All of these present problems in different contexts

Specific: This assumes that the picture you currently have of what you want is the thing you actually want. Do you want faster horse, a Model T, or swift reliable transportation of a form you've not yet imagined.

Measurable: If you only value that which has a number, you'll lose sight of what truly matters in life because of the Streetlight Effect[1]. Consider the ridiculousness of the question "What NPS score would your children give you?"

Attainable: There is a limit to the degree to which you can "be sure" of anything, especially without 2020 vision.

Relevant: This requires really knowing what your values are so that you can practice the subtle art of not giving a fuck[2] about other things. Determining those can be hard emotionally-painful work, but in any context it is a good problem you want to have solved.

Time Bound: Sometimes deadlines spur action, sometimes they paralyse or cause you to lose sleep. Sometimes, they are so far off in the future that you don't think about them until it is too late because you thought you could do them. If you're looking at a timescale longer than 6 weeks, consider instead that you might want a CGP-Grey style Theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVGuFdX5guE

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetlight_effect

[2] https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/The-Subtle-Art-of-Not-Giving-a-... Highly recommend this to anyone who spends lots of time thinking about personal goal-setting.

My contrarian take:

1) Write out your goals in the form of a personal letter to yourself. Focus on the things you think are making you unhappy, not what you think will make you happy. Read it out loud in private. After that, hide it away for a while where only you will find it.

2) Keep your goals private. Especially keep progress private. Trying to stop smoking/drinking? Folks will notice, but politely decline to answer that infamous "how long since...?" question. Don't externalize the rewards.

3) Focus on very small results. Find a way to make them stick. Build on that and in time you'll find that amounts to a LOT more progress and personal satisfaction.

IMO build from the ground up and the fancy big goals will come more easily and naturally. You won't have to game it.

I attended training at my work where they changed M to Motivating, and I use that with all of my employees' objectives. One might say that if it's Relevant then it should be motivating, but when I ask them if it's motivating I often get an honest no. I find if the person doesn't like the goal despite it being SMART, then they tend to avoid it.

The other question I learned to ask for Attainable is "do you think there is an 80% chance or better you'll hit your date--if not it's good to dial the goal back.

>> 'I want to spend an hour of time a day with my child' is both specific and measurable.

This is probably not a goal but a system and systems are much preferable to goals. This has been discussed elsewhere and I personally prefer to have systems than goals.

I have still not reached a stage where I can define systems without a goal as a starting point. Even then I let the system make the goal fade into the background and eventually make it invisible/irrelevant.

The key difference is systems eliminate the end stage of a goal and the resulting emptiness after completing a goal.

I don't quite get the advice to come up with a "big hairy audacious goal (BHAG)" for one's self. It's one thing if one already has a personal BHAG, but going through a process to develop one as a personal goal seems almost... backwards to me. I would find it difficult, if not impossible, to come up with something so specific that "sums up" the way I'd like my life to turn out, but maybe that's just my personality.

Christ I hate the word 'overwhelm'. It's SO jarring. It's like when people say "I'm feeling melancholy". NO! You're feeling melancholic! You did something "on purpose" and not "purposely"! And the world is not full of overwhelm. It's full of emotional overload[1] perhaps.

[1] https://www.dailywritingtips.com/overwhelm-is-a-verb-isnt-it...).

CGP Grey has an excellent video on this exact kind of goal setting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO1mTELoj6o

And another on New Year's resolutions more generally: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVGuFdX5guE

Here's the question I struggle with: How do you set "goals" when you don't know what you want? I have been stymied by this time and time again. If you don't know what you want to accomplish, how do you set any "goals"?

Process beats goals.

Don't set a goal of running a marathon or losing x pounds/Kgs but rather run every day x distance and eat / don't eat every day x healthy food / y unhealthy food.

Once a process or habit is in place, you can look at goals and more ambitious processes. Small goals are good to start with and having huge life goals is fine (having a "purpose").

Im not the type of person to worry about, or try to optimize for, productivity, because I think it can turn insidious or unhealthy quickly, but from the little that I _have_ read about goal setting and whatnot, this seems like a great explanation of how to quickly get started implementing a system for personal growth.

Im glad that it wasn’t biased towards specific systems, but rather general concepts which anyone can implement however they like. This feels like non-bullshit content marketing. Well done, doit.

From what I get, this is focussed on SMART, which is good. For goals like the ones that are mentioned in the article ("Workout 3-5 times a week") what I found though, and what did wonders for me, was additionally considering the results of research in habit forming. Especially binding the activity to a trigger instead of a certain date and time was really effective.

The post mentions Accountability Tools. I offer my services as an accountability coach. I’m geared towards helping coding project type goals, but, I’d help with most anything. If folks want help getting their projects across the finish line, I can (personally) help!

https://coding-pal.com/

Most people can set goals, follow through and completion is often where they get stuck. I don't blog, but if I did, "Completing goals for 2021" would be a nice one.

> The act of simply showing up, no matter how you feel or what else you need to do, is hugely powerful. Anthony Trollope was a prolific English novelist who published 47 novels while maintaining a “regular” full-time job. He did this by committing to write 250 words every 15 minutes every single day. He did that every day, without fail, and achieved amazing results.

How the hell does one write 250 words every 15 mins every day while having a job.

Stop setting goals.