Lifestyle13

I’m not a big one for making New Year’s Resolutions.  However, I do think goal setting is important.  Resolutions are too easy to break.  If you do your goal planning correctly, you’ll be able to stick to your goals and accomplish them.

A person should set his goals as early as he can and devote all his energy and talent to getting there. With enough effort, he may achieve it. Or he may find something that is even more rewarding. But in the end, no matter what the outcome, he will know he has been alive.
 
- Walt Disney

Many goal-setting experts recommend using the mnemonic SMART when setting your goals.

SMART stands for:

• Specific
• Measurable
• Achievable
• Realistic
• Time-bound

For example, you can’t just say, “I want to make more money” because if you make one dollar more, you’ve made more money, but that probably wasn’t your goal.  At the same time, you must be realistic and the goal must be achievable.  If you have a $20,000 a year job, saying, “I want to make a billion dollars this year” isn’t realistic and probably isn’t achievable. 

Instead, you could say, “I plan to make an additional $5,000 by December 31, 2oo8.”  With this goal, you’ve been specific in what you want.  Your goal is measurable because you can measure your progress by tracking your income.  Making an additional $5,000 is both achievable and realistic, and you’ve time-bound the goal by saying you’ll accomplish it by December 31, 2008.

The next step is to make a plan for how you’ll accomplish your goal.  In this example, to make the additional $5,000, you could get a part-time job.  You could also work to convince your employer that you need a raise.  Or you could look at starting a small side-business that would generate enough revenue to create a $5,000 profit by the end of the year.

Once you have a plan in place for achieving your goal, you should break down the plan into manageble pieces and do something every day to move you closer to accomplishing your goal.

For some inspiration on goal setting check out How to Achieve Ridiculous Goals from the Self Made Chick.

1965 - The New York Jets sign quarterback Joe Namath for $400,000.

1967 - Actress Tia Carrere is born.

1968 - Actor Cuba Gooding Jr. is born.

1974 - President Nixon signs bill lowering maximum speed limit to 55 mph.

1983 - “Annie” closes on Broadway after 2,377 performances.

1939 - Hewlett - Packard is founded.

1971 - Cigarette ads are banned on U.S TV.

1983 - The ARPANET officially changes to using the Internet Protocol creating the internet.

1985 - The internet’s domain name system is created.

1999 - The Euro currency is introduced.

2008 - New Hampshire legalizes civil unions for same sex couples.