The ability to set goals correctly. Goal setting: where to start? Step-by-step instructions for achieving the goal

The well-known business coach Brian Tracy, who has spent many years of his life studying the issue of goal setting, is well told about how to set goals correctly. It is worth saying a few words about him. His method is most clear to the subconscious, and therefore effective. Not only was he poor, he did not even finish school, he was also constantly without money, did not have permanent housing, trying to earn at least some pennies at a construction site. He studied the behavior and habits of highly successful people and noticed that they all share the same habit. They write down their goals. After that, he didn't just decide to start writing down his goals, he went ahead and did it! It started with the right goal setting. new life Brian Tracy when he clearly wrote them down on a piece of old paper. He began to have extra money, then he was able to afford to quit the construction site, escaped from poverty, and began a completely different life. Later, he became a world famous and highly paid expert, who is invited to different parts of the world and has no financial problems. But it all started simply with written down goals.

Brian describes this effect as follows, it's like you're driving a race car and you get pushed from all sides and you accelerate incredibly fast towards your goals.

How to set goals correctly - Brian Tracy's technique

Did you know that 97% of people don't have a goal? You may start to argue, but then you will find out exactly what Brian means.

If these are goals, then people should achieve them, but in reality it turns out that only such goals as going to make coffee for themselves, buying jeans, a car, and other slightly more complex ones are realized.

In fact, 100% of people have desires, and if you call this desire your goal, then it is still just a desire. The goal can only be considered what is written on paper. An unwritten goal is just a desire that you pay more attention to than other desires (which you simply single out from the rest), and nothing more.

If you wrote down your desire, then you can pay much less attention to it, but it is realized with a probability many times greater. This will be the goal.

Goals are important to write down by hand on paper (and not print).

In this case, it is fixed in your subconscious, and the so-called superconscious (the term that was introduced by Brian Tracy is also often used, in my understanding this is the universe - author's note).

How to set goals the right way - 7 basic steps

  1. Be clear about what you want
  2. write it down
  3. Set deadlines for implementation
  4. Make a list of necessary steps to achieve the goal
  5. Make a plan from this list (prioritize the list, determine the sequence)
  6. Take action immediately
  7. Do something every day that moves you towards your goal.


The main steps in setting the right goal

  1. Be clear about what you want
  2. write it down
  3. Make a list of necessary steps
  4. Make an achievement plan (priority, sequence)
  5. Do something from this list every day

I will talk about the other two steps separately. Why are they secondary, albeit important? They can speed up your goal. As soon as you take action, you already start the realization of your goal, understand this. Prescribe the timing of implementation, this is a delicate moment. I prescribe them only when I know for sure that it is quite possible to meet these deadlines, then this does not scare me. But even if you are late, then seeing that most of the work has already been done, you can finish the rest of the work, it will already be easier. Therefore, if you understand that you can do it in time, then write down the deadlines. If you don’t know how realistic it is, then write down at least 5 basic steps, and proceed to action. By the time you can determine along the way, when there will be more information, and there will be at least some results. By writing down the main 5 steps, this will increase the likelihood of achieving a result by tens and hundreds of times!

Now you know how to set goals correctly, I wish you success and I want to say only one thing - act right now, go and write down your goal, you will succeed!

When you realize what you want, do not stop, dig even deeper. Is this your goal? Is that what you want? Maybe your mother wants this, the environment or other foreign voices impose their own?

Are you sure you really want it. Choosing and setting the right goal is half the battle and the basis for a successful outcome. Let's analyze the criteria for correctness.

concreteness

It is not enough to set the goal "apartment". It is necessary to describe the nuances in as much detail as possible, otherwise discrepancies are possible. The apartment seemed to have appeared, there is a place to live, but it is not yours, you cannot dispose of it as you please. This apartment is not the right size, in the wrong city, this is not an apartment, but a room in a communal apartment. Has the goal been reached? Yes. Is this what you wanted? No.

Wrong target: apartment.

