Personal Goal Setting - Long and Short term goals

When setting personal goals it is important to set both long term and short term goals in order to achieve what you want to achieve. By setting long term goals you have a vision of what you ultimately want to achieve, while short term goals help you work on the larger goal a step at a time instead of finding the larger goal daunting and never really getting started.

Personal Goal Setting Begins with Long Term Goals

Your personal goal setting needs to begin by looking at your long term goals. This can be done by writing down what you ultimately want to accomplish in life, what you want people to say about you at the end of your life and writing up a personal mission statement. Once this has been done you can transform your vision into SMART goals by setting long term goals that are specific, measurable and realistic over the long-term and with a date set sometime in the future for its completion. Your goal setting needs to begin here in order to have an overall view of what you are trying to accomplish.

Why Short Term Goals are Important in Personal Goal Setting

If you just set long-term goals the chances are that the date far in the future will cause you to put them off for some reason - this may be due to procrastination or it may be due to a feeling that you will never reach the ultimate goal. Breaking your long-term goals down into short-term goals means that you have something you can start working on immediately that is not as daunting and where the closeness of the deadline encourages action. Short term goals can be broken down even further into "Do it now" goals or a task list with actions that can be completed today.

Setting Short Term Goals in Personal Goal Setting

Once you have written down your long term goals analyze each one and write down a number of steps which you will need to reach in order to attain these goals. Normally the largeness of the long term goals ensures that it can be broken down into a number of smaller steps. These steps are going to be your short term goals and you should also ensure that they are specific, measurable, attainable, rewarding and timely goals. Set a deadline within a couple of weeks or months and make them realistic to achieve.

Short Term Goals and Do It Now Goals in Personal Goal Setting

Sometimes even short term goals can be broken down further and if the deadline is in a few months these should be broken down into "Do it now" goals which can be accomplished immediately. This focuses you on the importance on preventing procrastination and making a start on achieving your personal goals.

In conclusion, personal goal setting includes both short term and long term goals. In order to set your long term goals you should look at what you hope to ultimately accomplish in life and turn these into SMART goals, meaning that your goals should be realistic and have a set deadline by which you hope to achieve these goals. Short term goals can be set by analyzing your long term goals and breaking these down into a number of smaller steps. In order to stop procrastination and start achieving your goals today you can also set "Do it Now" goals which can be accomplished immediately.