Is Your Goal The Right One For You?
Make your goals SMART
After my last blog post, a friend of mine brought a very good point: “what goals should a person set, and how can they be right?”.
So here we are now..
Goals Vs. Dreams
I have talked before about how it is important to distinguish between goals and dreams. The simple differentiation would be that dreams are imaginary while goals are realistic. That being said, dreams can still come true, once you transfer them to goals you can work on.
It is vital that you believe that your dream, no matter how crazy you may think it is, can become real. Lets say your dream is to travel the world one day, but you are broke right now. How does that become your goal?
Well you can start by making it more realistic. To travel the world you can work for money, or get a job that requires traveling, or start a GoFundMe account…etc. Thus, making tiny goals to make that dream come true.
Are You Your Worst Enemy?
You definitely can be.
It is not always your surroundings bringing you down, sometimes you can do that single handedly. When you keep putting off the needed work and finding reasons not to start, well there is no one else to blame but yourself.
You can have doubts, no body is perfect. We are all struggling, but don´t let that be a reason for you to become your worst nightmare. We spend so much time worried about what could go wrong and how others might ruin it that we sometimes don´t notice that we are the ones doing the harm.
It is okay to take the risk, and to fail even. How many times have you fallen down when were learning how to walk? and here you are walking and jogging as if you always knew how..
Make Your Goals SMART
If you are a business or psychology student (maybe other majors as well), you probably already know what´s coming.
SMART goals in theory are ones that are: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-based. Now I don´t want to turn this into a lecture, because it is mainly self-explanatory. However, I want to point out that these characteristics of the goal will make it easier for you to see your progress.
Going back to our example, it can be: I want to travel to 8 countries in 2022. (Well at least let´s hope for 2022 for now!). So from now on start taking decisions and steps to reach that goal. Find ways, not excuses!
Be The Center of Your Goal
Having a SMART goal doesn´t necessarily mean that it is the right one for you. It is equally as important to make a goal that you can control.
Life is unpredictable, there is now argument there. Nevertheless, you have to eliminate excuses by taking responsibility. This means that the goals you set have to be ones that depends on you and not on others. For example, instead of “I am traveling the world once my friends agree to come with me”, it should be “I am traveling the world once I make the money.”.
The point of this being, that the money here is what YOU can get in a lot of different ways. While your friends might never agree and you will always find someone else to blame and a reason for you not to move forward!!
Bottom line, don´t put YOUR life in someone else´s hands. People change, situations change and life goes on. But if your life depends on others, then you will always be at loss. So take charge, make yourself accountable, and go get it!
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