The Mental Emotional Health Blog

In the Mental Health field and my personal life, I have heard plenty about the subject of goal-setting. I also think I was naive and unrealistic for most of my life in setting goals for myself. It was not until recently that I got a better handle on my own goal-setting.

In general, the traditional components of goal-setting are:

• The goal is realistic/reachable.
• Set specific goals. For example, it’s better to set a goal of “Run 1 mile in under 7 minutes”, than “Be healthier.”
• Make the goal time-specific; set a deadline.
• Tell your goal to someone for accountability/motivation.
• Write the goal down.
• Consider potential obstacles that might get in the way of reaching your goal.

It was in writing goals down that often got me stuck. My problem (and this was my challenge, everyone is different) was that I would list a bunch of goals on one sheet of paper.  Sometimes even the next day I’d look at my goal sheet and feel overwhelmed. So now I’ve adjusted my goal-setting, and it has helped. Here are my tweaks to goal-setting:

1. The goal is realistic and reachable in the amount of time you give yourself to accomplish it.
2. Set specific goals.
3. Make the goal time-specific. Give yourself enough time to complete the goal while setting a deadline to keep the goal on your mind.
4. Do not wait to be motivated, or waste energy trying to get yourself motivated. Focus your energy on working towards your goal. Just do it (thank you, Nike).
5. Write one goal down at a time to improve your focus.
6. Consider potential obstacles to achieving your goal, and remove them or work around them. Just don’t focus more on the obstacles than on your actions toward your goal, or the goal itself.

You may notice that I removed “Tell your goal to someone”. I found that for myself, the less I share my goals with others, the more likely I am to work towards my goal. I don’t know exactly why that is, but here’s my guess. I think I value my independence, and want to keep my goals personal. A few times I have tried using an accountability partner for losing weight, but I didn’t start actually losing weight (and forming healthier habits) until I just worked on that goal myself. People have noticed too, which is nice. I went from weighing 230 lbs to 200 lbs in about a year and a half. Then I told myself I feel 2-3 bowling balls lighter than before (a little positive self-talk).

If an accountability partner works for you, or listing several goals works better, then do those things. The trick to goal-setting is understanding that it is just the expressed purpose of accomplishing something specific.

If the purpose is right, and reachable, and you give yourself time and energy to work towards the goal, you’ll get there.