It’s that time of year again, everyone is trying to move into the new year with resolutions and goals to achieve to get closer to their ideal selves. Whether it is academic, financial or personal, here are my five tips that I have found useful for goal setting.
- Breaking down long term goals into smaller daily manageable actions makes it easier to stay consistent in working towards your goals. If you want to pass upcoming exams, breaking that goal down into a plan to have smaller study sessions every day builds a sustainable system to easily integrate into your life. For a lot of goals that aren’t achieved, the intimidation of starting a goal that seems like you can’t succeed puts people off from even starting. Try starting with an 10-minute action that gives you a little encouragement before getting underway.
- Setting minimums for smaller time frames to track progress either daily or weekly so that as the time you want to achieve the goal approaches you don’t get that feeling of everything piling up. Having an accountability partner to share daily or weekly tasks with can cement a commitment to a certain amount of work in a time that works for you.
- Building SMART goals are a good framework to start with to increase the likelihood of achieving your goals. SMART goals are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound. Keeping a record of how you have defined these goals already sets a plan in place to start.
- Predict what will set you back. Lack of time? Not motivated? Haven’t got a good environment? Are you a procrastinator? Thinking about these things ahead of time can be helpful
- What is your WHY? What is the only thing that stops you from giving up, or the purpose for wanting to achieve this goal in the first place. It’s always good to have something to remind you of this when you are getting tired or stressed.
Lastly, James Clear’s Atomic Habits is a book I have been recommended again and again. Another I have on my reading list is The Mountain Is You by Brianna Wiest which is all about self-sabotage and how sometimes the biggest obstacle to success is yourself.
I wish everyone the best of luck with their goals in 2022!
One comment for “5 Realistic Tips For Goal Setting”
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Hey Meley, I really loved this article it helped me set my goals and manage to study for my mocks in a more efficient way. As a result, I managed to achieve all A*’s and am very pleased! Thank you so much for your help!