Here are several quotes about setting and achieving goals. My comments follow.

The weakest ink is better than the strongest memory. - John Rickenbacker

Do you want to dramatically increase the likelihood of you meeting your goals for the new year? One of the simplest yet most powerful actions you can take is to write down your goals. Its so easy to get caught up in the busy-ness of everyday life that it then becomes all too easy to forget about your goals. I think the saying is when you are up to your rear-end in alligators, its easy to forget your original intention was to drain the swamp.

Put your goals down on paper. Keep them where you will see them everyday. Doing this will prevent you from saying around this time next year, oh yeah, I remember those.........

Goals are dreams with deadlines - Diana Scharf Hunt

Set achievement dates for your goals. Otherwise, we get caught in the trap of someday. As in, someday Ill do that.

Check out your calendar. You will find:

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.

What you will not find is:

someday.

So not only does someday never come, it doesnt even exist.

Make your goals public - Dr. Philip Humbert

Go public with your goals. Share them with family and friends. It increases the likelihood of you reaching your goals in at least two ways:

1) those close to you can hold you accountable

2) those close to you can encourage you and cheer you on.

I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is another step forward. - Thomas Edison, Inventor

In the confrontation between the stream and the rock, the stream always wins - not through strength but by perseverance. H. Jackson Brown - A Fathers Book of Wisdom

In any endeavor worth doing, you will encounter difficulties and slips. Never, never give up and quit. Dont die of thirst just a few feet from the water. You never know how close you may be to reaching your goal.

Each and every time you fall short, you have just learned something very powerful: you now know at least one more way that does not work. Discard it and keep going.

It really can be as simple, and as difficult, as the following Japanese proverb that says

Fall seven times, get up eight.