Goal Setting
The Read Guard, 1986, Desmond Morris
Setting, tracking, and achieving goals is fundamental to who I am. I stumbled upon an old notebook I kept in high school this week. Every page tracked daily goals as well as an overall yearly goal. I also had a "year in review" style essay at the end of each year. I can't remember what first got me into goal setting, but it's stuck with me throughout my life. A couple of days ago, a friend asked me if I had ever written about my approach to goal setting, and I haven't. Today, I decided to change that and share my approach. I hope it's of help to anyone struggling to set and keep meaningful goals.
Categories
Broadly, I'll take on three categories of goals.
The first is physical goals that require me to burn calories and move my body. Pushing my body to new physical limits so that what seemed impossible last year is just routine this year is my favorite kind of goal. For example, in 2020, I got back into road biking after a 4-year break. I rode 1000 miles that year and got my last few miles on New Year's Eve. In 2022, I set a goal of 3000 and got there sometime in December. This year, I set a goal of 4000 and would have hit 5500 if I hadn't been in a car accident (I hit the 4000 last week).
The second category of goals is intellectual. Reading books, forming new habits that help me to internalize what I learn, and learning new technologies or disciplines all fall into this category. These goals are essential because they guide and structure my desire to learn everything.
The third category will be life goals. Examples may be career goals like getting promoted, being more involved in my community, or being more generous with my giving. These goals are similar to physical goals because they take something I've never done before and make it the new normal.
Visualization
The most important aspect of goal-setting is visualizing the person I will be after achieving the goal. If it's a weight loss goal, will I look much thinner? If it's a reading goal, will I better grasp life and critical thinking? That helps me set the goal and decide how hard I want to work for it. If I can't imagine the goal having a compounding effect or becoming a life-long habit, it's not a goal I will set.
Accountability
The accountability aspect of goal-setting is the most crucial part. Any goal worth setting should involve daily behavior to help you achieve it. You need to hold yourself accountable each day and understand that each day you don't contribute to the goal, the goal is further in jeopardy. By doing this, you will understand that 5 miles skipped today will be 10 miles run tomorrow.
Tools I use
Before I get into the specifics of my tools, I want to give a caveat that the best tools are the ones that work for you. Your determination and work ethic are the essential tools to set and accomplish goals. No app, friend, notebook, or class can help you accomplish it without those. Before you buy anything:
Determine that you will accomplish your goals.
Try running daily for a few weeks before getting a watch to track your distance and splits.
Before you keep a detailed checklist, try one checklist item.
With that, here are the tools I use.
Streaks
Streaks is a habit-tracking app. Whenever I have a goal related to changing behavior, I track it in Streaks. The app is highly customizable and also provides reminders and analytics. That said, streaks can't make you do anything, and you should have a good idea of when and how you will start your new habit before spending money on the app.
Todoist
Todoist isn't the fanciest to-do list app on the iOS block, but it's the app I have been using for about nine years. More than the app, I set a daily and weekly review of my tasks to ensure that I work toward my daily goals. These reviews help me catch my mistakes to compensate for them the following day or week.
Friends and Family
Whatever goal I set, I always talked about it with friends and family. I'll mention how many miles I have left to accomplish my goal to friends at dinner. I'll mention how many books I have left to read for the year to a cousin when we catch up. The purpose of this is to internalize the goal and to bring more accountability to it. People remember what you tell them, and you remember when you tell them. The more people know, the more accountability there is. I understand some goals are private, and I would be careful about your share in that case, but this tool is the most underrated of the tools I have mentioned.