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Episode Summary:

How do you set goals that align with God’s plan for your life and business? In this episode, we’re diving into Spirit-led vision casting and how to invite God into your goal-setting process. You’ll learn how to move beyond hustle culture, surrender your plans to the Lord, and set faith-driven, actionable goals that align with His purpose for you.

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by traditional goal-setting methods, struggled to stay consistent, or wondered if your ambitions truly reflect God’s will, this episode is for you! Let’s walk through how to cast a God-centered vision and create a plan that keeps faith at the forefront.

Key Takeaways:

🖤 Why most goal-setting methods fail—and how to set goals that actually stick

🖤 How to seek God’s direction first before making plans

🖤 The 6-step Spirit-Led Vision Casting process

🖤 The importance of surrendering your goals back to God

🖤 How to balance faith, action, and trust in your business decisions

Key Scripture:

✨ “Commit your actions to the Lord, and your plans will succeed.” – Proverbs 16:3

🎯 Listener Challenge:

This week, take time to pray over your goals and vision. Ask yourself:

✔️ Am I seeking God first in my goal-setting?

✔️ Am I creating faith-driven goals instead of following worldly success standards?

✔️ Am I surrendering my plans and trusting God’s timing?

Spend time journaling and take one intentional step to align your goals with God’s purpose this week!

Let’s Connect!

📲 Instagram: @erseaberg

💌 Join My Community:

⭐️ If this episode encouraged you, leave a review and share it with a friend!

Listen in and be encouraged—when you put God at the center of your goals, He will direct your path. 🖤

Transcript:

Hello, and welcome to You've Been Called Out.

I'm Erin Seaberg, and this is the podcast for Christian women in their entrepreneur era.

Today, we're talking about goal setting and vision casting.

And it might seem like it's a little bit late in the month to talk about that.

A lot of people set their goals back in December, wanted to get all ready for the new year.

But one of the reasons why I wanted to do this episode now is because I have noticed that most of the time, by the end of January, people are dropping off.

You're going strong maybe week one and two.

Week three, we're starting to teeter a little bit.

By week four, we're like, yeah, that was a good idea, but maybe I'll try again next year, or I'll try again February 1st.

So this is for all of the women who never set goals, for all the women who are ready to try again on February 1st.

And for anyone who's going strong with their current goals, but maybe just wants a little bit of encouragement, or maybe wants to align them more with biblical principles and the things that the Lord has for them.

So we're just going to dive into a little bit of what my goal setting process looks like, and the process that my husband and I went through this year to set our goals.

And it actually comes directly from my program Made for More Entrepreneur.

It's one of the first things that we do.

Well, the very first thing is that we work through identity, because before you set any of your goals, you need to know who you are, especially in light of who Jesus is.

So after we get through that, we work on setting goals and vision casting, and then goal tracking, building habits from there, all that kind of good stuff.

But a core component of that is spirit-led vision casting.

And what that looks like is seeking the Lord first.

It's not this crazy, you know, thing that you have to figure out.

We don't have to dissect God's will for our lives, and the vision, and all that kind of stuff.

It is simply starting with offering ourselves to the Lord, offering our year, our lives to the Lord, our plans, our dreams, all of those things, and then asking Him to lead us.

So I just want to go over with you kind of the process that we went through, and it's literally like, for my clients, it's just a worksheet that we have that literally takes them through this process.

What we start with is prayer and scripture, and kind of just centering our minds on the Lord.

Because ultimately, we have all these dreams, we have all these concepts in our head, but the Lord is the one who is going to direct our steps.

He's the one who's going to bring those things to fruition, and he has plans already laid out for us.

So there's a scripture that I want to read, actually two scriptures, right at the beginning of the worksheet that I feel like really sums up the focus of the work of Spirit-led vision casting.

And the first one is Ephesians 2.10, which says, for we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

And the second verse is Proverbs 19.21.

Many are the plans in a person's heart.

It is the Lord's purpose that prevails.

And to me, those are both just great reminders that the Lord already made a plan for what we're gonna do with our lives.

And what we need to do is focus on Him, and then He will direct our steps.

I think a lot of times people get really hung up on, is this God's will?

Is that God's will?

I don't wanna operate outside of God's will.

