Achieving Goals
with Dr. Ayesha Madni, Educational Psychologist
Today, I’m going to share with you how to create powerful goals for yourself. However, before we get into the nuts and bolts of goal-setting, I want you to think back to a time when you felt highly, highly motivated to achieve something... Do you have it? Can you remember it clearly? Remember how you felt? Inspired. Driven. Strong. Like you could take on anything. Now, did you have a goal that was guiding you at that time? Whether you had it written down on a piece of paper or in a journal, or not, I’m pretty confident that your answer is yes. You had a goal guiding you. That’s the power of having a goal. They direct our attention, they give us a reference point to work toward, they make us persist, because we want to achieve them, especially when the goal is meaningful to us. And, chances are, if you felt motivated to achieve that goal, it was meaningful to you. That is the beauty of goals. We cannot feel motivated without them. Whether, the goal is in our mind or written down with pen on a piece of paper. So, given that we now remember what it feels like to be highly motivated, and we know that we had a goal guiding us, let’s jump into the why and how of creating powerful and effective goals.
As I mentioned, meaningful goals are the most powerful, and that is because they are important to us. They involve something we value. This could include spending time with friends, spending time with family, spending time with your pets, doing art, playing an instrument, and doing well in school. The sky is the limit! You can create goals for any area of your life. Your homelife. Your school life. Your life with friends. The most important thing is that the goal you create is important to you. To help you decide what you may want to create a goal for first, create a list of 3-5 things that make you feel really happy and are important to you. Then pick the top 3 ones on that list, and start creating a goal for the one thing on the list that you have not done in the longest time. Because, it’s about time that you do it.
Now, to make the goals you create even more powerful, you want to make them highly effective. And, highly effective goals are SMART. SMART meaning specific, measurable, action-oriented, realistic, and timely. Specific stands for what you want to happen with as much detail as possible. Measurable means that you can actually tell that it happened. Action-oriented means that the goal focuses on actions. Realistic means that you are creating a goal that you can make happen. Timely means that the goal will be completed in a certain amount of time or by a certain amount of time.
Let’s look at the goal that I got from my top 3 list. I got “I want to exercise.” I enjoy exercising, because it keeps my body healthy and my mind happy, and I have not exercised in a while, so it is important to me to make this happen. So, to make my goal of wanting to exercise SMART, I would write something like this:
To keep my body healthy and my mind happy, I will run, do yoga, or dance every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday during the week at 8:30am for 20 minutes.
This goal is specific, because I have stated what I want to happen with as much detail as possible. The goal is measurable, because I can tell when it has taken place. I can, for instance, schedule this goal in my calendar, and check it off when it has been completed. It is action-oriented, because it focuses on actions, such as dancing and running, and it is timely because it has to take a certain time and start at a specific time.
Now, that we have gone through this example together, create your own powerful, meaningful, SMART goals, and fill your life with joy and confidence!
Seli, H., & Dembo, M. H. (2020). Motivation and learning strategies for college success: A focus on self- regulated learning (6th ed.). New York: Routledge.
As I mentioned, meaningful goals are the most powerful, and that is because they are important to us. They involve something we value. This could include spending time with friends, spending time with family, spending time with your pets, doing art, playing an instrument, and doing well in school. The sky is the limit! You can create goals for any area of your life. Your homelife. Your school life. Your life with friends. The most important thing is that the goal you create is important to you. To help you decide what you may want to create a goal for first, create a list of 3-5 things that make you feel really happy and are important to you. Then pick the top 3 ones on that list, and start creating a goal for the one thing on the list that you have not done in the longest time. Because, it’s about time that you do it.
Now, to make the goals you create even more powerful, you want to make them highly effective. And, highly effective goals are SMART. SMART meaning specific, measurable, action-oriented, realistic, and timely. Specific stands for what you want to happen with as much detail as possible. Measurable means that you can actually tell that it happened. Action-oriented means that the goal focuses on actions. Realistic means that you are creating a goal that you can make happen. Timely means that the goal will be completed in a certain amount of time or by a certain amount of time.
Let’s look at the goal that I got from my top 3 list. I got “I want to exercise.” I enjoy exercising, because it keeps my body healthy and my mind happy, and I have not exercised in a while, so it is important to me to make this happen. So, to make my goal of wanting to exercise SMART, I would write something like this:
To keep my body healthy and my mind happy, I will run, do yoga, or dance every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday during the week at 8:30am for 20 minutes.
This goal is specific, because I have stated what I want to happen with as much detail as possible. The goal is measurable, because I can tell when it has taken place. I can, for instance, schedule this goal in my calendar, and check it off when it has been completed. It is action-oriented, because it focuses on actions, such as dancing and running, and it is timely because it has to take a certain time and start at a specific time.
Now, that we have gone through this example together, create your own powerful, meaningful, SMART goals, and fill your life with joy and confidence!
Seli, H., & Dembo, M. H. (2020). Motivation and learning strategies for college success: A focus on self- regulated learning (6th ed.). New York: Routledge.
Your Goal Worksheet: drag and drop on your computer or save the image on your phone. Print and enjoy!
