Sometimes our “dreams” can seem so far away from where we are right now, it gets overwhelming. Trust me, I know this. Often we gape at the sheer magnitude of the mountains ahead of us and just decide, “It’s simply too far away” or “It may never happen”. We look at the dream and realise it’s all too much and walk away.

But here’s the thing you gotta ask yourself. How is it possible for other regular human beings to get to live out their dreams despite the odds? What are THEY doing that I’m not?

Last week, I shared my Behind-the-Scenes Story of How I Started My Cake Business, and for those of you who read it, you would know that my beginning was far from perfect. I had a million reasons to walk away and do something “easier” or “safer”. But somehow deep within my gut, intuition and heart I knew I had to pursue this.

So you’ve heard my story, and now you’re dreaming up a storm for your life. What now?

Today I’ll be sharing the 4 things that helped me position myself towards actually ACHIEVING my career goals. 4 actions that made sure that I didn’t fall down the slippery slope of wishful thinking but actually DO the things I so wanted to. These are goal-setting pillars I learnt from business coaches & life mentors which helped propel me towards my own career milestones. That said, I am still walking out my own journey, and I’m soooo not done kicking goals yet (cause I always believe in the potential for even “greater things” ahead no matter what we’ve already accomplished).

So today I’m sharing my insider goal-setting actions that I know from experience will help spearhead you in the direction of your aspirations, in hopes that you get to experience the delight of walking in the future your dreams have written.

#1 Write Down Your Goals

If you’ve already done this, then big pat on the back to you. Marvelous.! But stay with me on this…

Why is this important you ask?

Let me explain…. Having a dream or idea in your head is all well and good, but putting it down on paper (or your laptop or whatever) is the FIRST STEP to actually planning our your dream-chasing course. You need to gather your thoughts and work out IN DETAIL what it is exactly that you want to achieve.

So you want to actually write & list out a 3 year goal, a 2 year goal & finally your 1 year goal (yes, working backwards).

Your 3 year goal should be your “big dream” goals. The big scary stuff you want to work towards but aren’t quite sure how they’re gonna happen.

The 2 year goals are in between milestones that you know you need to achieve in order to reach your 3 years goal.

Your 1 year goal is a list of things you have to complete by the end of the year to set you on the right track towards achieving year 2 & 3 goals. These first year goals should be both realistic, yet ambitious.

The key to all this again is to be SPECIFIC. Don’t just write down “Imma gonna be the best cake decorator EVAAA” or “I’m going to make lots of $$$$$ cha-ching!”

That is not an achievable, realised goal. What you probably want to write down is something like:

“I want to enter 2 cake competitions or collaborations by the end of the year”

“I want to start & grow my Instagram account by at least 5000 this year”

“I want to start booking $1k+ weddings by mid this year”

And so on & so forth…

You want to write & plan out calculable goals that you can actually take steps towards.

Working backwards in Goal planning in this way also helps make your BIG GOAL look more achievable. Why? Cause you’re breaking it down into smaller bite sized pieces that you KNOW will eventually lead you towards your BIG DREAMS.

#2 Invest in study & development

If you’re reading this blog, then well done you! You are INVESTING in your skills & knowledge which makes you not just a “dreamer”, but DOER. High five!

The ones who get ahead in life are really those who never ever stop learning, growing or evolving. The ones who are hungry for knowledge and who actually invest time & money in their education.

The more we apply ourselves to learning, the better cakers & business people we will be. Over the years, I have invested heavily in courses, online tutorials, live classes, books, blogs, articles…and they have been the biggest asset in my caking career. Every investment I’ve made to growing my business knowledge & cake skills have always paid off in spades not just in my confidence, or skill…but especially so in my business profits.

That’s what investing means. To put something of value into a venture in hopes of reaping a greater profit or benefit. Whatever time, effort or finance we invest into our education isn’t a lost… we reap the fruit of in in a different, compounded form over time.

It’s a lot like the act of planting a seed. We need to tend to the soil, water the seed, fertilise the ground and invest time & resources into this seed. But later on, as time goes by, we get to experience the FRUIT of our early labours with a bountiful harvest!

#3 Don’t just dream…DO.