Correct target: three-room apartment without encumbrances in the center of Moscow in my property.

measurability

Let's say your goal is to become a popular blogger. Thanks to social networks, there is a simple and concrete sign of popularity - a large number of subscribers. If you find it difficult to determine this figure for yourself, look at how many subscribers a person you think is popular has, take this number as a guide.

Wrong target: I want to be popular.

Correct target: 5,000 Facebook followers.

Reachability

As one boss said, ask the impossible, you will get the maximum. Set ambitious goals for yourself, wish to jump above your head with your heart, believe in yourself, and then land and take into account objective reality. It makes no sense to set yourself the goal of growing a third arm.

Wrong target: I want people not to get cancer.

Correct target: employment in a cancer prevention organization.

Significance

Ask yourself the question "Why?". Repeat until you come up with an answer like “This will make me happy”, “I will feel satisfied”, “I am fulfilling as…”. Ultimately, most human desires come down to these simple things. Therefore, it is not recommended to set a goal for a certain amount of money. Money is not a goal, it is a means to achieve what will bring joy, benefit, happiness.

Wrong target: I want a lot of money to buy a yacht.

Correct target: yacht.

Timing

Deadline is a necessary parameter to achieve the goal. Without buoys, the sea of ​​time seems endless, but suddenly life passes. The approaching deadline stimulates acceleration, will help to correlate the current progress and the rest of the time.

Wrong target: I want to learn how to draw.

Sign of goal achievement

By what sign will we understand that the goal of “getting married” has been achieved? An official document will appear confirming this - a marriage certificate. I will say a seditious thought, but in achieving the goal we go rather not to the goal itself, but to the sign of its achievement. Without a sign of achievement, the goal ceases to be specific. It's not enough to want your car. The car becomes mine at the moment when my name is entered in the vehicle's passport.

Wrong sign: Dodge car.

Correct sign: Title for a Dodge car.

Goal Achievement Tools

Countdown

List the key milestones in order from last to first. This will help the question "What do you need to ..?" Determine indicative dates at each stage, so that later you can refer to the plan.

Example

Goal: October 2019 - housewarming in my own house, which I will build.

  • What do you need to celebrate housewarming in the house that I will build? Interior decoration (September 2019).
  • What do you need for interior decoration? Bring communications (May 2018).
  • What is needed to communicate? Cover the roof (April 2018).
  • What do you need to cover the roof? Build the Walls (March 2018).
  • Lay the foundation (September 2017).
  • Select a construction contractor (June 2017).
  • Order a project (April 2017).
  • Find an architect (tomorrow).

So we come to the first step: tomorrow write a post on the social network and ask to recommend an architect.

Action every day

Do at least one action every day to reach your goal. Even if you only have enough strength for one microtask, let it be done: curtains, call the architect and discuss the date of the meeting.

Create an environment

Fill in the air. Subscribe to thematic resources, meet and communicate with experts and experienced people, read, watch. This contributes to the accumulation of knowledge, helps not to forget about the goal.

Ideally, if close people support, encourage, help. Specialists and experienced people can also provide moral support, not limited to expertise.

Self-tuning

A method for those who do not deny that thought is material. Place yourself in the desired image. It can be a visualization of the goal: someone draws a goal, someone makes collages from their photos and photos of the goal. Someone practices the principle “Live as if you have achieved it”, models and cultivates the feeling that you have what you want.

What to do if the goal is achieved or not achieved

Regardless of the result, analyze it. What hindered the achievement of the goal, what helped? What inspired, what provoked procrastination? What needs to be considered or improved next time?

Analysis and adjustment:

  • The goal was not achieved in the desired period. Revise the deadlines, adjust them in accordance with the input data.
  • The target is irrelevant. Perhaps interests, values, life situation. Adjust the goal or abandon it.
  • The goal is relevant, but the priorities have changed. Life has made adjustments to plans, other issues require attention. Review your goal and timeline.

Do not regret, do not criticize yourself, analyze, look for cause-and-effect relationships, draw conclusions. Accept a situation that cannot be changed. It will be easier if you give all your best and enjoy the process along the way. Even if something didn’t work out, at least you had a great time. What's next on the list?

