Over the last year or two, I have begun breaking down my long term goals into more doable chunks and shorter term goals. This has really helped me overcome a tendency to build mountains out of mole hills and procrastinate. Instead of staying vague, I have forced myself to take my goal and really break it down into doable, shorter term steps.
A useful book that I recommend that describes this idea is Stick with It: The Science of Lasting Changes, by Sean Young. I like how this book logically breaks goal setting down into 3 levels: Steps (small tasks, taking 2 days or less to complete); Goals (short term goals, which take about a week to complete; and long term goals, which are comprised of the short term goals, and take up to about a month to complete); and Dreams (goals that take 3 months+ to complete).
One example is my current financial goal to payoff my student loans. This has seemed like a very challenging and sometimes insurmountable dream for the last 4+ years. One helpful tactic for me has been to break down this vague and huge goal (“I want to payoff my student loans as soon as possible”) into something more concrete and specific. For example, I set goals to reach certain number milestones each month, each 6 month period, and each 12 month period. I focus on the present (e.g. the present week or present month), estimating my budget of spending and income, and then calculate the extra money I can send toward my student loan. And then, I analyze my progress at the end of each month and the end of each year.
Another example is setting my goal to run a marathon. Rather than getting too overwhelmed and giving up due to inexperience, I read several blogs and books to help me. I chose a marathon training plan, and wrote down the workouts each week on my calendar (doing this really helps me – I hate to leave something on my calendar undone). And then, rather than continuously seeing the 26.2 miles and getting too overwhelmed, I tried to focus my attention on what was before me: each month, each week, each day, each workout, and each step/stride.
By breaking down a huge 26.2 mile distance into doable chunks (e.g. each workout with a set distance and time goal), I was able to minimize the overwhelm, and instead slowly chip away at my goal. I was most importantly able to feel a sense of accomplishment with each of my small goals – that is, completing each of my daily workouts. Then, on my race day, I was able to smoothly and confidently meet my long term goal of finishing the long race. I had plenty of practice in hitting my daily and weekly goals, and thus, race day, though challenging, did not seem so foreign and daunting. In other words, I felt read and prepared.
Even in planning out my week each week, I attempt to set 2-3 big overarching goals, both in my work/career and in my personal life. Then, I strategize how to really, concretely, make this happen, e.g. carving out 30 minutes of time on Monday for my goal of reading, or setting aside 20 minutes of time on Friday to exercise. Instead of rolling through life, letting my life’s responsibilities control me, I feel a sense of focus, having been able to set small doable goals for the week, day by day. There are 168 hours in each week, 24 hours in each day. And unfortunately, time is a precious finite resource. It cannot be brought back once it is gone. I think goal setting in this logical, step-wise way, i.e. breaking big things down into smaller doable goals, has helped me better manage my time and actually finish more of the tasks I set out to do.