In times of uncertainty, it’s really hard to think far ahead. And who could blame us?
Goal setting it’s something we are wired to do — thinking about what we want to achieve is how we keep ourselves motivated.
Yet, as many of us take every day as it comes, setting goals can feel daunting or even anxiety-inducing.
I would have never believed the setting goals and planning your future could become so hard. It’s something I realized when I had to look at my personal life and my own business and ask myself:
“Where are we going to go now?”
I was looking at my inbox this Monday and I was feeling lost, I felt like I did not know what to do next.
How quickly things are going to change? How long will we have to live this way, which is different from what we are accustomed to?
As all of these questions were flying through my head the last thing I could think about was my goals.
It’s hard to ask yourself where you want to be in the next three months when you don’t even know what your day is going to be like tomorrow. I am sharing this because I want you to know that you are not alone.
It’s okay for you not to be wanting to set goals for the next six months, It’s okay to slow down and take every day as it comes.
However, I do have a tool that can help you set small little achievements that can support you with feeling happier and more accomplished. Even in uncertain times like these ones.
Welcome to micro-goals
Just like the name says setting micro-goals is nothing more than setting simple achievements you want to accomplish every single day.
The reason why micro-goals work in times like this is that they allow you to set little milestones day by day. I will not lie to you, dear reader — even micro-goals require a bit of set up.
How to set up your micro-goals
I personally like to set to micro-goals every day; one for my personal life and one for my professional life.
As a self-employed person, and the founder of my company, nobody is going to set goals for my professional performance. I was the one who had to pivot, change and re-align our targets.
When it comes to professional goals, I had quite a big task ahead, but after I found how we were going to thrive in these hard times, I made sure the both myself and my team could stick with one micro-goal to celebrate each and every working day.
I am going to use a personal example to explain how you can set micro-goals for yourself.
A very important part of my day is exercising, therefore I had to make sure that I made the time to move every single day. I, therefore, set to myself a small challenge and for the next coming week, I made sure that every day I moved in any way that I felt inclined to.
From research, we have learned there is no “perfect” time-frame to how long it takes to build a habit, however, I’ve seen from my experience that sticking to a rewarding activity every day for a week is a great way to lay the foundations for new positive habits.
By only having two goals every single week if you allow yourself to take the time to cherish a new habit.
In our normal lives, we have loads of to-dos, projects, activities in our diaries. All of these simple activities become in themselves accomplishments that we have to go through in our day.
When we can focus on only two or three small rewarding tasks every week our willpower and commitment are heightened.
This is why I would stick to a goal like moving every day for a week, after that, I will change my goal to something equally simple and rewarding.
By setting positive yet to specific micro goals you will always have two or three things every day to be grateful for.
In this example, in my gratitude list I will always have one entry about the yoga class I attended online or the walk that I had on my garden and so forth.
Personal micro-goals can admittedly be easier than professional ones.
However, I find that the little things like for example committing every day to check in with your team and have a clear agenda of the day could be a great goal and resolution for yourself.
Video of goals stems from reframing simple activities And turn them into proactive ways to improve and better your life.
Try micro-goals for yourself
The best way to set micro-goals is to ask the right questions. Here are some questions that you can ask yourself in order to set new micro-goals each and every week.
First ask yourself:
How do I want to feel this week when it comes to my personal life and well-being?
Examples can be inspired, relaxed, energized.
Then ask yourself the same question but when it comes to professional life. Examples of answers can be successful, abundant, in control, focused.
Then, we have the second question, do moneymaker if you may.
Take the time to ask yourself
What is the one thing that I can do every single day this week to get closer to that feeling?
This is very different than setting smart goals, the reason why that is is that I want you to set a goal that keeps you motivated and the taps into the emotional connection that you have with yourself.
Micro goals should be rewarding, they should keep you going without adding extra stress or strain to your day.
Every week write down the answers to these questions, set to goals, and stick to that for the following seven days.
This is what keeps me going every week, and I hope he helps you do the same.