We are far from achieving all of our goals - and often the point is not laziness and weakness, but the inability to correctly formulate tasks and determine priorities. Self-improvement consultant Robert Sipe has published a book by Mann, Ivanov & Ferber on how to use brain science to increase productivity and focus on the practical implementation of your ideas and desires. Theories and Practices publishes a chapter from the book.

Reduce the number of goals

Write down the 5-6 most important goals you want to achieve in the next 90 days. Why exactly so many? The main thing at this stage is to reduce: the term and the number of items on the list. Why? There are five or six goals, because, as we already know, consciousness is not able to effectively cope with an excess of information. It is easy for him to focus on only a few tasks at a time. Of course, there is an appropriate time and place for the so-called creation of a dream, when you get rid of all the limitations of thinking and time and indulge in bold and crazy thoughts. This exercise is useful for expanding the horizons and possibilities of your mind, but now we will do something else. Take a calendar and determine the next milestone in about 90 days. Ideally, this is the end of the quarter, the end of the month is also suitable. If the end point comes in 80 or 100 days, that's fine; the main thing is to be close to 90. Why is this important? Because for about that time, a person can be very focused on one important goal without hitting the "reset button" and still see real progress.

Not for nothing that almost all diets or training programs are designed for about 90 days. A great example is the wildly popular P90X home fitness program. "P" means "strength" (power), and "X" - "limit" (Xtreme). Basically just a marketing gimmick. But behind the number "90" there are serious scientific justifications. The program is not called P10X, because you can’t achieve great success in 10 days, but also not P300X: no one can stick to the program for so long without a break. Why do you think Wall Street attaches such importance to the quarterly financial reports of companies?

Because it is during such a period that significant changes can be introduced without losing focus. In any important undertaking, much shorter than 90 days is too short to see real progress, and much longer is too long to clearly see the finish line. Study the next 90 days and write down numbers from 1 to 6 on a piece of paper. You will write down the 5-6 most important goals that you want to achieve in 90 days. Now analyze all areas of your life: work, finances, physical health, mental/emotional state, family, participation in society - so that your list is comprehensive.

As you write down your most important goals for the next 90 days, recap what makes a goal effective. In the previous chapter, we discussed in detail the five essential characteristics of your goals, and here I will list them briefly again.

1 . What you write down should be meaningful to you. These goals are yours and no one else's, so be sure to fix what you really want to achieve.

2. What you write down should be specific and measurable. We're talking about a 90-day program with an explicit deadline, so general phrases like "increase income", "lose weight" or "save money" are out of place. Clearly define what exactly you intend to achieve during this period. How much money to earn or save? How many pounds to lose weight? How many kilometers to run? What will be your sales (define specific numbers)? Your numbers or details are not important to me, but specificity is necessary. By neglecting this step, you will miss out on most of the opportunities this process gives you.

3 . Goals must be of the right scale: challenging, yet achievable from your point of view. Remember: you have about three months to do everything, and then you have to blow the lights out. So choose the right scale goals. In this exercise, you will have to choose between the options "a bolder target, so you have to strain" and "a more modest one, to play it safe." The choice depends on your experience and previous successes. If you are used to achieving the main thing easily or you are a little bored, then choose a more ambitious goal. If you are doing this for the first time, then you should choose a more modest goal.

4 . Even if it is obvious, I will emphasize: the goals need to be fixed in writing. You are doing yourself and me a disservice if you read all this and do nothing. I didn't say "think about what you want to achieve in the next 90 days", I said "write it down". I assure you that the coordinated work of the eyes, hands and brain raises the choice and design of goals to a qualitatively new level. So, fix your goals in pen and paper, not just in your mind.

5 . You will regularly review what you are currently writing, so be honest with yourself and create goals that you will be interested in achieving. Once you've laid the groundwork, we'll develop a whole plan with the need to be accountable to ourselves and the programming elements, so keep in mind that you will interact with these goals.

Enough descriptions - it's time to work! Grab a pen and paper and write down your top 5-6 goals for the next 90-100 days. Give it as much time as you need, and then go back to reading.

