This is the second in a series of blog posts dedicated to helping you take your goals, shape them into something actionable, and start acting on it. If you haven't already, get out a sheet of paper or open up your favorite digital note-taker: we're about action here, not just reading.
(Note: Step 1 is covered here)
The benefit of a specific, measurable goal is this: you’ll know when you’re done. Looking at the “Learn Spanish” example: you don’t know when you’re done! Should you celebrate when you can order a taco at that food truck you love? When you finally understand Don Quixote? If you haven’t defined success concretely, you won’t know if you’re heading towards it.
Let’s look back at our travel example. If you’re planning a weekend getaway to Mexico and have a severe food allergy, maybe what you want is “Learn these 500 food words in Spanish and how to ask about ingredients in a dish.”
Now let’s think about the working example we’ve chosen of a lawyer looking to better serve their Spanish-speaking clients. A specific, measurable goal might be: “Learn 1000 legal words in Spanish.”
Look back at the goal you wrote in the first box. Is it specific and measurable? Do you know exactly when you’ve achieved it?
On your sheet of paper finish this sentence:
"I'll know I have reached my goal when..."
(e.g. I’ve learned 1000 legal words in Spanish by the end of the month.)
Setting goals for yourself that can’t be reached is a huge motivation killer. You do want to set ambitious goals: otherwise you’re not stretching yourself as far as you could. But too much ambition can result in you not getting anything done and then feeling bad about it. Or worse: reaching the moon and feeling bad because you didn’t make it to another galaxy. We want to celebrate every moon we land on!
Let’s look at our last example goal. 1000 legal words? First of all, are there 1000 legal words? Secondly, how attainable is it to learn 1000 in a month? The internet says it’s possible to learn 100 words a day. But that sounds like too ambitious a goal for me!
It’s a doable challenge for me to...
(e.g. learn 500 legal words in Spanish by the end of the month.)
Meanwhile, I gotta pay my cat tax:
