For over ten years of my life I have helped people achieve their goals. Sometimes I have a feeling that I have read every possible book on goal setting and motivation, tried most goal setting techniques on myself, seen some people perform miracles of determination and creativity and heard others make every possible excuse there is about why they can not pursue their goals.

And while every person is unique and different, there are some traits of character and similarities that many of us share when it comes to setting and achieving our goals.

I have identified Six Main Types of Goal-setters. After you finish reading about them, take time to say in the comment section, which one you are!

1. Judgment Callers

Judgment callers are people who choose not to set goals, either because they do not know what they want or they are ok with the way things are. They prefer to use judgment calls instead, which usually means that they pick the most urgent task on their to-do list and go with that.

People like this live in constant stress and struggle: reality hits – they react, problem arises – they solve it, boss demands – they perform. And it is not that they lack intelligence, determination or ability.

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Many people are great at starting things and bad at following them through. I bet if we went through our closets, drawers and garage shelves we would find signs of incompletion: a pile of magazines that we ordered a while ago, but never had time to read; a work out machine, collecting dust in our garage; a guitar that we never learned how to play. And what about all the emails that we did not have time to answer? What about New Year’s resolutions that we are unmotivated to finish?

If it sounds familiar here are a few things you might want to consider, before leaving something unfinished:

1. You spend more energy thinking about uncompleted tasks, than actually doing them.

All the mental energy that we spend thinking about all the unfinished tasks, could have been directed at doing something way more productive and satisfying. So next time you will feel like leaving something incomplete, think twice. Because you are actually making yourself work harder.

2. The hardest part is starting, not finishing.

Starting something is already a big achievement in itself. There are a lot of people, who get stuck in the thinking phase, so they actually never get to taking action on their ideas. Even if you took one little step towards your goals, you have already made progress. You are on the right track. All you have to do is take another step and another step… and little by little you will get there.

3. Perfectionism is the worst enemy of completion.

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Last night I looked in the mirror after I had finished brushing my teeth and thought that I was really beautiful. Do you have these moments when you catch your reflection in a mirror or shop window and think, “Boy, I look good!”? Well, last night I felt like that!

This morning when saw myself I almost changed my mind… My hair was a curly-frizzy mess, my eyes were sleepy, no matter how much I tried to keep them wide open, my face was grayish white and I had a big red line left by the pillow all across my cheek.

Do you know how they say that we all need our beauty sleep? Well, that was not it. This morning after spending 8 hours in bed I had definitely awakened from some special kind of ugliness sleep. I could have easily passed a casting for any horror movie looking like this. I felt frustration building up. How will I ever make THIS girl staring back at me look somewhat decent!

Before coming to a final conclusion that this was not my day, I remembered an article that I read yesterday. It talked about attachment to a certain idea being the number one reason for work stress.

For example, when we have one of those really bad days at work when everything seems to go wrong and nothing gets done, the reason for our stress could be our attachment to the idea that we must be extremely productive every day. It is an interesting thought. At least it resonates with me. I know that when I have one of those super-productive days I often expect that the next day will be just as great (which is obviously not realistic). We cannot perform at the maximum of our efficiency and creativity every single day.

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