How Setting the Right Goals Can Make Dreams Come True
Turns out you can do a little more than just hope and pray.
There’s a reason why goal-setting is often hailed as the “first step” to success. It organizes tasks and gives you a sense of direction. But, many of us are setting the wrong types of goals. We’re setting materialistic goals.
After all, we can say, “I want a billion dollars,” but for many of us, that just won’t happen. Something like that is completely out of our control. But, what we can control is ourselves by setting goals on character, personality, and habitual traits. In other words, we should all set personal goals.
Materialistic goals will crush you if you don’t succeed and leave you disappointed even if you do. Personal goals help you grow, no matter the outcome.
I learned this lesson the hard way:
At the start of my freshman year of high school, I promised myself that I’d win as many national awards as I could. I thought, “I saw myself do it last year, so why not this year?”
But, my motivation dwindled and before I knew it, I had wasted a quarter of my high school life. I felt ashamed of myself.
That is, until I realized it wasn’t my work ethic that was to blame. It was my goal. It wasn’t unrealistic, but it was definitely too materialistic.
As the luster of shiny medals dwindled, so did my motivation. And so I slacked.
That’s because materialistic goals are circumstantial. They depend on Meanwhile, personal goals are only based on you. As long as you want to become a better person, they’ll stick around.
At first, I felt like a failure… until I realized that I had achieved some of my goals. And though they didn’t yield me any medals, they rewarded me with something much better.
“Self-improvement is the name of the game, and your primary objective is to strengthen yourself, not to destroy an opponent.”
~Maxwell Maltz, author of Psycho-Cybernetics
I remember walking home on a dark night, after my first day of band camp. I didn’t know anybody and felt awkward the whole time. So that night, I vowed that I would work to come out of my shell and become more charismatic.
Soon after, I made a key friend. He was one of the most outgoing people I have ever met. We became close, and eventually, his habits rubbed off on me, boosting my charisma and confidence. Our friendship even shifted my values more to spontaneity and energy.
It also turns out that my friend also had an unspoken personal goal. I noticed that he seemed ashamed of his charismatic attitude. He felt that he wasn’t able to build trust because he was too immature — the complete opposite problem that I had.
You see, these were the personal goals. We couldn’t see them at first, but the goals pulled us together sub-consciously, like a magnetic force. Was this just a coincidence? Or not?
To me, it wasn’t just dumb luck.
After all, did Jobs and Wozniak become the greatest duo in Silicon Valley “by chance?” Of course not. Take a look:
“…[Wozniak:] ‘we had so much in common. Typically, it was really hard for me to explain to people what kind of stuff I worked on, but Steve got it right away. And I liked him. He was kind of skinny and wiry and full of energy.’
Jobs was also impressed. ‘Woz was the first person I’d met who knew more electronics than I did,’ he once said, stretching his own expertise. ‘I liked him right away. I was a little more mature than my years, and he was a little less mature than his, so it evened out. Woz was very bright, but emotionally he was my age.’” (Isaacson 25).
And what came out of it?
- One of the most successful companies in recent history,
- the modern icon for the startup-duo of Silicon Valley,
- the yin and yang of startup culture.
Some might even say that the energetic Jobs was the electricity to the bright Wozniak’s light bulb. Even their mental ages “evened out!”
As you can see, we’re always growing, but the facets in which we grow is a little less clear. Many of us think we can’t control these facets, but with personal goals, we can control our growth.
In other words, taking care and improving yourself is your responsibility. Now, with personal goals, you can choose where you take your growth.
So how do you do it?
Say that you want to be more productive. Your goals could be to “increase the length of ‘power hours’ and limit distractions.”
These goals are effective because they break the larger end-goal into smaller pieces that you can do today. Then, you can assign simple tasks to each goal. For example, “focusing more” could simply mean installing a productivity app on your phone or blocking YouTube on your computer.
These types of goals are also more honed in on a specific aspect of your life.
“I want to get a job at Google” and “I want to be someone that Google would love to hire” seem like similar goals, but they evoke completely different responses.
The first one will push the hopeful job-seeker to improve her resume and/or network . These are both superficial tasks that will not help her ace an interview.
Meanwhile, the second version will urge the bright-eyed Googler to build up her skills, research Google’s culture, and even refine her own personality.
Now, would you rather hire the bedazzled resume or the girl that just became a better person to join your company? I know which one I would.
Personal goals force you to imagine what kind of person you would like to be — not what kind of resume or degree you’d like to have.
Strong goals are key to achieving a successful life, avoiding burnout, and living your dream. But realize that they will only help you plan for them. Remember:
“You can’t build a reputation on what you are going to do.”
~Henry Ford
Hey! Thanks for reading. I’m not going to ask for much down here, just that you give me a follow! It’d really push me to write more stuff! :)
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