserable as you were at the bottom of the ladder (even though you may be surrounded with lots of 'things': money, material things, that is).

How would you feel to learn that you're working hard to get to a place like that?

The point is this.

Before you put your goals to paper, you need to make sure the goals you set are truly desirable to YOU. Make sure they're goals you'll end up very satisfied and fulfilled with once you've reached them. Make sure that the price you have to pay to reach those goals is something you're willing to do.

How can you tell if you'll be happy about your goal and the journey to reach it? In other words, how can you ensure that your ladder of success is leaning against the right wall?

By first assessing your core values.

What are they?
What things are most important to you?
What principles do you believe in?

If you do not know the answers to these, and similar questions, you're setting yourself up for frustration and failure. This is because when you dishonour your core values by your thoughts, words or actions, you set off waves of negative vibrations (you can't fool your subconscious mind, you know). These in turn attract unfavourable people and circumstances to you.

You find yourself self-sabotaging your own efforts once you get the chance. You break your commitments to yourself and others. You don't quite feel like doing the things you 'should' do. And so forth. All this leads to undesirable outcomes, as you can imagine.

So your challenge and assignment for this week is this: Spend some quality time uninterrupted, and probe deep into your soul to find out the answer to the question: what are your core values?

Once you are crystal clear on what your values are, your awareness will enable you to set goals and action plans that honour those values. This will ensure that your ladder of success is leaning against the right wall. It will also ensure that your climb up that ladder is a delightful one.

That's surely a worthwhile investment of your time, then - the time you spend clarifying your values, don't you think?