The HOW That Got Forgotten

I'm not going to tout the benefits of the S.M.A.R.T. method of goal setting. Whether you call it by this name or not, I think most of us have it engrained into us to some extent.

We know not to set a goal like, "Write more." We set goals like "Write ___ number of words a day/week," or "Write for ___ amount of time every day."

We don't say, "Finish drafting soon," We say "Finish drafting by ____ date."

We don't say, "Blog a lot," we say "Blog ___ days a week."

We don't say "Write ten chapters a day until book is finished," we set a goal that is actually attainable. (And if writing ten chapters a day is what you consider attainable, HOLY COW. I want you to say so in the comments so I can give you props.)

A writing friend and I have agreed to share our writing goals with each other, and have weekly meetings over the phone to report our progress on our goals and to help each other over struggles, so I've been thinking a lot about goals lately.

And there's one thing S.M.A.R.T. doesn't cover: HOW.

You can make a list of the most fabulous, attainable, specific, measurable, relevant, time bond goals possible for you and what you want to accomplish. However, that list means ABSOLUTELY NOTHING if you don't also figure out a way to make that happen.

Let's face it: WE ARE ALL BUSY. AND GOALS TAKE TIME.

So let's say you haven't been writing, and you make a goal to write for an hour every day. That's S.M.A.R.T.! But obviously the mere making of the goal isn't going to cause it to happen. That time has to come from somewhere, so you've got to decide what you're going to sacrifice. A common answer is sleep. But what if all your life responsibilities already have you living off the minimum? You find something else. You look at the things that have a lower priority to you and sacrifice those. If there is nothing that can be sacrificed all the time, make a rotation. Nothing will feel too neglected if it only gets neglected one week out of every four. :)

The point is, you need to have a plan of what is going to change in your life to make the goals you set possible. Or that goal that you made the S.M.A.R.T. way, and wrote down so that it counted as a real goal? It might as well go in here:

And we don't want to do that! Look at what a pained expression he has on his face.