Issa Rae shares the simple exercise she uses twice a year to set herself up for success—it includes pens, lists and a ‘superpower day’

Issa Rae has a tried-and-true technique to setting herself up for success, she says.

The 41-year-old author, actor, producer and entrepreneur categorically organizes her targets and concepts in a pocket book at the starting of the year, and revisits them six months later to test her progress, she tells CNBC Make It.

Rae is commonly a busy girl. She co-created, co-wrote and starred in the HBO collection “Insecure,” which premiered in 2016 and resulted in 2021. She’s acted in a number of motion pictures, produced different movies and TV reveals, and launched a number of companies, together with manufacturing firm Hoorae Media, Viarae Prosecco, haircare model Sienna Naturals and Hilltop Espresso and Kitchen, a California-based espresso store chain.

New Year’s Day is “my superpower day,” says Rae, who’s set to moreover seem in a business for TurboTax throughout Tremendous Bowl 60 on Sunday. “That is when every part feels doable. Every part will get achieved. I have a look at the [old] notebooks, compile the concepts that I wrote down and resolve what’s attainable and what’s achievable, and I’ll set these targets.”

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Rae jots down her private and profession targets individually, she says, and then writes out her resolutions. “The resolutions I preserve to three or 4, and they’re actually basic, like, ‘learn extra,’ ‘be higher.’ However the profession and private ones are literally very particular.” (Rae declined to share examples of these particular targets.)

If Rae will get an thought for a aim or decision throughout different occasions of the year, she makes a level of writing it down earlier than she forgets, she says. “The most effective concepts present up once I’m simply chilling,” she says. “I all the time have a pocket book close to me.”

Rae refers to herself as “not a good long-term thinker,” and says that “having a routine and being actually, actually intentional about what my targets are” helps her keep disciplined.

Enterprise luminaries starting from FUBU founder and CEO Daymond John, a longtime investor decide on ABC’s “Shark Tank,” to billionaire Richard Branson have spoken about writing down their targets, too. The simple exercise could make reaching them simpler, neuroscientists and psychologists say, serving to you set a clear plan and higher observe your progress.

You’ll be able to even strive changing your bullet-point record of targets with writing a letter to your self, neuroscientist and writer Erin Clabough instructed CNBC Make It on Jan. 27. The exercise will help you instill a sense of motivation and self-belief that you simply may in any other case lack, she stated.

Writing your self a letter is often handiest if you set open-ended, big-picture targets, stated Clabough. A press release like, “I’ll embrace new, thrilling experiences this year,” may permit for extra flexibility and satisfaction than one thing inflexible and unadaptable like, “I’ll journey to three international locations this year.”

Then, as soon as you have given your self a directive, “do the greatest that you would be able to in direction of that intention, each day,” Clabough stated. “You are going to make progress in direction of that, however generally it will not be in the means that you simply thought you had been going to do it.”

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