How to Create and Achieve Personal Goals in the Coming Year
As far back as I can remember, goals have been central to my personal, professional, and financial success. I remember setting personal goals as a child, such as personal summer reading assignments and savings goals, and this initiative continued into adulthood.
This post was originally published on The Simple Dollar .
Goal setting was an important part of how, for example, Sarah and I were able to achieve financial recovery, and goal setting was also an important part in creating The Simple Dollar.
However, as I continued my journey in life, I discovered a few things when it comes to how I set goals.
First, I’m much more likely to achieve goals that I find fun . Almost every year I set myself some reading task – and this year is no different from others – and I almost always cope with them. The challenge this year is to read a certain number of books that I find interesting , those that will expand my thinking, and I am very happy about that. I find this goal incredibly fun , although I know it is good for my mind too.
Secondly, I am much more likely to succeed if I feel as if I am somehow pinned against a wall. Our financial pivot was centered around a really big goal of getting out of debt, but I don’t think I would have pursued that as intensely if it hadn’t been for the fact that Sarah and I put ourselves in a real financial crisis.
If these two factors are not true, I often find it difficult to achieve my goals. Goals whose philosophy is that I want to improve some aspect of my life, but I don’t feel like I need to do it, are difficult because these goals lack daily motivation.
Today I will not talk about easy targets. I’m going to talk about these difficult goals, the ones that don’t sound like fun or are what you think you should do, but you really want to . Financial independence falls into this category, as does weight loss for many, to name two examples. These are challenging goals. Often these are goals that people really want . But at the same time, people are often not in a situation where they should do it.
Many people like to use the beginning of the calendar year as a time to achieve their main personal goal, and it makes a lot of sense. A new calendar year often seems like a fresh start.
Break it down into daily beats
The biggest problem with giant goals is that they lack immediacy. They often seem so large and so far away that it doesn’t seem like you can actually make significant progress towards that goal anytime soon, which makes you feel helpless and hopeless and thus give up on the goal.
The trick is to break this gigantic goal into small little steps, things you can do today that will inevitably lead to achieving your big goal and the success you desire.
I personally like the method presented by Gary Keller in his book One Thing , in which he deliberately breaks the goal of the “big idea” into daily parts.
Let’s say you have a big five-year goal. What is one thing you can do in the next year to make it happen?
So, you have one big unique thing to do this year. What is one thing you can do in the next month to make it happen?
So, you have a big single goal for this month. What is one thing you can do in the next week to make it happen?
So, you have a special goal for this week. What one thing can you do today to make this happen?
The answer to the last question is the most important because it focuses exclusively on the present day. It focuses you on what you can do today , not on some big pie in the sky problem. For example, let’s say your five-year goal is to get a master’s degree.
The only thing you can do this year to get your master’s degree is to get into the master’s program and be ready to start your studies.
The only thing you can do this month to enroll in a master’s program is to prepare materials for admission to the master’s program in three targeted schools.
The only thing you can do this week to prepare these materials is to find out what materials you need to send to these schools.
The only thing you can do today to figure out what materials to apply for your targeted program is to find schools with strong master’s programs in your field.
So, right now, you have something you can do today to get started. You can do it right now. You can find several schools that you might want to apply to. To achieve this within a week, you will need to find the application and admission requirements for these schools and find the ones that you are likely to fall into, and then prepare them for the rest of the month. applications and preparing them for submission. The rest of this year can be filled with other preparatory steps, such as temporary career changes to make room for this new initiative, and then in subsequent years, you move on to pursue this master’s degree.
Let’s take another one – let’s say this is the goal of losing weight. In one year, you want to lose a lot of weight.
The only thing you can do for losing weight this month is adjusting to a healthier diet.
The only thing you can do this week to adjust to a healthier diet is to build a manageable long-term healthy eating routine that you can stick to in the coming weeks.
The only thing you can do this week to build a healthier diet is to eat healthy foods today and avoid unhealthy snacks.
