01 March 2022

Living your life to its fullest means being and believing in yourself to the fullest in all that you do or seek and accomplish.  To get the very things you want in life whether it is material or not comes down to your planning and executing those plans.  Not all plans work out as we wish them to, and so refining our plans to achieve those goals or objectives is then required.  But how do we create the ultimate plan for ourselves in life when it comes to accomplishing anything?  Well, one of the very best ways to get moving on the right foot is to use a system called SMART when getting your goals written down and then executed to achieve your desired outcome.

What Is a Smart Goal?

When making goals, it’s important to learn about the acronym S.M.A.R.T. It can help you make better goals. Each letter stands for a different area of the goal. If you create a smart goal, you have created a goal that is Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Reasonable, and Timely. Using SMART goals can set you up for success in your goal setting.

S – Stands for specific, which means that your goal needs to be spelled out very precisely. Using language that leaves no doubt as to what the goal is, why you want to achieve the goal, and how you will get there is very important. If you are not able to be detailed in your description of the goal, it will be hard to meet it. Take the time to do this part right.  

M – Stands for measurable, which means that you should be able to use this as a metric for which to determine success. If your goal can’t be quantified, then it’s not a full goal and you won’t know how to tell when you’ve succeeded. An example of a measurable goal is something like: “I want to add 100 dollars per week of income to my bank by writing five 500-word articles each week for a magazine.” 

A – There are different things that “a” can stand for but it’s usually actionable, assignable, or achievable. The preference to really get something good done is to make your goal actionable, meaning something where you can do something for each day that will eventually result in an accomplished goal. Goals should also be achievable, or you will only get frustrated. Be accurate about the time it takes to reach a goal, and what actions it takes to get there. Also, know who will be responsible for doing it.

R – This can stand for realistic or relevant, and either or both are important and are true. If you want your goal to succeed, it should most certainly be something that is realistic, or you will fail. It should also be relevant to your life’s vision and match with your values. 

T – Various authors refer to the “T” in the S.M.A.R.T. acronym as time-bound, timely or trackable. All of these t’s are important parts of the goal creating and setting process. If you don’t set a time limit and you can’t track what is happening, your goal will be hard to quantified or show as achieved. 

Create Goals that Work for You

Whichever words you use to help you craft your goals the important thing is that you need to have a process to help you make smart goals. Smart goals are goals that you follow through on achieving and know when you’ve met them.  Goals are attainable by taking one step after another until the desired outcome is reached.  Goals that are not planned out properly from the start using a system such as SMART will ultimately never be accomplished to the level that was wanted.  So, take a little time in going over this system named SMART so that you can make the right choices with the right steps in the right order for yourself.  At the end of the day, we each want to make the SMART choice, not the wrong choice when accomplishing our goals in life.