Setting Goals You Can Actually Achieve
Tags: New Year, Goals, New Year Resolution, New Years Resolutions, Goal Setting

I know I’m not the only one who could not be more excited to shove 2020 out the door. Goodbye forever you will not be missed. BUT another January 1st means another year of set goals that inevitably will not be met. This year, however, I personally have vowed to change that. After a year that was basically a complete waste, I’m actually ready to get things done in 2021.

I want to start by saying I know there are many ways to set goals, and everyone is different. But, I wanted to share my personal philosophy in hopes that it resonates with someone out there on the world wide web. I’ve set my goals for next year and here is how I went about it. Enjoy.

Step 1: Place your goals into categories

These can be whatever categories apply to your own life. Mine are personal, financial, career, and hobbies (or activities). Examples I’m willing to share: A personal goal is to commit to doing yoga 5 times a week. A career goal is to get a job (my job situation came to a screeching halt in March). My hobbies/activity goal is to travel. Anywhere. Whenever we can again.

The goal here is to make these more specific than the ones I shared, but I left out some details on mine because I don’t feel like bearing my soul to the internet at the moment. For example: be healthy, isn’t a great goal. Be more specific. Do you want to cut out weekday drinking, ordering takeout every night, do you want to do 30 minutes of cardio every day? Decide, and write it down. Once your goals are in your categories move on to step 2.

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Step 2: Create actionable steps to achieve your goals

This is where the real works comes in. I’ve come up with 3 methods for creating actionable steps that I plan to use to achieve my goals this year. 1) Research. Example: you want to buy a house this year. Get Googling to find out how much houses are going for, how much you need to put down for a down payment, how to get a real estate agent etc. 2) Networking. Tell everyone you know (and feel comfortable sharing with) what you’re working towards this year. You NEVER know who knows who and could connect you to your dream scenario. Maybe your aunt’s neighbor’s cousin is selling their house. Maybe your friend’s dad’s nephew works at your dream company. Put out feelers so no stone is left un-turn. 3) Use your past experience. What has and hasn’t worked for you in the past? Can you apply any of that to your future goals? Once you have some actionable steps to achieve your goals, move on to step 3.

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Step 3: Remove road blocks

Road blocks/barriers are inevitable. No matter how much we wish and hope, our days will still always only have 24 hours in them. So if one of your biggest barriers is time (“I don’t have time to work out”) figure out how to remove that barrier this year. Maybe you wake up 30 minutes earlier (yuck I know) or have a good friend watch your kid for 30 minutes while you workout. Maybe your barrier is financial, so you need to get a side hustle going or take out a loan. Figure out a way to remove (or lessen) the barriers so you can actually make your goals work.

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Step 4: Be realistic (but not afraid to push yourself)

Example: If you want to be elected president in 2024, but you’re only 18 that’s not a realistic goal. But, you could find out what steps you could take to start becoming a great candidate like maybe going to school to study political science. And maybe that could be your goal for the year instead. The same goes for money. If you’re currently making $50,000 a year at a job and plan to stay at that job, it’s probably unrealistic to say “I want to get a 1 million dollar raise this year.” So instead you might need to figure out other ways you can make money and try to adjust the number so that it’s more realistic and not setting yourself up for failure.

Step 5: Give your goals a time limit (or don’t)

This one is complete personal preference. I believe life is a marathon not a sprint. Example: losing 50 pounds might take you a year or even 2 years, but wouldn’t it be better to take that time and live the rest of your years healthier and happier than to try to lose the weight in 6 months, not see results and feel like you failed at reaching your goals? On the other side, some people are not be motivated to do anything if they don’t have a timeline so it’s up to you, but again try to be realistic about it. And if you don’t know what a realistic timeframe for something is, you always have Google.

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Step 6: Set check-ins for yourself

These can be monthly, quarterly, whatever it is. You wouldn’t plant a flower and then just hope for the best. If you take the time to plant a flower, you’re going to check on it and make sure it’s getting water, enough sunlight, you may even need to move your plant to a different part of your yard if it’s not thriving. And the same goes for your goals. Don’t just write them down and never look at them again. Set checkpoints for your progress to see if what you’re doing is working. And if it’s not, try something else. Change something. And then try that for a few months then see how it’s going. If something isn’t working don’t just give it up immediately. Try different variations to see if there’s a variable you can change that could bring you success. This also goes back to being realistic about your timing. Maybe the goal you set wasn’t a realistic time frame so make sure you look into that as well if something isn’t working out.

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Step 7: Celebrate your wins!

It’s so easy, especially in the social media age, to feel like you’re not doing enough. But all of your little milestones are going to build one on top of another to create a big beautiful masterpiece. Without all those little stepping stones, you wouldn’t have gotten there. So break up your big goals into smaller ones that you can celebrate along the way. For example if you want to save up $20,000 to buy a house. Once you reach $5k celebrate, $10k celebrate, $15k celebrate. Because all of those mini milestones are just as important.

Good luck reaching your goals this year my friends. May the odds be ever in all of our favors.