Yesterday, we talked about the first of three D’s that make for good goals: making them definable. Tomorrow we’ll talk about giving them deadlines. Today we’re going to talk about ensuring that they’re doable.
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“Doable” Goals
Something that is “doable” is something that is a realistic goal. What is realistic will vary – from person to person, from season of life to season of life, and depending upon how long-term the goal is.
If you’re a trained runner, “run a marathon” may be a perfectly reasonable goal: something you can do. If you’re 200 lbs. overweight and haven’t run in 30 years, maybe not so much.
If you are pregnant, it might not be the time to train for a marathon. although perhaps you’ve run them in the past or will again in the future.
Perhaps more significantly, how long you have will determine whether or not running a marathon is a goal you could actually accomplish.
Time Frames
If you are looking at goals for this month, chances are pretty good that running a marathon is not achievable unless you are already thoroughly trained for marathon-running. However, running a marathon may not be out of reach for you even if you’re that 200-lb-overweight individual who hasn’t run in 30 years – if you set it far enough out.
If you’re looking at goals for this year or for the next five years or the next ten years or sometime during your life, there’s a much greater likelihood you could actually do this! The key is to make sure that it’s reasonable for you.
If you set a big goal like that, for a longer period of time, you’ll probably want to set incremental goals leading up to that. So if “run a marathon” is on your 10-year goals list, you might have “run a half-marathon” on your 5-year list, “run a 5k” on your 1-year list and “run every weekday morning” on your 1-month list. See how the smaller ones build up to the big one?
Do you have any goals that aren’t realistic? How could you tweak them to make them more “doable“?
Next: Deadlines
[…] sure your goals are achievable by determining incremental goals. Titus 2 Homemaker points out that running a marathon may be a smart goal for you if you’re already a runner, but […]