Remember Those New Year's Goals?

This guy is a goalie and his goal is to keep that ball away so no points are scored by the opposing team. We writers have goals, too. We talk about our goals. We write lists of our goals, especially when we are celebrating the New Year. We occasionally think about our goals.

The question is Do we actively pursue our goals? And What percentage of our goals do we achieve each year?

Did you make a list around the first of January 2018? My post for December 31st of 2010 mentioned making goals instead of resolutions. Read it here.

We all have the best intentions in working toward our goals on a consistent basis. Then Life steps in and we push the thoughts of those goals aside to address things that appear to be more important at the time. I'm not pointing fingers because we all do this, myself included.

Every once in a while, one of the goals I made pops up in my mind and I have to ask myself what have I done to meet that goal. I don't always like the answer. Then, it's pretty easy to push it back into oblivion again.

I copied two paragraphs in the 2010 post mentioned above because I think it is still good advice today. Good for you and for me. This is what I wrote:

You don't need to make a list of 25 goals for this year. Try one or two or even three, but keep the number achievable. Anyone who creates a lengthy list of goals is going to feel overwhelmed before they even begin. Whether the goals are about your personal world or your writing world, you won't want to make the goals so difficult to reach that you feel defeated before you get started. There are many steps in every stairway. Take your goals as you do the steps--one at a time.

When the first of each new month arrives, make a quick assessment of those goals. What did you do the previous month toward each one? Then ask yourself what you would like to do, or need to do, in the new month. It's better to do this monthly than wait until next December 31st and ask yourself if your goal(s) was achieved.

The suggestion that I liked best is to try looking at your list of goals, whether it is an actual list or tucked away in your mind, on a monthly basis instead of once a year.  

Creating goals is great. Achieving them is even better.