Define a key goal

Now you need to determine which of these goals is key for you. You may ask, “What is a key goal?” And that's great, because you've probably never looked at your goals this way before. Your key goal is one whose serious pursuit supports most of your other goals. Looking at your short list, you will surely notice that there are connections between many goals; you may even realize that some are in competition with each other. But I have found that in almost all cases there is one of the goals, the persistent pursuit of which is likely to achieve the desired results in all areas. I don't want to over complicate things. You may already know which of your goals fits this description.

Often, when a person gets to this stage, one of the goals he wrote down catches his eye and seems to scream: “Hey! Make it so that I come true! If you have already found this goal, just mark it in the list and only then continue reading. If the key target isn't immediately visible, that's okay too. I myself often had to figure out which of my goals is the key, where to focus my main efforts. You want the one that is most likely to help you reach the rest.

There are several options. Sometimes the achievement of a key goal indirectly causes the implementation of the others, almost automatically. It happens that a key goal requires the achievement of others as an intermediate step or an auxiliary tool. And sometimes a key goal can affect your life so much that you gain the strength, confidence, and energy to break down any wall you come across. Here is an example. Recently, I began to figure out what I want to achieve in the remaining 100 days of the year, and came up with the following:

1 . Personal selling.

2. Personal income.

3 . Pay the debt off.

4 . Run 355 km and do 35 strength workouts.

5 . Meditate at least 50 times.

6. Take 14 days of guilt-free vacation by disconnecting from everything.

These were the most important goals. Note that they are all specific and measurable. I knew that I needed to reduce them to one and take it seriously. Strictly speaking, there is no right answer; none of them were better or worse than the others. Deciding where the main effort would bring the most return was entirely up to me. Guess which one I chose? Sales. The figure itself would not tell you anything, but I will describe my line of reasoning. By fulfilling the sales plan, I would thereby receive income and ensure the repayment of the debt. Achieving my goals would also allow me to find time for vacations. And what is the connection with training and meditation? I knew that maintaining physical, mental and spiritual health would give me the energy I needed. So all these goals are interconnected.

If the main efforts are directed to a key goal, the subconscious mind actually takes on all these goals and the likelihood of achieving them increases significantly. Do you understand? Your next step is to do this with your goals: determine which one is the key to the rest. If you haven't selected it yet, then choose slowly. Make sure you are confident in your key goal before moving on.

Confirm the reason

Now that you have one goal to focus on, it's time to answer the most important question: why? Why is it important for you to achieve it? Intuition may provide the answer. Sometimes the stars align in such a way that it dawns on you. You say to yourself: “I don’t need unnecessary reasoning. I have never felt such enthusiasm, I am eager to fight!” If so, great! Just write down your thoughts as a guide. If insight does not occur, try to stimulate your thinking with questions such as:

Why do I want to achieve this?

What will give me the achievement of this goal?

How will I feel when I realize this goal? Self confidence? Delight? Appeasement? Inspiration? Strength?

How will achieving this goal help me become a better or stronger person? What do I need to grow into?

What else can I do with this result?

There are no wrong answers to the “why” question, and the more you have, the better.

Visualize Goals

To focus and "tune" your mind, you need to visualize goals. So far, all your activities have been related to making plans. Most don't even get to this stage when thinking about their goals, so you're already in the lead. But there is still a lot you can do to speed up the process. Your subconscious mind is billions of times more powerful than your conscious mind. It thinks and works in many different ways. As we have said, one important key to the subconscious mind is to understand that it operates with images. The conscious mind manages coherent, linear thoughts that go one after another (which even sound like sentences in your mind), and the subconscious, in fact, just sees the pictures and stubbornly strives for them.

Take advantage of this: let your brain have something to look at! Give him images to work with. Sometimes I suggest that clients store images in a notebook or folder. Sometimes - create a dream board and hang it in the workplace to see all the images at once. Many of my clients place images of their goals on cards along with affirmations. There are many ways to visualize your goals. Experiment and choose what suits you best.

