Previously I talked about viewing your goals differently and how SMART goals can be very restrictive and far too corporate, and I promised I would share my goal setting strategy I developed when I got sick, and still use today. Again, feel free to interchange goal with any word that you are more comfortable with.
Waaay back when I was first diagnosed, I was told there were many things I wouldn’t be able to do again. With almost half of those diagnosed becoming housebound and reliant on carers I could [kind of] understand why they would tell me that. Not exactly encouraging, though, is it?!
Jump forward a year or so and I was completely over being told I couldn’t live my life how I wanted and my life would never be the same again.[]I’m just going to take a moment here to point out the obvious rubbishness of “life would never be the same again” as it applies to each and every one of us every single day. Birth, death, break-ups, just waking up the next morning. Life has already all changed!
Let’s have a quick refresh of the acronym that is SMART
….and the problem with SMART goals, and naturally I’m going to use running here as an example as it’s simple to explain SMART with.
- Specific – the goal has to be super-specific, with no vagueness whatsoever. You want to learn how to run, not just learn a sport.
- Measurable – accurate tracking is a must. You need to track along the way so you can see how you progress, and so you know that you have met the goal. You want to run a 5k.
- Attainable – meaning don’t you go being over-ambitious here. You have to be able to reach the goal. No dreaming high-in-the-sky. I’m going with the assumption that they mean because I’m pretty rubbish at physics, there’s no point me setting a goal to smash some quantum theory or some such. But pretty much anyone can say 5k, or even a marathon. Trust me, after some of the people who ran past me in the New York marathon, including a lady without the use of legs using only her arms and crutches to power along, you can if you set your mind to it.
- Relevant – this is where many of us start to fall down with what to write. Relevant to what exactly? If I want to run a 5k, learning to run is obviously already relevant.
- Time-bound – pick a date a date, stick to it.
So what does that have to do with the problem of SMART goals? Well, I just didn’t know how I was going to be feeling from one day to the next, and SMART suddenly became difficult for me. I could say that I wanted to get back into running over the next few months, but I couldn’t be specific, measured, or timely enough.
My goal-setting process
Grab yourself a pen and a sheet of a4 paper (or as near as) and divide it into 4, with the upper half smaller than the lower.
- In the top left corner write “what”
- Jot down here what you want to do. This is the easy one.
- In the top right corner write “when”
- Jot down here when, in an ideal world, you’ll set your end date. Can you do it in a month, 3 months, 6 months, a year?
- In the bottom left corner write “frustrations”
- What/Who is likely to get in your way? Mentally as well as physically. Thoughts, money, people. Write it all down.
- What is the downside of things changing?
- The downsides of things staying the same.
- Can you achieve it?
- Do you really want to?
- In the bottom right corner write “feelings”
- How would you feel after?
- What will life look like after?
- What will you be telling yourself after?
- Tell yourself the story of what achieving this will look like.
So, there you go. One simple piece of paper for how to solve the problem of SMART goals.
I know that just because we commit it to paper, it doesn’t mean that it’s magically going to happen. If only, right? Could you imagine being able to write something down and all of a sudden you’re achieving it every-single-day? More on that next time.
We do not know our limits. Our limits exist only in other people’s minds.
Want some help with how to do this for something that isn’t as “straightforward” as running? Get in touch and we’ll work through it together.