Planning, learning, & investing in our “dreams” alone ain’t enough. We have to actually DO it. Otherwise, our goals & wishes remain just pipe dreams…whimsy’s and fancies that eventually, never go anywhere.

So what does it look like to not just dream, but DO?

Well, it would be to set aside a set amount of hours each week to action out your goals. So for example you could determine to make 1 cake or new edible décor each week. Or perhaps you could set aside 2 hours growing your social media following each week. Or you might want to learn 1 new cake skill every month.

Whatever it is, just DO IT. Set aside time each week (even if it’s as little as 1 hour) dedicated to working towards your 1 year plan.

#4 Create a Habit of Using a Planner or Diary 

I would totally recommend using a planner or diary to map out each week so you KNOW you are taking small steps towards your goals. Successful people are very good at maximising their time. Think about it, we all get 24 hours a day. You, me the President of the United States. But how is it that some achieve more than others in their set 24 hours? The difference is in being organised with our daily schedule & responsibilities by planning out our weeks & months with intention.

I used the word HABIT because it is something that has to be cultivated over time. Not everyone is used to living their lives according to a planner, but this is something that should be learnt if you are serious about running a thriving & organised cake business.

You can choose to use a diary that’s inbuilt into your phone, or if you’re like me and love to scribble everything down (to have it visually & physically mapped out) you can use a weekly or daily planner. I love doing this, as it allows me to make sure I’ve got all my weekly tasks mapped out, my day-to-day mommy duties & my work all neatly slotted somewhere into my week. I don’t have to worry about doing this or that, because I’ve got it all out of my brain and onto my diary, which I simply have to follow.

Yes, sometimes things come up and our week doesn’t quite go as planned. Life’s like that. Simply reschedule and move those important things into the next week and go from there.

If you struggle with procrastination, then set yourself little rewards so you’re motivated to finish mundane tasks (like reward yourself with a cookie or something). Another great tactic which I picked up in my teenage years back when I was a junior state athlete (say whaa..?) is to mentally visualise the end goal (e.g I’m going to spend 2 hours practising my piping so I can make those beautiful iced cookies I saw someone make last week). Try it, it works 🙂

In my first Blog post of the year, I talked about Achieving Your Wildest Cake Dreams and so many of you responded that this post resounded deeply with you. One of my personal goals this year is to equip you with keys & tools to actually achieve YOUR wildest cake dreams.

So my sweet friend, don’t just fantasise about your dreams… Do something about it. Don’t live with the regret of “what if” or “if only I had…”.

It’s all possible.

Write your goals, make a plan, invest & learn deeply, map out each week & most of all….

DO.

What if 2018 was the year where you finally stepped out? What if you could finally start earning an income from cake decorating? What if you won a cake competition? What if you launched that cake business?

What if, what if, what if…

If you follow Sugar Sugar Cakes on social media or are a regular reader of this blog, you would know that I drop a new blog post here on Mondays. So with the opportunity of releasing a new blog post on the FIRST day of the NEW YEAR, I want to challenge you, that this could be YOUR YEAR. The year that you turn those ‘what ifs’ into a something tangible.

I don’t know about you, but I got a stirring in my gut about this year (and it ain’t from all the Christmas trimmings I had last week). I’ve got this unshakeable sense that there are quite possibly big things in store for each & every one of us if only we position ourselves (our goals, our priorities, our learning & our mindset) in the right direction.

I’m convinced that it should very well be time to shake off the doubts, the naysayers, the fears and take purposeful steps forwards to turn our secret hope & dreams into our reality.

For some of us, the ‘cake dream’ is clear. Perhaps you wake up in the morning wishing you could stay home and bake all day instead of going to work. Or maybe you twiddle you pen at the office dreaming of starting our own cake business. Or perhaps you spend your afternoons watching Youtube videos on cake and wonder if you could ever be one of those chirpy teachers you see on your screen.

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So here are some bold statements I’d like to discuss on the subject of ‘Discovering & Achieving Your Cake Dream’….

You don’t have to be ultra-special to be a success 

“Wha…? Amanda..?! This is ridiculous …” you say. All the “reasons” built up in our minds about why we can’t have the wins that we see others have are mostly fabricated & untrue. All those people you admire, aspire to be like, hope to emulate… are all in fact, regular normal people.

