Taking Micro Steps for Big Wins
Ever felt overwhelmed by your goals? Excited yes, but overwhelmed at the same time?
Goals play an incredibly important role in getting what we want out of life. But life is busy, and it can be all too easy to lose sight of the end game and get off track - especially for some of those big, long term horizon goals.
So, if you want to give your goals fuel for success, take a moment for this mini read on Micro Goals.
What are Micro Goals?
I want to be financially independent. I want to travel. I want to exercise regularly. I want to read more… We often start out by setting goals, but fall short of getting into the detail, which makes achieving them that much harder. Take ‘I want to be financially independent’ as an example. A great goal – but what does that actually look like and what are the next steps to get there?
Micro Goals are about now. It’s where you break your big goal down into smaller, specific, actionable steps, and prioritise them. And the key there is specific and actionable. Things that you will do this week, next week, the week after and so on – ongoing fuel for focus and motivation.
So, for our example goal - I want to be financially independent – perhaps week one would have a list of Micro Goals like:
- Monday to Wednesday: Spend 30 minutes writing down what financial independence means to me.
- Thursday: Spend one hour researching resources that I might need to help me get there.
- Friday: Spend 30 minutes jotting down a list of steps and actions and start prioritising; create 'my Micro Goal To-Do' list for the next two weeks.
In a nutshell, Micro Goals hone your focus on the now - what you can do and achieve in the present that will get you to your future goal. And as well as moving you forward, Micro Goals are great at keeping you connected to the end goal you’re striving for. Which, when life does what it always does, and gets busy and distracting - can be the difference between a worthwhile goal languishing in the background, or crossing the finish line.
Like to get started?
Sound like a plan and a process you can work with? Here’s a couple of quick tips to get started.
Setting Micro Goals: Don’t over think it, just start writing down anything and everything that comes to mind; the various steps you can think of on the journey to your bigger goal. Then you can start breaking those down and prioritising them into Micro Goals – with dates. And remember, bite-sized, specific and actionable Micro Goals win the day.
Following Through: If you like ticking things off, you’ll likely find that using Micro Goals gives you plenty of motivation to follow through. But regardless, it’s good to get into a habit of reviewing how you’re tracking, and of course, making changes and setting new Micro Goals as you travel towards your endgame.
One final note
Everyone is different – so how you use Micro Goals will be different from the next person. But if there is one thing you take away from this read, we hope it is this: What can I do today to bring me that one bit closer to my goal?
