I wonder where the birdies is. So goes the poem I learned as a child…everything according to plan.
We’re nearly through the first quarter of the year. The trees are blooming. The flowers are coming up. How are you coming along with your grand plan? I am sure you did a lot of goal setting at the new year. You might have been goal setting along with me, or you might have generated some resolutions. Either way, here’s your chance to check in and see how it’s going.
1. Do you remember you goals? Did you write them down? Do you remember where you put them? Have you verified that in the cold light of day they make sense?
2. Do you need to clean up some of your goals? Sometimes we set wonky goals, or goals that are a little more of a stretch than we will be able to achieve in the time we set. Or they seemed like good goals when we set them but for some reason we just can’t fathom how we came up with them. Goals can be modified. I don’t advocate just changing them because they’re challenging, but sometimes, you really do generate a stinker or a really unrealistic goal and those should be changed.
3. Are you moving toward those goals? It’s not enough to write down your goals – did you also document how you were going to go about achieving them? Did you make a plan or just a goal? If you didn’t do planning before, now is not too late to begin. Sometimes planning is daunting – it is so much easier to just set a goal. But just setting the goal isn’t really setting a goal at all – it’s more like dreaming. And we know that the path from dream to reality is to make a plan. Break down how you intend to reach your goal into manageable steps – and write them down – you probably have some great ideas, but if they are anything like mine, they’ll be like that movie title – “Gone in 60 Seconds”! They’re great ideas – as long as you remember them – so be sure to write them down.
4. Did you set a path but then you missed a turn? If you did make a plan but you’ve been derailed, its time to evaluate the plan. I used to make completely unrealistic plans. For instance, I once set the goal of finding, learning, arranging, and mastering a tune a week – which totally ignored the fact that I had set other, even more aggressive goals in other parts of my life. It was a plan, but not a very reasonable one. So, sometimes you have to modify the plan. That’s ok.
So, if you haven’t gotten moving on your goals for this year and you’ve determined that the goals were sound, and you’ve identified your path or plan, you should be good – as long as it fits you. If it doesn’t, change it. Goals are your tools – make them work for you!