Create supporting rituals

You don't have to sing hymns or sacrifice a lamb. To create a ritual, you will consciously build some kind of automatic behavior that will become a binding to your goals. This is not just a trick I made up. Here are three books that have convincingly proved its benefits to me:

The first two books helped me understand the science behind habits, and the third helped me put together a step-by-step program that is now bringing great benefits to me and my clients. Do you know that most of your thoughts have become a habit? Dr. Deepak Chopra states that over 99% of the thoughts we have today are repeats of yesterday, and 99% of tomorrow will be repeats of today. Actions are determined by thoughts, and many of them - at work, in relation to health, finances - are performed by force of habit. They are brought to automatism. Remember what you do in the morning from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to work: how often does one morning look like another? You put your feet on the floor, get up unsteadily, brush your teeth, take a shower, drink coffee, get dressed, have breakfast (maybe), drink coffee again, check email, drink coffee again, wake up the children, make them breakfast, drink coffee again and leave.

Track your morning activities for several days, and you may be surprised how similar one day is to another. So, you already have automatic behaviors; I advise you to perform them consciously for a while, and then replace them with new ones. There are two periods during the day when this will need to be done.

The first is as soon as you wake up in the morning. The first hour - or rather, the first few minutes - is a very good time to program your brain for success. At this time, it passes from sleep to wakefulness, and its waves are configured in such a way that your subconscious mind is exceptionally receptive to the "thought seeds" that you sow. Have you noticed how the first minutes after waking up can set the tone for the whole day? Have you ever gotten up on the wrong foot? Pay attention and you'll begin to see practical connections between an effective start in the morning and your results throughout the day.

Most miss this opportunity: in the morning we are either nervous for various reasons, or we move in a fog, not fully understanding what is happening. And many successful people purposefully use the start of the day to set their minds to focus on their dreams and goals.

The second time you need to program yourself is in the last few minutes of your day. They are important for much the same reasons as the first hour of being awake: it is a transitional phase for the brain. During the last hour before bed, find an opportunity to visualize your goals and some affirmations one more time, and then express your gratitude for all the good things that happened that day.

Those who have a Purpose in life are lucky, but not necessarily successful and accomplished lucky ones. The goal is yet to be achieved! Consider the best and simplest algorithms - how to correctly set and achieve the chosen goal.

Consider the basic rules for setting and achieving goals. And consider the available algorithm from Brian Tracy.

Algorithm "How to achieve the Goal in 24 hours" by Brian Tracy (initial scheme)

  1. Take a sheet of paper and write on it 10 goals that you want to achieve in 12 months. (put today's date at the top). Be sure to write down the targets on paper, for you cannot hit a target that you cannot see absolutely clearly.
  2. Then ask yourself - if you could achieve one goal from this list, which one would have the most positive influence on your life? Circle this goal and make it your primary goal. And here, write the deadline for achieving this goal (real time).
  3. Next, immediately make a list of everything you can do to achieve this goal and start working on this list.
  4. The main rule is to do something from this list every day!

Brian Tracy claims that this simple algorithm and action on it is sure to change your life for the better, and in ways that you cannot even imagine. It is said that people become great when they manage to identify their most important goal and start working towards achieving it every day.

If you do this, then in a week, a month, a year - you will look back and be shocked by the changes that have taken place.

One of the basic principles of all the most successful and wealthy people is that most of the time they think about what they want to achieve and how to achieve it! And not about the past, regretting losses or failures.

As soon as you start thinking about the goal, the goal starts moving towards you.

And now let's consider a more detailed algorithm for working with goals in order to speed up their achievement as much as possible, remove the contradictions between them and connect all the resources of your consciousness, turn on the maximum energy to achieve them!

How to set goals correctly. Complete Algorithm

Of course, ideally, strategic goals should be worked out for at least 10 years, and preferably 25. But they should be worked out in as much detail as possible for 1 year, as Brian Tracy says.

1. Make a list of all goals (results) that you would like to achieve and you need to boldly enter all your most cherished dreams into this list. It can be a list of 10 items, or maybe 50. Check this list by articles and dedicated goals (adjust your goals).

Against each goal - put a date when you want to achieve it (actual estimated date).

