There are many distractions in today’s world. You need to check social media, work, and other commitments. So many people get bogged down in their day-to-day responsibilities and forget to set personal goals.
Before we dive into some good personal goals that you should go after, here are some useful tips in order to make sure you follow those personal goals (even when it’s not easy).
Tips To Stay Dedicated To Your Personal Goals
Setting goals is easy. You could wake up and say I want to read 10 books this month. However, putting in the work and actually doing so is a different ball game. Below we will go over some tips that will help you stay focused on your personal goals.
Keep Promises To Yourself
Have you every made promises to other people and feel guilty if you don’t go ahead and follow it through? When you make promises to yourself, you should feel the same exact way. You should maybe even feel a little worse.
You have to develop a mindset that no matter how enticing it is to break the promise, you have to stay true and keep your word.
Write Them Down In Your Journal and Document Them Frequently
frequently jotting down your goals in a journal will help you stay accountable and give you a better understanding of the goals. You also have to document your progress frequently as well. Documenting them will let you know or not if you’re truly keeping those promises to yourself. When you store everything in your mind, it’s likely that you will skip out on portions of the goal and you won’t keep yourself accountable.
Set Realistic Goals
We have an article about this exact subject. It goes over why setting realistic goals is so important. When it comes to the goals you set, if you’re not realistic, you’re setting yourself up for failure off the bat.
For example if you set a goal to increase your bench press by 50 lbs in a month it’s not likely to happen. You have to make sure that the goals are realistic and they can be achieved over time.
Now that we went over these tips, let’s now go over some examples of solid personal goals that you should go after.
Good Personal Goal Examples
Health and Wellness Goals
We put health and wellness goals first because of the fact that setting good health and wellness goals will put you on the right track to effectively take care of your other goals.
Establish a consistent exercise routine
When it comes to health and wellness goals, establishing a consistent exercise routine is the most important. Depending on your fitness level you want to create program for yourself that you could do week in and week out.
Adopt a balanced diet
One of the biggest fitness saying is, “abs are made in the kitchen”, and while this is true, even if you don’t want abs, you need to make sure that you are eating in a healthy manner. All the consistent exercise doesn’t mean much if you can’t put health foods into your body.
Improve sleep habits
Prioritizing 7-9 hours of sleep each night is essential for a multitude of reasons, as it significantly contributes to maintaining overall health and well-being. Many people develop different health issues due to lack of sleep and its important to make sure that you create a good sleeping schedule.
Moreover, proper sleep is crucial for optimal brain function, enhancing one’s ability to concentrate, think clearly, and process memories. Another important aspect of sufficient sleep is its role in maintaining a healthy weight and promoting a positive mood.
On the other hand, sleep deprivation has many different negative effects when it comes to your overall health including an increased risk of heart disease, depression, weight gain, and inflammation. Consequently, it is of paramount importance to prioritize and safeguard your sleep, ensuring that you receive the rest your body needs on a daily basis.
Maintain proper hydration
Setting a hydration goal could be another good personal goal to ensure that you’re keeping up with your health and wellness. Here is a list of things proper hydration could do for you:
- Proper hydration is essential for good health, offering benefits such as regulating body temperature, lubricating joints, and preventing infections.
- Adequate water intake ensures optimal organ function and delivers vital nutrients to cells.
- Being well-hydrated directly impacts brain performance, digestion, energy levels, weight management, and overall mood.
- Older adults should prioritize proper hydration to maintain regular physical activity and promote healthy aging through a balanced diet.
- To ensure good hydration, it’s important to consistently replenish fluid levels in the body by consuming enough liquids throughout the day.
Goals For Your Mental Health
also part of your health and wellness, is setting goals for your mental health. Mental health is just as important if not more than health, because without a good mental state, it would be hard to maintain the other goals in life.
Some things you could do in order to work on your mental health are:
- Meditate for 15-20 minutes each morning
- Prioritize your self care: set time to relax, put in time when it comes to your skin care routine, exercise (mentioned above), and more.
- Set boundaries and practice self-discipline
- Go and talk to a mental health professional
- Practice gratitude on a daily basis
Personal Development Goals
Becoming the best version of yourself is what life is all about, isn’t it? Setting personal development goals should be on the top of your list. Here are some good personal goals you could take inspiration from:
Master a Unique Skill
Go out of your comfort zone and learn a unique skill. It could be anything from learning to play the guitar, coding, photography or any other art form that you admire. This will spark creativity as it breaks the monotony of everyday life and adds a new dimension to your personality. On top of that, it helps keep your self-discipline at tip top shape and improves your confidence.
Become a Minimalist
Another good example of a personal goal, which is often overlooked is to set a goal to become a minimalist. Figuring out what is an essential and what isn’t is a key part of the minimalist lifestyle. This will encourage you to declutter your home and workspace, which in turn helps create better focus and clarity. This new found clarity will also enhance your ability to focus on all of your personal goals.
