To get what you want out of life, you must know what you want out of life.

And even if you know it, you must remember it every day. It must always be in the back of your mind.

Start every morning by reviewing your most important goals and aspirations. And say them out loud. When you say them out loud, it combines reviewing them, hearing them, and doing a physical action (speaking) with them.

Before that, of course, you need to spend some time deciding what you want as your main goals and aspirations.

Some goals will be life-long; others will be short-term, for this month or this year.

Think about what you truly value in life:

• If you died tomorrow, what would you want to have accomplished?
• What kind of person would you want to have been?

It’s important to put a due date on goals. A goal without a due date isn’t a goal, only a wish. “I want to lose 10 pounds” won’t motivate you. “I want to lose 10 pounds by December 31” is a real goal.

Your aspirations, on the other hand, are not specific goals. They’re principles you want to follow and habits you want to develop. By reminding yourself of them every morning, you keep your life on track. It helps to have a written list.

One of my written aspirations is “I want to focus on doing good things to achieve my goals.” I say it out loud every morning. Especially now, it’s easy for anyone to get sucked into wasting hours on unproductive and sometimes unhealthy trivia. Having a spoken aspiration every day helps keep the focus on what’s true and important.

So what’s important to you? What do you want your life to be like? How is your life going to matter in a positive way?

Get started today, and remind yourself every day from now on!

How to put beliefs into action is a key theme of my book Why Sane People Believe Crazy Things Second Edition, available now. Get your copy today!