Creating Blogging Goals that Motivate and Inspire

Goals that Motivate and Inspire

Posted on July 19, 2008 by Katy

Dreaming

It’s Saturday, I have a busy weekend ahead so let’s see about a more leisurely post and one that perhaps gets you thinking and sharing. Up for a conversation?

There are no shortage of posts around the blogosphere telling you how to make money, earn a full time income, and in some cases “become rich” with blogging. While I utilize a lot of concepts and put them to work for myself, I don’t often blog about income. I don’t see it serving a huge purpose at the moment because there are many other places to fill the need to learn this.

Additionally, constantly blogging about earning an income on my own blog means that I would be putting aside my own goals for this blog as well as generating “me too” concepts that have been said by other bloggers.

Now, having said that, I do have income goals and monetization strategies that I have put into place for myself (most of them are not on this blog). But because of the income I do and can generate I have extreme goals to create my own since of notoriety within the blogosphere.

Previously I’ve talked about brainstorming goals that will enable you to reach the level of success that you choose to have. But mostly the goals I suggested in that post were how you would reach the next level of blogging, again, not monetization.

But I have a dream that I’m working towards with monetization because of my blogging and here’s where this post is going.

When you look at your blogging goals, where are they taking you in your real life?

Do you want to quit your day job? Do you want to earn a specific dollar amount per month? Are you waiting to afford your dream vacation or get-away? Is your blog just an outlet with no monetization strategy?

Today, I’ll give you a glimpse of my own offline goal of where blogging will take me and I invite you to share your own goal(s) as well…

If you have read my about page, you may know that I live in Las Vegas. You’ll also know that I’m absolutely in love with my city and have no real intention of leaving but recently, this changed.

For some unknown reason I started doing a lot of research and day dreaming about Europe and have decided that I want more than a visit, I’d love to live there and more specifically, I’d like to move to Paris.

Paris, France

A conversation with Joanne that she’d indeed love to live in Paris and we’ve now got an official time line to move. It’s not tomorrow, it’s not even next year, in fact it’s 5 years away! But the goals that I have created for my online work practices is exactly what will move us to our ultimate destination.

Why am I sharing?

After having this goal for a bit, it recently occurred to me that only my closest friends know of my plan. Why am I hiding it? Especially when it’s something I’m very excited about (we’re already started to learn French, just to prepare). By creating this post and express to all of you what my goal is suddenly, it makes the goal more concrete.

By having my own goal known to the world, perhaps I can inspire you to set a goal that you’re sure you can reach, share a goal you’d like to reach, or put into motion the steps you have to take to reach your goal.

What it Takes

Moving to Paris requires several stepping stones. But I’m happy to tell you that after just 2 years of dedicated blogging, I have one third income that I need to generate to put this move into place for us. After all, reaching the goal of moving to Paris means that Joanne (my wife, if you don’t know :o)) will no longer be working and will take an early retirement.

More than that, having a goal this huge generates dedication, determination, and a need to put myself out there. No, I won’t be asking for money (that is, unless you’d like to freely give it) but instead, use the tools that I already have to create the income that is needed to move and sustain our life once moved.

Keeping Focus

I have set myself up to be reminded of my goal on a near constant basis.

My desktop is the image that I have above of Paris. Several times a day I break to check out the Paris Live webcams. And because we have already started to learn French, random words are thrown out in my conversations with Joanne in an effort to not only learn but utilize my new language.

If you have a goal, how do you motivate and inspire yourself to keep going? What’s your reminder to stay on track?

Sit and Ponder

Thinking

What do you want to create for yourself online? Not everyone will have something as big as moving to another country and not everyone will want to earn an income that can sustain their household. However, that doesn’t mean that you own personal goals for your blog aren’t just as important and just as valuable.

So, have you thought about some important blogging goals and where you’d like blogging to take you? Would you care to share your goals?

