A Day or Two Late:

Well, as promised, here are my thoughts on goal setting. Sorry, I am a day or two late, but that is the thing about goal setting….you have to have a target, stretch, and exceeds measure attached to each goal or you might feel that you never are successful at meeting any of your goals!! *smile*

First, I have to say, setting goals should not be done in order to see what you failed at but to see where you have been successful. They are road maps about where you came from and where you intend on going (and how you will get there). 

Before I go any further, I am not a person that likes to set goals, or can easily think up goals, and I don’t usually set really long term goals. When I talk about long term goals (LTG) I mean that I don’t usually plan out the next 10-20-30 years of my life. Not to say that is not important…I just have a difficult time thinking in terms of where I will be or what I will be doing in 10-20-30 years. I get more satisfaction from short term goals (STG) because I can see my progress more clearly and can change my action steps more frequently, if needed.  (YES! I like frequent gratification!! LOL)

So here is what I mean about how I set goals for myself. I will relate them to my training for the half and full marathons, because this is newer to me and I still have goals that are in action mode.

In August, I decided to sign up for a half marathon on October 30, 2010 and a full marathon on January 9, 2011 (LTG). I knew that I could not just show up on these dates and run without some type of training. So, I researched different training styles and developed a plan that I thought would work for me and my life. My next step was to develop a calendar of daily and weekly (STG) goals that I would need to meeting in order to be able to meet my LTG’s.  I quickly realized that these goals (because of life) had to be fluid. For example; I might have determined that this Saturday I need to do a long run of 10 miles. But we ended up going out of town and would be driving home on Saturday. So I would do my long run on Sunday instead of Saturday. Did this mean I did not meet my goal, NO! I meant that I adjusted my goal so that even with life changes, I could meet my goal and be successful. I still got the same number of running miles in, I just changed that day that I did the run! In other words, my goal was to get in a total of 16 miles during that specific week, with 10 of those miles being done in one day (Saturday). I did get all of the miles in that week, I just had to rearrange the days that I did my runs. So I met my ultimate goal I just had to do it by being flexible about what days I actually did my runs.

If I were writing this goal out for business purposes it would look like this:

Main goal: To run a total of 16 miles this week

Action Steps:

1.     To run a short run (3 miles) on Tuesday

2.     To run a short run (3 miles) on Thursday

3.     To run a long run (10 miles) on Saturday

Target: to get in 16 miles this week – to include one long run of 10 miles

Stretch: to get in 16 miles exactly like I planned in my action steps (above)

Exceeds: to get in 16 miles plus a day of cross training or sprints

Now you might be asking why I set up my goals this way?  Because I like to be successful, and I believe that goals can and do help you to be successful, but that you have to be realistic when setting them. If you set a goal that only says you are going to run 10 miles on Saturday or you are going to lose 10 lbs by December 25th, and you don’t or can’t meet that goal, then what happens to you? You feel defeated, sad, frustrated and a whole lot of other bad feeling words, and then you give up. And giving up and not what goal setting and accomplishment is about!!

Does this mean that you will be successful at every goal you set? NO! Does it mean that you have a greater chance at being successful and feeling good about your accomplishments? YES! There are things that happen in life, that you (we) have no control over which influences our goals…(it is inevitable) but that is when you have to learn to “put on your big girl panties” and dust yourself off, readjust your goals and move forward!!

To conclude, I will leave you with this:

 Whatever it is you are trying to accomplish, set small goals that will help you to meet that larger goal, and remember three things: 1. they must be realistic, and 2. they should be fluid enough that you can still live your life to its fullest! Goals are not to hold you back, but to help you move forward in life, and 3. when life throws you a curve ball don’t give up, learn  how to readjust, celebrate what you have been successful at, and move forward!!

I hope you all have a very happy and blessed holiday with your family / friends!! I thanked God today for all the blessings in my life….have you?