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 What’s the Game Plan?

If you often find yourself asking “What are my goals? Where do I start?” then you may be a game planner. It’s ok to not know what your goals are, but in order to find out they need to be specific. You must also have a plan on how to achieve them, otherwise they won’t happen. For example, stating three goals in life, but not having any set plan on how to achieve them other than going to school or working each day is completely useless. Even if you do get a degree or a job, knowing what you want out of it doesn’t matter unless you have a plan on how to achieve it. For the sake of this article I will use goals to illustrate my point.

Some general rules:

1) Don’t have vague goals like “I want ____”

2) Don't have goals that are impossible such as "I want another million dollars"

3) Don't have goals that take too long such as "I want to quit smoking.” Quitting smoking does not take a long time, but if you don't have a plan on how to do it the goal will never happen.

The two most important things to remember about goals is that they must be specific and achievable. Here are some examples of what your goals might look like:

1) "I want to go to college by the age of 20" This goal is clear and easy to understand, but also very vague. It’s possible that you won’t go by the time you graduate high school, or that you can’t go because you don’t meet your dream school's requirements. You must have a plan that goes along with the goal so that you can achieve it.

"...I want to go to school by the age of 20, and I'm going to go to a 2 year tech school, get my associates degree then transfer to Arizona State."

This goal is more specific. It tells you where you want to go and what needs to be done in order for you to get there. You are educating yourself on how getting where you want can happen, and what path will get you there.

2) "I want another million dollars. I want to walk the red carpet at a famous Hollywood event, I want to become a millionaire, and I want to be the best chef in the world." This is impossible. If you think $1 million is impossible then you aren't alone. At some point in time you would have to stop working and start living off of your investments. In this example it’s not a bad one because you specify that you want to get another million dollars (which requires hard work) but it’s also not realistic either.

"...I want to go backpacking through Europe, becoming nationally ranked by soloing 5.14 at the age of 22"

This is much more realistic and achievable even though it seems extremely long-term. It’s also a great goal, but it is not specific. You have no idea what exactly you want to do with the money you get (buying a house, traveling around Europe, living off of investments.) If you had that much money you could do anything you wanted with it. So instead of having one huge goal that takes years to achieve, break it down into smaller goals and focus on only one at a time.

3) "I want to quit smoking." Quitting smoking isn't hard, but achieving this goal isn't realistic either because it takes too long.

"...I want to quit smoking... I will buy a pack of cigarettes every day and smoke one cigarette before I go to bed for the next week. In a week I'll smoke less and in two weeks I'll smoke only three cigarettes a day and in four weeks I'll be smoking after breakfast. In five weeks the urge to smoke in the morning will be gone, then three weeks later I'll only crave to have a cigarette at night after dinner."

This is very specific, but achievable. It’s also set up so that you can easily achieve it slowly so as not to give up on it due to the time it will take to quit your habit.

4) "I want to be the best in my class." This is a broad goal that can be hard to achieve. There are too many factors that can come into play. It's better to have a few smaller goals you can work towards because it will be easier to reach each step of the way because you know what you need to do in order to get there.

"...I want to finish my math classes with an A before I start working, and I'll start working after graduating college with an A degree and a 2 year degree, then I'll start working at a customer service job with an AA degree."

This isn't as specific as some of the other goals, but it's more achievable without taking too long. If you work consistently in 6 months you could maybe get a couple As, and then in 5 years you might finish your degree with an A. It's not very specific, but it is more attainable than a broad goal that doesn't have any steps to reach it.

An example of how to achieve a goal would be:

"I want to quit smoking... I will buy a pack of cigarettes every day and smoke one cigarette before I go to bed for the next week. In a week I'll smoke less and in two weeks I'll smoke only three cigarettes a day and in four weeks I'll be smoking after breakfast. In five weeks the urge to smoke in the morning will be gone, then three weeks later I'll only crave to have a cigarette at night after dinner. I'll stop updating my blog after I complete week one, and have my best friend set up an incentive for me. If I beat him in a race or earn more money than him this week, then he'll buy me an iPod for my birthday."

This is a very specific goal with realistic ways of achieving it. By the way there are many other ways you can achieve this goal without writing it all down on paper, but they aren't as specific nor as achievable.

5) "I want to get fit.

Conclusion

With goal-setting being the core of a New Year's resolution, it is important to follow these rules. If you don't set goals specifically then it can be hard to achieve them. For example, someone who wants to improve their skills at drawing could set specific goals that include drawing artwork everyday. You could also set a goal of improving your daily drawings by ten percent every day. These goals are both specific and achievable. It depends on what kind of person you are because there are a lot of variables that come into play in goal-setting, but if you take the time to think about what you want then you will eventually figure out what works best for you and what your goals should be.