Which could only mean one thing. Lil ol’ me, you, she, him, her… all have a shot at achieving our biggest wildest cake dreams regardless of where we were raised, which country we live in, how much (or little) money our family has, our social standing, our age etc.

One thing that I appreciate from Snapchat & Instastories (a new “insider video” form of social media) is the ability to take a sneaky peek into the lives of affluent & notable individuals from all over the globe. Seeing them do their weekly grocery run, buy coffee, get stuck in traffic, go to the doctors and stroke their pets are all wonderful reminders that the “greats” out there are JUST LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE.

The fact is, ANYONE can achieve their cake dreams and find success in the cake industry.

You may ask then “why isn’t EVERYONE successful?” ahha… I’m glad you brought that up. Therein lies some very interesting factors that separate the exceptional from the ordinary, the legendary from the mediocre. And THAT, will be covered in my next upcoming blog post in exactly a fortnight from today.

You don’t have to wait until you’re the most talented caker to START achieving your dreams

Now let’s get one thing straight. In making this statement, I am NOT endorsing laziness or passivity in working/schooling-up on skill & knowlege. I believe every caker needs to constantly work hard at being the creative BEST that they can be.

The point that I’m making here is that you don’t have to wait till you win “so & so” competition or till you are good at “so & so” skill till you venture out and do something BIG with your caking. The key point I’m trying to make here is to JUST START ANYWAYS. If you keep “waiting” till you reach a certain height or accolade, the danger is that you may spend too long (or maybe your whole life) waiting. And that will be so, very sadly unfortunate.

I was casually chatting with a friend last week who is currently attending art school and I asked her, “How come I never see you post or show people your artwork… like, ever?” to which she replied “I only want to show my work when I feel they’re professional enough, and until then, I’m not going to display my work”. I get it, the feelings of insecurity & fear-of-judgement when our work is exposed onto a public platform to stand alongside those with 1M followers & a gazillion likes. It’s hard and kinda freaky.

But friend, I’d like to offer an encouraging nudge.. Take intentional steps forward this year towards your cake dream. Don’t sit around waiting. Cause here’s another fun fact for ya..

There is no perfect time to start chasing you dreams

You. Just. Gotta. Start.

One step at a time. The longer you wait, the longer you’re putting off your own progress & achievement.

Something veeeeery interesting that I’ve observed in my own journey & others: Success comes progressively over a long period of time, and not overnight. You know the age old adage “Rome wasn’t built in a day”? Well, it’s true. And the principle applies in the building of cake empires.

The growth, the learning, the refining, all happen along the way. We don’t start building our dreams when we’ve got all our ducks lined in a row.

We build our dreams when our heart & gut tell us to, and as we take each progressive step forward, each learning curve brings a mini success (which in time, leads us to bigger and then big success).

One of my favourite things to do (when I’m “busy” procrastinating on my laptop) is to scroll far faaaaaar back in the online History of some of my fav cake & business personalities (the people I admire who are really slaying it in their field). One very fascinating common vein I observe is that all these people started off pretty average. Don’t believe me? Just look up popular cake personalities and hunt down their earliest video, blog post, Instagram post or whatever. You’ll find that they started from humble beginnings. The cakes probably looked a lil wonky, the video quality sketchy and the cake images amateurish. But they started anyways and look how far they’ve come, how much they’ve learnt and how influential they’ve grown.

My friend, if you’d seen some of my earliest cake work, you’ll feel a WHOLE TON better about yourself. I caked some of saddest looking cakes I’ve ever seen (no joke!) in my early decorating days. But I persevered, I studied hard, I invested in my cake education & over time, I’ve finally reached a place where I’m living out my cake dream for reals. I pinch myself daily that I get to bake, create & connect with cake enthusiasts all over the globe for a living and be my own #girlboss.

And if I can do it, you can too..

Remember..

“The distance between your dreams & reality is called action”

In the coming posts, I’ll be sharing steps on how to make your cake dreams a reality, and also my personal (never before shared) detailed story on how I started my cake business. I’d love to know dear reader, what’s been holding you back from chasing down your cake dreams?