SMART GOALS

Smart Goals is a method of goal setting that keeps you on track.

Specific:

• Your goal must a specific: clearly expressed and understandable by a third party.

• Simple enough to be understood by an outsider.

“If you don’t know where it is you’re going, you’ll never get there.”
Anon

Measurable:

• How will you measure whether you have achieved your goal?

• It must be clearly measurable so will know exactly when, how and where you achieved it.

Common sense is the measure of the possible; it is composed of experience and prevision; it is calculation applied to life.
Henri Frederic Amiel

Attainable:

• Are your goals attainable?

• If you aim too high, you become discouraged because you either can’t get there, or because you can’t get there in any reasonable time frame.

• If you want to create a very large goal, also divide it into smaller chunks, and consider each a goal in its own right.

Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained.
Marie Curie

Realistic:

• Are they realistic?

• Is it realistic to think you can get this?

• Is it a good stepping stone to where you ultimately want to go?

If one develops substantially unrealistic expectations regarding the future that greatly exceed what one is actually able to accomplish, then one is set up for failure and disappointment, leading to lower self-esteem." Shelley E. Taylor

Timeline:

• When do you expect to have achieved this goal?

• If you don’t give yourself a timeline, then so long as you achieve your goal before you die you will have succeeded.

• Your goals need reasonable timelines to keep you on track

"It's a funny thing about life. If you refuse to accept anything but the best, you very often get it."
Somerset Maugham