How To Set Long Term Goals and Achieve Them

Imagine this…

A new season is upon us and you’re feeling inspired for change. You’re ready to take steps forward and motivated to set and achieve the goals you set forth.

But the golden question remains: how do people achieve goals anyway? With all the other day to day responsibilities and things to do, how are you supposed to find time to figure out how to succeed?

We hope these tips support you in setting and achieving goals you’re proud of.

What is a goal anyway?

A goal is something we set out to do or achieve. Key elements involved in achieving a goal:

A clear understanding of what the goal IS. What are we setting out to do or achieve?
How much time do we need to accomplish it?
What are the steps we need to take to accomplish it?
How and when do we take those steps?
How do we understand if we are on track for success or not?

Sometimes it feels like working towards goals is too strict or limiting, sometimes it feels like we don’t have the time to give to them, and sometimes it feels like we don’t have the resources or support needed to be successful.

Regardless of the barrier(s) or challenges we feel, we can support ourselves and our success by using a framework to help ourselves break down big goals into small steps and setting systems of accountability to help track our progress over time.

How should I think about goals?

A goal, like we said, is something we set out to achieve. A goal could be something we want to do regularly, like exercise, or it could be a more specific, one-time action, like running a marathon.

In both cases, the aim (exercising more or running a marathon), signify a change(s) or doing things differently than they are happening today. But what are those differences? How many of them are there? For example, if you aim is to run a marathon in the coming year and today you do not run at all, the change, or difference, is being able to run 26.2 miles at one time.

How are you going to be able to do this? It would be a good idea to be able to run 1 mile before you aim for 26.2 after all, right? With that in mind, setting smaller targets along the way will be helpful as they give you specific milestones to aim for in service of your larger goal.

Even if your overall goal is to build a regular exercise routine, the same idea applies. What does ‘regular’ mean to you? What are you doing for exercise and how often are you doing it? If you want to establish an exercise routine where you are working out 3-4 days a week, a milestone would be first getting to 2 days a week consistently, and then moving up from there.

The better we are able to take these big overall goals and break them into smaller targets, the better we will be at understanding what work goes into hitting the milestones, and the more milestones we hit, the more likely we are to hit the overall goal, right?

How to set a goal:

When thinking about setting goals, it is helpful to first start really high in the big picture view.

Start by asking yourself, what is the goal you want to achieve?

Perhaps you already know what it is, or perhaps you need some time to formulate one. If it is the latter, think about the areas of life that are more important to you and what you want to achieve. For example, if financial security is one of your values and something you want to work on, what is a goal related to that area? Perhaps a savings goal? A debt reduction goal? Using a budget?
Once we have that overall aim in mind, write it down.

Then, ask yourself, if I were to fast forward to one year from today, what do I want to have achieved with respect to this area?

What is the observable difference or change you want to see at that time?
Write that down as well.

Next, ask yourself, what would be most helpful to focus on in the next three months to support you in being able to hit that 1 year target?

What segment of this 1 year target will be most impactful to bite off first?
You guessed it, write that down as well.

Now, think about how to start bringing this area more into your day to day life.

If in 3 months we want to achieve X, what would be helpful to start changing or doing this week? If we want to run a marathon, perhaps we want to invest some time in looking for a training plan, or buying a new pair of shoes, or going for a walk.
Exactly what these weekly actions are will change week over week, but having the pattern of setting and following through on weekly goals will be really helpful now and in hitting the 3 month and year out goal.

After you have gone through this exercise, we encourage you to talk to your coach/therapist about what you identified, and they can help you with setting up parameters around accountability and support in achieving these aims.

As we said, getting really clear on what our goals are (as you just did), and having systems in place to check in on our progress are key elements of goal attainment. In the beginning your therapist/coach will be a great ally for you in this work and you can use your sessions with them to check in on how the plan is working, make any changes if needed, and troubleshoot any challenges that arise.

Long-Term Goal Planning