Enhancing The Good

Flash back to Junior High School: You’re sitting in health class and are learning about goals. The teacher writes five letters on the board:

S. M. A. R. T

Remember what these stand for? If you’ve been up-to-date on the social media posts (or just have a fantastic memory) you’ll know that these stand for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relative, and Time-bound. If you weren’t sure before, now you know 😉

I occasionally get sick of hearing these words when contemplating my goals because they seem to be stressed no matter where you go to seek help (the internet, coaches, books, memories, friends, etc.). So if you’re anything like me, I get it… BUT there really is a reason that we make sure our goals align with these rules. So, if you look anything like:

this,

this,

or this

when your goals don’t turn out how you would’ve liked, listen up! We’re going to dive in now so we can understand WHY these five rules are SO important and why I emphasize them being the keys to goal setting:

S- Specific

Having too broad of a goal means that you have MANY ways you can divert yourself other than reaching the goal you actually want.

If you set the goal to “be more healthy” or “drink more water”, it won’t be surprising if you don’t reach your ideal weight or are still seeing issues you thought would go away. For one, these goals aren’t very motivating as there is no clearly defined checkpoints where you can recognize yourself improving and thus gain more momentum and the will to keep going. Secondly, if you want to “drink more water”, that could be one sip more than you usually take and you’ve technically achieved your goal (which might make you feel good in the moment), but in the long run, you’re not seeing any difference in your life and that’s when feelings of defeat and despair set in.

Having too broad of a goal also means that you leave plenty of room for distractions to sneak in. Saying you want to spend less time on Instagram might get you to not open the app in the first place, but then you might be likely to open Facebook instead (and is that really what you meant when you set that goal?)

So, be specific! Instead of saying “be more healthy”, set your goal to say something like “eat three whole fruits a day”. It’s going to be a lot harder to avoid meeting that goal since you know exactly what you need to do!

M- Measurable

How are you going to keep track of your progress?

There are quite a few benefits of doing this, one of my favorites being that you can actually see how well you are doing and it can motivate you to keep going instead of giving up! If you’re trying to start a blog (hey, there’s an idea), how many posts are you going to write a week? A month? By including this part in your goal setting, you can look back and evaluate your plan. Does it need adjusting so you can stay on target? Is it too easy or too hard? Lots of good questions to help you think…

A- Attainable

How honest are we being with ourselves?

If you hardly ever set foot outside of your house because you’re nervous about being around other people, how likely is it that you’re going to find the love of your life at the first social gathering you attend? I’m all for shooting for the moon, stretching ourselves, and completely believe that difficult things (that may seem impossible) are actually, in fact, possible, but let’s start with something a little smaller. Maybe it’s not finding your love right away, but actually getting out that needs to be the focus.

When thinking of how to make your goal more attainable, what is it that you already know about yourself? What are your strengths and weaknesses? When are you motivated the most versus the least? It’s still important to challenge yourself, but don’t let the challenge be too overwhelming or out of reach where you know you might give up.

R- Relative

The last example is good here as well. Normally when we set goals, there is usually a bigger goal in mind. If you’re not sure what that is with the goals you have already, ask yourself “why do I want to find the love of my life?” (if that’s your goal… If not, that question might not be very helpful). Not only does this question help you see the bigger picture but it can often be a great motivator.

If you already know your big reason of why you’re setting the goals that you are, make sure that those goals are actually going to bring you at least a step closer to that reason, otherwise what’s the point? It’s going to be a lot harder to get outside of your house if you genuinely don’t care about creating a relationship with someone.

T- Time Bound

I’m sure you aren’t sick of hearing about how COVID affected all of our lives, so here’s an example from then:

Remember when the world was pretty much shut down because of a virus that was spreading uncontrollably? And to try and keep the world from ceasing to spin, many companies and schools changed the way they did things. A lot of responsibility was switched as employees became more accountable to themselves and a lot of students were encouraged to finish assignments on their own.

I’m sure there are tons of great people out there who, despite this, were able to get everything done and be on and off the clock at exactly the right times when no one was watching, but how many of us struggled with being that on top of it??

Being time-bound with our goals is our main motivator! Not only does it help us to stay aware of how we are progressing, but it also pushes us to work harder than we would without it.

If you want a raise or promotion in your job, you got to earn it, right? You have to set the goals that will get you there. Let’s say you set those goals and improve in your performance, strengthen your relationships with employees and customers, are showing up to work on time, etc. (good job by the way ;)). The overall goal hasn’t quite been met yet (but don’t worry). Because you took this advice to heart, applied it to your life, and set your goal to get that raise or promotion by the end of this month, you have it planned out to meet with your boss next week to have this discussion and showcase the wonderful improvements you’ve made (spoiler alert, you end up getting it!!).

~

I hope by now you’ve seen why I call the “S.M.A.R.T” acronym “The Five Keys Of Goal Setting”. If not, scroll back up to the top and read again 😉

How are your goals looking? Do you need to go back through them and make sure they check off these five keys? When your goals have them, I’m sure you’ll soon start to look a little less like the three pictures at the beginning and more like:

(or something similar).

I’d love to hear how it’s going for you! Drop your SMART goals in the comments below and let’s see how they’re looking!