At the beginning of every year, I sit down myself and start writing my yearly goals. Those goals are the ones that I will be committed to accomplishing during the year and I think that they will guide me to my life purpose or whatever I can call to the things that I dream for in my life.
During my writing process of 2017 goals I have reviewed my 2016 goals and, get ready, I have failed in 80% of them! It’s an enormous failure that has a huge impact on what I want for my life and puts me thinking in the reasons why this happens.
My weekly schedule is based on my monthly goals and my monthly goals were constructed looking at my yearly goals. So if I comply with my weekly goals, I will comply with my monthly goals and therefore with my yearly goals. Not true!
In a simple review, I noticed that I have tried to accomplish more goals during the last 6 months of the year than in the first half of the year. This was not caused by some laziness or lack of grit because in the first half of the year I have introduced tasks to accomplish some of the goals, and I have completed them.
So many goals
During the last 6 months of the year, I have tried to accomplish the majority of the tasks that could lead me to some achievements, but the tasks were always being moved forward to the next week. This was caused by the lack of time that I have to perform all those tasks during the week and believe me, it was a lot of things to do. So reducing the number of goals, or the quantity of work associated with the goals will improve my success rate and perhaps will improve my overall performance due to a more focused daily life.
When I set up my goals, I think in long-term objectives that I wish to accomplish in the future, but some of them could not be a priority for this year or a priority for the near future. They are something that I would like to accomplish one day, but if they are not accomplished now, no problem.
Bad Timing
If we want to accomplish all of our life goals in one year, something is wrong. Or you have a little ambition or you are too ambitious. In my case, some of my 2016 goals are goals that could be moved forward one, two or three years, without any impact, or better, with a minor impact. If you have the opportunity to do it now, do so, but we need to prioritize the goals and allocate the number of goals that you think can be done in a comfortable way.
Placing short-term goals on my yearly goals, was not a good decision. At the end of 2015, when I was looking back to my 2015 goals, I thought “this doesn’t make sense! Some of these goals now are completely obsolete.” When you start the year, the goals may be life objectives, but after some months, if their importance and time range to complete them is low, the probability that they will become obsolete is high.
Only Long-Term Goals
Analyzing the goals that we have failed and ask why is an important exercise to improve for the next year. In my case, I need to quantify the approximate amount of time that I need to accomplish each of my goals. After that, and giving a reasonable amount of time that I have during the year to accomplish them, I need to allocate them by their priorities. I hope that your yearly goals analysis could lead to big improvements for this year.