Learning goal setting

Goal setting: what is it and why does it seem to be everywhere? At the end of the year, people discuss new years’ resolutions and at the beginning of the year, there is much talk about vision boards. You get to the job interview and the interviewer wants to know where you see yourself in 5 years or your goal and objectives about the job. So, what is this goal setting? Well, continue reading to find out.

What surprised me the most about goal setting?

This one time I was watching a movie and this couple was set to complete high school and go off to college. The guy asked the girl what her plans were after graduating high school. She reiterated her plans with much perfection from which college she was going to, the company she will intern at after completing college, and finally the company she will work at.

The guy her boyfriend, with much amazement asked, “you have everything planned out?” This is because the guy only had college plans and nothing beyond that, surprisingly, the girl was amazed that the guy hasn’t thought about his future thoroughly. Like the boyfriend, I was surprised at how thorough the girl was.

This movie surprised me because, in the past few years, I’d set goals but not follow through or even care much to check if I was progressing. Most times I’d be overwhelmed with where or how to start achieving my goals whether career goals, personal goals, or financial goals and I’d give up before I could even start.

My understanding of goal setting

I have sat down and looked at my life and I have realized I have no sense of direction at all. Well, I do know that I want to be a good content writer, an SEO expert, and a social media marketer. But the big question remained, how in God’s name will I achieve this if I lacked purpose and direction? That’s when the movie I talked about in the above section gave me a glimpse of reality. For me to get what I want, I need to set goals and follow through on those goals.

Goal setting to me is establishing exactly what is it that I need in my life, relationships, and career now or in the future, writing it down, and keeping a promise to work at whatever it is that I need until I achieve it. It is easy to say my career goal is to become an SEO expert it’s straightforward, but working toward becoming an SEO expert is not that easy. So, setting this career goal is me acknowledging that I need this, breaking this goal into a series of mini-tasks is fulfilling the promise I made to myself; to become an SEO expert.

For the first time in a long time, I set goals and while in the past I’d feel anxious and leave this task midway, I didn’t let the anxiety get the better of me. I set my goals for the year, and I have already achieved some of them way before the initial set date.

The challenge

I am learning how to set career goals, financial goals, and future goals, and one of the most challenging things about this is the anxiety that I am not doing it right. Sometimes I think my goals are either too easy or too difficult to achieve. In the past, it was similar thoughts that withheld my learning of how to set goals.

Another challenging thing is how to break down a goal into tasks that will eventually help me achieve my goals. As you can see, I aspire to be an expert in three disciplines of digital marketing. While they are correlated, they are different requiring different tasks, approaches, and mentality. Where and how do I start without getting overwhelmed? Also, I have realized I always feel bad if I must delete some goals or change anything on my goal list.

As you can see, the challenge I am facing is harsh judgment from myself and nothing else. I am only learning goal setting this year, but I want to be perfect at it when learning requires patience, making mistakes, and learning from them. Seriously, I am way too hard on myself for someone who has achieved two career goals this year.

Career goals that I have crossed off of my list

My goal list for this year looks very comprehensive and it sometimes scares me. In January, my goal was to start writing again because I am working towards being a content marketer. As to why I stopped writing because I was good if I have to say so myself, is a story for another day. My goal in February was to land a content writing internship and lastly, in March I would land a paying internship in either an American or British company.

In January I started watching content writing videos and practicing simultaneously. I didn’t start immediately in January though but eventually, I did. One of my tasks was to write an article on a daily basis but I am still struggling to follow through on it. However, I did learn a great deal and at the end of January, I got an internship to start in February in a digital marketing agency where I will be learning content marketing, SEO, and social media.

Unfortunately, I will not pursue this internship because guess what? Yes, I got a paying job in a UK digital marketing company as a Local SEO intern with a chance of getting more responsibilities in general SEOsoone. You can imagine my excitement and amazement when crossing off those goals from my list.

The final word

I am starting a new journey of learning how to set goals properly, follow through on them and achieve them, and from my story, you can see that goal setting works and there is no doubt about that. Maybe you have been struggling for years like me, or you are riddled with anxiety and self-doubt as I have mentioned in the challenges section. However, you can start small and grow into it as time goes on.

I am on a new adventure and if you would like to learn with me, you can read some of my posts. They are personal because as much as I do research on a topic before writing, the majority of the information is my story. After all,e I want you to know that you aren’t alone in struggling with goal setting or other stuff that I write about. Let’s take this learning journey together. Read my other posts to learn more.