“Choose one goal and stick to it.” I’m sure you’ve heard that before. It’s sound advice too, when you think about it.
If you have only one goal to worry about, you can focus all of your energy on achieving it.
Practical, right?
But what if you’re like me? I have dozens of goals. I can’t choose just one piece of my life to change. I want to change everything! I want to improve every aspect of my life.
So what do you do? Choose one and ignore the others for now? Work on all of them at once? Let’s break this down to find the best way to reach your many goals.
The downsides to working on one at a time
What happens when you work on only one goal? It’s true that you can give it your full attention, but is that a good thing?
Think of it this way: you’re bound to get bored of your goal.
Let’s say you want to read as many books in a year as you can. Your goal is 75 novels in a year. That means you need to finish about 1.5 books each week.
But if all you did was read books, spent every spare minute of your day reading, you’d burn out pretty quickly. That can be said for any goal. If this is all you do, you’re going to tire of it.
Should you work on a bunch of goals at once?
Since it doesn’t seem like a good idea to work on only one goal, perhaps you should just work on them all. After all, there are 24 usable hours in every day.
Now let’s just imagine this for a second. Let’s take me for example. I just counted my ongoing list of life goals and there are 61 things on there right now.
In order to adequately achieve a goal, you need to try to do something about it every single day.
Working on 62 separate goals every single day is just ridiculous. Impossible! Sure, it’s a challenge, but it’s a challenge that’s just a bit too tough for just one person to handle.
When you spread yourself thin, you aren’t giving enough attention to each goal. It will take longer to achieve anything and you may not get to your goals at all this way.
The solution: main goals, secondary goals, and the wait list
Instead of working on one or all of them, try something in between.
Split up your goals into main goals, secondary goals, and a wait list.
How to choose main goals
- Main goals should be concrete and achievable. Something like ‘learn a language’ that you can start working on today.
- Choose between 2 and 4 main goals to work on every day.
- If you’re having trouble picking a main goal, try ones that have a large impact on your life. For instance, choose ‘build a new marketing plan’ if you own your own business. The outcome of this goal with make many aspects of your life better.
How to choose secondary goals
- Secondary goals should be important and concrete, but not as urgent as the main goals. Something that takes a lot of prep work to achieve, like ‘run a marathon’. This is especially the case if you’re out of shape because you’ll need to start walking before you can ever think about running.
- Pick up to 10 secondary goals, although fewer may be better. This is a big number, but if you’re like me (and have more than 60 goals), it’ll work out fine.
- Work on secondary goals a few times each week. Secondary goals can often be reserved for the weekend, i.e. ‘knit a scarf’ and other weekend projects.
How to build your wait list
- Some of our life goals can’t be done right now. For instance, I have ‘visit Paris’ on my goal sheet, but there are several things I need to do before I can work on that goal. (Like get a passport, and earn more money.)
- Always be mindful of goals on your wait list. While you may not be working on them now, you should have them in the back of your mind. This will help you be better prepared once something on the wait list becomes a secondary or main goal.
As you achieve your goals, reevaluate your list. As spots empty on your main goal list, shift secondary goals into that spot.
This method tends to be the best for getting the most done while avoiding getting bored.
Hi Trisha,
I’m currently wrestling with this right now.
I began the year with 14 goals, and now some have taken over and others have fallen by the side of the road. 2009 has been great, but I’m neglecting certain areas, to be sure. I think I’ll pare it down, like you say, to about 3 main goals and some secondary ones.
Thanks for this post, you have a great looking blog. Clean and clearly written.
David Cain’s last blog post..7 Profound Insights From the Beatles
Good stuff.
I think having a portfolio of goals is a good thing. In fact, I think it’s key to success.
I think another key is having boundaries and constraints. This way you don’t over invest in one area when you could or should be investing in another. You need to know what good looks like and find the most effective technique for it.
That’s how we move up the stack.
J.D. Meier’s last blog post..Finding Your Process