Goal-setting: Set achievable goals and change your lifestyle
Tags: watercooler
Published: 2021-01-11 11:59:14

First of all, a very happy new year to you. Cheers! You have made it through the year 2020 safely. Let's welcome 2021 warmly but with a mindset to evolve.

We wait every year for new year's day, January 1. We always look forward to the upcoming days with lots of hope in our eyes. But, do we really make efforts to make those hopes come real?


**"New year, new me" - we tell ourselves. We post it on our social media. Or, at least, we would have thought about how we can improve our life around the corner of new year's eve.**


But have you ever come up with actionable steps to improve your lifestyle and mindset and reach where you want to be?

So, today, I am going to share with you some tactics on how to improve your lifestyle by setting achievable goals and evolve as a better person as you thought always.

#1.
Write down your thoughts upon the previous year (in our case, 2020) in your journal or a note-taking app. Self-reflect upon your lessons, decisions, changes you made, things you did, things that happened, and so on.

This will give you an insight into yourself, your evolution, and the hidden lessons that life has taught us. It also helps you to know your strengths and the places where you need to improve.


**"Being self-aware is a superpower."**


#2.
​Prepare a list of things that you want to achieve or happen in the year 2021 (the new year). Add the things that you wish to change in yourself to become a better person. Basically, your goals for the year.

*__Pro-tip__: Write it down on a paper/sticky note and paste it in front of the place where you will surely be. In my case, I paste it on the wall behind my laptop since I stay near my laptop always.*

Else, you can also type them down digitally, take a screenshot, and make it as your phone wallpaper.

The idea here is to make you be aware of and dedicated to your goals and resolutions. If we keep the list of goals in front of us or in a place where we can see it easily and always (phone wallpaper, sticky-notes on the wall), we tend to start working towards them more and it keeps us focused.

#3.
​After sorting out your goal list, check if you have set specific goals and write down actionable steps to achieve them.

For example, if your goal is to read more books this year, it is vaguer and we tend not to complete the goal correctly. Even if you read only 1 book this year, you tend to strike out that goal from your list, which is not right. So, set specific goals.

**"Read 50 books this year"** is an example of a specific goal.

Now, focus on setting actionable steps to achieve them.

Your goal is to read 50 books this year, for instance. The actionable step for this goal may be to **read at least 1 book a week.**

By setting actionable steps, you have set your brain to focus more on achieving the goal in a specified path. This increases your chance of achieving the goal.

*__Pro-tip:__ Set deadlines for certain goals. If you have many goals on your list, then you can set some deadlines for certain goals. This makes you stay more focused on those goals first and then gives ample time to complete other goals too.*

For example, I have set a goal to complete my story on Wattpad this year. I have other goals too. So, I have set a deadline to complete the Wattpad story as April 30, 2021.

Being specific with actionable steps along with the deadlines makes us work harder with determination to complete it.

#4.
​Commit to your goals. Share it publicly on social media like Twitter. Or, share it with a person you trust the most. This will make you feel accountable and act with responsibility.

When we keep our goals private, we tend to be irresponsible and might also cheat or lower the standards of the goal as I said in the case of reading more books.

Sharing it keeps you accountable. It makes you complete your goals, no matter what.

#5.
​Track weekly progress of your habits, goals, and accomplishments. This makes you be self-aware of yourself by showing you where you lack and where you need to improve.

*__Pro-tip:__ Share the weekly progress with the same person you trust. This keeps you accountable and gives you the motivation to do more.*

These are the major steps in setting achievable goals and changing your lifestyle. These are the 5 major steps you can do to make you evolve as a better person and achieve the lifestyle you want this year.

What are you waiting for?

Start doing all these steps. Start those habits you want to build. Start working towards your goals. Hustle hard, boss.

Always remember,

*__If you can think of it, you can achieve it!__*


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