2. Set priorities. It is necessary to single out the main one or several goals - the most important, high and large-scale ones that will most positively affect your life (they will change your fate as much as possible). Circle the main goal (or several) with a marker and line them up by numbers - No. 1 The most important and then in descending order.

All other goals of the list, as a rule, will directly depend on certain main goals, that is, they will be subordinate to them. or related to them indirectly.

Certain main goals are those steps to achieve which you will need to take every day for sure.

3. All conditions for achieving the goal. Make a list of everything that will contribute to the achievement of the main goals (everything that somehow helps to achieve them). From this list, choose what you need to do every day. At a minimum, every day, be sure to do something from this list.

Better yet, make a plan for when and what you will do in order to implement the entire list and achieve your goal.

4. Inclusion of aspirations to the goal - increased motivation. Your motives are the main force on which the speed of achieving the goal depends (it will be sluggish and long or fast and with great enthusiasm). In order to understand what motives lead you, what is missing, first just answer the question for yourself - why and why do you need it, why do you need to achieve written goals?

To generate a huge charge to achieve the goal, answer the following questions in sequence:

  • How will you change as a person when you achieve your Goals? How will your attitude towards yourself change?
  • How, in the very the best option change your destiny? What will disappear from your life, what do you not like and what will appear from what you dream about?
  • By achieving your Goals, how will other people and society benefit?
  • Describe in addition how the achievement of goals will change all spheres of life: your work, relationships, leisure, life, the very way of life (where will you spend your life time?)?

The answer to each question should be at least 5 detailed items (2-3 lines each), and preferably at least 10.

Of course, in order to achieve the Goal - the above is not enough, you also need to adequately, effectively act, learn, be able to see and admit your mistakes, to do this, analyze and correct all your actions.

For success, a lot of things are needed, in addition to the Goals, you still need faith, will, activity, learning, analysis, and fundamental personal qualities such as discipline, responsibility, sociability, etc. But we will consider this in an article on.

Good luck in setting and achieving goals!

If you have any questions during the development of goals, I will definitely answer!

Whether you have big goals in life or small dreams, set yourself goals to achieve them. To achieve some things, you will have to spend your whole life, and to achieve some, a couple of three days will be enough. When your plans and dreams come true, you feel that indescribable feeling of accomplishment for a long time and dignity. Starting to fulfill your dreams may seem difficult, but we will show you how to do it.

Steps

Set achievable goals

    Define goals in life. Ask yourself some important questions about what you want in your life. What do you really want to achieve: today, in a year, or in your lifetime? The answers to these questions can be quite general, such as "I want to be happy" or "I want to help people." Imagine what you hope to achieve in 10, 15 or 20 years.

    • Goals can be completely different, for example, open your own business, lose weight, or start a family one day.
  1. Divide your life goals into smaller tasks. Divide your life into specific areas or areas that you would like to change or improve over time. These may include: career, finances, family, education, or health. First, ask yourself the question of what exactly you want to achieve in each of the areas of your life within 5 years.

    • For a life goal like “I want to get in shape,” you can set small goals for yourself, such as “I want to eat healthy food” or “I want to run a marathon.”
    • For a life goal such as: “I want to have my own business”, the tasks can be: “I want to learn how to effectively manage a business” and “I want to open my own bookstore”.
  2. Set short term goals. Now that you already know roughly what you want to achieve in a few years, you can concentrate on completing specific tasks. Set reasonable deadlines for completing tasks for yourself, in the case of short-term tasks - no more than a year.

    Turn your tasks into steps towards your goal. In general, you must decide why you are setting this task for yourself and what it will contribute to. Here are some good questions to ask yourself: Is it worth it? Is it worth it to start right now? Do I really want this?

    • For example, if you want to achieve the desired shape in life, a short-term goal for you may be to take up a new sport within 6 months, however, ask yourself how much this will help you run a marathon. If not, change the task so that it becomes the next step towards achieving your goal.
  3. Reevaluate your tasks periodically. Your life goals may not change, however, sometimes think about reviewing your short-term goals. Can you achieve them within the given time frame? Are they still necessary in achieving your life goal? Be flexible in setting short-term goals.

