Goals are extremely important to our sense of well-being. But, not just any goals, research has shown goals with certain characteristics are achieved easier and help make us happy. Here’s the skinny on goal setting for a high completion rate and max benefit.
- Make goals that have personal meaning to you.
- Make goals that align with your beliefs or value structure.
- Goals that focus on helping others bring more satisfaction and higher completion rates than self-serving goals.
- Approach goals are easier to achieve and give more sense of fulfillment than avoidance goals. For instance, I want to meditate every day (approach) is more attainable than I want to cut sugar out of my diet (avoidance).
- Highly abstract goals work well for long range goals but concrete goals work best for short range.
Remember, making progress toward goals brings a higher sense of well-being than achieving the goal. Or as Denzel Washington’s character said in The Equalizer, “Progress not perfection.”
