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How a little support can help you achieve your goal

Big dreams, small steps.
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U-18 Stoney Nakoda Girls Volleyball Team going to the Alberta Indigenous Games.

By Martin Parnell

When you have set yourself a goal, whether it be to further an existing project or begin a new one, it’s important to have strategies in place, in order to achieve your target.

These may include:

Setting a timeline – making sure you have enough time to reach your goal, but not too much that you let it drag on, letting things wane and running the risk of losing interest.

Securing funding - having the finances to cover the cost is essential. You can ask for funding from grants, finance the project with your own funds (so long as you can afford it), ask for sponsorship, use crowdfunding or bring in a partner, who shares your ideas and passion.

Recognizing obstacles – thinking about the challenges you may encounter is a good way to put in place strategies to overcome them, when they arise.

It’s not often that we can complete all our goals on our own and, therefore, another important strategy is to enlist the help and support of others. This can help in numerous ways, i.e. gaining expert knowledge, tech support, supplies, funding, sharing tasks and maybe even in practical ways e.g. child care and especially moral support.

An example of ways in which others can support you in achieving a specific goal can be illustrated in the route taken by Joey Wesley, coach, of the U-18 Stoney Nakoda Girls Volleyball team.

Joey’s goal was to have his team of girls, from the Wesley, Chiniki and Bearspaw First Nations, participate in the 2019 Alberta Indigenous Games. Joey shared the story with local media and set up a GoFundMe page. They had a financial target for their expenses and support came in from groups including Nakoda Youth Council, Rotary Club of Cochrane, Banff Lodging Co. and Communitea Café. The team did their own fund raising with bake sales and over $2,000 was raised by 33 donations on the GoFundMe page. Support also came from Dylan Squires, Town of Cochrane, who is a volleyball coach and helped Joey during the girl’s practices.

The team went to the games in mid-August and were competitive in every match they played. Joey and his team had set a goal, planned on how they were going to achieve it and succeeded in their efforts. Congratulations to everyone who was involved in this endeavour. Together we are stronger.

© 2019 Martin Parnell
[email protected]
www.martinparnell.com

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