We can get so bogged down with trying to interpret or understand or predict God's will that we totally lose sight of the fact that He has already put those dreams and desires and things in our hearts.

And we know that because we're in constant communication with Him.

By setting our minds and hearts on Him before we even begin vision casting, we know that already we're in the right place.

We're moving in the right direction because He wants us to go to Him and to meet with Him about these things.

So after getting the heart and the mind in the right place, the next step is to start to talk about what is God's will.

And again, like I just said, it is that the desires of our hearts are in line with what He desires for us.

And the more time you spend with the Lord, the more you'll learn that.

So there's a couple of journal prompts that work through.

What do you think God is calling you to do with your life?

How do you see God working?

Are there things that you need to remove from your life that you're not sure about?

All of that kind of stuff.

The really, really tough questions that we don't necessarily want to answer, but we need to be honest with ourselves and with the Lord about where we're at as we come into this time of vision casting and goal setting.

So as we're going through that, we're also talking about what are the practices in my daily life that need to continue or that need to stop so that I can continue to connect with the Lord in these areas.

And then the next step is to look at the vision.

So what is the vision for my life?

What is the vision for your life?

Do you want to have a farm and a bunch of animals?

Do you want to have an Etsy shop?

Do you want to have children?

Do you want to get married?

In case you couldn't tell, I want to farm with a bunch of animals, highland cows specifically.

I'm obsessed with them and chickens, but that's besides the point.

But what's the vision?

What are the dreams that God has put in your heart?

What are the things that you are building Pinterest boards about and daydreaming about?

And when you see them or you hear somebody else say that they accomplished it, it makes you so excited.

What are those things?

So jotting those things down and then releasing them to the Lord.

And the next thing is to look at God's will for your business.

Same thing.

What is He calling you to do?

What is it that you're afraid to surrender?

Are you afraid to surrender financial stability?

Are you afraid to surrender predictability?

Are you afraid to surrender visibility?

Are you scared of being seen?

Do you not want to be out there in the world?

I know that's a huge one for me.

Like, Lord, if I could do this from a closet in Timbuktu, I would.

I would love to be anonymous.

But the Lord has called me out and He's calling you out, too.

So what are those call outs?

What are those things that He's asking you to surrender so that you can step into what He's called you to do for your business?

And then after journaling through those things, the next step is what's the vision for the business?

And again, same thing.

What are you supposed to be building?

What does this look like?

What do you want it to look like?

What's your vision for that?

And then also, what's your vision for client experience?

How are you serving clients in the name of Jesus?

How are you sharing the gospel in the way that you conduct yourself, in the way that your business operates with your employees, with your customers, with your clients?

What does that look like?

And then taking all of that and offering it back to the Lord.

So really, it's like a six step process.

So first, we are centering our minds and our hearts on the Lord.

Then, we are looking at what is God's will for my life?

What is He calling me to do?

What things might get in the way?

And then, what's the vision?

What does this look like, like, tangibly, tactically?

What do I see for this?

And then, what is God's will for my business?

What does that look like?

What do I feel like He's calling me to do?

And then, what is the vision for the business?

Again, tangibly, tactically.

And then same thing with client experience.

And then, ultimately, surrendering everything back to the Lord in prayer and then moving forward.

So, that's Spirit-Led Vision Casting.

In a nutshell, the process that my husband and I went through.

And then, we moved on to goal setting.

And in goal setting, that's a whole other worksheet that I have for my clients in the program that, again, starts with setting our mind and our heart on things above.

So, some of the scriptures that I have in there, Matthew 6.33, Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

Psalm 37.4, Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.

Proverbs 16.3, Commit your actions to the Lord, and your plans will succeed.

So, when we start with scripture, with whatever we're planning to do, it's positioning us to be in a space where we are completely focused on the Lord.

And everything else comes second to that.

And for me, as a planner, my job is literally wedding planning.

My whole life, everything has been planned out and organized and all that kind of stuff.

When I stop and shift the focus off of what I'm trying to accomplish and I shift my eyes towards heaven and towards the Lord, it changes everything.

And so goal setting and vision casting are no exception to that.

So the next step in the process, after our mind and our hearts are aligned, is journaling.

Again, what does it look like the Lord wants me to do in the coming year?

What do I feel like He's calling me to do?

How am I getting in my own way?