This brings the focus to the present day . Today, your focus is solely on eating better and nothing else. You will use the results of this routine throughout the week to determine what works and build a diet that actually works for you through trial and error. At the end of the month, you should have a better daily routine that you can stick to, and if you focus on keeping it and then gradually add in some exercise (with later month-to-month targets), achieving that goal becomes inevitable.
Let’s take another example. Let’s say your goal is to get debt relief in, say, five years.
The only thing you can do to move towards debt free this year is to pay off the two largest credit cards.
The only thing you can do this month to pay off the two largest credit cards is to make a large additional payment on the highest interest rate credit card.
The only thing you can do this week to make a big credit card surcharge is to cut your food bill significantly. (Yes, of course you could do other things as well, but the idea here is to focus on just one thing, which is pretty good.)
The only thing you can do today to cut down on your food costs is to draw up an entire week’s meal plan based on grocery flyers and the contents of your pantry, compile a shopping list from that meal plan, and go on your one and only shopping trip. weeks. (This is actually one thing.)
Here you have a specific action to focus on that will lead you straight to your overall goal. The key is to keep going step by step, but the advantage here is that you have one single thing you can do today to make that happen.
Focus on action, not immediate results
Many people get hung up on results when they are working on big goals or big decisions that they have set for themselves. They focus primarily on losing 75 pounds.
The problem is that by making this number the focus of a goal, you diminish the focus on what is needed to achieve it. It also sets you up for failure because you often won’t make linear progress towards your goal. Often, the greatest success in achieving a goal is achieved when you have good habits.
In addition, there is a separate problem where the goal sometimes depends on the actions and choices of other people that are outside your control. It is always a good idea to minimize the influence of external forces on your goal and to maximize the impact that your own right choices can have on that goal.
So instead of setting a goal based on results, instead set a goal based on the actions you can take to achieve it.
Let’s stick with our examples above, starting with the goal of earning a master’s degree. This is a very solid goal, but it is still judged by the end result, not by the actions that need to be taken. You might think of something like, “I will take all the necessary steps under my supervision to get my master’s degree in five years.” Another great goal is to lose weight, but instead of focusing on weight, focus on something like “I’ll eat 1,500 calories a day for 300 days this year.” You can do something similar for the purpose of paying off debt, simply by making your goal something like “This year, I will take a positive moderate step every day and use every penny of the proceeds to pay off the debt.”
For the sake of brevity, you can certainly look at your goal as a weight loss goal or a debt repayment goal, but know that your true goal is not focused on results, but on your actions, which will inevitably lead to the desired results.
Set aside a few minutes each morning to focus.
One of the biggest obstacles for many people in terms of maintaining a daily goal or daily focus is getting lost in the busyness of our daily lives. We have this great intention, but it is in the mental background and we often lose sight of it.
For example, if our goal is to lose weight through an improved diet, we will give up unhealthy fast food, but not on purpose, but because the goal of losing weight is crammed into the depths of our minds and becomes secondary to other, more pressing issues. …
If our goal is to spend less money, we will buy something without thinking about the financial implications of it, again not because we have lost this goal, but because other thoughts fill our minds.
What to do about it? So far, I’ve only really found one thing (well, two things, but we’ll come back to the other in a minute) that has helped me keep purpose in my head throughout my busy day, and that morning. a routine that makes me think about this goal head-on.
I spend about ten minutes each morning thinking about my daily goal. I imagine exactly how I am going to achieve this, how I am going to overcome potential obstacles that may stand in my way, and how I will feel at the end of the day, having achieved my goal. I usually do this when I take my morning shower, so this is what happens in my head when I clean up. I usually accompany this with ten minutes of meditation / prayer, which has been proven to be very helpful with mental clarity and focus, and then only spend a couple of minutes writing down five things that I am grateful for in my life that bring me joy. and holds back my ego.
I find this little routine helps a lot when it comes to keeping a big goal for the day present in my mind even when everyone is busy. It feels like an alarm goes off in my head if I’m going to do something that doesn’t meet this daily goal.
