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Do you have specific goals for your life? Do you have a vision for what you will be doing next year? In the next five years? In the next 10 years? Many of us simply work and play counting upon serendipitous occurrences to advance our careers and personal lives. The whole idea of setting goals seems daunting to some and restrictive to others. And yet, goals can help us become more efficient and give us a feeling of competence. Goals can motivate us to move forward and show us where forward is. Here are some tips for setting goals that work for you.
Develop a Vision
For some, the very idea of setting goals creates a terrible fear of failure. If you have set goals, then failure becomes clearly defined - and seemingly inevitable. Certainly, goals setting shouldn't be taken lightly. To begin, you must look inside yourself and determine what defines personal success for you. Then, when you know what would make you most fulfilled, content and secure - you can develop goals to take to you that place. Let's break down the process by using the journalistic tools of who, what, when, where, why and how.
Who?
Who are you? With what specific people groups do you best identify? Certainly, the simplest answer is "I am a woman" or "I am a man" - one people group can be defined by sex. Look at other places where you identify yourself - perhaps by your region or country; perhaps by your age or education; perhaps by your cultural history or race; perhaps by your occupation or hobbies. Identify yourself as clearly as possible. Rank that identification in order of importance - with what groups do you identify most strongly? Often your goals fit closely with your personal identification.
Perhaps you discover that one of your strongest identifications is with your social group. I am of Irish descent. If that were one of my strongest personal identifications, my goals might include visiting Ireland, tracing my family tree, or taking part in specific Irish groups or causes.
What?
What are some tasks you would like to accomplish? These can be simple things like "paint the living room" or more difficult like "build my son a tree house" or even huge like "run for public office." Brainstorm all the tasks you would like to accomplish. Don't be concerned about a task's feasibility at this point; just write all the ones you can think of. Then rank those tasks in order of most importance to you. Don't rank "clean out the fridge" higher than "read War and Peace" just because you think you ought to do one first. This ranking is strictly by personal importance, not value to society or preference by your family.
Now, look at all the tasks you have written and strike out any that cannot be accomplished through your own efforts. For example, "marry Demi Moore" or "date Bruce Willis" are dependent upon the behavior of another person. Your goals must be accomplishable by you without counting upon the will of another person. Anything directly dependent upon another person, like "date a cheerleader" or "get my brother to stop drinking" aren't goal-tasks, they are wishes.
After you have ranked your tasks according to importance, rearrange your list and group similar goals together. For example, "plant garden," "build fish pond" and "fence yard" might all be grouped together. Do some of your most important tasks also group together?
When?
Look again at your task list. Use a highlighter to mark tasks that need to be done immediately, or not at all. Then, with a different color, highlight tasks that could be done anytime within the next year…then anytime within the next few years…then finally tasks that you would simply like to do in this lifetime.
Where?
Look again at your task list. Put a check mark beside any that can be done right where you are now. Circle any that would require travel and underline any that would require a move. Sometimes the value of a task falls when we realize we would have to move away from family or would have to relocate to a part of the world we would not enjoy.
Why?
Now, for every task, ask yourself why you included it. Particularly consider any that come to mind with the words "ought" or "should." Our lives often become full of meaningless tasks that are done from a sense of guilt. "I ought to wash my car; it looks so dusty." "I should throw away some of this clutter." Really study the "ought" and "should" tasks - okay, you should do them, but do you want to do them? You ought to do them, but will they improve your life or the life of the people in your who group? If the answer to both of those questions is no, strike off those tasks.
How?
Now examine the remaining long-term tasks. How many are important to who you are? When you answered the why - did the tasks still seem worthy? If so, the next step is how to turn those tasks into workable goals. If the most important tasks are clustered, examine them to see if some are steps toward achieving others. For example, if one of my goals was to connect with my relatives in Ireland, then the tasks: "trace my family's Irish roots" and "make a trip to Ireland" are two steps toward the end goal of connecting with relatives in Ireland. Break your big goals into big steps.
Now look at those steps and break them down again. For example, the task of making a trip to Ireland requires saving money, arranging time off from work, getting my passport, etc. The task of tracing my family's Irish roots requires learning about genealogy, talking to close family members, writing letters, visiting libraries with genealogy collections, etc. Arrange those steps to make a procedure that leads up to completing the task.
Now, look at those steps and ask yourself, "What can I do, today, to get closer to that goal?" Perhaps you can stop buying sodas and put the money into your Ireland fund. Or perhaps you can stop by the library and get a book on genealogy. Every goal starts today. By breaking the goals down to daily focused steps, your huge future goal become manageable. And as you do each step, you can visualize accomplishing this bigger goal, which can help keep your morale high for the journey. If you find your enthusiasm waning, feel free to redefine your goal. Perhaps that item was not as important as you thought. Since these goals are for you alone and not dependent upon the actions of others, you can always change focus or redefine at any point. So begin the journey today - and go for it!
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