How to Use AI for Goal Setting: The Dream Check Exercise to Run Before You Set Another Goal

Why Most Goals Are Set Too Low

Here is the question this post answers: how do you use AI for goal setting in a way that actually raises the size of the goal instead of just organizing the small ones?

I built an AI goal-setting exercise to solve exactly that, and I want to walk you through it. I was working on my 2029 vivid vision, reading Benjamin Hardy's 10x Is Easier Than 2x and Cameron Herold's Vivid Vision. Hardy writes about a concept called the dream check. You take the biggest check you have ever received for your unique ability, you 10x it, and you build everything backward from that number. The moment I read it, one thing hit me. Both of those books were written before AI. So I turned the dream check into a guided AI prompt and ran it live in an Undeniable Studio group session, where we gave ourselves 10 minutes to explore it. By the end, the result is simple. You look at the biggest goal you set this year and you realize you set it too low. Once that vision is set, the next move is using AI to actually achieve your goals.

That is the whole point of using AI for goal setting the right way. The tool is not there to make your to-do list faster. It is there to shatter your belief ceiling of what is possible.

What Is the AI Dream Check Exercise?

The Dream Check is an AI goal-setting exercise you run before you set any goal for the year. You open Claude or ChatGPT, you paste in the prompt, and the first thing it says is, "You're gonna be my creative partner for the next 10 minutes."

That framing matters. You are not asking AI to plan for you. You are asking it to think alongside you while you raise the ceiling. The exercise plants the seed of possibility from 10x Is Easier Than 2x, then asks you one question at a time. The beauty of the prompt is that it asks each question only after you answer the previous one, so it builds on your real vision instead of running you through a static form.

One practical note that changes the whole experience. Use the dictate function in Claude or ChatGPT and speak your answers out loud. Do not audit yourself, because this is meant to live in vision. When you type, you edit. When you talk, you tell the truth about what you actually want.

How Do You Use AI for Goal Setting With the Dream Check, Step by Step?

Here is the exact flow I ran on screen, so you can use AI for goal setting the same way.

1. Anchor your biggest number. The prompt asks you to finish this sentence: "The most I've ever been paid for one project or piece of my work is ___." I entered two real numbers, $10K for a VIP half-day AI workshop and $5K for a keynote. The AI came back and told me my dream check is $100,000. Nice and simple. It 10x'd my biggest result.

2. Name the person who writes that check. Not a category. A real person. The prompt asks, "Picture them, a real person, not a category. What's their world look like? What did I help them create that made $100K feel like the easiest money they ever spent?" For me, the first thing top of mind was someone running an exclusive mastermind for high performers. Maybe they charge $5K to be there and get 20 people in the room. There is $100K right there.

3. Make the math obvious. The exercise then asks what would make that $100K feel like a bargain, not a stretch. This is the part most goal setting skips. I asked it plainly. Would you pay $5,000 to make $100,000, $500,000, or a million-plus in your business? I certainly would. When the math is that clear, the number stops feeling scary.

4. Build the tangible deliverable. It asks what they walk away holding and what happens in the room because of that. Now you are visualizing. I described blowing their mind with possibilities they never imagined, helping the group leader get 10x the value, handing over resources, SOPs, and agentic infrastructure. The vision gets specific.

5. Answer the identity question. This is the one that lands. The prompt asks who you would have to become to be worth that number. A $100K result in a day means your unique ability has to operate at a level most people never reach. My answer came fast, because I have already lived it. As Steve Martin said, be so good they can't ignore you.

6. Assemble the full dream check. Finally it asks for the whole thing in one place. The number, the person who writes it, and the one capability you commit to building this year to make yourself undeniably worth it. It mirrors all of it back to you.

That is the exercise. Six moves, 10 minutes, and your belief ceiling is in a different place than where you started.

Why Does Using AI as a Creative Partner Beat Doing This Alone?

The biggest problem with AI right now is not that it cannot do enough. It is overwhelm. Things are moving fast and there are too many options, too many tools, too many possibilities. That is the 80% that gets in the way of the one thing that is actually your unique ability, the thing you can 10x into the dream check.

Using AI as a creative partner for goal setting cuts through that. It keeps you on the one number while it does the heavy lifting of asking the right next question. And here is the rule that keeps it honest. Everything the AI gives you, you do not have to accept. At one point the prompt pushed my answer toward member retention, and I did not take it. I redirected it to value. The AI is your yes-and partner, not your boss. You stay in the driver's seat of your own vision.

If you have ever felt like you start every AI session from zero, this is the opposite of that. You can stop starting from scratch every time you use AI by giving it a real exercise with real structure. The Dream Check is that structure for goal setting.

What Do You Do With Your Dream Check After You Set It?

A vision you never act on is just a daydream. So the exercise ends with an alignment check, and this is where AI goal setting becomes a tool instead of a feel-good session.

Once your dream check is assembled, you ask yourself two yes-or-no questions. Does everything I am doing right now align to the 10x version of this dream check? Have I brought together this level of commitment to making it happen? There are a lot of people who complain about the goals they hit from the actions they do not do. This is the tool that closes that gap.

Most of us are swinging at singles. I can do this, then a little efficiency, then another small task. All fine. But how often are you going for the home runs? The Dream Check orients you to the home run, then the alignment questions make sure your daily actions match it. That is the bridge from vision to roadmap. If you want more on the vision side of this, I wrote about how to dream bigger and make it real and how to build as your future self now.

Your Next Steps

Use AI for goal setting before you set your next goal, not after. Here is the simplest way to start today.

1. Open Claude or ChatGPT and turn on dictation so you can speak your answers.
2. Run the Dream Check. Anchor your biggest number, 10x it, and let the prompt walk you through the question chain.
3. Speak in raw. Do not audit yourself. Let the vision be bigger than feels comfortable.
4. Redirect the AI any time it goes a direction that is not true for you. You own the vision.
5. Assemble your dream check and run the alignment check against what you are doing right now.
6. Pick the one capability you will build this year to be worth that number, and start there.

There has never been a better time in the history of the world to make your dreams happen than right now. The exercise just makes sure you are aiming high enough to deserve the moment.

Get the Prompt and Go Deeper

I dropped the full Dream Check prompt in the comments of the video this came from, so you can run it for yourself in the next 10 minutes.

For more on getting real results from your prompts, here are the prompts I use every day to grow my business.

Sending tons of love and good vibes your way. Here is to setting goals big enough to be worth chasing.