    • Perhaps you have achieved good results in a 5K run and after a few workouts, you should change your goal from “run 5K” to “Run 10K.” Over time, you can set other goals, like “run a half marathon”, and then “run a marathon”.
    • To start your own business, after completing tasks such as completing accounting courses and finding premises, you can set yourself a task, for example, take out a loan for a small business, buy premises, obtain a license from the local government. After buying or renting a space, stock up on books, hire staff, and open the doors of your store. You may soon start thinking about opening a second one.

    Stick to an effective strategy in achieving the goal

    1. Be specific about your goals. Before you set a goal, you need to know whether it can be the answer to very specific questions: who, what, where, when and why. As you set yourself a goal, understand how it will be useful in achieving your life goal.

      • Being in shape has a rather vague wording. Therefore, it is worth creating a more specific goal to “run a marathon”, which, in turn, is achieved through short-term goals - “run 5 km”. When you set yourself a similar task, answer the questions: who? - I what? - run 5 km, where? – in the local park, when? – within 6 weeks, why? – to achieve your goal and run a marathon.
      • In order to open your business, create a short-term task to “take an accounting course”. She can answer next questions: Who? - I what? - accounting courses, where? - in the library, when? – every Saturday for 5 weeks, why? - to manage the budget of your company.
    2. Create tasks that can be measured. To be able to track progress, goals must be measurable. "I'm going to walk more" is much harder to evaluate than "I'm going to walk 16 laps every day." In fact, you should have several ways to evaluate your result.

      • “Running 5 km” is a task that can be assessed. You know exactly when you need to do it. It may be necessary to create other short-term goals, such as “run at least 3 km three times a week.” This all works towards your goal, after reaching which the next measurable goal will be “run 5 km a month, in 4 minutes”
      • Also, the task of “taking accounting courses” is quite measurable. These are specific classes that you need to go and sign up for and go to classes once a week. A less specific task is to “learn accounting,” you never know if you have reached the goal or not, whether you have completed the task set for yourself.
    3. Be realistic in setting goals. It is important to assess the situation as honestly as possible for yourself and understand how realistic the fulfillment of your goals is, whether you have everything to put them into practice. Ask yourself this question, do you have enough knowledge, time, skills or resources.

      • To run a marathon, you need to spend a lot of time running. If you don't have enough free time, given task unacceptable to you. In this case, find another task for yourself that requires less time and can help you achieve your global goal.
      • If you want to open your own bookstore but don't have the experience, no start-up capital, there is no honest understanding of how the bookstore works, you do not like to read at all, you should probably give up your own goal, because you may not achieve success.
    4. Set your priorities. At any point in your life, you have multiple tasks in various stages of completion. Determining the importance of the task or goal is crucial. If it turns out that you need to complete too many tasks, you will feel overwhelmed. This will lead to the fact that the final goal will not be achieved.

    5. Track your progress. Entries in personal diaries or journals is a great way to track progress, for both personal and professional purposes. Self-examination is the key to staying motivated towards achieving your goal. This method may even inspire you to work harder.

      • Ask friends to track your progress and help you stay on track. For example, if you are training for a serious race, meet regularly with a friend who will oversee the completion of your tasks.
      • If you're training for a marathon, record in a journal or diary your accomplishments, how far and how long you ran, and how you felt doing it. Seeing where you started from will make you more motivated to take on more challenging tasks.
      • Once you run a marathon, you must understand what you want next. Do you want to run another marathon by improving your time? Perhaps you want to try your hand at triathlon? Or do you want to go back to running 5K and 10K again?
      • After opening your store, do you want to take part in social events, lead literary circles or literacy circles? Maybe you want to earn more money? Maybe you should open a cafe in a store or in a nearby building?
    • Use the SMART method to set effective goals. The SMART method is used in the work of trainers, motivation specialists, in personnel departments and in educational system to define goals, achievements and attitudes. Each of the letters SMART is the beginning of some concept that helps in achieving the goals.