Face Your Fears
Everyone has different fears, and I don’t mean go out and bungee jump if you are afraid of heights. I mean to face the smaller fears in your everyday life, whichever they may be. Let’s say you don’t really like talking in front of a crowd. This could be an excellent opportunity to set yourself up for success and do something about it. Set a goal to learn public speaking.
Learn About Emotional Intelligence
Develop your emotional intelligence by learning to recognize, understand, and manage your emotions and the emotions of others. This skill can lead to improved relationships, better decision-making, and increased empathy – qualities that can set you apart personally and professionally. Here are some ways you could go about doing this.
- Constantly reflect on your thoughts and reactions to certain things. Doing this will help you analyze how you could do better.
- Develop empathy by putting yourself in other peoples shoes and try and understand their point of view.
Create a Personal Project That Takes You Out Of Your Comfort Zone
Let’s say you like gardening. Although it may be uncomfortable, start that podcast, blog, YouTube channel, or whatever it may be. Not only will it get you out of your comfort zone, but it also gives you an opportunity to learn new skills and take on a project that could potentially change your life.
Improve Time Management Skills
Setting a goal to improve your time management skills is important in todays day and age. With social media giving everyone a quick fix and leaving them satisfied, the attention span of the average person has decreased drastically. So much so, that the human attention span has become shorter than a gold fish. Here are some ways you could improve your time management skills and get ahead of the rest of the pack:
- Schedule and plan your day ahead of time
- Allocate specific chunks of time to tasks and projects (time blocking)
- Learn how to prioritize tasks according to importance.
- Minimize distractions by removing all distractions from your workspace, such as phones and other electronic devices.
- Focus on one task at a time and try to avoid multitasking.
In order to get good at it, you could read books based on time management, watch YouTube videos from productive people, or take a course on it.
Maintain Strong Relationships
Setting goals to maintain strong relationships is also very important. Another thing social media did was to make people feel like they have all the friends they need, giving them an illusion of companionship. In order to see your friends, all you really have to do is go on Instagram. However, deep relationships are extremely important. Here are some goals you could set in order to maintain and improve your relationships:
- Make sure you take one day out of your week to call someone you haven’t called in a long time
- Set a goal to learn to actively listen to your friends or significant other
- Set a goal to meet with one friend at least once a month (or more)
Learn Something New Every Day (And Document It)
Set a goal to learn something new every day. To take it a step further, set a goal to learn something new every day in regards to yourself. Whether it’s your career, relationships, or hobbies – learning something new can help you grow as an individual.
Read More Books
Replace Netflix and Chill with reading instead. Most Netflix shows are mindless and can leave you feeling empty after watching. Reading books about different aspects that you want to enhance in your life can provide knowledge and understanding with much more clarity.
The goal doesn’t have to be too hefty, consider reading 15 pages a day. If you begin to like it a lot, expand your goal to 30 or even 50 pages.
Learn Self-Discipline
The biggest thing that separated successful people and non-successful people is self-discipline. So many people focus on “motivation”, but you can’t rely on motivation to be there every single day. What you could rely on is self-discipline which is one’s ability to do things they don’t want to do. In order to improve self-discipline you need to:
- Do things for longer periods of time in order to build up your tolerance. For example you may have a hard time sitting still and doing work for 10 minutes at a time at first. Set a goal to push past your current limits so you could eventually do it for an hour.
- Set Clear and specific goals, so you know exactly what it is you’re working for.
- Learn how to monitor your progress and reflect on it regularly so you could adjust accordingly.
Financial Goal Examples
Your finances are important due to the fact that it is one of the main components that can determine your freedom. Here are some financial goals you should consider setting for yourself:
- Increase your savings
- Pay off debt
- Create a budget
- Start investing in stocks or mutual funds
- Cut unnecessary expenses
- Increase your income
- Create an emergency fund
- Plan for retirement
- Save for a big purchase (e.g. a house, car, or vacation)
When it comes to making any financial decisions it’s important to consult with an expert to make sure you’re making the right decisions.
Career Goal Examples
Career goals go hand in hand with financial goals. The better you set yourself up for success in your career, the more money you could make, easing your financial burden.
- Set a weekly goal to stay updated on your industry by watching YouTube videos, reading blog articles, and more.
- If necessary, and possible, pursue additional certifications or degrees that will make you more marketable.
- Set goals to improve your work life balance
- Set a goal to find a mentor or coach who can help you get where you want to go
Conclusion
Setting your own goals personally will really come down to deep, honest self-reflection. You need to figure out the why for each aspect of your life in order to form goals that are tailored to you.
Leave a comment below of some personal goals you set for yourself. We may add it to our list of personal goal examples!