How to Write Down Your Goals in 3 Easy Steps

You know your goals are big enough when they seem impossible to achieve. When they scare you even when you have them broken down to the simplest steps. That’s the sign of a great goal.

In most cases, time is what makes a goal seem unreachable. Losing weight can take several months of consistent hard work without much in return for most of that time. Businesses can require initial investments which then start you off on a loss, meaning that you’re not racing against time to make money. Even changing as a person will require a lot of painful experiences and confrontations with yourself before you see progress.

You can make that whole journey a lot easier by writing it down before you start.

Why you Need to Write Down your Goals

Once you write your massive goals down on a piece of paper they become “real” because there’s now evidence of them.

Our brains are very protective of us, and that weirdly involves protecting us from the uncomfortable feeling of failure. This is why it feels better to daydream or think about our lifelong goals than actually work towards them. It’s not a fear of hard work itself, in fact in most cases we’re happy to pay the price, but the fear that the sacrifice would have been for nothing.

The benefit of writing down your goals is that they then become a commitment that you’re held accountable to. The simple act of writing it down shows a desire to achieve it and creates the possibility of failure. Even if no one else knows about your goal and you throw the paper away immediately after, you’ll know that you took the first step towards something. If you then don’t work towards the goal, you’ll feel like a failure which should motivate you.

You could write down your goal on a random piece of paper, in a journey, on social media, or even fun a social media account dedicated to achieving the goal. Whatever you choose, the important thing is that your desire to achieve the goal is out there.

Make your Written Goals Clear

You can’t hit a target that you can’t see.

You need to be specific when writing your goals down because you’ll be measuring your progress to them. Remember, you’ll be looking over your written goals for months to come and comparing yourself to where you was when you wrote them. If they’re vague then you might not be able to see progress, or you’ll think that what you’re doing isn’t working. This will cause you to take a new approach which could slow down your progress.

This does require some research beforehand and a basic understanding of the methods or tasks involved in achieving your massive goal. Take the time to research and really understand the steps you’ll need to take to achieve your dreams. Also use this time to think about whether you really want to achieve each goal or not since you’ll now have some idea of the effort required.

Potential Struggles you’ll Face When Wording Your Goals

There are several potential struggles that you might encounter when you try to write down your goals.

The first is trying not to be too specific in case it’s “wrong” or not physically possible. This often happens when you’re trying to set a long term goal but achieve it in the short term. This isn’t impossible, but it requires a watertight plan that doesn’t allow for error (as well as a lot of luck). You won’t know what the best method of achieving your goal is and this will prevent you from choosing a method at all.

To get around this, make sure your goals are set for reasonable timeframes and that you can physically do the work. For example, don’t write down that you’ll spend 3 hours in the gym every night if your schedule doesn’t allow for it. This is why it’s crucial to research your goals before you make any commitments to them so you know what’s required and what you can/can’t do.

The second issue will likely be actually wording your goals as you won’t know what exactly to write. The trick here is to write your goal as if a 6 year old could understand it enough to tell someone else about it. This means using only a couple of sentences and making everything as simple as possible.

For example, write “lose 2 stone by May” instead of “lose 2 stone by May by going to the gym every day. Monday is Arms, Tuesday is Chest etc I will eat x and aim for 1600kcals per day”. All of this extra detail is important but that comes in the next step. In the beginning, aim for bullet points and expand on them in the next section.

Break Down Your Goals

The next step is to break down your goals into monthly, weekly, and daily tasks. This is where the research from earlier comes in.

Start by thinking about what you want to achieve on a monthly basis and how you’ll make that happen. If you start with a year then the goal will seem out of reach so start with a month or even a week if needs be. The key here is to write down a series of actions that you’ll continuously take to get you closer to the goal.

A trick for this is to look at a goal, such as losing weight, and ask yourself “how do I do that?” at each step. Use Google for help here and try to break down each step of the goal so you have a detailed plan for how to achieve it. For example, if you want to lose weight then you might go to the gym. You might then have to find a suitable workout plan that works for you and then you’ll have to learn each exercise etc.

