Your guide to setting life goals

Setting goals

Setting goals can help you to focus on what really matters to you. Most of us have to set annual goals as part of our jobs. But why stop there? Our career is just one aspect of our life, it makes sense to carry this through into all areas. Not convinced? I've listed below a whole host of other reasons why I recommend you set some goals for the year.

• Give you a clear purpose and direction in life

• Make you think about ‘the why’ behind your actions and whether they align with your values

• Help you visualise the future and motivate and inspire you to take action 

• Provide a framework that helps you to organise your time and where to focus your efforts and energy

• Achieve bigger results in less time, without stress and overwhelm

• Transform your habits, behaviours, self-confidence, and mindset

• Accomplish more.

Sound good? Ok, so where to start? If you haven’t put pen to paper and set goals for yourself before, then it might feel a little bit daunting. I’m going to share a loose framework with you to help you on your way. 

Spend some time reflecting

Below are some questions you could ask yourself before you begin. Some of the questions might seem a little unusual but I’m building in some NLP techniques to help you step back, reflect, and emotionally connect.

• What do I want to do, change, experience, or have specifically this year? 

• What’s important about that? What will it give me? (This helps you to check in and see if what you want to do is aligned with your values)

• How will I know that I’m getting the results I want? What will I see, taste, touch, or hear? 

• What was getting in the way or stopping me from doing that before?

• What needs to change or what do I need to let go of in order to work on my goals?

• What will happen if I achieve my goals?

• What won’t happen if I achieve my goals?

• What will happen if I don’t achieve my goals?

Consider grouping your life goals by themes

If you are struggling to come up with ideas, you could try breaking it down into themes. Below are some suggestions.

• Health / self-care

• Relationships (partner, family, friends)

• Career

• Finances

• Personal development

• Fun.

You may then decide to create a goal for each theme or you might skip one of the themes and have several goals under another. Brainstorm some ideas and then go through your list and rank them in order of importance and decide what you really can and can’t commit to this year.

Hints for drafting life goals

If you are new to goal setting then I recommend you start with a few, maybe five or so, to avoid overwhelm. Writing your goals down is a must. You’ll never remember them otherwise!

The way that you write your goals is very important. I've shared a few hints below.

Hint one: Write your goals in positive statements, including the outcome that you want. Framing them this way changes your energy, motivation, and enthusiasm. Writing in the negative (e.g. I don’t want to xxxx) focuses your mind on avoidance rather than achievement and doesn’t point you in the right direction. Instead, ask yourself what you do want e.g. the opposite of what you don’t want!

Hint two: Make them as specific as possible. Just saying “I want to go on holiday” is too vague, it needs more detail such as “I want to go on a skiing holiday in Europe in the spring with family, and on a beach holiday to Spain with my best friend in the summer so that I get some time away from work to relax and recharge”.

Hint three: Include ‘the why’ – what the goal will give you, and how it will add value to your life. This will ensure that you are taking action that aligns with your values, which in turn will give you that boost over time if you start to lose momentum.

Hint four: Make sure that they are realistic and achievable. It’s good to dream big but would you be able to become an astronaut or complete a degree in a year? 

Hint five: Put a timeframe around them so that you are clear about what you want to achieve and by when. That way, you won’t keep putting them off and end up trying to do everything at the end of the year or not at all. If you suffer from fatigue, it's important that you pace yourself. It's tempting to try to cram everything in. Do be careful not to overextend yourself. Consider starting off with three goals and consider anything else that you achieve, over and above that, a bonus!

How to avoid the overwhelm

Once you’ve drafted your life goals for the year, it’s time to ‘chunk down’. Chunking is a way of breaking down larger goals into more realistic and achievable steps. The process helps you to understand what you need to do to achieve your overall goal and encourages you to create a timeline to get them done. Completing a series of mini-goals along the way helps you manage your energy more effectively, gives you a sense of achievement, and motivates you to keep up the momentum. 