Set aside a few minutes each night to review
On the other side of this morning focusing session, there is tremendous value in spending a few minutes in the evening review of the day, where you can proudly look back on the day’s successes and take a fresh look at mistakes. ask yourself what you could do better.
This simple evening review, which I often do right after I put my kids to bed, is perhaps the most valuable tool I have for finding problems in my routines and plans before they escalate into a real crisis. For example, this session is almost always invaluable in identifying temptations before they escalate into mistakes. When I identify a temptation, I actually think directly about that temptation, think that what I am tempted does not really help me in my larger goal, and consider ways to eliminate this temptation in the future, usually with a minor change. … from my usual routines.
A perfect example of this is the goal of paying off debt. You can run this routine proudly taking your lunch to work and eating all your meals at home, but you might also think that you really wanted to buy a new book for your Kindle. Maybe you could get a book from your local library instead?
I often do this when I write in my diary, which I try to do both in the morning and in the evening. I usually think about the three biggest successes of the day and one or two of the biggest mistakes, and I find that these reflections almost always help me build a better tomorrow.
Create a “strip” very clearly
There is one more thing I do every night with a specific, specific purpose: I continue my “strip” on the board.
I have a small board in my office that I keep where I see it quite often. The board is empty except for a few lines with crosses. At the end of each day, when I reach my daily goal for what I’m currently doing, I put an X on this board. At the end of the day, when I don’t achieve this goal, I erase all the crosses.
Let’s say I worked hard on a goal and I have a row of 15 crosses. This seems pretty good to me, as it clearly shows me that I have achieved my goal and made real progress. On that sixteenth day, even if I am truly tempted not to reach my daily milestone, this X series provides a kind of extra mental boost to get things done.
In truth, I usually have two and sometimes three rows of crosses of different colors, because I often pursue a personal and professional goal at the same time. I just mark which target is at the top and then follow it with rows of crosses.
This “strip” idea is not mine; it is actually stolen from comedian Jerry Seinfeld, who used the same technique to hone his joke-writing skills .
I have two stripes right now. One is my daily writing goal in terms of word count, and the other is preparing for another professional project where I want to create a lot of content before launching. In the near future I am going to start the third streak of personal goals in the coming year.
Don’t give up on petty setbacks
It is very easy to become devastated by a little mishap. You try to keep track of what you eat and mindlessly eat fast food. You try to be very careful with your money and then make a spending mistake.
Taking a step back can feel incredibly painful, even if it comes after a long sequence of steps forward. It may seem like your progress has been completely wiped out even if it’s not at all, and many people use this initial mistake to essentially give up on their goal.
First of all, it is important to remember that you are human and that people make mistakes. No one is perfect, no matter how flawless their social media lives are.
Second, admitting that you made a mistake is incredibly important and a valuable step in and of itself. You acknowledge what you have done. You acknowledge that this was not the right move. You have a negative emotional reaction to this. These are all good things. All of this is indicative of positive progress.
Third, nothing in the world prevents you from moving forward again. Of course, you took a step back, but most likely it happened at the end of a long run of steps forward, and you can easily start moving forward again. This is a bump in the road. This is not the end of the road.
Fourth, this is usually a learning opportunity. You can take a step back and ask yourself why you made this mistake, because this mistake is usually a sign of a flaw in your plan. This is ideal food for thought as it will almost always help you find the best way forward.
See error not as a disaster, but as an opportunity to build a better plan and become a stronger person, better equipped to achieve that goal, the great success it is destined to become.
Final thoughts
When you think about your big goals or your plans for the coming year, take these strategies to heart. Break down those goals into what you can do today that will help you make clear progress towards that goal. Tune in to the right mindset every morning and watch your mistakes and successes every night. Make it your daily routine and you will be far more successful than you ever imagined!
Good luck!
How to Reach and Achieve Personal and Financial Goals in the Coming Year | Simple dollar