I’s suggest that you have 2 notebooks or pieces of paper for this section as you’ll do a lot of scribbling and thinking. When researching how to do things, you’ll be presenting with several ideas and it’s a great idea to break many of them down but then only go with 1. This is because your original methods might fail or need evolving and it’s easier to keep going if you already have a few back up ideas. Use 1 book for these several methods and then use another notebook as the definitive written plan.

Allow for Trial and Error When Achieving Goals

The truth is that you won’t know the journey unless you’ve done it before. You probably won’t know the pains you’ll experience, the setbacks you’ll face, and what will happen in your life in the coming weeks.

For example, it’s not advised to jog every day if you’re a beginner as you’re going to ache badly, and this will hinder your progress. You might not know this so will aim to run every day for a week and learn the hard way. From this, you can start figuring out your limits and the best weekly routine for you.

This can create problems when it comes to writing down your goals as you might not be able to stick to what you’ve written when in practise. This is just part of the process and is why I recommend having a scribble notebook so you can quickly adjust course if need be. As long as you know the destination, then the path you take doesn’t matter. Think of it like being able to climb a hill from several sides but still ending up at the top.

If you do need to rewrite your goals then make a small journal like note explaining why. Remember, you’re going to be reviewing these notes months down the line and might not remember the specifics of why a method failed. Write down what worked, what didn’t, why you need to change, and what you’re changing to. This should allow you to keep track of changes as well as keep a record of what actually works from each method.

Write Small Personal Notes Next to Your Goals

The ugly truth is that no matter how excited you are to achieve your goals, at some point you will hate working towards them. There will come a point when everything seems pointless, when nothing’s working, and when you want to quit.

Your first idea to overcome this will likely be to read over your written goals with the hopes that they’ll inspire you. You might see the progress you’ve made so far and overcome or remember why you started and keep going. This is where I recommend you write a personal note to yourself as you can reread it and become inspired to keep going through the struggle.

Write a Message From The Future

The first great idea for a note could be a message you’ve written but as if you had already achieved your goal. Studies have shown that writing goals in the past tense, such as “today I went to the gym”, forces us to live up to that commitment. If we don’t do it then we’ll feel like we lied to ourselves which will be demoralising, so we do it.

Think about what your life will look like when you’ve achieved your goals and spend some time thinking about it. Then write down what your life looked like as if you were there. For example, “I am self-employed, with a beautiful partner in a happy relationship, and financially stable”. This will always remind you of where you’re heading and why you’re putting yourself through the struggle.

Whilst not strictly journal related, you could also send yourself an email for the future to achieve a similar result. There are several sites like FutureMe.org that allow you to do this, and you could even use your usual email provider. The only issue is that scheduling an email will also allow you to see it again and make changes if you wanted to.

By sending yourself a future email you know that you’ll be confronted with the possibility of failure which will motivate you. You know that the email is coming, you know that if you don’t achieve what you set out to by then that you’ll feel like a failure, and you’ll do everything that you can to prevent that. 

Write Something Motivational

You are going to be reviewing your written goals several times so writing something motivational is a great way to boost your mood when times are tough.

This could be a motivational quote or something that you say to yourself through hard times. This could be a challenge you’ve previously overcome which will remind you that you’ve achieved greatness before. Whatever it is, the idea is that it will motivate you when you read it.

I would recommend that you don’t write why you’re starting this journey as this isn’t always strong enough to get you through the hard times. For example, if you started your business journey to become financially free, then that won’t be useful to you when your business is losing money. In fact, it’ll make you want to quit even more.

Avoid the standard “you can do it” and common sayings too unless there is a deeper meaning to them. Aim for a quote that resonates with you, such as “hard tasks, easy life”, or a collection of quotes that will help with different aspects of the journey (such as a quote for confidence, facing struggle, failure etc).

You could take this a step further by having a whole page of quotes that you’ve written down that you can hang up on your wall or have nearby you when you’re working.

In Summary

• Writing down your goals will show your desire to achieve them
• Make your written goals clear so even a 6 year old could understand them
• Break down your goals into steps by asking “How do I do that?”
• Write a motivational message next to your goals