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Discussion: 696CommentsGoals+that+Motivate+and+Inspire2008-07-19+18%3A58%3A57Katy

Comments to “Goals that Motivate and Inspire”

Taryn Merrick

- 19th Jul, 08 06:07pm

Oh Katy, how I can relate. My dream years ago was to move to Australia. However, that was prior to my days as a business owner and before the virtual business world emerged.

I still can relate though. I envision my future blog (my current one is good but my future one will be better ;-) to position me as an experienced authority on Virtual Assistant’s in my specific niche. I would like it to be a vehicle for people to learn more about my company and it’s abilities, and thereby draw them to me as clients and colleagues.

I am learning a LOT from you blog, of course!

Michelle

- 19th Jul, 08 08:07pm

You never cease to amaze me and I am sure you will be happy in Europe. My husband and I have often thought about moving to Canada (it’s another country, but still close to our home state Wisconsin, but no plans yet).

I have several goals that I am working towards and many new projects that are exciting! My goals are less about blogging and more about my business – I blog for fun currently and the monetization is extra. I do plan to target my strongest niche market and am planning a new site based on this next year. I stay focused because I enjoy seeing my creations come to life and then whatever happens next is a bonus!

Nicola

- 19th Jul, 08 11:07pm

What a fantastic goal to have. Paris is beautiful and I bet you’ll have a great time, especially if Joanne doesn’t have to work and you can define your own working hours. Don’t forget to hop on the Eurostar and come and visit some of your English fans ;)

On the subject of goals, I’m in the process of restructuring and rebranding my blogs (with the help of my husband, who writes multi-million pound business plans almost daily), and it’s great to have it written down in black and white – what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. It’s a real motivation.

Katy Castro (author comment)

- 20th Jul, 08 10:07am

@Taryn: Perhaps you’ll still have your chance to move to Australia because of where you see your online work taking you. One never knows! :D

@Michelle: Joanne and I once considered Canada but the reasons behind it just weren’t enough (they allow gay marriage). Though I hear it’s beautiful there I’m further tainted by the idea after talking with my brother’s Canadian wife.

@Nicola: Thank you! I certainly will head over to England as well. In fact, when we set our goal of Paris we had several weeks worth of conversation to decide between moving to England or Paris. Obviously though, Paris won but I plan on spending a lot of time traveling once we get there (great thing about an Internet job). :D

Good luck with your business plan, sounds like it’s in the right hands with your husband. :o)

dmarie

- 20th Jul, 08 09:07pm

Thanks for sharing. Awesome vision. I like how you incorporate your future vision into your present reality. Many people refuse to take that leap of faith. But for those that do, they know it’s the only way to achieve your goals/dreams.

Katy Castro (author comment)

- 21st Jul, 08 10:07am

@dmarie: Thank you! For me, projecting my goals and sharing them with others makes them a reality and in this case, something I wanted to share to inspire others to create goals they believe they can work towards. As a personal feeling, without goals, I have nothing to work for.

WebTrafficRoI

- 21st Aug, 08 12:08am

Setting goals is an important part of any job .And this applies to blogging also.By reading your post it seems you have thought deeply about your goal and chalked out a well laid plan to achieve your goal and have given sufficient time to realize the goal,which is a very good thing to do.Hope you will succeed in your goals

Caz

- 22nd Oct, 08 06:10am

Hi Katy,

I just emailed you via Kiss My Code but I wanted to say good luck with your dreams. Coming from England I did spend 10 months living and working in Paris. It is a beautiful city but I’d certainly try and visit before moving out there so you know what you’re getting yourself into.

My dream funnily enough is to move to Las Vegas with my fiance and live the American dream and put into action 3 projects which I’m working on, 1 of which is web based. This week I’ve really started to shift into gear with them and you’ve inspired me even more to do so.

All the best,

Caz

Create + feelings

- 20th Mar, 09 10:03am

I have set myself to be reminded of my goal a near constant basis. I have a goal, I motivate and inspire myself to keep going. Thanks for inspiration.