Hey y’all! Right now is the perfect time to be productive and get organised! I recently shared a post on things to do to keep productive and organised at the moment (I’ve put the link here!). So as an add on from that post, today’s post is all about setting goals. Full disclaimer this is how I set my goals and what has worked for me, but there are a lot of different ways to do it out there so if this isn’t helpful to you I encourage you to keep looking. Hope you enjoy this post.
Step 1
Step 1 is Brainstorm. Personally I love physically writing my goals and thoughts down. I highly recommend writing your goals down by hand as it helps get them out of your head. It could be as simple as getting a piece of paper and jot down anything that you want to achieve. However big or unspecific your goal is write it down. You may want to set a 5 minute timer just to create a sense of urgency, which often helps you focus your mind. Set a timeframe for your goals and write down all your thoughts on anything you want to achieve by that time. It is ideal that you write as many as possible from a range of aspects in your life. Remember a brainstorm is supposed to be vague. We will evaluate throughout the process. When brainstorming think about more words and phrases rather that sentences.
Step 2
Step 2 is building off step 1 and it is to break your goals down. Get into the more specific details of what it is you want. Don’t make them to specific though as we will break them down further again later. At this stage you mainly want to focus on breaking down your larger goal. For example if your general goal was to lose weight you could break it down to “By this time next year I want to have lost _____ amount of weight”. Be specific. “I want to have completed ____ kilometres/or miles of a marathon”. If you have a more specific goal it is easier to track and recognise once you’ve achieved it. When you have larger goals it sometimes feels like you will never finish, which can make you doubt if you have done enough and may make you want to give up on your goal or just forget about it in general.
Step 3
Step 3 is to ask yourself Why. Why do you want it? Whatever you’re goal is there must be a reason you want it. Do you want to run a marathon for the health benefits or for the self confidence and knowing that you can do it. Acknowledging why you want something helps to keep you motivated on your journey to achieving it.
Step 4
Step 4 is manifestation. Think about the minor details of what its going to look like once you’ve achieved that goal. Think about where you are when it happens,what you can see, hear and smell. Most of all allow yourself to think about the feeling once you have achieved that goal. Visualise it and allow yourself to dwell on it.
Step 5
Now that you know exactly what your goal is, it is time to start planning it. Back in Step 1 I mentioned keeping your thoughts short and sweet because we were going to evaluate them later. I also mentioned in step 2 not to be too specific because we were going to break them down even further. Well now is the time to do both of those things. Planning your goals is a really important step to achieving them. To start off with try to make smaller goals. Think about something that is reasonable for you at the given time. Baby steps. I’m going to go back to my example of a marathon. You aren’t going to be able to run 42km on your first try. Work your self up to it and over time you will get the results. Think about S.M.A.R.T goals. S.M.A.R.T goals is an acronym and it stands for; Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely goals.
When planning your goals think of it like a flow chart. My first goal is to run 1k. My second goal is to run it in under 10 minutes. Keep giving yourself something to work on until you reach that ultimate goal.
Step 6
Step 6 is my favourite. It is to write it all down. But it doesn’t have to be boring. I personally am a very visual person and like to create vision boards. You can physically sit down, print out pictures and stick them onto cardboard or you may just create a Pinterest board. That doesn’t work for everyone though. You may write your goals down in your journal or on a piece of paper. Just get them down.
Step 7
Put them everywhere! If you keep a journal write them down in your journal every night. If you made a vision board hang it up behind your door or some place where you’ll see it. Did you write a list? Stick it on your fridge! If you’re constantly seeing your goals your more likely to remember them and keep motivated to achieve them.
Step 8
Step 8 is to keep track of them. Every month or so give yourself a check in. Where am I in relation to my end goal? What am I working on now? How far away is my goal? What have I achieved? When you religiously check in with yourself you’re also reminding yourself of the goals.
Thank you for reading! I hope this post was informative and helpful for you! Now is a great time to be working towards goals as we have some extra time on our hands. Hoping that you’re safe and well. – Sophie
Credit to: Jess Bailey @unsplash images
Happily Ever After 