Impossible Dreams or Actionable Goals?

The New Year is here. We all set yearly goals, but how many of them do we actually accomplish?

Every new year the entire world feels refreshed and rejuvenated to accomplish so much! Lose weight. Get a raise. Read everyday. Spend more time with family. You want to know the issue with all of these goals? They aren’t achieveable or actionable. These goals are so broad and if you accomplished them you either wouldn’t know you did or you feel like you can never achieve them. The result: You stop pursuing them. Another year in the books and zero of the goals you set have been accomplished. Once again. So now you consider them dreams because you believe they are impossible to accomplish. Stop setting dreams, and set actionable goals!

What’s the best way to set goals?

Step 1: Define The Goal, Clearly.

The first thing to do with setting goals is to define the goal. Defining a goal allows you to work towards it as well as accomplish it. Losing weight can’t be a goal because you could end the year having lost 2 pounds and you can still feel like you haven’t lost enough. If you want to lose weight, find a number of pounds you want to lose but don’t stop there! If you want to lose 10 pounds, ask yourself by what day specifically? June 24th? Before the first day of summer? Your birthday? Make sure to clearly define it and then pick a specific date to accomplish it by. Once this is done the next step is to determine how.

Step 2: Define How You Will/Can Accomplish Your Goal.

You need to find out how you can accomplish your goal by your set specific date. If your goal is to have a new logo by March of the new year, you need to consider what it is going to take to get you there. You will have to ask yourself a series of questions. Who can design a logo? How much money do I have to spend to make this happen? Do I know what I want? Once you answer these questions you will have a better understanding of what your next step to take is. You know of 3 graphic designers who can design a logo but you don’t know their pricing for logo designs. So an actionable goal would be to first research these three graphic designers. Find their contact information, view their logo design work, and reach out. Once you have reached out you can check that off of your list of a goal accomplished and then you set a new goal. No you have not achieved your final goal yet, but you are one step closer to achieving that goal.

Step 3: Create a schedule

This is one of the most crucial parts of the actionable goals journey. Create a schedule to constantly achieve all of your actionable goals. If your goal is to post a blog post everyday to lead people to your new website, you might have a recurring goal of writing a new blog post everyday. Well then, what time everyday are you going to post your new blog post? Let’s just say 12pm. Okay well then to post at that time you have to start planning and researching what you are going to write about around 8 am. So now your schedule for this goal is to start writing/researching for a new blog post everyday at 8am. That’s an actionable goal that you can ask yourself everyday if you have accomplished or not.

My goal planning discovery

What I’ve realized with this three step process to setting actionable goals is that I can get so much more done within a year. So much that I’ve accomplished yearly goals all within a month because of the group of smaller actionable goals that are easier to attack!

You can tackle a giant with an army that is consistently attacking, or just pickup a slingshot…lol
–Christoph The Artist

So no more setting impossible dreams and start setting actionable goals that you can accomplish everyday and you will start setting yearly goals to accomplish in a month and do that 12 times in a year and you will look back next New Years and say, What a Year! All goals accomplished!

Let me know how you are doing this year with your actionable goals. Comment below your thoughts and experiences!