What goals should I set for myself?
We all see those posts at the start of the year that tell us we should be setting goals and they should be “SMART”, that is Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timebound ( or even SMARTER if you are going to Evaluate and Review them). I’ve never been very good at setting my goals down, although I certainly have them. One goal I do always try and set for myself is how many books I would like to read in the year ahead. I use Good Reads to record the books I read and I add my goal to the reading challenge each year. I love reading so I usually aim for about 30 books in the year. On the whole, this goal helps me to pick up my book when at times when I might otherwise revert to Netflix instead. It also helps keep me going with more challenging reads.
I find each year that as I get further towards November and December I adjust my reading habits, though and not necessarily in a way I really find productive. This goal of reading 30 books in a year qualifies as a SMART goal. However, for 2022 it is not the best goal I can set for myself because I have realised that it won’t help my make the decisions that will get me where I want to be.
Why isn't this the right goal for me?
In the last few years, I have enjoyed reading the first two books of the Wolf Hall trilogy by Hilary Mantel about the court of Henry VIII as told through the eyes of Thomas Cromwell. I was in the supermarket a few months ago and I came across the third book in the series, The Mirror and the Light. Since I’ve enjoyed the first two books and I have been waiting for the concluding third book to come out, I jumped at the chance to buy it. I made my purchase, brought it home and placed it by my bed in readiness for me to pick up and read. Although I enjoyed the first two books, I didn’t find them an easy read. None of the books are short, the third one has 875 pages and is fairly weighty. It felt like a real investment of time to get started with it so it continued to sit next to my bed without moving for several months!
When I bought the book, we were approaching the end of the year and I realised that although I wanted to read it (I wouldn’t have bought it if I didn’t) if I started to read it at the end of 2021, I wouldn’t achieve the goal that I had set for myself. I am good at being self-accountable and if I tell myself I am going to do something, I am going to do my best to get on and do it. I realised that if I read this book that I had bought for myself, I wouldn’t hit my target of reading 30 books in 2021.
Every time I finished reading a book, I chose to go for a book that I knew I could read more quickly. I’m not saying that I deliberately chose short books but I was definitely avoiding the 875-pager and as time went on I realised I was choosing books that I knew I would be able to read more quickly! The longer I looked at the book next to my bed waiting to be read, the more I realised that my goal wasn’t helping me to achieve what I really wanted it to.
What should I have done instead?
In 2022, I have decided to reduce my reading challenge for 2022 to 20 books. This means I can choose longer or more challenging books to read and even now that I have chosen to pick up The Mirror and The Light, I won’t be feeling that I have to try and rush through it because I have allowed myself breathing space this year. I'm now on page 675 and enjoying the story and the characters. It's well worth reading the series if you are prepared to invest in the time to do so!
Goals are useful and do help us achieve what we want to, however the wrong goal can push us in the wrong direction and so we need to keep making sure we are on the right track.
What would have helped me reach the right results sooner?
I have realised that setting a smaller goal over a shorter timescale would have been a good idea. Deciding to read 2.5 books per month would have given me the space to moderate my book target more quickly. I could have decided there was going to be one or two months when my target was reduced to just 1 book. By breaking a goal into smaller chunks it can seem more achievable and allows us to adjust it quickly if we need to.
Alternatively, I could have counted the 875 pages of The Mirror and the Light as if it was 3 or 4 books. That would have allowed me to maintain my book goal for the year but given me the credit for all that extra reading time.
Obviously, my reading goals are just for fun but it is also worth considering whether our business goals are really driving the right behaviours as well. In 2019, I set myself the goal of writing a new blog post every week. I started my business in 2017 and whilst I had a few clients, I also had some capacity so it seemed like a really good target to set, and I achieved it. My business has moved on now though and I no longer have the time to devote to this level of blogging, continuing to set a target to blog every week is counterproductive and means that I can have lapsed and in recent times have hardly written any blogs at all! A more moderate goal of a single blog post per month seems much more achievable and may get me back to it (watch this space).
I’d love to hear from you whether there any goals that you have set for yourself that are not helping you to achieve what you want. Hit the buttons below to get in touch!