Getting started: To start chunking, you need to work backward from your end goal and think about what you need to do for that to happen. You then create mini-goals or milestones, and actionable steps (individual tasks that will help you achieve each mini-goal). This approach is really beneficial because it shows you the steps you need to take, and when to take them, in order to make your goal happen. Plus, it cuts through the overwhelm, which is one of the reasons why people fail to meet their goals – but more on this later. Take a look at the example below. Don’t forget to put deadline dates against each one. You can always adjust them depending on what else you are juggling with at the time. 

1) Life goal: By July, I want to get a new Marketing Manager job, which is in the retail industry based in London, that pays 15% more than my current job.

2) Mini-goals:

• Research – companies, recruiters, and job sites

• Prepare – write CV and draft responses to possible interview questions

• Job search – online, networking, magazines/papers etc.

• Interviews - practice and attend.

3) Actionable steps for the ‘prepare’ mini-goal):

• Revise CV and add latest job details

• Ask a friend to read CV and give feedback

• Create LinkedIn account 

• Add details of accomplishments to LinkedIn

• Find connections on LinkedIn

• Send CV to relevant recruiters.

Six life goal success tips

Here are just a few suggestions on ways in which you can ensure momentum and make new habits stick.

Tip one: Think about what could get in the way of you achieving your goals and what you could do to prevent that from happening. This is particularly important if you suffer from fatigue. Often you don't know you've overdone it until it's too late. So pay close attention to your energy levels from day to day, look out for any patterns and structure your actionable steps and timeline accordingly.

Tip two: Find an accountability partner – this could be a partner, friend, or family member. Let them know what your goals are and provide details and timelines of your mini goals and actionable steps. Then agree on how often you’ll update them on progress. This is a great approach as it will help you stay on track and keeps you motivated!

Tip three: Brainstorm ways in which you can keep your goals front of mind and maintain the momentum. Examples could include a vision board, integrating your actionable steps into your diary or planner, or setting phone alerts/reminders.

Tip four - visualise success: 

• Close your eyes, float out of your body, and watch yourself below doing the actionable steps.

• What does it feel like when you reach each milestone? What can you see/hear/feel? 

• Watch yourself being motivated, enthusiastic, fulfilled, and achieving your end goal. How does it feel? 

• Float back to the present and take a deep breath.

Tip five: Decide how you will celebrate small successes and reward yourself along the way. This is great for motivation! Think about small rewards that would be meaningful to you. Maybe it’s something like a nice meal out or it could be something as simple as having a hot bath surrounded by candles.

Tip six: If you are prone to overwhelm then I suggest you start by doing one thing at a time. If it’s a habit change then wait until you’ve built it into your routine before moving on to the next thing. Make sure that you haven't scheduled too many actionable steps at the same time. Try to spread them out a little.

Why some people fail to achieve their life goals

Over 80% of people give up on their goals within weeks. There are a number of reasons that people fail to achieve their biggest goals. Many of these are associated with fear. 

Below are a few examples of this type of self-sabotage.

Fear of starting:

• You procrastinate and give in to distractions

• You feel overwhelmed by the number of tasks or you’ve set too many goals 

• You need everything to be done perfectly before you start.

*Tip: breaking your goals down into small actionable steps will help you to avoid procrastination. Also, it’s important to remind yourself that ‘perfect’ does not exist! 

Fear of failing:

• You fear judgment from others 

• Your limiting beliefs get in the way. For example, you think you aren’t good enough or you can’t do it.

• You give up at the first sign of a setback.

*Tip: try to reframe your thinking in line with one of the Neuro-Linguistic-Programming (NLP) principles, which states that “There is no failure, only feedback”. 

Fear of success:

• You worry that, once you achieve your goal, you’ll be unable to sustain it.

• Many people struggle with change. Success could result in some significant changes in your life and potentially who you are as a person. 

*Tip: be aware of your self-talk. Try to keep your thoughts in the present. Avoid 'what if' questions, they'll only stress you out unnecessarily. 

Get in touch

If you are struggling to do this alone, then do get in touch. I'd love to discuss how I could coach you through any aspect of goal-setting and/or act as your accountability partner so that you can stay on track and motivated!