2021-08-27 - Goals

I’ve been contemplating goals a lot lately. It seems like goals can be both good and bad depending how you set them. They can help you get stuff done while at the same time discouraging you from doing things.

On the positive side, goals are good for making sure you know what to do. Having a plan for your career, hobbies, life etc. If your goals are short term they can provide with options when you are contemplating what to do with your spare time and then make you feel more accomplished when you complete them. If your goals are long term they can give you direction and tell you what to work for.

On the negative side, they can be discouraging if it’s not clear how to accomplish them. If a goal is difficult or requires a lot of luck it can be easy to not even try. They can also make your other accomplishments feel less impressive because they aren’t what you’re supposed to be doing.

It seems like the further out your goals are the more vague they need to be. Don’t set yourself an absolute target far away instead try to set a general direction you want to go in. Figure out a few things that you can do along that path but don’t set up too many things upfront. Complete those tasks, see where you are, figure out where you want to go and make some more tasks.

You may not end up where you originally planned to go but you should at least end up going somewhere.