What am I letting get in the way?

How am I staying in step with the Lord?

All the tough questions.

And then the fun part is the goal setting and just classic smart goal framework.

So specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, time bound.

We're looking at making smart goals.

And so we're setting our minds and hearts on the Lord.

We're asking, what does the Lord want me to do?

And what might get in the way?

And then we're diving into setting those goals.

We're not just like, I think I should walk because it's good for my health.

Like it's super unhelpful.

How far are you walking?

How often are you walking?

How many miles are you trying to do?

Like what does this look like?

Tangibly again, tangibly, tactically.

What does this look like?

And so then it's jotting down goals.

And then at the end, again, submitting it back to the Lord.

So wrapping up with scripture and with prayer and surrendering everything back to him.

And I think one of the reasons why I designed this framework for my clients is because again, we get so anxious.

It's like, what if I'm missing what the Lord wants from me?

Like how am I going to know?

Like the Bible is like, you know, it doesn't say like go here and do this tomorrow.

No, but it tells us how the Lord wants us to think about him and how he sees us.

So the scripture that we wrap up this time of goal setting with is Proverbs 16, 9, which says, in their hearts, humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps.

And it just reminds us that we can put all the big dreams down, we can put all the plans down, but the Lord is going to continue to lead us and guide us.

And so just because you wrote something down today, doesn't mean that that's how it's going to play out and that's okay.

And one of the other things that I teach is learning to be flexible.

And that's a whole other lesson for a whole other day.

But essentially, holding all of these plans and dreams and goals and vision very loosely, knowing that the ultimate goal is to serve the Lord, to love him and to love others and to share the gospel.

And if that's our primary focus, then everything else is just details.

And I don't know about you, but that takes so much pressure off of me because I'm like, if I don't get this right, if I don't make sure that everything is perfect, like no, honestly, I don't have that much power.

And in case you didn't know, neither do you.

And the Lord is really clear about that.

He reminds us of that.

And that's why Proverbs 16,9, in their hearts, humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps.

That's such a critical verse to me when it comes to goal setting, because at the end of the day, I'm gonna do my best to set these goals.

I'm gonna do my best to follow them, but the Lord is in control.

And so as long as I am in tune with what He wants for me, as long as I'm praying and reading scripture and spending time with Him, spending time in community with Him, with church and godly relationships, if I'm pursuing those things, everything else is going to fall together.

Maybe not how I would have done it.

Most of the time, it's not how I would have done it, honestly.

And sometimes I'm like, really Lord?

Like that was the big plan.

And other times I'm like, oh, wow, yeah, thank goodness it didn't go my way because that would have been a dumpster fire.

But the Lord in His infinite wisdom, whether I think it makes sense or not, it's so irrelevant because He knows.

He has the whole picture.

He sees every aspect of it.

And so all we have to do is lean into Him.

That's it.

We don't have to have it all figured out.

So my encouragement to you and what I hope you take away from this today is focus on the Lord.

Whatever it looks like to set your goals for this year, focus on the Lord first and then work through the vision, work through His will for your life, work through the calling, work through the goals, and then offer it all back to Him.

And if you would like to chat more about what it looks like to work together, I am in the process of revamping my entire program, which has been kind of crazy, but rebuilding it from the ground up and refocusing so that every single thing that I am sharing with my clients points back towards the Lord.

And so if that sounds like something that you're interested in, I would love to chat with you.

You can DM me at erseaberg over on Instagram.

And I would love to chat with you about what that looks like.

The goal is for Christian women who are in their entrepreneur era to be able to build community, to build relationships with other believers, other women, and to get training and coaching and support in building a lifestyle and a business and a brand that honors the Lord.

So if that's something you want to know more about, I would be thrilled to talk to you.

And if you want to share your story on the podcast, if the Lord has put something on your heart that he's doing through your business and you believe that you should share that, I have a form that you can fill out.

I will link it in the show notes.

You can also DM me and I can send you the link.

I'd love to see your story come through.

I'd love to meet with you and talk with you on the podcast.

And I would love for other women to be encouraged by the story of what the Lord is doing in your life and in your business.

I'm so excited for you for the week ahead.

And I hope that it's a beautiful one.

I hope that the Lord blesses you and blesses your business.

And I'll talk to you soon.